Dungeons of Aledorn Interview

Welome back everyone for another interview on RPGWatch. This time we talk with Ladislav Štojdl of Team 21 about his new RPG kickstarter game called Dungeons of Aledorn.

                                            (Kickstarter  Video)

Couchpotato:  Welcome to RPGWatch can you give an introduction of yourself, and Team 21?

Ladislav: Hello there! My name is Ladislav Štojdl. I studied at the Technical University Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, where I successfully graduated two years ago. I’d actually started working on the game whilst still at the school, in parallel with the writing of my thesis!

TEAM 21 is a new and relatively small group of indie developers. We currently have 12 members, most of whom work part-time. In the team you’ll find a game designer, 2 programmers, 4 graphic designers, translator, composer, PR and a few other members. In the field of games where we are basically newcomers, some the experience of our members is invaluable; especially in the area of video and film.

Our office is located in the center of Prague in the Czech Republic, where we have our motion capture studio, which we have used many times to create motions for DoA. Then there’s the editing director‘s room, a soundproof sound booth, sound and video recording studio with green screen and much more. Who wants to know more, I recommend that you find one of the older FlashNews on our site "Focused on Team 21" from 26.11. 2014, this’ll give you an introduction to our studio.

Couchpotato: What are your favourite RPG games you play in your spare time?

Ladislav: RPGs?  Ive played and finished really quite a lot. If I have to pick just a few, it will definitely be Fallout, Dungeon Master and Might & Magic. I also really enjoyed the MMORPG Lineage II which took off my few years of life.  In recent years I really enjoyed Legends of Grimrock and Blackguards.

Couchpotato: A question I always love to ask developers in every interview I do on the website is what is your opinion on the game industry of today, and modern RPGs?

Ladislav: Well to be honest with just a few exceptions, modern AAA RPG have not spoke to me at all. If we talk specifically for example playing Skyrim felt tiresome.  Although I played the game for tens of hours it just started to be boring. The same problem I had with the Dragons Age. What I am really looking forward is the Divinity: Original Sin, which I am planning to finish the game with my friend.

For smaller projects such as Legends of Grimrock or Blackguards, I found them to be quite fun and I enjoyed the game. Although with Blackguards I found areas where I would have done and it should have been done differently. Despite this, I enjoyed the game. Overall I think that the big game projects are adapting to the massive crowds and that is the reason why there is not enough fun for me or for other hardcore gamers.

Couchpotato: Can you give a brief description of your new RPG game Dungeons of Aledorn, and talk about what inspired you make the game?

Ladislav:  This will be very difficult to put concisely. Dungeons of Aledorn is a hard -core RPG / dungeon crawler, in which can be considered the spiritual successor to the old-school dungeon crawler. It uses the old and proven principles with enriches them with new modern elements. It combines first-person exploration and tactical combat tension. The entire game puts great emphasis on the reality of the game and the resulting possibilities which is place in the players’ hands.

DoA was inspired by several older dungeon crawlers ( Shadow over Riva and Betrayal at Krondor ) and board games RPG ( D & D and DrD ). The final impetus that I needed to start the development of the game was the success of the  Legends of Grimrock , who confirmed to me that the " hunger" for similar games existed.

Couchpotato: What makes your game stand out from all the other RPG games nowadays?

Ladislav:  I think predominantly, it’s the focus on Hard-Core players. Great opportunities equipping, great complexity of character development and possible action in the game makes the game very difficult for the inexperienced players. A system that an AAA game title cannot afford, its risk is too great. We also have several elements that are to our game unique, e.g. the transition between exploring mode into the combat environments use accurately model an environment where a conflict has occurred, rather than pre-defined battlegrounds, such as what’s used in the game King's Bounty, and Heroes of Might and Magic.

Couchpotato: How long will the campaign be, and will it have different Endings?

Ladislav:  The length of the game we plan something around 50 hours at 90% of side quests completed and the main story arc. If a player goes only towards the main storyline, then the game will be dramatically shorter. Different endings we do not plan, but as a very high stretch goal we have the opportunity to play as Orcs, which means to play for the other side against the human ‘heroes’.

Couchpotato: Lets talk about the games combat as your kickstarter page says it will turn-based. Can you give a short example to our readers on how it work in the game?

Ladislav:  OK, so if you walk around the map you come up to an area of thick forest.  The location will load up and you start exploring the site. In the distance you can see that a few wolves are chasing their tails. And now you choose to move a bit closer, your agro meter starts to rise and wolves shift their focus on you. From the beginning they will turn in your direction and, when you get closer they’re potentially going to start running in your direction. In the moment when agro meter is filled completely, the game switches the modes. If you begin to recede the agro indicator will slowly go empty and the chance of a battle is greatly reduced.

Also, there is an option that will allow the player click on a button and, if there is an enemy nearby, it will switch to battle mode.

If the battle begins, the game uses the exact same environment where you were standing and cover immediate surroundings with hexagonal map. The fight begins according to mechanics by initiative dice roll.

Couchpotato: Will the game have the standard character customization options, stats, and abilities offered in most modern RPGs nowadays?

Ladislav:  In this we are very close to the board RPG games. However, this is what are the updates come in and will cover, you’ll find these on our Kickstarter and web site; please wait on this. I will reveal only what is written in there. We have available 7 races and 6 professions.

                           (Download the Demo from the following link.)

One problem with a lot of RPGs is the inventory system. I was wondering if of you could share a few details on how it will function in Dungeons of Aledorn?

Ladislav:  Inventory is one of the most complex parts of our game. There will be something around 30 slots for items. Lots of slots will have an ability to add additional slots that will save Action Points (AP ) in the battles. One example for all is say that in your left hand you will put a magic bracelet increasing resistance against fire by 10 % on the right side you will place a bracelet - case for daggers. This case will create two more slots for throwing knives.

Let say the combat begins and your character has two knives in a bracelet case, one under his belt and 4 in a backpack. If we want to pull the dagger from his belt, it will use 2 AP but only one AP from the case and the bag. It would have to be calculated depending on situation. Removing backpack and put it on the ground 5 AP get on the knees to reach backpack 2 AP, finding the knife in the backpack 3 AP , a rise and stand up to get ready for fight 2 AP. So, in total, 12 AP. The advantage of this "bracelet case" is therefore straight forward.

Couchpotato: What about quests in your game as you mention they will be complex. Please tell me the game wont have to many fetch quests, and other filler quests?

Ladislav: I really don’t really want to spoil the quests but I'll try to reveal something. For example, one quest there is a farmer that has lost sheep. You, as a player, have got several options how to solve it. You can go to try to track down and reveal the source, or wait for the night, hiding in the shadows for the sheep thief, or to ask whether anyone was seen. 2 paths will lead you to the source, waiting will bring the source to you. But again, the question of whether it comes directly to the source, or the underlings, whether you kill them or run away and then the quest starts to develop. In a similar spirit are made most major quests in the game. Not to mention the other parts when you find the source and you have to figure out how to deal with it. It's about giving players the possibility to solve quests with different tactics than "Go here and kill that."

Furthermore, in the game will be quests that will have more than one end and closing the quest with different way will then trigger of a variety of special situations that impact on the future for players of the game.

Couchpotato:  I noticed you are using the Unity engine, and was wondering what your opinion on the game engine? Also do you plan to switch to Unity version five at a later date?

Ladislav:  This is a question more suited to our programmer rather than for me. I can only say that the Unity engine is slightly weaker than its rivals, Unreal or CryENGINE, but by the time we started the project Unity was the only one available for free. Plus two of my colleagues already knew the engine, well enough to start programming. So it was an obvious choice. Now I can say that Unity 4 has a bit of a difficulty with lights, however Unity 5 should solve this issue.  We will be transitioning from Unity 4 to Unity 5 after the KS campaign.  This will allow for more complex shaders, lights and textures and really will help us make Aledorn as beautiful as it looks in our minds!

Couchpotato:  From what  I understand  this is your first game for Team 21. So why did you decide to use kickstarter to fund the game, and not seek other funding?

Ladislav:  Well, we have been working almost two years as Team 21 and would like to make a game to a level of quality that would  not only suit us but also our players. Unfortunately, time and resources that we have available are limited, so we'd like to do this to form of " a little space for the development of DoA ". At the moment everyone in the team have to do all other various activities in order to exist.

Couchpotato:  On the topic of kickstater whats your opinion on the funding model, and the recent trend of negativity on the internet?

Ladislav: To me it comes in very reasonable. Players can directly pay for games that suit them and that they want to play. It also means that they are in a greater and more direct for of communication with the developers and thus the game itself is then closer to players which is targeted for. The problem is in the fact, that like everything in life, that everyone can misuse or abuse Kickstarter to exploit it and every such deed makes it more difficult for the genuine developers of games and products to win the trust of the backers and coverage in media.

Couchpotato:  Will your funding goal of $60,000 be enough to cover all the costs of development?

Ladislav: Yes, the lowest target will allow for us to finish the game at a bare bones level. The majority of the team are actually working on the project part time and the money would allow us to afford the opportunity to pour in more of our time. And would also, more or less, allow us to contract more freelancers. The previous two years we have financed all freelancers from our own resources, and the budget we ask for is wage for these freelancers (dubbing, graphical assets etc...) and for the studio.  Please remember that wages in the Czech Republic are far less than in UK or USA. The tasks that we need to finish, before the game is done, are in majority of cases certain jobs of which does not generate continuous work for the contractors. What i am trying to say, is that we do not need to pay people on monthly basis and spend a lot of money on employees. All members of the team are paid task by task on the contract and that is making all game cheaper than you think.

Couchpotato: You are offering a physical boxed version, and I was curious it you have a plan for delays, as other developers have problems with delivering physical editions?

Ladislav: At the moment we do not see the problem. The physical edition was already discussed with an unnamed company which is specialized in CD and DVD production, so we do not consider this as a problem.

Couchpotato:  Now for most important question of the interview, and thay is why should gamers be interested in Dungeons of Aledorn? Make it as short or long as you want.

Ladislav:  This is an easy to answer question. It’s because we're doing something else, a genre of a game that hasn’t been available and done well for many years and that the market is clearly missing it. Similar hard-core dungeon crawlers are seen only rarely. For me it the last game of the genre was Legends of Grimrock. Players who like dungeon crawlers simply don’t have anything to play  and we hope that DoA is something that they really can sink their teeth into and spend hour upon hour battling, looting dungeons and freeing the people of the Orcs’ tyranny!

Couchpotato: Thank you for your time. Do you have anything you would like to add?

Ladislav: I would like to thank in advance to all those who support us and share. I just want to say that we appreciate each person what will help us to realize our game Dungeons of Aledorn.

Don't forget to help back the kickstarter if my interview made you interested. You can also check out the developers website , and blog for more information.