Ralin: Dwarf Wars Interview

Welcome back everyone for another interview on RPGWatch as we had the chance to talk with Christian Biever who is the Developer, and Programmer for Ralin - Dwarf Wars.

Ralin is a community driven Rogue-like Hack and Slash RPG wrapped in high quality graphics with a lot of love for detail

Couchpotato: Welcome to start the interview tell us a little bit about yourself & Ogardonix Ltd?

Christian: My Name is Christian Biever and I am the Head of Development and programmer of Ralin - Dwarf Wars.I am working as a programmer for more than 10 years and I am a big fan ofRPG games.I also love to help other developers and to do game jams.

Ogardonix Studios ltd, established in 2014, is a creative game developmentstudio,based in the heart of London. Ogardonix Studios are dedicated to making apositive,lasting impact on the video game industry through quality, immersive games.

We empower the Community by creating an interactive world, in which they can dive in and feel comfy.Ogardonix staff are gamers that follow their passion and vocation.

Couchpotato:  What are you favorite games you guys play when your not busy working wotkng on your new game, and relaxing at home?

Christian: We are playing a lot of Blizzard titles like World of Warcraft, Diablo and Heartstone. But also other MMOs and RPG games. It depends of how much time we have to play. Sometime we are also playing survival or FPS games. It's fun to play different styles of games.

Couchpotato: So how how far along is the games development and can you talk about being an Indie developer in today's gaming industry?

Christian: We are now developing the title Ralin-Dwarf Wars for a year an we are atmore than 20% of the game.In terms of programming we are a bit further, but to provide good content we have toget a lot of 3D stuff done. This is unfortuntately also one of the reasons why we are on Kickstarter:
We need to raise money, because we have to pay our Freelancer. We wont release a game that is not polished and we don't want to have any lacks in terms of community communication.

Beeing a Indie developer is very hard sometimes. You have to check everything twice and need to worry about money to provide a good quality. Ralin took me over 35.000 US Dollar just to release the prototype. It's the same as beeing an entrepreneur and I think you have to be one. You have to find a way to not freak out and to find a balance. But I have to agree that it is also a lot of fun and you will meet a lot of open minded people with great ideas.

Couchpotato: Another question many developers will tell you I love to ask is what is your opinion on modern day RPGs? It can be a tough question t answer so take your time.

Christian: I am trying a lot of other RPGs to destress and to see what they did. The most of the RPGs are just doing the same. There are no innovations some times. That's why I love Dragon Age: Original Sin. A brillant game and they did it without having a publisher.

The crafting system is a huge inspiration for me. Other RPG's are going more the way of balancing the skill trees and they are trying to bring a good player vs. player system into there game. I think that at this time every player can find something on the market that sounds promising for him.

Couchpotato: Moving on can you tell us about your new Rogue-like Hack and Slash RPG game, and what separates it from other game on the market today?

Christian: Ogardonix is a small Indie Studio with a very big Project and a high sens of self critizism. Being very Community driven, we give a lot of attention to the people out there and listen carefully to their needs. We reach to satsfy the requirements they have in games.

Plus we are aiming the niche of the Nintendo Wii U which currently doesn´t have a game in this style to give to their Community. Since Ogardonix is approved developer of Nintendo Wii U we can offer a Hack and slash RPG with high quality graphics with lots of charming details. Ralin emerged in a fantasy world with their Favourite Characters such as Dwarfs and Goblins, and there are more to come.

Couchpotato: From what I underatand  from the Alpha version you can play the game solo, or offline on a server. Can you elaborate on how that will work?

Christian: Right now the downloaded version is a Singleplayer and a Multiplayer as separated software. We are also releasing an updated version including the Multiplayer modus in the main game. As a snack for our indie Community you can also download a free server software.

No need to go online to play, just install the server on a linux machine and start playing with your friends. The server software is open source. We will go public with this software on github.

Couchpotato: Lets talk about combat and game difficulty. Since this is a Rogue-like I expect we will die very easily, and be challenged to win each battle?

Christian: Drinking Beer makes our hero Dwarf Stronger and blowing the horn too, with the right technique it is no huge problem to stay alive during the fight against the nasty goblins.

We will definitely integrate a Hard Core mode for those players who need the extra challenge. But as hard Core can take many attempts before actually reaching the credits, which can be very frustrating, we want to cover the casual gamerstoo.

So there will be a choice of modi so that everyone has fun and is challenged.

Couchpotato:  On the topic of combat can you share how the battle system will work, and will it be turn-based or more action based?

Christian: The combat system is not really related to other action RPGs like Diablo. First you can choose how you want to play. If you want to play with the mouse and click on the ground, you can do that. But you can also choose the Keyboard to move or you can switch to a controller.

We as developers we have to balance every system behind to garantee a great experience. We are working on a very action related combat system, so there will be no round based attacks. We are also implementing blocking, vanishing, hiding and a lot of other defensive skills.

Couchpotato:  Lets talk about the kickstarter for Ralin: Dwarf Wars now. Why did you decide to use crowd-funding, and will £45,000 be enough for development?

Christian: Kickstarter is an awesome Marketing Campain that gives us more visibility and to genereate real clients interested in our Game.

Well it is always difficult to set an amount of money needed. If you aim too high the risk exist that you don´t get funded at all. By backing this project, our Production Budget will be increased and we can finish developing the game.

We will definitely continue toraise funds after Kickstarter in order to integrate these awesome features that are still on our to do list for Ralin.

Couchpotato:  If the game fails to get funded on Kickstarter do you have a back up plan in place, or will you just relaunch the game again?

Christian: Sure we have put a lot of thought in a Back up Plan. We will definitely go Steam early access, as we have been Greenlite within 5 Days in January. We already have build up a Steam Community. We will continue working on Ralin - Dwarf Wars. With the experience that we gained within this time, on a later time we will definitely relaunch the Game on Kickstarter again.

It is our first game that we launch in Kickstarter, there is certainly one or the other marketing strategy that we can develop and improve to spread the word in a better way. I really think the biggest challenge as a newbie in the Game industry is to grow a community and to spread the word.

We will definitely rearch out to investors who see the huge potential that it has.

Couchpotato: Whats your opinion of crowd-funding? Do you see you see it as a good option for small indie developers to continue to use for funding despite it being harder to get funded.

Christian: Crowd-funding on kickstarter minimizes the fundraising process and allows you to spend more time on the business. Kickstarer opens many oportunities but it is an exciting time because it is all or nothing. There are other platforms like indiegogo that are eventually also a good option for raising a lower amount of money, and suits eventually better for smaller projects.

The problem is to get people to trust in you and believe that you will finish the game and put all your love and efforts in it. Which we totally do. With the people that shook this trust by running away with the bakers money I think the Crowdfunding in getting harder.

Couchpotato:  Now for the most important question, and that is why should gamers back your game? As this will be the last questions I wish you guys luck getting funded in Kickstarter.

Christian: We are gamers who want to craft unforgettable experiences for our players. We deliver high quality Graphics and awesome gameplay,and we are in constant contact with our Community. We are listening to their Ideas and improvements. High quality graphics with lots of charming details are one of the many things that make our game unique.The Community driven Story will further improve the athmosphere and richness of the Universe.

As usual if my interview made you interested  you can help fund the game on Kickstarter. If you still need more information visit the developers webpage, and ModDB webpage.