5. LORE DEEP DIVE
In this post:
Brief reflection of progress to date
Digging into a mountain of fables
Bringing realism and immersion to the game
What’s next
60 Days In
All systems go. Discord, Slack, Trello, Confluence, and Outlook now buzz around the clock with a team of 10 all coordinating across two continents. My eyes never lose sight of the long-term goal of launch – despite the years of development time that will be needed to properly get there. And the milestones are clear:
Test Rooms
Gray Box Prototype
Beautiful Corner
Vertical Slice
Horizontal Slice
Alpha
Beta
Ship/Patches
DLC
We’re somewhere around step 2 with a dash of 3 mixed in right now and momentum is on our side. The team excitement is palpable. You can feel it in the collaboration and see the dedication in the progress work they share each day. Right now, all roads lead to GDC to pitch and secure the funding we need to bring this vision to life. We have done a lot in just a short period of time, but still too soon to release to the public. It takes quite a bit of self control to not share all the amazing work that’s been done to date… but that will all come in due time. Better to remain under the radar for now until more anchors are cast in our progress.
Required Reading
Somehow on top of the 800 other things going on I’ve still found time to dive into $350 worth of fable, folklore, and fairytale books each night.
The stories are fascinating. Very few follow any sort of narrative structure. They’re simply designed to entertain. Some are delightful – like Thumbelina, for instance, where she is taken on completely random adventures meeting all sorts of animals on her journey before finding and marrying a fairy prince and getting wings of her own – while others are terrifying – like The Robber Bridegroom, where a woman is quite literally raped and torn to pieces in the basement of a scary house in the woods by multiple horrific characters (they are all brought to justice in the end and lose their own lives in the process, for what it’s worth). Some are tragically sad – like the Brave Tin Soldier that falls in love with a toy ballerina and gets swept away on a great journey to finally return to his origin and be reunited with his love… until the child casually throws both of them into a fireplace where they melt into ash with only a small heart remaining between the two – and many more are just truly bizarre – like The Bremen Town Musicians that involves an old donkey, hound, cat, and rooster that each run away from home before their masters put them down from old age in order to go to Bremen and start a band together. Crazy.
None of these tales are told in great detail, and only a few of them have clear morals or purpose. And therein lies the charm of it all... They’re stories. Simple as that. Told and retold to pass the time and entertain others for thousands of years.
Many of them have several versions. For instance, Grimm’s version of Cinderella (published in 1812) does not involve a fairy godmother. Instead, Cinderella prays at her mother’s grave and two birds give her the gown and slippers she wears to court the prince over three separate nights. It’s also way darker than anyone remembers…one of her wicked stepsisters in Grimm’s version literally cuts off her toes to get her foot to fit into the slipper, and the other cuts off her heel. He actually believes they’re the right girl until one of the birds tells him to check out the blood in the shoe each time – no joke. Meanwhile, Perrault’s version of Cinderella that came over 100 years earlier (published in 1612) does include the fairy godmother and the more traditional telling of the story that most remember. It all truly is fascinating.
Perhaps the most fun has been deciding which characters and tales to include in this game and how to weave them together into a gripping, grounded narrative. For every inclusion it begs the question: Which fables have occurred in the past? Which occur as Red happens upon their characters? And which have yet to occur altogether? It’s a very cool experience to craft this world and its inhabitants into something cohesive and captivating.
Beyond the Fables: Realism & Immersion
Getting back to the game now, I knew from the beginning that our protagonist, Red, was going to primarily use a bow, arrow and knife as her core weapons in the game. And let me tell you, it has been an amazing ride to dive into every aspect of archery to learn and understand the history of it. Especially in the time period our game takes place (14th century). I’ve quite literally watched hours of videos of how medieval arrows were created and repaired; the differences between longbows and recurve shortbows; the anatomy of arrows (nocks, fletchings, shafts and points); the different types of arrowheads and what they were used for (like broad heads for hunting and bodkins for piercing armor). I’ve dug into the most common tropes that movies and video games get wrong about archery (for instance, the bow itself bends when you draw it, not the string) and matched our designs to things that could plausibly be created in that era – while still giving it originality and charm. We’ve calculated Red’s draw length (62 cm), her optimal bow size and style (124 cm recurve short bow), her grip (3-finger Mediterranean) and which side she rests her arrow on (thumb)… and that’s not even mentioning all the research into quivers and nocking speed for animation. For the gameplay itself, we’ve properly calculated the physics, speed, and trajectory of arrows in flight as well as how long it would take our character to draw a 50 pound bow and hold it at full draw (about 3-4 seconds before losing stability, most likely), and included the archer’s paradox of how arrows bend and twist in the air while speeding toward their target.
It’s been truly delightful to learn and put all of this into the game as accurately as we can. Not to mention that I’m also now pretty much going to have to get into archery myself after all this.
What’s Next for March?
GDC is March 18-22 so I will be up there to connect with publishers to sell the vision and passion behind this title with hopes of securing the funding needed to bring it to life properly. The team asks me constantly what is needed by then (now less than 3 weeks away) and my answer is always the same: As much as we can get done that doesn’t sacrifice our thoughtfulness and the care we’re putting into it.
This is not a race to fake something or pretend we’re farther than we are. I believe we’re farther than almost any first time game developer starting from literal scratch on Jan 1 to now, 60 days later. Wherever we are, will be fine, and our progress will be proudly shared along with a tightly rehearsed (and extremely thoughtful) pitch presentation.
One thing is certain to me now – the core description of the game: “Horizon Zero Dawn meets Grimm’s Fairy Tales” sums the game up instantly. People get it. They really like it. They see the potential of it. And they believe I can, and will, build it. Let’s go.