Vagrus - The Riven Realms is a game rich in storylines and quests, and most of these appear in the form of what we call Events: text based interactions where your choices guide the story. There are a lot (and I mean a LOT) of these Events and due to their nature, writing for the game involves quite complex scripting and a non-linear narrative design angle. But what does this mean in practice and what does it involve?

Time to talk about the Journal. Even though I don't think most gamers are super-excited about the details of in-game journals or quest logs, it is still extremely important to get them right in a game as complex and as full of storylines, tasks, quests, and objectives as Vagrus, and gamers do appreciate quest logs that work well and aid them when they need information.

Time for another project update! Seventy-seven days have passed by and even though it was summer - supposedly calmer times - it felt pretty frantic. In the good sense.

A huge Thank You! and wishing all the best to Marci

As your might remember, our previous post started with the news of Marci joining the team to complete his summer internship with us for his degree in software development. Marci has been instrumental to the progress we made on the Codex & Journal functionality and UI, as well as to catching up on our design documents. Now that he has returned to his studies, we wish him all the very best for his goal of finishing his Bachelor's degree. We're pleased to see that he is on the right track to become a great game developer!

It's spring 1990 and I'm in elementary school. My best friend brings a book to school that he reads aloud to a small group of us during our big walks at lunch break. The book has a weird old wizard on the cover conjuring smoke from a crystal ball. More interesting are the illustrations on the inside: intricate black and white drawings of strange fantasy creatures and dungeon locations. The little book is Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson's Warlock of Firetop Mountain, translated to our native language. Most of you probably know that it's a gamebook that you do not read from start to end but in branching numbered chapters that make the story personal and add replayability. Yet they are much more than simple choose-your-own-adventure books because they include a stat and combat system you have to manage throughout the adventure - albeit a really simple one.

Another character who plays a very important role in the Prologue, Javek is a young sorcerer who uses telepathic abilities. He is of Tarkian origin and because the Imperial province of Tark is based on early Persian and Turkish cultures from real life, Szonja designed Javek's appearance to match those in clothing and equipment.

Calm and easy-going, Javek's ability to pick up surface thoughts and glean motives can be very useful. He is also skilled at handling animals and beasts of burden. That skill is enhanced by his telepathic ability which works even better on animals. Does that remind you of someone? Hmmm. It makes you wonder, doesn't it? :)

It's time to share some combat images for the character 'Slinger' (more on him here: https://vagrus.com/news/character-artwork-slinger ).

It is finally time to look at the stats and systems related to the vagrus, that is, YOU, the player's character in the game (aka Leader). You can interact with the Leader UI screen (opened by clicking the leader's medallion in the bottom left) in order to manage said stats and improve your character.

This week's character reveal is the Orc Marauder. Orcs are popular fantasy characters with many different iterations since their addition to fiction by Tolkien. The Orcs of the Riven Realms are creatures prone to violence, sharing a mystical past and origin but they were created fairly recently. They are tribal in their homeland called Darkmoor but rarely travel in groups when far from it.

More character poses! This time for the good old Brigand - the very first character Szonja designed for the game!

The first image (top) is for Hamstring, an ability which immobilizes the target. The second (bottom left) is for Fend Off, an overwatch-type combat skill where the Brigand targets an empty space on the battlefield. It's bad news for an enemy if they move onto it. The third one (bottom right) is the Brigand's block/defense pose. The brigand is a very versatile support/defensive character for the outlaw roster, able to block spaces and defend other combatants, making him quite a pesky enemy.

This week's character artwork and reveal is that of a fairly common enemy: the Bruiser; created by Szonja. These folks are on the 'wasteland outlaws' roster and represent the muscle of the group. Bruiser abilities include a bull rush (that pushes opponents away), a blunt attack (that stuns the target), and a cheap shot (that puts a savage debuff on the target).