Factsheet

Developer:
Psychic Software
Based in Galway, Ireland

Release date:
TBA

Platforms:
Steam

Website:
psychicsoftware.com/thenecromancer

Regular Price:

USD$24.99

Description

The Necromancer's Tale is a classic top-down RPG where you play the role of a minor noble in the 1730s, drawn into the Dark Necromantic Arts as you uncover a complex multi-generational intrigue. The game focuses on conversation, narrative and ritual more than on combat. Yes, there are battles, however fighting on its own will not be a route to success. Choose your words wisely, because the characters you meet are already suspicious of the weird events in the town.

History

Sam had been knocking around with the basic idea of the player as a necromancer in a medieval town for a while – perhaps with a similar motivation to that behind our 2015/2016 game Goblins & Grottos – i.e. to focus on the player experience as an outsider, a character that is normally the enemy and normally a non-player character. However, we realised its potential as a narrative game when considering a funding application to the EU Creative Media fund. Sam and Kirsty wrote the draft story and ideas in 2018, and were successfully co-funded in 2019. A number of writers and artists have been working with us since late 2019.

Features

  • Classic top-down RPG.
  • Stongly driven by narrative and conversation.
  • Turn-based combat.
  • Eeriness: Confusing dreams, strange distant lights through the trees, spooky voices whispering your name, a loosening grip on reality - the game focuses on the unsettling experience of becoming a necromancer and transcending mortality, whatever that may mean...
  • Themes of death, change, morality, and a gradually eroding sense of time and place.
  • Deep focus on magic and ritual: which are not treated like guns, that you acquire and then use without a second thought. The process of gathering/manufacturing materials and knowledge and then the process of putting them into action is non-trivial and is a focus of the game.

Funding

  • Part-funded by the Creative Media Europe MEDIA fund.
  • Interested in talking with investors or publishers.

Videos

The Necromancer's Tale Pre-Alpha Footage YouTube


Images

download all screenshots & photos as .zip (17MB)
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Awards & Recognition

  • "Co-Funded by the EU Creative Media fund" Brussels, Sept 2019


About Psychic Software

Boilerplate
Psychic Software is Sam Redfern and various collaborators, and has been making indie games since the mid-1990s, ranging from a turn-based postapocalyptic MMO of vehicular combat (which has been running online since Jan 2006) to Amiga wargames, to casual iPhone games, and lots of other things in between! As a university academic (with a PhD in computer science), Sam has also published some interesting articles on games A.I. for combat and racing games.

More information
More information on Psychic Software, our logo & relevant media are available here.


The Necromancer's Tale Credits

Sam Redfern
Programming, Game Design, Level Design, Narrative Lead.

Dave McCabe
Narrative, Game Design.

Askhat Mizambekov
Art Lead.

Kirsty Halloran, Damir Omic, Zachary Pope
Narrative.


presskit() by Rami Ismail (Vlambeer) - also thanks to these fine folks