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About This Game

Under a Rock is a procedural open-world survival craft game for 1-10+ players, and is being developed for Windows, Linux, Playstation 5 and Xbox Series X. Explore a primitive but dangerous place with a different evolutionary path; here, wildlife is oversized, Neanderthals still exist, and curses are real.

We are currently in pre-alpha and share regular updates, as they happen, on our Discord. Hope to see you there!

SETTING

You are an early nineteenth century explorer who has just arrived - or crash-landed is probably a more precise term as your hot air balloon was ripped to pieces by a supernatural storm - in a world lost to history, a hidden world that few can travel to (and from!), a primitive but dangerous place with a different evolutionary path.

MISSION

The underlying mission is to find out what happened to a previous expedition, lift a curse that lies over the land, and discover a way to escape back home through the supernatural storm with as much treasure, artifacts and native wildlife as you can possibly collect to increase your standing with the Society of Explorers. Apart from this, just have fun exploring, crafting, building, fighting, taming, hunting, surviving, and more.

PROCEDURAL WORLDS

When you start a new game, a procedural world that is unique to you is created. Each world measures about 64km2 and includes caves and underwater areas to explore. Waterbodies, like lakes and ponds, are not limited to ocean level and can be found at any elevation.


Each world has a seed number that can be shared, and your avatar is not locked to one specific world. You may freely travel between worlds with all of your stats and gear intact.

ADVANCED AI

We want to make Under a Rock more interesting by having dynamic AI and are currently developing an AI engine for this purpose. It allows AI to remember and respond to your actions and the actions of other AI, compete for territory and resources, even construct new bases and defenses. Don’t be surprised if a neighboring clan of Neanderthals stage a raid on your base just because you smell wrong, or a pack of dodos take a liking to you. Different AI factions can grow closer to each other or grow apart as time goes by. Nothing is set in stone and a fresh game with a new world is likely to throw a few surprises.

NUMBER OF PLAYERS

1-10 players in co-op, but we plan on allowing an experimental mode where the host can set a higher player count. It will require the host to have beefy hardware and a hefty internet connection.

PROCEDURAL CAVES

They come in all shapes and sizes, from small to gargantuan, with the latter being a whole biome by itself. Creatures inhabit them, and they rarely like to share the space, or the precious resources found within. Kick them out, claim the space and build your base within, there are no limits. Caves are seamlessly integrated into the landscape, no loading screens.

BASE BUILDING

There are two build modes that can be switched between seamlessly.

• Default mode, for placing solid constructions directly if you have the necessary resources.
  
• Advanced mode, that allows you to plan and prioritize your base construction and for your friends to help build it by inputting the necessary resources. We call this Ghost Building.

OH NO, AAARGH! BASE GOT DESTROYED
Spent hours, days, weeks or even months on building an amazing looking base? Cannot stand the thought of doing all the nitty gritty details again? This is where ghost building truly shines.

Activate the auto-saved blueprint of your base or a manually saved version. Any destroyed base elements, from the largest to the smallest, will show up as ghost elements. All you need to do now is input the necessary resources. Since this is ghost building, any friendlies can also help with speeding up the reconstruction process.

SHARED BLUEPRINTS
We plan on eventually making it so that construction blueprints can be saved for later use and also be shared with other players. You cannot pack down your base and unpack it later, but you will be able to make blueprints and reuse these at other locations as part of the ghost building system. Use them to quickly establish a campsite, a small outpost, or even a large base provided there is ample space available for placement.

FREEDOM
There will be very few rules limiting how and where to build. On the ground, in the trees, inside of caves, even under water. We won't stop you, although the wildlife might try to.

HOW ABOUT PVP?

The host will be able to set rules for the server. PvP on/off will be available.

HOSTING A MULTIPLAYER GAME

There are several ways. You can host a game directly from your own computer, setup your own dedicated server or by renting a game server in the cloud from one of our partners. Games can be either public or private, and cross-platform will be supported.

WHEN IS EARLY ACCESS?

It’s a little hard to say. We have finished most of the technology requirements for the procedural generation of the world and for the multiplayer backend. Now we are populating it with visuals and gameplay, and as soon as we feel we have enough content for early access and a stable game that runs well, we will open up. Prior to this, if time permits, we really want to invite as many of you as possible to a period of alpha testing.

WHO ARE NORDIC TROLLS?

We are a small indie game studio, consisting of only five people filling all the necessary roles for making Under a Rock. Being so few keeps us very busy. If we are sometimes slow in answering, this is why.

HOW LONG HAS UNDER A ROCK BEEN IN DEVELOPMENT?

Full production started on October 8th, 2021. Prior to this we spent a few months thinking shit up and playing around with the idea of doing a procedural world.

WHICH GAME ENGINE ARE YOU USING?

Under a Rock is powered by Unreal Engine 5. We are taking full advantage of nanite and lumen, and especially nanite makes it possible to have a procedural open world with amazing view distance and detail.

DO YOU HAVE A FAQ?

Yes, check out the FAQ on our Discord.