Watch here on Wednesday, June 17th 2020 at 17:00 CET!

Ever wanted to become the President? Discover Suzerain next Wednesday by joining Ata, our Game Producer and Ilke our Game Designer on our Steam page, to watch them play through post-Demo content! This will be a good opportunity to engage with other fans and the developers in chat.

As President Rayne, lead Sordland into ruin or repair during your first term in this text-based role-playing game. Navigate a political drama driven by conversations with your cabinet members and other significant figures. Beware or embrace corruption; shirk or uphold ideals. How will you lead?

Warning: Content contains some spoilers

Also, we are doing a Q&A with our Game Designer and Writer on our Discord Channel from 9:00pm - 10:00pm Central European Time, on Friday June 19th for the Steam Games Festival.

• Join the Suzerain Discord server
  
• Wishlist us on Steam
  
• Follow us on Twitter
  
• Like us on Facebook

Welcome back to another monthly report! We are heading full steam ahead into June with dozens of developments in Suzerain.

There’s some good news coming the way of our followers who didn’t have the chance to check out the demo at LudoNarraCon because we are making an updated version of the demo available at the Steam Summer Festival starting on June 9! More info on what will happen during the event will come very soon.

It is also a good time to mention that we going to be present at the Guerilla Collective event on June 13 - 15 during the Indie Montage to spread the word to the masses. So visit the Twitch and Steam pages for that if you want to see us and all types of other cool indie games.

Settle in and get ready for the improvements and updates that were made after our LNC demo.

Most of Suzerain's content is delivered through our conversation window which we internally call scenes. The engagement with dozens of characters and a slow unravelling of events or decisions make this our primary delivery tool for the story. However, there are certain subjects and content that we want to include in the game that don’t necessitate scenes and also help simulate the political situation.

In comes bills and decisions!




Bills are what you would expect, the government presents these drafts to be signed or vetoed by the President. Since all laws must be approved by the President you have a lot of authority over what passes. Bills allow us to express the overall opinion of the Assembly, let the player have an expression on certain subjects and also help us simulate the Presidential Republic government type as an experience.




The second addition are decisions which are broader and don’t necessarily have to be related to the political process. These allow us to add more direct player expression and make some content in the game optional. We still use this for some political questions, for example, the one above about making an economic relief package to dampen the effects of the recession.

One of the subjects we noticed was that the news section had a lower UI/UX priority in comparison to reports. We use the news to give clear opinions and feedback according to the events that develop in Sordland. This meant that they actually should have a higher priority inside the interface. Our designer Ilke created a fantastic visual design with each news organisation receiving its own font and logo that differentiated them. Now you can read several articles from a single newspaper giving each of them a distinct feel.




This felt like a more pleasant way to check up on what is happening in the country. Pretty sure you will figure out the overall opinions of each and see some differences in them according to developments. Looking forward to hearing what news organisation you like the most!

Another visual improvement we made was to the reports UI. These reports are meant to be state communications not available to the general public, and therefore needed to feel like a confidential government report.




The hundreds of different comments and feedback helped us iterate and improve on several sections and now we feel much more confident about where we are in regards to our player experience. One of the most common constructive criticisms was regarding how our music was used. So, we switched to a dynamic music system that ensures the soundtrack better matches a scene. This also meant that we added a suspense track for more tense scenes that are clearly different from the atmosphere that usually exists.

Furthermore, there were other small additions to help the player better understand the polit ical situation in the country from small writing improvements to design refinements regarding promises. We tried clearing several elements that caused confusion due to a lack of context that existed in the demo.

Want to keep a closer eye on the development? Sign-up to our newsletter to get the latest breaking news for Suzerain.


Share this game with your friends and head over to our Steam page to wishlist Suzerain.

Thank you and see you next time citizen, Glory to Sordland!

April is behind us and what a month that has been! Our new key art, trailer and the LNC demo came out all at once! Join us in our recap of the highlights.

Starting in March we began working on our key art with Brenda van Vugt (Check out her ArtStation: https://www.artstation.com/brendavanvugt) and the team at Fellow Traveller. Suzerain revolves around Anton Rayne and what the player will do in his shoes, so we decided to focus the main piece around the main character. First, we started with broad ideas of composition. The depth focuses and other layer concepts helped us visualise the essence of what the scene would be. In this stage we thought about contrast and how the visual would appeal to the player.


After discussing we decided to pick option D due to its stark contrast and central composition. Another element that was important for us was the Presidential Office where most of the game takes place. Brenda moved on to improve the key art by adding further detail and visual improvements. Below you can see it take shape closer to the final version.


We enjoyed where the key art was headed but certain elements were a little too much like too many windows, white curtains minimising the contrast and how much focus the flags took away from the central figure. After a last round of discussions, we moved to the final version you can see below.


We are incredibly happy with the result and hope you are too!

Another big thing that happened around the same timeframe was our Trailer which we developed with James McGregor. (Find more of his work here: https://www.corfiz.com/) Our process with the trailer was different but had some similarities. Suzerain is quite the long and complicated game so expressing it in less than two minutes proved a challenge. You can see the final version below.


Let's get to the process of how we got here. We worked on visual drafts with work in progress music to experiment. In this phase we discussed what to show and how the trailer would flow. A total of seven drafts were created until we finally honed down the feel of the trailer. Our focus was to show the core of the game. This meant that we needed to communicate the backstory slightly which ended up being the newspaper section in the intro giving an idea of the situation. This below is the old intro concept for example.


The focus obviously was to communicate that Anton was the President but there were other important focuses like showing the reforms, the economy, and the different opinions of characters. After improving our visuals and finalising the music we ended up with a solid trailer.


Last but not least was our big LNC demo which we spent a week or so preparing. We also recorded a gameplay video and interview video for the event which you can watch above. Our team members also had the opportunity to host a panel at the very beginning of the digital convention!

The demo reception has been incredibly positive. Torpor Games has been swarmed with positive messages and also a lot of constructive feedback on how to improve Suzerain. We took our time and read literally everything. We discuss your opinions internally and improve the game accordingly where possible. We even pushed two hotfixes throughout the event and made several improvements! All in all, our team is very satisfied by the results. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

We will share a new lore post soon and update you on the next developments.

Enjoyed the report? Sign-up to our newsletter to get breaking news.



Still around and as excited as we are that Suzerain is happening? Share this game with your friends and head over to our Steam page to wishlist Suzerain.

Thank you and see you next time citizen, Glory to Sordland!

As President Anton Rayne, lead Sordland into ruin or repair in your first term. Navigate a political drama story driven by conversations with your cabinet members and other significant figures in a country with its own complicated history. Beware or embrace corruption; shirk or uphold ideals. How will you lead?



The people are hungry for democratic reforms after decades under a traditionalist power. The economy is in shambles and the political landscape is shifting. Neighboring superpowers are watching Sordland closely, and there are military threats on the horizon.

Can you pull the country out of its recession? Will you meet the demands of your people for reform? The future of Sordland depends on your choices.



Suzerain is coming Summer 2020, but the people need their president now! Step into your office and begin your term at LudoNarraCon this weekend: download the demo beginning April 24th.

Watch behind the scenes livestreams on our Steam page during the event until April 27th. We've got hours of footage prepared including gameplay with developer commentary and behind the scenes interviews. Tune into the livestreams and play our demo April 24th through April 27th by visiting our Steam page.



Can the people count on you? Wishlist Suzerain today to stay up to date with lore blogs and monthly developer updates!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1207650/Suzerain/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xpVeOvCI8c&feature=youtu.be

The Kingdom of Sordland period began in 1866 with the fall of the Renan and lasted until 1923. It was primarily ruled by King Egmund who claimed to be purple blood: a 19th century ethnic concept that established Sordish nationalism and pride. The king changed the identity of the country and distanced himself from the old systems that were more aristocratic. One of his first changes was the relocation of the capital from Erlory to Hol. The city was also renamed in the process to Holsord which means high Sord.



After securing the throne Egmund attacked the weakest neighbouring country Wehlen in a show of strength. The successive battles increased the fame of the Sordish Army in the Merkopa continent. This was his first successful conquest, expanding the realm territories westwards by capturing the Bergia region. Here the Bludish people resided for thousands of years. At first they welcomed the Sordish as saviours because they had suffered under the iron-fist of their previous ruler but soon after the annexation they were treated with similar respect by the Sordish. In comparison, the Agnolians living under Sordish rule were treated far better by the King who gave them as much freedom as possible and the minority slowly became assimilated. A new designation Agno-Sordish was established for those who accepted Sordish citizenship.

After the war, the king seized all Renan assets into his personal treasury and discontinued the many expensive welfare systems that were established before his reign. The event backfired and resulted in the largest protest in Sordish history. The people rallied behind the leader of the Republican faction in the King’s Parliament, Artor S. Wisci. The pressure caused the King to revert some of the programs to avoid a full-blown rebellion.



Later in 1891 a new powerful figure named Heron Walt rose to power in the Royalist faction and was appointed as the primary advisor of the king. Heron was a skilled architect and manager. He travelled the world to examine successful projects and advancements in order to apply them in the Kingdom. His most successful works were: the Agro-City of Deyr, Valgen Dam and the Free-Trade Zone of Sarna. These elevated the cities from poverty and revitalised the economy. The pioneering projects also boosted the popularity of Egmund in a critical time. The benefits to the Kingdom were so great that he was awarded the highest honour; Hero of the King.

In 1915, The Empire of Valgos embargoed the Kingdom due to the territorial sea disputes between the two nations. The great Valgos fleet at this time was larger than all other nations' fleets combined and posed an existential threat to trade. The embargo damaged the kingdom extensively and caused further isolation in this precarious time. On the other hand there were other internal issues like Egmund failing to birth male heirs. His only child was a young girl named Jule who was too young for rulership and despised by the royalist advisors who deemed her unfit.

Edmund’s grip was loosening as his old age began to show and the ideals of revolution became common due to the Century of Revolutions influencing neighbouring countries. The King's advisor Heron Walt became radicalized by the revolutionary Artor S. Wisci. He joined him, breaking with the Royalist faction in the advisory Parliament.



This started a chain of events that led Artor to energise the public with democratic ideas: thousands gathered in a march which was also joined by the 1st Army. Together they overthrew the King and the Republic of Sordland was proclaimed. The royal family was allowed to leave for exile under the initiative of the 1st President of Sordland Artor S. Wisci in order to avoid further bloodshed and suffering.

Even though the Kingdom lasted short of a century, this period is regarded as a turning point for Sordland because of the establishment of the national identity and the foundation of a democracy.



Sign-up to our newsletter to learn more and see you next time dear reader, hope you stay safe and healthy! See you this weekend at LudoNarraCon.

LudoNarraCon is a free digital festival running April 24 - 27 here on Steam that celebrates narrative games like our’s! Tune in to see behind-the-scenes streams from over 40 narrative games, download and play over 20 demos, and watch live panels from narrative developers. We hope you’ll visit our Steam page during the event: we’re excited to livestream 3-4 hours of behind the scenes content for you. It’ll replay on a loop for the duration of the event, so come anywhere and anytime starting April 24th until the 27th.


As part of LudoNarraCon, nearly half of the exhibitors will be offering free demos... We're excited that a demo of the game will be available for you during the event! Enjoy a taste of these games from the comfort of your home on your schedule.


Developers and publishers will stream live on their games' Steam store pages with behind-the-scenes content, couch chats, and demo gameplay. We’ll be streaming developer interviews and a behind the commentary as we play through the game.



A main theatre stream will feature 12 hours of live panels with game developers, writers, journalists, and other industry influencers. Panels will cover everything from narrative design, game localization, how to create player empathy, and much more.



The LudoNarraCon Sale launches on Steam during the event, with more than 50 story-rich games participating.

ATTEND FOR FREE, FROM ANYWHERE, ANY TIME

All live streaming content will replay on a loop for the rest of the event, making it easy to check out everything from the comfort of your own home on your schedule!



Excited and don't want to miss out? Visit this Steam page to set a calendar reminder.

Welcome to all of our dear readers, we wish you health and strength during these times. Today, Torpor Games wants to share the March monthly report with you, we have been working very hard on Suzerain so let’s get it going!

Many aspects of our game are moving forward at once and seeing all of the progress is very rewarding. Some of the highlights that we will share with you today are the character art updates, lighting pass v2 and the demo preparations.



Since our art review process began, we have been looking over what we can improve. It felt like our character portraits needed some love to make sure the player gets a little more personal with the interesting people that decorate the world of Suzerain. We decided to change the background colour of the portraits, lessen the border and make them bigger.

Overall, we have moved on to polishing some character portraits that needed a second pass, this entailed adding facial hair, different clothes and small colour touches. The image below displays the updated portrait visuals in the dialogue panel as well as the UI changes from last month.



Lighting had previously been satisfactory until our Unity engine update, after which it broke leaving the scene a little bland. We decided to take another look and go for a warmer approach with different sets of light at different angles. Another important detail was to also have different darker/brighter areas dependent on the lamp to add a touch of realism in an otherwise tailored light scene. This resulted in a cozier feeling, as you can see the comparison below.



Moving on to our exciting demo! Our game had a lot of public appearances to make sure we are on the right path. However, LudoNarraCon will be our first digital convention, the demo will be available to thousands of people around the world! We’re putting in some finishing touches and polishing our codex content, adding the latest characters and editing a few scenes that need a little more love.

We’re expecting our demo to have at least an hour of gameplay for you, if not more!



As you can see March has been a handful and there is much more exciting stuff to come once the 24th of April hits and LudoNarraCon starts. You will be able to play Suzerain and experience this universe for yourself during the digital convention. This is a dream come true for us at Torpor Games. Glad to have you along in our journey.



Enjoyed the report? Sign-up to our newsletter to get breaking news.

Still around and as excited as we are that Suzerain is happening? Share this game with your friends and wishlist Suzerain.

Thank you and see you next time citizen, Glory to Sordland!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1207650/Suzerain/?curator_clanid=33025617

Are you a dutiful and knowledgeable citizen? Then you must read today’s history piece talking about THE pivotal event in history, the Century of Revolutions!

This piece is possible thanks to the extensive support and research provided by the Faculty of History of the University of Deyr.

The pivotal Century of Revolutions began in the year of 1823 with the overthrow of King Jonathan XII of the Kingdom of Arcasia. It ended in 1923 with the fall of the Kingdom of Sordland triggered by the revolutionary Artor S. Wisci. The Century of Revolutions was a period when the ideals of democracy, communism and nationalism spread to all corners of the World. In some places it toppled brutal Monarchies; in others it brought down enlightened Meritocracies. Most empires splintered to smaller nations that re-discovered their identities after leaving their imperial past behind.

The century shaped nearly all nations on Earth except for the Kingdom of Rumburg which suppressed any revolutionary sentiment and maintained stability in their realm. One of the fundamental shifts occurred in the splintered continent Contana which suffered from dozens of regional wars before it transformed into an expansive collection of united communist states. This continent-spanning communist state is now known as United Contana, a superpower like the world has never seen led by Leon Malenyev.


United Contana's motto.

United Contana’s influence reached far beyond the sea. The revolutionary efforts backed by Malenyev caused one of the most powerful and global empires of Valgos to fall to a revolution and transform into the Democratic Republic of Valgsland. The ripple effect from the fall of Valgos, resulted in the massive decolonisation of the continents of Xina and Rika.


A map of the Democratic Republic of Valgsland.

Meanwhile on Merkopa nations like Arcasia, Wehlen, Lespia, Agnolia went through changes. Some were peaceful while others dreadfully bloody. Lespia and Agnolia embraced democracy and capitalism fully. A big contributor was the rising giant at the western coast of the continent, Arcasia, which promoted democratic and capitalist values all over the world.

The Arcasians quickly rose to prominence as a world financial centre, military power and cultural influencer. They took advantage of their safe geographic location and the time period’s instability and made investments other countries couldn’t refuse. The network of military and trade alliances Arcasia built up around the world earned it the designation of superpower.


Arcasia's motto.

The Century of Revolutions ended in 1923 after a democratic revolution in Sordland overthrew King Edmund and established democratic elections which birthed the Republic of Sordland. When the dust settled, one could clearly see that the forces of liberty, democracy and capitalism were on one side while equality, socialism and communism were on the other. This near to bi-polar World had the danger of creating a global conventional conflict. It didn’t, but anxiety caused many smaller proxy wars years later including the Wehlen Civil War.

Historians often note that after the Enlightening, this period is the most important turning point in modern history.

Enjoyed the history lesson?

“Instreten sis er Anginicar av Gereigna, int olla Almergwolltene, int olla Mexis.”
“Education is the premise of progress, in all societies, in all families.”



Sign-up to our newsletter to learn more and see you next time dear reader, hope you stay safe and healthy!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1207650/Suzerain/?curator_clanid=33025617

Heartfelt greetings to all of our citizens residing in Sordland! Today we welcome you to our February monthly report, sponsored generously by the Ministry of Information. In this segment, the Torpor Games team will be sharing recent developments of Suzerain. Let’s kick it off!

In February we had the awesome opportunity to sit down and talk face to face with Des Gayle, the production manager of Fellow Traveller who visited us in Berlin. Internet communication is practical, but these occasional personal meetings make everything much more fun and easier. Here is a neat picture from the visit!




We started our narrative review for the entire game which consists of the Prologue, 12 Turns, the Epilogue and Summary. While this process will take a few months, we have broken it down to several smaller manageable quarters. For example, this month we have specifically focused on the Prologue and the first three turns of the game. The team is making additions where necessary: reviewing and polishing our existing content alongside all the other elements that are tied to it like news, reports, codex entries etc.

Furthermore, there were also a couple significant changes that we addressed in our design reviews. One of which was the month concept which we thought restricted the game a little too much narratively. Most of our conversations are essentially moments; we internally call them ‘scenes’.

We thought that making months more arbitrary feels better while also contributing to the reality of the slow pace in political change especially in policies, constructions and layered unfolding events. Previously, each turn represented one month; now one turn encompasses four months. 12 turns perfectly represents your four year presidential term between 1954-1957.



Our reform redesign has finished, and work is going forward with full speed! A much more detailed and unique content tree is being developed in comparison to the old one. Even though the work is very complex, we really think it will be worth it in the end due to more customisation and player input. The designed political paths of the Reformist, Dictator and Autocrat all aim to be unique and interesting in their own right which compliments the rest of the game.



Last but not least, we have also added a personal wealth value that will keep track of Anton Rayne’s own money. This separates the budget of the government from your personal wealth, giving us as designers and you as agents more greed-based avenues to explore.

This change came along with a significant UI update, moving the political connections, country overview, budget value and the newly added wealth value to the bottom-left corner of the screen. To make sure they don’t feel sad and lonely in the corner, we added the portrait of the President who will gaze into your soul as you make your (im)moral decisions. Smiles in boatloads of money...

Enjoyed the report? Sign-up to our newsletter to get breaking news.



Duty calls and the country needs you. Display your approval for the rising star of the United Sordland party Anton Rayne, by heading over to our Steam page and wishlisting Suzerain. Let’s win the upcoming 1953 elections! #Rayne1953

See you next time citizen, Glory to Sordland!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1207650/Suzerain/

LudoNarraCon, the free digital convention on Steam celebrating narrative games, will take place April 24-27. There will be more than 30 narrative games exhibiting and a main theater airing 12 hours of live panels, all available free to you on Steam. During the event, exhibitors will be livestreaming onto their store pages! Learn more at www.ludonarracon.com!

Sordland is bracing for the passionately contested 1953 election season! All potential candidates from the three main parties have announced their bids to become the 4th President of the Republic of Sordland. It is time for you to join the political process when the doors open during LudoNarraCon between the 24th and 27th of April.

Heartfelt greetings from the Torpor Games team to all of you! We are super excited to share that we are attending LudoNarraCon, the digital convention for all kinds of cool narrative games right here on Steam. Narrative games come from the heart and soul and it is such a great opportunity to be among these talented studios and games. Not only that but we are also going to be releasing our Suzerain game demo to the public for the first time!

Don’t miss it, Sordland is waiting for you.






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjnumLK9LyU&feature=youtu.be


Stay up to date on the latest news by subscribing to our newsletter! We'll be sharing development updates, lore blogs, and more over the coming weeks. We'd love to stay in touch.