Sep 4, 2020

Suzerain - Fellow Traveller

“Laceriten, Ecciniten, Bretreniten - Liberty, equality, fraternity.”

The month of Emperor Augustus is behind us and it is a good time to take a look at the tasks we accomplished and the road ahead. This report will include a few teasers towards the middle so if you don’t want to know anything about the late game please don’t read further.

A new writer joined us! Rachel has joined the team to help with writing, editing, and finalising the personal storyline. She is a very skilled writer who has already improved a dozen scenes and the overall narrative design of our two exciting story flows.

Our narrative review continues and we are tackling societal elements that were lacking consistency and prevalence throughout the game. The world of Suzerain is different and old, and we needed to make this obvious to the player in order to achieve full immersion. Moreover, some of the gaps between decisions and scenes are being slowly mended to increase the interconnectedness of the story elements in the game.

Guess what these flags represent and respond in our Discord server here: https://discord.com/invite/H2F6xxg

The conclusion of the main political storyline is near thanks to Ilke’s design efforts and we are taking a final look at the late game decrees, the media influence and police actions. Other key choices are also considered before we take a step towards the finalised endings as they are connected with a portion of these actions. We have also finalised the design of the decrees panel and implemented the functionality. You can find an older mockup of it below.

[CONCEPT - Contents Subject to Change]

The Oligarchs storyline ended along with the range economic expression of planned, mixed and market economy doctrines with additional economic choices being near to completion. Ozgun has excelled in executing the final storyline. Key characters like Walter Tusk and Marcel Koronti are as expected playing a big role.

We have added a key choice of either nationalizing, privatising or not changing the big four corporations in the story with a bespoke UI. In the interface the player can further determine the percentage of ownership being bought or sold by the state. There are also a set of choices depending on previous player decisions that are very exciting. Will you eat the rich or feast lavishly with them?

[CONCEPT - Contents Subject to Change]

We attended Gamescom 2020 through the Indie Arena Booth. This cool digital event drove attention towards our game and increased our presence on Steam. Next up is PAX Online from September 12 - 20! We’d love it if you share your experiences with Suzerain on social media to spread awareness and support our election campaign!

Additionally, our Producer and Managing Director Ata has been working on the next business step in the evolution of Torpor Games. We will make a press release on the exciting subject when the time comes!

See you next time in the September report and thank you for your support!

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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!

Aug 6, 2020

July Monthly Report

Suzerain - Fellow Traveller

“Our strangest strength is the courage to live, knowing that we will die, knowing nothing more true.” - Bernard Circas

Hope all of you have been well and that the weather is treating you nicely. Work has been progressing very well on Suzerain and we aim to increase our quality with some additional support to our team.

Suzerain is a game of choices but a tracking system was necessary for game designers to be able to gauge the player’s behaviour in the long-term. Therefore we decided to track Democratic, Capitalist, Sollist (Ideology of Tarquin Soll, a former President of Sordland, centred around republicanism, nationalism and statism), and Malenyevist (Communist ideology of Leon Malenyev, the chairman of the superpower Communist country) public behaviours or policies by adding values on choices behind the scenes. None of these values are mutually exclusive when being added to a player choice. For example a player can be a democrat malenyevist or anti-democrat malenyevist.

As you can see above the Prologue also gives some of these values. This allows us to track a nuanced player expression throughout the entire game to shape choices, endings and other elements which are supposed to react to the player.

Work has been continuing on polishing our character art. One of our community favourites Serge has gotten a makeover to make him look more natural.

The police chief finally got his own portrait instead of using a rehash of another character that appeared later in the game. Karl Greiser will take care of your security needs throughout the game.

We have taken a look at the way we show the progress of time in game. We decided to remove the years listed at the beginning of each chapter in order to reduce the narrative requirements it creates. Most of Suzerain is depicted in moments and we believe this makes the experience much better.

The game will still start at the beginning of 1954 and end at the end of 1957. All turns of the game will be divided into chapters and we will name them for extra immersion.

Furthermore we decided to remove the political connections panel because it revealed too much and removed the discovery aspect of these power relationships that are happening behind the scenes that the player needs to figure out. The factions overview and key figures still remain but you need to be cautious in scenes, read the codex, news and reports to figure out the web of connections.

The development of the second half of the game is progressing well with a great amount of progress being made towards our release candidate. We also wanted to give you a heads up, many of you would have seen that Suzerain was scheduled to come out in Summer 2020. As we’re now coming into August, we wanted to let you know the Summer 2020 release isn't a possibility anymore and we will update you soon on the release date.

See you next time in the August report!

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!

Jul 7, 2020

June Monthly Report

Suzerain - Fellow Traveller

Great to be back with another juicy monthly report detailing our development for the month of June with a recap of the most exciting moments. Let's begin, shall we?

There were two big events in June that increased our presence and allowed us to reach new audiences. Guerrilla Collective displayed our short trailer to hundreds of thousands of people which was a great moment for us in the studio. At the same time a Guerrilla page was up on Steam in which we made our updated demo available again.

You can watch the trailer below:

This demo had drastic improvements to the LNC version we released in late April therefore we collected a new round of feedback to take a final pulse of what people feel like. The Guerrilla Collective was immediately followed by the Steam Summer Festival which also had the updated demo available but with an exclusive one-time livestream with the dev team.

During the stream we showcased post-demo content on the Autocrat path that was morally questionable at best. Additionally we also hosted a Q&A on our Discord server that was a lot of fun!

Speaking of, our Discord community is growing and becoming more fun by the day with engaging discussions and the funniest Serge memes. You can join us in our servers in these links below:

Fellow Traveller Discord: http://discord.gg/fellowtraveller
Suzerain Discord: http://discord.gg/H2F6xxg

Let's talk about game development. Between the usual bugfixing, content improvements and story additions we have spent a good amount of effort into making sure our narrative support elements compliment all your decisions well. This includes solidifying the identities of the newspapers, adding extra details to game choices that change the news and making sure these elements give the player a heads up, the ability to react or deliver lore about everything that is happening. Our reports also had a pass with improvements to writing content and further branching details.

Some extra time was spent on adding logos, additional functionality, location images and other misc visual elements to the codex in order to make the experience richer. Since the story features a lot of references to the regions we decided to add them into their own category with map background visuals. Dozens of players made it clear that the codex is an experience of itself so why not make it a little more pleasant?

We have completed our first pass on polishing the first half of the game. Additional testing, balancing and bug fixing is currently ongoing to make sure nothing slips through the cracks! This opportunity also helps us find the edge cases which are hard to find even though we have a dozen eyes on the build. There are some key issues we want to tackle like the reforms and economy balance that need extra playtesting due to the amount of branching and choices.

This image above is from Articy: our story, design and database tool. It displays approximately 1/10th of the game content.

Moreover, the Unity engine version of Suzerain was updated from 2018.4 LTS to 2019.4 LTS in order to keep up with the latest and greatest changes. The long time support version is specifically great for our launch needs since it primarily focuses on fixing older versions. This causes minimal issues with updating the engine version.

The team is moving forward to the second part of the game in July where we will follow a similar procedure but this time we are heading to combine everything to be able to playtest and find the problems inside the whole frame. It's very exciting and weird to take a final look at Suzerain and to slowly say goodbye to many parts which we will not edit until after release.

July has the A MAZE digital festival in store with us. We will make our game demo available once again for those who didn't have the chance to check it out before. Other opportunities may arise and we will keep you updated about all the developments!

We have been working very hard on delivering the best Suzerain experience to your hands that is realistically possible. The past few months have been personally challenging for all of us. Our appreciation for your feedback, positive comments and overall interest cannot be understated.

See you next time at the July report!

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!

Jun 19, 2020

Become a Suzerain this weekend!

Suzerain - Mr. Nowak

Ever wanted to become the President and lead a country? Explore the intricate and detailed country of Sordland as Anton Rayne. Meet your cabinet, spend time with your family and make difficult choices that shape the future of your term and the country!

Play the Demo

In 1954, the country of Sordland is emerging from a 20-year dictatorship, following a bloody civil war. You play as a charismatic young man, Anton Rayne, who has surprised everyone by rising to the top of the party in power and getting elected as the new President of Sordland.

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 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. Good luck, Mr. President.

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Join the Suzerain Discord Channel Here!

Want to know more? Join Ata, Ozgun and Ilke on the Suzerain Discord channel to ask your questions, live!

The Q&A will be from 9:00pm - 11:00pm Central European Time, today!

Jun 11, 2020

Suzerain Developer Q&A on Discord

Suzerain - Mr. Nowak

Join the Suzerain Discord Channel Here!

Did you ever want to become the President? Join Ata, our Game Producer and Writer, on the Suzerain Discord channel to ask your questions, live!

The Q&A will be on our Discord Channel from 9:00pm - 11:00pm Central European Time, on Friday June 19th for the Steam Games Festival.

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?

Additionally, we're live-streaming a Q&A and post-demo content playthrough on Steam at 5:00pm - 7:00pm Pacific Time, Wednesday June 17th for the Steam Games Festival!

Jun 11, 2020

Suzerain Developer Livestream

Suzerain - Mr. Nowak

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.

Jun 5, 2020

May Monthly Report

Suzerain - Fellow Traveller

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!