Nidaria

(pronounced /naɪˈdɛəriə/)

From the word Cnidaria; the phylum that contains all species of jellyfish, for which the city was modeled after.

Nidaria was cobbled together during the last two decades before the Mimic haze engulfed the land. It can then be said that work on Nidaria commenced around 20 BH (Before the Haze). Its launching marked a new era of life for the inhabitants of Skystone. This dirigible became a beacon of hope, and the last refuge for man as the land below vanished beneath a thick veil of haze.

At the base level is The Boiler which pumps ether-infused steam to the Bell at the top of the city. The Bell maintains buoyancy and support for all its levels, and acts as a tethered hub for all the surrounding houses. When Nidaria first set sail, The Dock was the only level found above The Boiler. Since that time, more levels have been added to accommodate the growing number of refugees from around the land. While most levels are maintained by the Aeronauts, a few have been built up by both Crags and Ferrics. These welcomed additions add cultural flair to this ever growing, sky-bound city.

Nidaria Development

Although much can be said about each individual level of Nidaria, we will have to save that for another time. Instead, let’s explain some background into the development and evolution of this floating city.

From the start of it all, we knew there would need to be a town, and based on the story, it would have to be located up in the sky. Our first step was to create a style guide that would include all visual inspiration needed for the design of the town. It was divided into 4 main categories:

1. Tensile/Fabric Architecture
2. Neo-Victorian Details
3. Rust/Grass Surface
4. Industrial Sub-surface

Draft 1

The first draft had a town scattered across multiple chunks of land connected by bridges and all at the same altitude. The perspective of the scene would all be done from a top-down axiometric viewpoint. This would be a contrast to the 2D platforming levels found during gameplay. After a rendered version of one of the levels was created, the flaws in the design started to appear. The top down perspective became jarring when both vertical and horizontal movement was allowed. Movement between areas was also dull when using only bridges as connection points. On top of all that, houses were almost completely covered by their canvas roofs.

Draft 2

The next redesign had five goals in mind:

1. Give the town a more vertical orientation
2. Multiple town levels reflect the multiple-floor setup for houses
3. Lower camera angle to add more depth to each composition
4. Divided town into smaller chunks to ease loading time
5. Better understanding of how town works and looks from a distance

In this draft, we organized the town completely vertically, with a single elevator that can take you to any section of the city. Each Section was built with an inflated bladder that supported a giant surface cog. We now had a full understanding of how the town looked and worked, and we gave it the name, Nidaria. For this draft, a vanishing point perspective was used to allow the faces of each house to be in full view. We also locked the camera to only pan left and right, allowing vertical movement only when the players traveled between sections.

We were getting warmer with this new town, but there were still a few issues to be dealt with. Although we thought we would be improving movement between sections by giving them elevators, it still resulted in the same dull feeling, maybe even worse than the bridges. Also, the design became a bit monotonous with each section being built off a similar bladder/cog template.

Final Design

First off, thanks to Chris Pasley from Kongregate for convincing us to try one more time to see if we could create an even better town experience for the players. This resulted in reorganizing the town to allow multiple paths to take, and multiple ways to travel between sections. We now have incorporated air-lifts, zip-lines, elevators, stairs and ladders as modes of travel. Each Section is individually designed to reflect who built it, how it was built, and why it was built. We are now very happy with the final product, and hope you will be too when RoS is released on Kongregate.com

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We’re kicking off our development blog with a recap on the various game modes that we’ll have available in Remnants of Skystone, and going into a little more detail than we previously have on our site and in press releases. Read on for more details!

Adventure

At the core of the Remnants of Skystone design is the single-player adventure, where players can take their character down to the ground below and work their way through the expansive world. Each of the three character classes have a different move-set with special abilities, which players will have to use to navigate through the side-scrolling platforming environments. While exploring the map, the player’s goal is to defeat the Mimic creatures that have taken over the land, while working their way towards the Mimic boss at the core of each area.

As the steampunk Aeronauts, players can blast their way through the environment with steam-powered jetpacks, and use their Blaster Cuffs to fire ranged steam shots at enemy Mimics. When playing as a tribal Ferric, a player can grab onto ledges and climb up sheer walls and across ceilings. The sharp armor on their arms that aids in climbing is also used to slash away at enemies at close range. As the mountain-climbing Crags, players will swing through the air using grappling ropes, and attack Mimics with short-range flails. Since there are so many special moves here and so many ways to play, we’d hate to have players choose only one character class and miss out on two-thirds of the experience. Our current plan is to let users create multiple characters tied to their account, and let them work their way through the Adventure using each of them at their own pace. Along these lines, we’re planning for some elements to be unique to each of a player’s characters (each character will have separate stats, for example), while other elements can be mixed and swapped between them, like clothing and Ether Tubes. We’ll save the details on those for a future post!

Co-op Missions

In a similar style to the single-player Adventure, players can team up with others online to take on various Co-op Missions on the ground. Each of the areas from the single-player experience will have their own separate maps for Co-op, with a somewhat different emphasis: While the Adventure areas had been cleared of the poisonous haze and the plant life that creates it, the Co-op Missions take place in the overgrown outskirts of each area, which are only partially cleared of the poison and fungal plant life. These areas will have a larger focus on environmental puzzles and cooperating with your teammate to clear your way through the area, while competing with one another for the most spoils. Players can choose whichever of their characters they like, so an Aeronaut can team up with a Crag, or a Ferric with a Crag — any combination works.

The Floating Town of Nidaria

When the ground was overtaken with Mimics and the poison haze, the Aeronauts built a floating city of platforms, and were soon joined by the Crags and Ferric in this midair refugee post. In the game, players will be able to visit this town in the sky to meet up with others — to hang out and chat, or to challenge one another for Co-op Missions. A myriad of shops are also scattered across the city’s platforms, where players can purchase new items and more, as well as NPC characters who offer quests to complete during the Adventure or Co-op. Look for more information on Nidaria and its many amenities in an upcoming post!

Player Houses

When players first create their game account for Skystone, everyone will get their own house tied into Nidaria, which other players can visit whenever they like. We’ll have a variety of furnishings available in town, so players can customize their living space however they like — as a relaxing spot between missions, a hangout with a funky look, or even a decked-out house for block parties. We’ll also put a “display case” in every player’s house, where visitors can check up on any awards or collectibles earned by the house owner.

But wait, there’s more!

There’s still a lot more to Remnants of Skystone that we haven’t talked about, from the leveling system to the collectibles to the Victory Lab. In future posts, we’ll expand on each of the above modes in greater detail, as well as hit on some other features and the finer points of customization and ability boosts that we’ve only briefly touched on here. The exact details are still subject to change as we continue to refine our ideas and adjust gameplay, but we hope these broad strokes have helped bring you up to speed, and hint at things to come for Remnants of Skystone!

Want to give us some feedback on what you’re most looking forward to in the game? Select the features below that spark your interest — we’d love to hear what people want to do in the game!

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Posted by Matt under Game Design | Comment » (1 comment) |

Welcome to the launch of the Remnants of Skystone development blog! Since the initial game announcement last October, we’ve been fairly quiet about game details — but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been busy! As we’re moving along in development, we thought it would be a nice opportunity to share what we’re working on and shed a little light on some aspects of the game.

What exactly is Remnants of Skystone? It’s an upcoming side-scrolling platformer playable online, which also includes MMO and community elements. We’re lucky enough to be working with Kongregate as part of their Premium Game Program, and RoS will be one of the first batch of Premium Games to launch exclusively on their site this year.

In the game, players enter a world in which alien Mimics had long ago infested the land and spread their noxious poison throughout the countryside. The people of Skystone retreated to an airborne town high above the poison haze, and are now ready to launch their attack on the Mimic infestation.

Players can customize their own fighter — choosing from three classes each with unique abilities — to explore areas on the ground and exterminate the Mimic threat. Players can also mingle with others in the airborne town, and team up with another player for co-op adventures on the ground. Each player also starts the game with their own dwelling, and can furnish their home with store-bought goods and adventuring spoils. Players can visit others’ houses to chat, and to rate their decorating style.

We’ve got more information in store for the launch of the blog, so read on if you’re interested in learning more. Our galleries contain some early concept art and mockups if you’re interested in a sneak peek, and you can keep up-to-date with our blog entries by signing up for email updates or checking the RSS feed.

Thanks for stopping by, and we hope you’ll come back for more as we update!

Matt Neff and Tony Solary
Flipline Studios

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