UgaritRL
| UgaritRL | |
|---|---|
| Alpha Project | |
| Developer | Orbital Cows Software |
| Theme | Canaanite Mythology, Christianity, Conspiracy Theories |
| Influences | Sangband, Terraria, Geneforge, Breath of Death 7, Actraiser, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines |
| Released | February 20, 2011 |
| Updated | November 14, 2012 |
| Licensing | GPL (Free, open source) |
| P. Language | Java |
| Platforms | Windows (so far) |
| Interface | Graphical (Orthogonal), Mouse, Keyboard |
| Game Length | Undetermined |
| Official site of UgaritRL | |
Overview
UgaritRL is a tech demo attempting to apply the awesome power of 90's era video game technology to the features common in modern games. UgaritRL will be an adolescent power fantasy. Players will begin the game as weaklings but quickly rise in power until they can slaughter legions and summon armies with a wave of one hand.
Combat will be turn-based and will feature relatively large scale strategic battles. There will be a wide range of enemies within the game, and little attempt will be made to exclude things that don't make sense.
UgaritRL is not an end in itself, but rather a stepping stone to a much greater game: The Ugarit Heresy. The Ugarit Heresy will be UgaritRL with a plot designed to trivialize religions and other beliefs. Unfortunately, the projected 15-year development cycle for the tech demo suggests that The Ugarit Heresy will never be completed.
Features
Here are some features that will make UgaritRL unique among rogue-likes:
- More mental than Binding of Isaac.
- Retro 2D graphics, but mercifully no ASCII mode
- Unique 3-option character development system inspired by Breath of Death VII
- A crafting system modeled upon Terraria's, but with less detail
- RTS-like buildings
- Easy resource gathering
- Ally creation, much like in Geneforge, but possibly customizable like the units in Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
- Includes a map editor for creating new scenarios
- Based loosely upon ancient middle eastern myth (particularly Canaanite myth)
- Humans are livestock!
Sadly, none of these features are fully implemented at this time. The 3-option character development system exists but can only be used in a trivial way at this time. Mostly, the player can just wander around aimlessly.
There will most likely never be any animation because animation is hard and/or costs money.
Development
This game started as a platformer about a squirrel, changed to an RPG about anthromorphic rabbits, and finally settled into being a roguelike about Canaanite mythology.
As time passes, the design elements are becoming less malleable than they once were. The constant shifting back-and-forth is due to the lack of a strong purpose and the haphazard development process.
At the time of this writing, the current build number is 82.
Release
The current release is a pointless demo of wandering around. The design isn't even finalized yet. It's currently scattered across many different text files and in a notebook.
The tentative release date of the game will be August 11, 2023. That will give the game roughly the same development time as Duke Nukem Forever.