Universal Castles (by Sets and Settings)

Discussion in 'Upcoming iOS Games' started by folmerkelly, Aug 26, 2015.

  1. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    #1 folmerkelly, Aug 26, 2015
    Last edited: Sep 8, 2015
    Hi everyone!

    I'm Folmer from Sets and Settings, and I recently started working on a new project called Castles.

    Castles is a minimalist action card game where the goal is to manage your resources in order to destroy your opponent, using turn-based action cards. The game focusses on strategy and skill, eschewing things like tiers, overpowered decks, and pay-to-win practices. Castles has a flat deck, basically. The concept is inspired by a flash game called Castle Wars which was quite big back in the day. I always loved that game and tried to instead of just win, get my resources filled up while keeping the AI alive-but-just-barely, to give you an idea of where my head is at with this game.

    [​IMG]

    Castles uses a 4 colour palette (the style was originally inspired by GBJam, a game jam intended to create Game Boy style games), drawing influences from occult / religious iconography, the work of Susan Kare- particularly her work on the early Mac icons, and dotwork:

    [​IMG]
    Cards come in 3 categories: Attack Cards (which cost AP), Sorcery (SP), and Builders (BP). Attack cards are your weapon, they allow you to destroy your opponent. Builders are your defense and what will likely keep you afloat while the other castle throws their attacks your way. Sorcery... well, Sorcery basically ��������s with the numbers. And lets you do strategic things, hail Mary passes, turn a losing battle around... Sorcery is sorcery. That said, Sorcery cards require cleverness to use effectively and can be as dangerous as they can be helpful.

    I don't want to say too much about the cards because they're quite fun to discover and consider on your own, but I'll give a couple of examples:

    VISION (Sorcery): Playing a Vision Card will flip reveal the opponent's current hand. After they play a card and draw a new one, the new card will NOT be affected by Vision.
    BUCKET OF TAR (Builder): Playing the Bucket of Tar slows down the next Attack Card played by your opponent, delaying the damage dealt by one round. Remains passive until an Attack Card is played; stacks.

    [​IMG]
    (VERY early gif from when the game used a tiny Game Boy screen size!)

    I suspect that Castles will be a niche game that's not for everyone, and I kinda dig that. To be clear: I'm not trying to make a competitive card game! Some form of multiplayer, local and online, I'm trying to make it happen. BUT if you're trying to compare Castles to anything (which I know we all do), ideally you'd think "Hearts on Windows 98 -played on a Mac II- meets Crossy Road".

    Yeah, I said Crossy Road. Which brings me to the practical stuff! So: Castles will be F2P with no interstitial ads. After each victorious round, the player is rewarded with crown coins, an in-game currency. The size of the reward is calculated by your health and resources at the end of a match. When you have 100 coins, you get to draw a new card from the pack, which essentially functions the same way the gacha machine in Crossy does. Whenever you get a new card, you can put it in your active deck. Now, LET ME SAY THIS AGAIN: The deck is flat. There are no rare cards, tiered cards, diamond cards, whatever cards. All cards have different stats but each card is balanced against the others. You may get a Sorcery Card that has an effect you're not into at all, so you decide to use that slot to ad an extra Attack card instead, etc etc. Again like Crossy, cards can individually be bought for actual money, and since there won't be tiered cards it'll be a flat price.

    Anyway, that was quite a post! Thanks for reading, and I'd love to hear people's thoughts about Castles :) I currently have the base engine going and I've been adding cards and their stats at a steady pace the past couple of days. I suspect I'll be sending out TF builds to my testers by the end of the week, and I might open it up to a wider closed beta in due time.

    In closing, some more bits and pieces!

    A short Vine: https://vine.co/v/ej7DL7jBD07

    A short gameplay video recorded on my iphone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYipscCkhPo
     
    nickhoola likes this.
  2. GeorgeIng

    GeorgeIng New Member

    Aug 26, 2015
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    This looks rad! I've really loved all of your other games, especially Battle Golf.

    Might I get a build per chance?
     
  3. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Thanks for the kind words, GeorgeIng! Like I said, builds will go out to my testers soon <3
     
  4. vectorarchitekt

    vectorarchitekt Well-Known Member

    Dec 29, 2013
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    Really cool! Would love to help test when it's time
     
  5. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Awesome! Once I have enough cards I'll probably run a TA-based closed beta for a while, the game'll need a ton of balancing :)
     
  6. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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  7. secredut

    secredut Well-Known Member

    Feb 3, 2015
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    I love it too. Please let me be a beta tester when the time has come :)
     
  8. GeorgeIng

    GeorgeIng New Member

    Aug 26, 2015
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    No problem! It looks freaking awesome :D
     
  9. spacebulldog

    spacebulldog Well-Known Member

    Aug 10, 2015
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    Videogame Producer
    Seoul, Korea
    Wow.. the graphics really touches my old memory on classic game console..
     
  10. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Glad y'all are digging it!

    Working on cards today:


    [​IMG]
     
  11. freakernet

    freakernet Well-Known Member

    Jul 9, 2015
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    Please let me be a beta tester when the time has come also
     
  12. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Yesterday and today I spent some time redesigning the layout of things:

    [​IMG]


    The difference being that the card description now appears above the card rather than in the box below. The box now displays the card's title instead. Two reasons for that: 1) tapping a card obscured the description since the hand covers the bottom part of the screen, which annoyed me, and 2) this way I simply have more space to write better explanations.

    Anyway, I'm keeping tabs on everyone asking to be part of the beta and I'll be going through the thread IN ORDER so first come first serve :)
     
  13. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Building a fence is a good way to protect a castle

    [​IMG]
     
  14. volando

    volando Well-Known Member

    Jan 13, 2015
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    I want definitely play this
     
  15. paperjack

    paperjack Member

    Aug 31, 2015
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    Wow i'm impressed with the visual :)
     
  16. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Couldn't resist making this gif :D

    [​IMG]
     
  17. MassiveIndie

    MassiveIndie Well-Known Member

    Aug 28, 2015
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    Indie Developer and Publisher
    Arizona, United States
    Oh man! This reminds me of a favorite back in the day "Cardwars". Incredible work. Absolutely loving the minimal art style on this!
     
  18. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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    Glad to hear it! And yeah Cardwars was definitely an inspiration :)
     
  19. folmerkelly

    folmerkelly Well-Known Member

    Oct 2, 2012
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  20. cofunguy

    cofunguy Well-Known Member

    Sep 24, 2012
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    #20 cofunguy, Sep 2, 2015
    Last edited: Sep 2, 2015
    Looks great. Hope to see great things here. Would love to beta test this and find the odd ball items. I have been doing testing for 20+ years and I do find those wired quirks (don't ask how..I just do!!)

    Just don't ask who has to "pay" to build the fence here in the USA!! Sorry couldn't resist...

    Gather there will be a way to get other types of cards via adventure or something of the like??
     

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