July 26, 2007

Steven Peeler delves into the Depths of Peril
By Michael Lafferty

“I think we will appeal to action-RPG players mostly that want some more depth than the typical offering”

Is it an RTS or an RPG? Maybe it’s a hybrid of the two, but whatever the case Depths of Peril is hoping to appeal to both types of gamers with a single-player experience that will challenge players to skill up, and protect the homeland through strategic combat or diplomacy.

According to the official announcement:

“Depths of Peril is a single player action role-playing game (rpg) with strong strategy elements. You play as a faction leader protecting the barbarian city, Jorvik, by destroying threatening monsters and completing quests. At the same time, you compete with rival factions to see who will rule the city. Barbarians choose their leaders by fighting to the death!

As a faction leader, you must deal with rival factions through diplomacy, trade, and in time, war. Between battles and raids against other barbarian factions, you build the most powerful faction possible, to withstand your enemies. Building the power of a faction involves exploring a fantasy world, slaying dangerous monsters, solving quests for the city, avoiding deadly traps, and plundering loot to share within your faction.

But in this world, actions actually have consequences, so take care. Annoying the powerful and aggressive Legion of Fear faction will cause them to declare war and destroy you. Ignored Orc uprisings in the Black Forest will cause even more trouble. Protect ally covenants that are being raided, because friends are hard to come by.”

This sounds like enough content to keep players busy. But we wanted to get the inside scoop on the game and so turned to Steven Peeler, owner & lead programmer/designer at Soldak Entertainment, Inc., who chatted with GameZone about this title.

Question: The game is billed as an action RPG with strategic elements. It seems to have incorporated some of those elements that are usually associated with RTS games. If true, how were you able to meld the two genres together?

Steven: Actually, Depths of Peril probably has more in common with games like Civilization since RTS games rarely have trade and diplomacy. The most important strategy element we have is multiple factions vying for control of the city. Unlike an RTS, you can trade, use diplomacy, and even form alliances with these other factions. Although when it comes to war and raids we are a little closer to an RTS game since they are all real time. You only control your one character directly however rather than controlling an army like a typical RTS game.

Melding the two genres together was part of our original concept, and we have never intended to be a full RPG and a full strategy game at the same time. We started with an action RPG and added the basic idea of barbarian faction wars to the game. Then we have very selectively brought over only strategy game elements that fit and support this gameplay.

Aside from the idea of protecting the homeland, does the game have a theme that pulls the entire concept together? Is there an end-game element?

Steven: Well, story wise the game takes place right after the Fourth Great War of Aleria. Ciglio (a necromancer) and Draaien (an orc) banded together, gathered a huge army, and launched a war against the west. Unfortunately for the barbarians and many other races, this war was extremely successful and destroyed pretty much all of the western cities. Now the barbarian cities are all destroyed, the elves have nearly been wiped out, no one has heard from the dwarves at all, and the sade, teratai, and humans have all taken heavy tolls.

But treachery was at foot. Before the armies of Ciglio and Draaien could finish off the west, their shaky alliance broke down somehow. No one knows exactly what happened, but the barbarians believe that either Ciglio or Draaien betrayed the other and attacked to keep all of the spoils of war for themselves.

This is where the game starts. The west has basically been destroyed. You live in what is now a small barbarian town called Jorvik. Jorvik used to be much larger and important city, but was destroyed in the war and has only just now rebuilt a small portion. The massive armies of undead, orcs, and many other monsters are still everywhere, but they are no longer completely focused on the barbarians and other allies. Ciglio and Draaien are still out there though and will soon turn their attention back on to the barbarians.

End game wise, we work more like a strategy game then the typical RPG. The game "ends" when you conquer and control Jorvik through military or diplomatic means or you have been destroyed. Basically, you will win if you are the last surviving covenant (what the game calls its factions) or you are allied with all of the remaining covenants. You will lose if your covenant is destroyed. Unlike most strategy games however, when you start a new game you can bring over your character, all of your items, and all of your recruits if you wish. There is an end to the storyline also, but it doesn't end the current game.

How many hours of gameplay do you think there is in this title?

Steven: Well, you don't play straight through Depths of Peril, so it's very difficult to say. In this respect we are a hybrid between an RPG and a strategy game. There is a storyline to play through that might take a certain period of time, but this might be spread across many different games that you have won and/or lost. Just finishing the storyline greatly depends on how much you focus on the story and how much you focus on destroying the other barbarian covenants.

Even past that part though, the game is very replayable. We have four different classes that play very different from each other. Each class has 30 skills, has a unique power system, and has a different focus. This allows many viable builds for each class. There are four difficulty levels in the game that can be played through. Also, each game is very different. Each game has different enemy covenants and different dynamic events.

This is, at the moment, a single-player experience. What made you decide to not include multiplayer in the game, and is there the possibility that some sort of multiplayer action may be available later after release?

Steven: Basically we wanted to focus on single player and make sure we created a good, fun single-player game first instead of a decent single player and multiplayer game. We do hope to add multiplayer support in an expansion though.

What kind of graphics engine does this game use? Is the game a solid three-dimensional experience with a rotatable camera? Or is the camera fixed and the game simulates a 3D environments?

Steven: The game uses a custom-built engine specifically made for Depths of Peril. The camera is in a fixed direction but can be zoomed in and out. The engine is fully 3D however.

Tell us about the combat system. How does a player skill up?

Steven: Combat is usually fairly fast paced with lots of monsters with a tough champion, elite, or unique monster thrown in here and there. Your basic melee swings are automatic once you chose a target, but all of your skill usage is up to you. The skills use a hotbar system with hotkeys for easy access. The actual gameplay varies a lot depending on what class you are using and what skills you have chosen.

Rogues focus on stealth, trickery, and quickness. A rogue might use Stealth to sneak up on a group of monsters and do massive damage while her enemies are surprised, then use Dazzle to confuse the remaining enemies, and use Slice and Lethal Blow to finish anything that still moves.

Priests focus on defensive magic like healing and buffs, although they still have offensive magic and are pretty dangerous with a mace. A priest is likely to walk into a fight at full health and buffed with something like Holy Shield or True Aim, use her mace and magic like Holy Fire to kill her enemies, and heal herself when hurt.

Mages focus on offensive magic but also have a variety of magic skills. A mage might try to stay out of melee range while his recruit takes the brunt of the melee combat, while he rains down destruction from a distance using Arctic Shard or Sweeping Flames.

Warriors focus on melee combat plain and simple. A warrior is likely to wade straight into the action and kill anything that gets too near him using skills like Bash, Gut, or Crush.

These really are just examples. With 30 skills for each class, there are a lot of different ways to play each one of them.

Depths of Peril uses a level system where each level the player gets a few attribute and skill points to allocate. This is fairly common to RPGs but where we differ is the skill system. All of the skills are available at the beginning of the game, but each skill has a different starting point cost and the cost goes up by one for each skill level. For example, a mage can chose to focus on Fiery Blast which is one of his cheaper skills that has a starting cost of 1. So the first skill level will cost 1, the 2nd 2, the 3rd 3, and so on. Or he can go for the more powerful Fireball spell that has a starting cost of 6. So the first skill level will cost 6, the 2nd 7, the 3rd 8, and so on. In other words, either path is viable because you can get a couple levels in the powerful Fireball or a lot of levels in the weaker (per level at least) Fiery Blast.

What niche do you think this game fills? What type of gamer will it appeal to?

Steven: I think we will appeal to action-RPG players mostly that want some more depth than the typical offering. There is way more going on in Depths of Peril than most action RPGs. There are multiple covenants fighting for dominance using diplomacy, wars, raids, and alliances. The world is very dynamic and changes based on the actions of the character, the other covenants, and even the monsters. There is also a huge backstory so even the history of the world is fairly deep.

What elements do you consider unique to the game?

Steven: I think we have a lot of things that are unique or at least unique to the action RPG genre. Our biggest unique element is the faction wars with the other barbarian covenants, of course. We also have a very dynamic world that makes each game very different. Also unlike most RPGs there are actual consequences to a lot of your actions or lack of actions. For example, attacking a covenant's ally will likely cause some type of retaliation. Not quelling an uprising of orcs might lead to attacks on the town. Not killing renegades might lead to more and more renegades banding together. And even attacking the wrong monster might lead to a war against the barbarians.

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