Exploring Rogue-like Magic: Lorebound Interactive Game Development Insights

As someone who has been playing RPG since the earliest days of computers, I absolutely love the challenge of the old true rogue-likes.

I started Lorebound Interactive after graduating from Full sail's prestigious Game Development program so that I could bring my vision for a modern rogue-like to life. There is a sub-genre of fiction (very popular in web-serial format on sites like Royal Road and in many of today's popular animes), call LitRPG, which features worlds and characters that can can gain experience and level up in a game like format. Sometimes this involves a system apocalypse, like the extremely popular "Solo Leveling" manga, other times it is getting stuck in some sort of simulation like Sword-Art Online, and other times the main character is whisked off to some fantasy world governed by game-mechanics.

The premise for the project is this. If one day, a blue screen popped in your vision announcing that the end was here, and monsters started pouring out of portals all over the world, but you could suddenly level up and gain access to supernatural abilities, how long could you survive? Would you band together with others? Try to go it alone? Or maybe support the front lines of humanity's fight by joining a settlement and providing essential services? Instead of a traditional action game, this game will be much more simulation oriented, with no extra lives, no invincible npcs, and procedural maps and events. Monsters will claim territory, settlements will thrive and die, and danger lurks around every corner. Classless progression means you can grow your character however you want, to meet the needs of the moment. Meta progression will include unlocking alternate starts. A computer nerd on a college campus? A soldier who starts with better gear, but is beholden to his unit? I junkyard owner with a trio of dogs? These are just a few of the starting scenarios to unlock.