Welcome to the Battle of Olympus Dev Diary, a series dedicated to giving the community a behind-the-scenes look into the lives of game developers. With this series, we hope to shed some light on the struggles that come with making a successful and engaging blockchain game.
In Dev Diary #3, we’ll hear from Game Director Ranko Trifkovic about the latest developments in Battle of Olympus’ journey toward perfection. Feel free to scroll to the following sections of this article:
- We need weapons!
- Moar! Moar!
- Onwards and upwards
We need weapons!
If you have followed our previous Dev Diaries, you’re already familiar with our struggle to find the delicate balance between depth and accessibility. We want our game to be an amazing experience for single-player newcomers to the genre, as well as the seasoned fighters thriving in the arenas of the Olympus Megacity.
Once we ironed out all the technical wrinkles regarding the animations, we beheld our work and it was… well… okay. But we don’t want to release an “okay” game. This world is overcrowded with “okay” games, don’t you think? Well, we agree with you.
Coming back to the roots of our inspiration, we wanted to achieve that excitement that comes when you COMMIT. So you are not mashing buttons anymore. It’s clear it won’t work here, and you’ve learned the basic moves and maneuvers. You estimate the distance, do the magic on your controller and that split moment before virtual fighters explode into action and you see the fruits of your plan, half instinctive, half deliberate, in that mystical borderline where martial meets art.
In other words, we want our players to really experience the visceral magic of martial art master. So we wanted to kick it up a notch and add some cool weaponry.
Moar! Moar!
Of course, the weaponry must correspond with the character of our cyber gods. That’s why it wasn’t easy to pick the best piece for our Greek-inspired divinities. For Ares, it was a fairly obvious choice. Just like AXE screams VIKING and SWORD is the staple of all Medieval warriors, big SPEAR is the marking of a true HOPLITE. Classical Greek heavy infantrymen who all fought and died while muttering Ares’ name under their helmets so lavishly topped with horse mane crests.
Hades, now he was a bit tricky. A typical weapon of Hades, as per mythology, is a bident. BIDENT! Sounds like something with two teeth or something you stick your behind into to get refreshed. As with all the other Greek gods, the alternative was… you guessed it… spear. Now don’t get me wrong, I like spears and all the variations, but we wanted a touch of unique choice for each god. Since we’ve already declared Hades the Lord of the Underworld, we decided to grace him with a scythe. Not your ‘me grandpa used to cut grass with this blade’, but a sick war scythe worthy of the Grim Reaper that is Hades.
Zeus… well, he was our favorite heavy hitter from the beginning. And since he tosses lightning left and right, we wanted to continue the theme of hard-hitting, so it was a two-handed hammer for him. His moves are the first you will see with this new weapons setup.
Athena, as a goddess of war and wisdom, usually would wield… again, yes, the spear. Or bow and arrows. We didn’t want ranged weapons to be prominent (some ranged magic, yes), so it was sword and shield. Yeah, a bit Roman style, but hey, those guys did bring science to warfare, so it’s only appropriate that cyber goddess Athena borrow some of that wisdom.
Artemis is a young, passionate huntress. She is a true war maiden. Dual wield, duh. What’s cooler than having your favorite fighter lass slice and dice, whirl, and chop with two short swords? That was an easy answer for us.
Metis… now, here we went East for inspiration. Are you familiar with those Japanese fighting games (and anime) where a tiny girl wields a gigantic weapon? Well, our Metis is neither tiny nor Japanese, but we thought it would be fun to have her wield a huge two-handed sword.
Onwards and upwards
Ah yes, I’ve promised you to talk about the map and missions but trust me, the weapons stole the spotlight today. No worries, though, because the missions and maps are coming along nicely!
So stay tuned until the next Dev Diary. You will get to see our 3D Olympus City map come to life with (flying) cars and much more.
