Kurt Gantz
A mechanical engineer by degree, Kurt has taken his knowledge of control systems and combined them with a passion for video game development. A desire to always improve will ensure innovation and quality in every project.
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Scripter/ Programmer
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Animator
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Sound Designer
Austin Gantz
Austin has a degree in digital
art + design and enjoys bringing concepts to life through 2D and 3D mediums.
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3D Modeler
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2D/ Concept Artist
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Texture Artist
ACTION ROLE-PLAYING GAME
For example, if a Rith generates a larger horn, it can tear it off to use as a weapon, making the enemy much more dangerous. However, if the player spots the horn quickly, they can prioritize the enemy to prevent a more dangerous situation.
Rith will have dozens of similar interactions to keep game play fresh and engaging. These randomized properties apply not only to a Riths offense, but their defense as well.
A prominent defensive component in the demo is the carbon head plate. This plate makes a single enemy much more difficult to fight. This component cannot be damaged and blocks more than half of a Riths head.
Crystal deposits can similarly be generated, taking a single shot to destroy before the area behind is made vulnerable. Just these two elements add a lot of dynamics to a standard head shot, and these elements are just the beginning.
The Rith
Enemies in Rail Theory will have some unique mechanics to keep game play interesting and engaging. Various elements of every enemy will be randomly selected from a pool of hand designed assets. Each asset will change some element of the enemies physical characteristics, abilities, and behavior. These attributes will affect both individual and group behavior.
Feature Overview
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Randomized Enemy Components
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Dynamic Difficulty
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Innovative Health System
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Unique, Multi-Purpose Weaponry
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Cause and Effect Environments
Innovative
Health System
The Rail Theory demo features a unique health system that directly complements the randomized enemy components.
The health system is composed of three main elements: armor, trauma, and stamina. As the player takes damage, armor decreases while trauma increases. As trauma increases, effects such as increased aim shake and decreased mobility start to surface, making survival more difficult.
The stamina begins to fill from the current level of trauma on the right half of the gauge. Therefore, the higher trauma is, the less total stamina there is available to work with. This makes it much more difficult to perform actions such as sprints or melee attacks.
Additionally, the different weapons an enemy can generate do varying amounts of damage to armor and trauma depending on their properties.
For example. a blunt weapon will do high trauma damage, while doing relatively low armor damage. However, a sharp brittle weapon would do high armor damage and low trauma damage.
The blunt weapons impact would be felt through leather armor, but would not damage it much, while a sharp brittle weapon would cut the leather, but shatter before doing much bodily harm. Similarly, a caustic attack would damage armor, but not trauma. If armor runs out, both the armor and trauma component of damage will go straight to trauma.
Enemy weapons will also be able to change in real time. Being hit with a blunt weapon could cause it to shatter, turning it into a sharp dagger. The first hit would do high trauma damage with low armor damage, and the second hit would do high armor damage, but low trauma damage. The weapon could similarly shatter if it is shot by the player, whether this is done accidentally or by choice.
This concept is demonstrated in the demo when fighting Fire Onus. As pieces begin to break off his hammer, it begins to sharpen, drastically increasing his damage output as the fight goes on.
Dynamic Difficulty
When playing Rail Theory, several in game statistics will affect the enemies in real time. In the demo, higher accuracy and lower damage taken directly influences how likely an enemy is to have a carbon head plate or a more dangerous weapon. These self-calibrating game mechanics tie in perfectly with the randomized enemy assets and allows players to be challenged in different ways.
In the finished game, this system will change up game-play by testing to see if the player is getting too used certain enemy mechanics. The behavior and component pools of enemies will then change in real time to keep game-play fresh and engaging.
Enemies will also adapt while being fought. Shooting too many crystal deposits while trying to take down an enemy may cause more crystals to grow back in less opportune locations, like on their hands, arms, or over a previous weak point, making them more dangerous as a result of misplaced shots.
This type of target shooting is very engaging, especially when facing more than one enemy at a time. You’ll be able to make decisions about how to start and handle various engagements depending on your available resources.
The dynamic difficulty system was also used in the demo to fight an alternate, more diffcult version of Onus.
The Foyl
Dredge
The Foyl Dredge is a unique weapon that can be used for both melee and ranged attacks. It is powered by the crystals created by the Rith, who use them as a means of storing energy. Shots from the Foyl Dredge can be fired normally or charged, creating high damage shots at the exchange of accuracy.
The weapon can also be used to do a powerful melee chain, at the cost of the same ammo that is used for ranged attacks. Contextual attacks can also be performed on staggered enemies. These opportunistic attacks siphon energy from the enemy being hit and do not use ammo.
Additionally, shots from the Foyl Dredge pierce crystals, bypassing one of the Rith’s main means of defense. Many of the randomized elements of the Rith will be built around interactions with the Foyl Dredge.
The weapon will also feature a unique upgrade path that will incentivize different play styles.
Cause and Effect Environments
Rail Theory will have open level design, so there will be multiple ways to progress at any given moment. However, doing certain areas before others will cause changes in surrounding areas. These changes will affect both the environments themselves, as well as the enemies and boss fights within them.
For example, doing a frozen area first may result in events that cause part of a caustic area to freeze over. Parts of the environment and the enemies of this newly changed caustic area will have different properties and enemies than if the caustic area had been done first.
In the demo, the dynamic difficulty system was used as a criteria to change the final area from a calming change of pace to a continuation of the cave's horror theme.
This gives the game a lot of replayability, as the order of levels changes surrounding areas. Time will also change certain environments. Going to a certain level early may result in stable bridges and locked doors in a certain area. However, going back later will reveal the bridges are now too corroded to use. Additionally, the hinges of the locked doors may now have rusted to the point where the doors can be knocked down to explore new areas.
Rail Theory
Rail Theory is an action RPG with an innovative dynamic difficulty system. The game features several innovations designed around randomized enemy components and open level design.
Kurt Gantz
A mechanical engineer by degree, Kurt has taken his knowledge of control systems and combined them with a passion for video game development. A desire to always improve will ensure innovation and quality in every project.
-
Scripter/ Programmer
-
Animator
-
Sound Designer
Austin Gantz
Austin has a degree in digital
art + design and enjoys bringing concepts to life through 2D and 3D mediums.
-
3D Modeler
-
2D/ Concept Artist
-
Texture Artist
Enemy Concepts
Rail Theory will have a diverse range of enemy types, each having unique properties based on their locations in the world. Below are a few concepts you can look forward to in the game. Several of these designs where featured in the proof of concept demo.
Thanks For Stopping By
We hope you've enjoyed our proof of concept for Rail Theory. Definitely check out the demo and let us know if you enjoyed it!
The Devs
