Ambitious Open-World RPG Skyclimbers Is Coming To Switch, Subject To Crowdfunding Success

Procedurally-generated and looks strangely familiar...

Looks like Assassin's Creed × Zelda × Immortals Fenyx Rising, but you know what, I'm interested.

Mmm seriously interested.

lol at those BOTW looking characters and background sets in screenshot 2... not very subtle inspiration.

Looks good, Might have to look out for this one.

Good Old Kickstarter Switch ransoming, no thanks

With the Switch soon to enter its 5th year, I wouldn't feel comfortable funding a title that hasn't even started proper development yet. It could be 2 or 3 years off at least. Especially from an unknown developer, who so far have released just 1 game for VR devices and currently have 2 more in development with no release date. Now they're taking on another one?

The one game they have released, Sky Climbers VR, has limited information online but I did find a couple of reviews. They say it looks great and starts well but then after a while, it's clear the game was released before being finished and becomes a buggy mess.

I don't do Kickstarter but if I did, I wouldn't go near this one.

Edit - I just realised that this new game is an open world version of that only release, the unfinished buggy mess. Yeah, I'd stay well away from this.

Good news about the game itself, but don't tell me the fandom just started hallucinating "BotW clones" yet again. Did that sequel teaser cause some kind of abstinence syndrome or something?

@OorWullie Thanks for doing the due diligence for us!

@OorWullie just FYI, based on their Steam page, it should release in about 2 months (March 1st, 2021).

But their Kickstarter is not live yet. It's been approved, but isn't live. Wondering what they need money for...we'll see soon. I just subscribed to get notified, just out of curiosity.

Ah, the release in March will be Early Access it looks like.

"The world will be randomly generated." Yeah I'm out.

It originally launched as an Early Access in...2017! On their Steam page, there is a few reviews from back then.

Hey guys, developer here.

Sorry for all the confusion, we really didn't expect this kind of coverage just yet and our website is currently under construction.

To clear some things up right off the bat: @jipiboily

• BoTW was not the first game to utilize Gothic cathedrals and large green landscapes @Clyde_Radcliffe
• The engines entire code base has been pre-screened for android APK and we are targeting Switch / Mobile regardless of crowdfunding.
• Therefore any claims that we will be using Kickstarter to leverage money towards the Switch are not validated, and in fact Switch isn't even one of our stretch goals.@Bunkerneath
• As VR only experiment, we did launch and update an Early access version of the game to positive reviews on Steam consistently for over 3 years. However, we decided to instead move forward with third person as it makes the development process much faster.
• Only certain game modes will make use of the proc gen engine, other game modes will allow players to experience a linear story with finite world boundaries, hand placed story features, and set characters. @Captain_Toad
• Other than visual style, musical choice, and open world traversal "climb anything go anywhere" we have a very different core game that is built around city building and simulation. @nhSnork
• The "unfinished buggy mess" was a by product of accommodating multiple VR platforms with a small development team while also pushing the boundaries in terms of player movement, physics, and world scale. Not a reflection of the teams ability. Despite these issues, the original builds still hold up with a 80% positive review rating.
• As a development team we have learned from our mistakes, and will NEVER release a product again before it is ready, which is precisely why we have chosen to go down the route of Kickstarter / closed Pre-alpha instead of using Steams Early Access program as a paid tester scam like so many developers and publishers continue to do today. @OorWullie

@Paratope

Thanks for providing us some clarity.

I'm all for procedurally generated landscapes if they enhance an otherwise fully-fleshed out world with hours more content. We're a long way from the Arena and Daggerfall days, but this seems like a good compromise between fine-detail open games like Morrowind/Oblivion (which this looks like too)/Skyrim/Breath of the Wild etc and massive proc gen games like Morrowind's predecessors.

Daggerfall was MASSIVE - the size of the real world UK - but proc gen. Morrowind by comparison is tiny. It's roughly half the size of Skyrim, which is roughly half the size of Breath of the Wild, which is roughly the size of the city of Kyoto (so Morrowind was roughly 1/4 the size of Kyoto). But Morrowind and those other non-proc gen games are highly details with much more interesting story environs and used mountains and other barriers smartly to make the game feel bigger than it is (Breath of the Wild peels that away a bit by letting you climb anything, but it only starts to feel small once you have enough stamina to actually climb anything without falling (and even then you gotta luck out with weather), or can warp all over to every shrine across the map, or have the master cycle zero to zoom around the map).

I'm looking forward to more games taking this merged approach.

@marandahir No problem, if you have any other questions, ask away.

There is a reddit thread from r/nintendo you can read here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/nintendo/comments/kpm809/we_are_paratope_and_were_working_on_a_breath_of/

This goes over many of the commonly asked questions around the game.

Glad that it's not just another Pokemon-like games and you're actually going on an actual story quest with the monsters you befriended quite like Dragon Quest V. Definitely may check this out as it came to fruition.

I like the solemn Nordic-esque vibe from the trailer. Will check it out.

I'm struggling to see the ambition, myself.

@Paratope

Oh, thanks for responding!

Oh, ok. The random generation is in certain modes only.

Also was wondering about when you're going RPG'ing in an rng world with 10+ hours in (if it's possible your mode goes that many hours) and in impassable RNG seneario pops up. Is there something in place that prevents that from happening, because I feel that would be frustrating.

They took those archer towers straight out of a very familiar game.

This contains some of my favourite things in gaming: Kickstarter, procedurally generated, BotW "inspired". Hopefully it has DLCs and microtransactions to be the perfect game to never land on my wishlist.

@Rhaoulos You have a great point!

Nostos, Decay of Logos, Windbound, the list goes on and on of unsuccessful or completely abandoned "BoTW Inspired games" however the key difference here is that other than visual style, musical choice, and open-world nature our game is completely different.

In fact, at its core Skyclimbers is a city-building multiplayer experience, with other elements scattered into the mix which makes it distinct from any other "BoTW inspired games" to date, and will allow it to distinguish itself from BoTW side by side with ease.

Kickstarter is a valuable tool for indie developers to avoid publisher and investor interest. Would you rather us go to a private investor who may require us to ship an unfinished game in order to satisfy shareholders? While not perfect, Kickstarter does allow developers to make products directly for the communities they serve, rather than making a profit for an uninvolved third party.

And the big one, procedural generation, which as you may already know is a core part of modern AAA development. Even a game like BoTW uses proc gen systems to generate grass or terrain before designers adjust it to their liking.

The decision to use Proc gen was made in order to increase the amount of content and scale the game could handle with limited team size.

No DLC or Microtransactions are planned, and Nintendo doesn't have a patent on rugged wooden archer tower designs. 😏

All that said, we hope to break this trend and do right by the community by providing a long term roadmap for gameplay at no additional cost, while also delivering a playable product early, and not running away with peoples money for 5 years like many other Kickstarter games.

Hopefully, this gives you some insight as to why certain decisions were made.

Sounds way too overly ambitious. I hope it doesn’t turn into a buggy mess like games like Decay of Logos

will this have character creation?

@anoyonmus Yes!

@Paratope so any gender? are you sure.

Can you send me the game info

@anoyonmus Gender, body, type, hair style, face skin, promise!

You can learn more on the Steam page:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1362000/Skyclimbers/

@Paratope

can you show me to the kickstarter page. I hope the goal gets reached.

Also why does this game look a lot like botw in terms of graphics.

@anoyonmus Any cell shaded game with foggy atmosphere and semi realistic medieval buildings looks like BoTW.

Here is our pre launch page!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/skyclimbers/skyclimbers-a-multiplayer-city-building-action-rpg

@Paratope Thanks for coming here and clarifying things. I subscribed to be notified for the Kickstarter.

Regarding Early Access, I don't think it's a scam, if well done. i.e., having a relatively polished product but that will incorporate feedback quickly and move fast. Which I think is kinda hard for smaller teams. But it can work exceptionally well (think of Hades, for example).

Looking forward to your KS page with all the details