Athonite - Narrative Exploration Game - Stylised Byzantine Monastery

Bomber

Athonite is a short first person 'walking simulator' with platforming elements, which I am creating as a solo final year project for my course at the University of Hertfordshire. I have been working on it for about four months and it is scheduled to be completed in May 2018.

It is set in a fantasy - alternate history universe.  As the last surviving member of a great Order of Athonite warrior-monks, the player is invited to explore an old abandoned Byzantine monastery and uncover the story behind its downfall.

You can read everything about the creative process that I have followed so far in this Pre-Production Portfolio document: https://www.dropbox.com/s/2ais2zpgahcvpmq/Athonite_Pre-Production_Portfolio.pdf

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZVxU5a1Igs

Bomber

Finished the beacon fire asset and its interaction system. When you approach the beacon, a torch icon appears as a crosshair. Click it or press an action button to trigger the cinematic which shows the beacon in flames and ends the game.

izaakb

I like a lot of how the organic materials are rendered, but I feel like there's a disconnect between organic and man-made. Maybe it's because there's more texture on it than the rocks and other objects and isn't pushing the visual/modeling as much as the rocks.

As for game-play, I like how the torch/fire is farther away, though maybe a suggestion, what if it were just up a bunch of stairs instead across a super narrow bridge? I'd feel like that'd fit a monastery better, and wouldn't be as hard for players to fall down when trying to walk in a straight line for a long time. If the stairs were done, I could imagine some stylized trees and more rocks and plants/ shrines on the way up. Visually I think it could be really cool! But that's an opinion. I don't know how you're doing with time lol. Good luck!

Bomber

izaakb said:

I like a lot of how the organic materials are rendered, but I feel like there's a disconnect between organic and man-made. Maybe it's because there's more texture on it than the rocks and other objects and isn't pushing the visual/modeling as much as the rocks.

As for game-play, I like how the torch/fire is farther away, though maybe a suggestion, what if it were just up a bunch of stairs instead across a super narrow bridge? I'd feel like that'd fit a monastery better, and wouldn't be as hard for players to fall down when trying to walk in a straight line for a long time. If the stairs were done, I could imagine some stylized trees and more rocks and plants/ shrines on the way up. Visually I think it could be really cool! But that's an opinion. I don't know how you're doing with time lol. Good luck!

Thank you for your feedback. I can see the disconnect thing. Ideally, I would want the man-made structures to have a more organic look themselves. If I have time, I will try to push that more (with more foliage for example - it's definitely one of my stretch goals).

The narrow bridge was originally meant to be an on-rail moving platform, but currently I am leaning more towards a rope bridge. I will have to experiment and see what works best, I may have to shorten its length.

Timewise, my university needs a game trailer to be completed in May, and I want to finish the playable version around that time too. I'll try to fit in as much stuff as I can until then.

Bomber

The rope bridge is in!

Bomber

Scaffoldings and other wooden structures have been added:

Bomber

I completely redid the game's lighting, to make it more atmospheric. This is the new version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVD4EzIugKY

Bomber

Athonite has reached its Alpha stage. This is its trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVQi89okYbM

A playable version can be downloaded from here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6v3yv5xs975wn64/Athonite_Alpha.rar

Bomber

Athonite is now up on The Rookies:

http://www.therookies.co/game-of-the-year/pc-console/athonite/


With a lot more foliage in it:

Bomber

I've been working on a stylised corpse/skeleton of an actual Athonite warrior-monk. Next, I want to give him some weapons, make a few different variations of him, pose them (lying dead on the ground) and place them around the level:

Bomber

Athonite has reached its Beta version. Here is the new trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AwtcEJWZ2Q


An updated executable can be downloaded from here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/y97pitql3n3am9o/Athonite_Beta.rar



And here is a full gameplay walkthrough:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dv192L82Bx0

Bomber

I've been adding more structural detail to the monastery, as well as smaller churches:

Bomber

Kirill Tokarev from 80.lv asked me some questions about Athonite and the short article I wrote has just been published:

https://80.lv/articles/simple-stylized-environment-scale-and-mood/

Bomber

Athonite's final trailer is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZVxU5a1Igs

Updated screenshots have been added to The Rookies page:

http://www.therookies.co/game-of-the-year/pc-console/athonite/

HughieDM

Some really cool work here! I like the simplistic art style.
Is this a playable game or just the video?

Bomber

HughieDM said:

Some really cool work here! I like the simplistic art style.
Is this a playable game or just the video?

Thank you

It's playable, although the focus is on the visuals. It currently has no audio - the audio person is working on setting that up now and a gameplay walkthrough will be up soon. This is the latest version of the executable: https://www.dropbox.com/s/dktv2akn44jzdnd/Athonite_NoAudio.rar

Bomber

Here is a full gameplay walkthrough of the entire level. Big thanks to Matthew Mainprize for recording this and for his awesome sound, music and audio implementation work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHiZNu3aOfI