Whereas I relish the possibility to talk with any recreation builders, it’s at all times attention-grabbing to get an opportunity to speak to up and coming indie builders. Rising Lords is a technique recreation that has been in Early Entry over on Steam for a short time, and it’s going to be making its Nintendo Swap debut on January 18th of 2024. The event staff behind it, Argonwood, was based by a pair of German brothers who wished to make one thing impressed by their previous favorites. One of many two, Chris Fernholz, took time from his busy schedule to reply just a few questions we had in regards to the recreation. Additionally, pizza toppings. As a result of I’m incorrigible. Let’s get to it!
TouchArcade (TA): Hello, thanks for giving us your time as we speak. Are you able to let our readers know just a little bit about your self? And, per TouchArcade custom, inform us your favourite pizza toppings?
Chris Fernholz (CF): Hello, and thanks for the possibility to speak to you! Argonwood relies in Cologne, Germany, and was based by my brother Manu and me (Chris) 5 years in the past and we now have been engaged on Rising Lords full-time since then. Now we have been supported by just a few freelancers however Argonwood is a really small staff nonetheless. We initially studied electrical engineering and sociology, however we now have been programming and drawing all our lives. Creating video games will be very time-consuming, the remainder of the time we regularly spend with our households or enjoying video games ourselves. Manu likes his pizza very fundamental, with cheese, tomatoes, and mozzarella. I not too long ago discovered a brand new favourite with Hollandaise sauce and Kebab, however you’ll be able to’t actually eat this greater than as soon as every week.
TA: Are you able to give us the short pitch for Rising Lords? What ought to our readers be excited for?
CF: Rising Lords is a medieval turn-based technique recreation with components from board and card video games. The story marketing campaign for Rising Lords is actually the factor we’re most enthusiastic about. It brings our core recreation components collectively completely together with a deep story and nice paintings harking back to the medieval ages. It’s the proper single-player expertise, however you can too play sandbox matches with different gamers or towards AI. With simultaneous area administration and constructing in addition to tactical battles with a well-balanced unit counter system, terrain, ability playing cards, morale, and extra, that is particularly thrilling to play with pals.
TA: I’ve seen the basic Lords of the Realm 2 cited as your predominant inspiration for this recreation, however are you able to inform us about every other inspirations?
CF: Now we have actually taken some inspiration from many alternative genres and video games that we now have performed for greater than 30 years, even pen-and-paper video games and board video games like Heroquest and Chess. HOMM, the Whole Conflict sequence and Civilisation actually had an affect when speaking about PC video games. As you already talked about, the non secular prequel is Lords of the Realm 2, though we utterly modified many features — battles was actual time for instance.
TA: What have been a number of the challenges concerned in bringing this recreation to the Nintendo Swap?
CF: Making the sport prepared for Nintendo Swap was actually a problem. There may be the restricted {hardware} after all, and we needed to reshape and rewrite a number of core features to match that. Additionally, technique video games are normally performed with a mouse. Nintendo Swap has the benefit of contact controls, however even with out these we have been capable of work with snapping factors so that you simply don’t should play with a joystick as a mouse; as a substitute can choose the related gadgets and figures with the D-Pad.
TA: Are there any new or unique components within the Swap model of the sport?
CF: No. we wished to be sure that the expertise is similar throughout all platforms. However, this additionally signifies that the Swap model has every little thing included that the opposite variations have as properly.
TA: What are a few of your present favourite video games within the turn-based technique style?
CF: Though technically solely half of it’s turn-based, our long-time favourite for technique video games is the Whole Conflict sequence. Rome, Medieval, Shogun, Warhammer — you title it. A must have for us is a working multiplayer although.
TA: What do you suppose is the good factor about Rising Lords?
CF: We expect Rising Lords takes the perfect features from completely different technique video games and merges them on an accessible degree. Area administration, story marketing campaign, tactical battles, multiplayer, and so forth. A lot bigger video games function a few of these features in better element, however others are sometimes not very approachable or fairly fundamental. One other factor that most individuals adore lots is our distinctive artwork fashion.
TA: What was the pondering behind that particular artwork fashion? Any specific inspirations there?
CF: The unique thought was to make Rising Lords really feel like a medieval board recreation. That’s the place Lewis Chessmen got here into play and served as an inspiration for our models. Different components are primarily based on medieval tapestry paintings from this time interval. The medieval and even the traditional world have been much more vibrant than folks suppose! Colors fade over time, however Rising Lords brings them again to life.
TA: Are you able to inform us about one thing you wished to incorporate within the recreation that simply couldn’t be completed?
CF: One of many issues we had with the sport and the lengthy growth time was that we included much more issues than we initially deliberate. If there was one factor lacking that we had thought-about at one level, it might be devoted sea battles with ships.
TA: Thanks once more for talking with us! Do you will have every other message you need to give to our readers? That is your free area to take action!
CF: In our opinion, there will not be many technique video games obtainable on Nintendo Swap. There are even fewer medieval turn-based video games. Time to shake up some stagnant mechanics and take a look at one thing completely different! Particularly for these searching for a soothing gaming expertise, alone or with pals. Now we have created a complete new medieval world for everybody to discover, stuffed with heroic adventures and lovable characters.
Thanks once more to Chris for answering our questions, and for Derek at Hound PR for facilitating. Rising Lords will probably be coming to Nintendo Swap on January 18th, 2024. We’ll doubtless be doing a overview of the sport, so do stay up for that when the time comes.
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