Celestian Tales: Old North. - A Traditional Narrative-Driven RPG

Couchpotato

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Well by now most of you should know I love 2D traditional RPG's. So because of that I bring you a new kickstarter called Celestian Tales: Old North.

Traditional narrative-driven RPG. An epic of love, faith, and justice. Six characters. Three decades. How will you shape the Old North?

Celestian Tales: Old North is inspired by JRPG titles of the 90s, the era of SNES and PlayStation. We strive to recreate the retro feel but add our own modern touches on top of it. For example, our native resolution is 800 x 600 instead of 640 x 480, we use high-resolution hand-drawn character illustrations for dialogues instead of pixel art, and user interfaces are made with seamless animation.

Stemming from our love of great stories and narrative-driven games, Celestian Tales is a direct fruition of seven years of brewing ideas, concocting intrigues, and sculpting a living, breathing world through D&D 3.5e, D&D 4e, Pathfinder, Iron Kingdoms RPG, and many other tabletop RPGs. The story of Old North is derived from one of our dedicated campaigns which ran weekly sessions for a year long. Have you ever created an original character and wished he/she could be alive in some form? This is it — this is that hope made reality.

Have you ever felt nostalgic about classic RPGs you played in your youth? Are you an old school gamer like us who long to taste once again how a game with simple graphics could move our hearts? To play a game which memories you'll cherish deeply for a long time? Perhaps you've never experienced it yet have heard about legends of the past?
More information.
 
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OK, watching that guy talk was just flat out spooky. Weird voice-over!
 
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OK, watching that guy talk was just flat out spooky. Weird voice-over!
Well English isn't his main language probably. I had no problem understanding him.:)
 
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The concept art kind of got to me, but I was quickly taken out of that by the gameplay footage
 
Hi everyone, I'm the guy who appears in that video =D

Sorry for my English. It's not my first language, so I tried my best to sound as western as I could. Do you have suggestions for me to fix it?

@Sacred_Path: We're very open to gamers who voice their opinions =D If it doesn't bother you, would you please elaborate what you'd like to see in a traditional 2D RPG's footage?
 
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Monblade why would you go something you're not? Don't fix something that isn't broken.

As for the game... Looks promising. I'm not driven off by gameplay footage since I'm interested mainly into a story. But to be honest with you, if this is a smartphone game being ported onto PC, and it looks like it is, I won't be supporting it. Sorry.
 
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Monblade why would you go something you're not? Don't fix something that isn't broken.

As for the game… Looks promising. I'm not driven off by gameplay footage since I'm interested mainly into a story. But to be honest with you, if this is a smartphone game being ported onto PC, and it looks like it is, I won't be supporting it. Sorry.
Joxer it's for PC/MAC, and Linux. Nowhere in the description does it say it was a smartphone game.
 
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I just listened to the presentation and your english was fine; I think they are being unreasonably harshed.

Hi everyone, I'm the guy who appears in that video =D

Sorry for my English. It's not my first language, so I tried my best to sound as western as I could. Do you have suggestions for me to fix it?

@Sacred_Path: We're very open to gamers who voice their opinions =D If it doesn't bother you, would you please elaborate what you'd like to see in a traditional 2D RPG's footage?
 
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@Sacred_Path: We're very open to gamers who voice their opinions =D If it doesn't bother you, would you please elaborate what you'd like to see in a traditional 2D RPG's footage?

Let's just say I was hoping for something that doesn't look like it was made with RPGMaker

But I'm not exactly squarely in your target group anyway as I rarely play JRPGs
 
Looks interesting, Im a little burned out on KS funds for now, but I'll keep an eye. I think I may back this and Dungeonmans as well =).
 
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Lost me in the second where I saw the smartie monsters which was like in the first after clicking the headline in RSS.
 
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I like the idea of the thirty-year time span, and the thing that attracted me most was the one piece of concept art showing a character (Reynard?) at three different ages. I would feature that aspect more heavily in your pitch: lots of games say your choices affect the world, but games that actually make that happen in an interesting way are rare.

Also, can you give a bit more detail on how the gameplay is deeper than the old-style JRPGs? What exactly is the role that D&D 3.X/Pathfinder plays in the system -- because that's a game I really love.

My negatives: I do have nostalgia for the 90s-style JRPGs, "smartie monsters" and all, but I'm not eager to spend ages grinding in the same repetitive combat system those games got by with. So I'd be reassured by a really crunchy update on the mechanics (the kind of thing Obsidian does with Eternity) showing that there's more to the combat than press-A-to-attack and hit-ice-monsters-with-fire.

I'm perfectly happy with barebones graphics, but I have to admit that the combat screenshot suggested a barebones style of gameplay. What are you doing to make the combat interesting now that we're all twenty years older?
 
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@RedSocialKnight:
Old-style JRPGs commonly are quite linear in their combat system. First you wake up with a wooden sword. Then you roam around a forest and find an Iron Sword. Then buy a Bronze Sword in the next town. And so on, and so on.

In CT:ON, we're making equipments horizontally equal. For example, a Longsword in DnD 3.5 is more accurate than a Warhammer, but has lower damage output. This applies to every single character's weapons and armors. You don't just simply buy the next tier, you'll think a bit about what best to use.

The full combat mechanics are scheduled for an update, so do keep in touch =)

Regarding "smartie monsters", we actually designed it so that you can REFUSE to do battles. In fact, one of our side-quests involve you going to a sacred grove. If you managed not to harm any of the monsters there, the forest spirits would give you something in return of being a 'friend' to them.

Also, all six characters gain exp and level up even though you win a combat with only three, so that you don't have to grind just to level someone in case you want to change party members.

We designed the combat graphics barebone-like to represent old-school RPGs, but if there's a lot of request to 'upgrade' it into a more 3D-ish pixel art, we'll try making a sample or two and ask for opinions.

Thanks for the comments, everyone. I'll be hanging around here, so don't hesitate to ask anything. =D
 
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Where is the kickstarter for an Amberstar remake?!
 
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