Bound By Flame - E3 2013 interview and Previews

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Bound by Flame was at E3 but seems to be ignored by most sites. Here are two previews and a new interview video.

Bound by Flame Interview with Jehanne Rousseau at E3 2013

RPGFan

Bound by Flame is not designed as a full open world, but instead is divided into chapters, with each chapter having its own quest hub and areas to explore. Because of this design, we were told that the game will be "semi-linear," but with a heavy focus on story.

Combat appears to fairly standard action RPG fare, though we were impressed by the creative monster designs and the detailed environments in which you'll fight. Over the course of the game, you'll meet up to five potential companions, of which two at a time can join you in battle. While you only directly control your own character, you can issue commands and assign set behaviors to your AI-controlled companions.

Outside of battle, you'll interact with your companions and NPCs through a variety of dialog options, a WRPG staple. Depending on your choices, you can affect your relationship with other characters, enough that certain companions may even leave your party if you alienate them enough. For you lovers out there, yes, there will also be romance options.

We don't yet know if Bound by Flame will break the mold of the dark fantasy action RPG, but the wealth of customization options and imaginative monster designs show promise. Maybe being possessed by a hellish flame demon isn't so bad after all.
SideQuesting
Bound by Flame utilizes a traditional Third Person Action RPG gameplay system: run around and slash at enemies, use magic, level up through skill trees. There’s crafting, alliances, and conversation choices. There are up to five additional party members than can join in, and multiple side quests that pop up, seven per party member. The visuals carry a sort of dark fantasy style, with plenty of skeletons and giant demons running around. The environments we saw during our demo presentation showed us the insides of caves, tops of cliffs, and warrior encampments. Characters look like knights or savages, wizards or fighters. It’s not going to blow your socks off from that respect.

Where it does do some interesting things is in the morality side. The main character, which can be created based on our gender and appearance whims, has been possessed by a fire demon. As the game progresses and choices are made to gain power, take the hard way, do good or bad, our hero can become more possessed by the entity, slowly turning into one along the way. The change is both physical and plot-based, too. In our presentation the character grew horns, became scaly, more muscular and threatening, and the appearance will be different based on how we’ve designed our characters. The game’s different factions and allegiances will change, since some groups are considered pure and others are nearly cult-like towards the demon.

It’s a little like the team took the idea of Mass Effect 2‘s Shepard physical changes and expounded upon them to the nth degree.

It’s an intriguing idea that may inspire a few playthroughs, as players take different paths and make different choices along the way. It seems like it has the ability to make everyone’s experience with it unique. It’s still early in development, and has been pushed out of 2013 into the beginning of 2014. Though it’s being developed for XBLA , PSN, and PC right now, the team hasn’t made any choices yet for next gen consoles as of yet.
More information.
 
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Enjoyed that interview with Jehanne, she is a joy to listen to with her exquisite accent. She is also a very good script writer. They have an excellent engine and it shows from the character and world models, and from Mars War Logs.

Looking forward to their game.
 
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Enjoyed that interview with Jehanne, she is a joy to listen to with her exquisite accent. She is also a very good script writer. They have an excellent engine and it shows from the character and world models, and from Mars War Logs.

Looking forward to their game.
I agree despite Fluent's review I have enjoyed everyone of their releases. At least this time they have a publisher so that means a bigger budget.
 
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It'll probably feel like Orcs and Men with a reskin, as they're really mass producing games while the engine lasts. That means another 10 hour corridor RPG, with some good ideas and decent writing. I honestly think these guys are talented enough to make truly good games, but that won't happen while they're popping out several games per year.
 
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Exactly. Maybe they could do a lot better, but aren't allowed, because then no salary from the esteemed publisher/investor.

So they must churn out this crap. Generic, lifeless thing, bad particle effects, mediocre animation, stealing from God of War and god know where else. Buyers of today , if they buy this worthless junk must be themselves made of same material what they consume.
 
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I didn't play Orcs and Men, but I thought Mars: War Logs was decent enough. This looks like it has enough potential to be worth keeping an eye on.
 
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Exactly. Maybe they could do a lot better, but aren't allowed, because then no salary from the esteemed publisher/investor.

So they must churn out this crap. Generic, lifeless thing, bad particle effects, mediocre animation, stealing from God of War and god know where else. Buyers of today , if they buy this worthless junk must be themselves made of same material what they consume.

That's harsh. Do not pretend to know me, good sir.
 
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So they must churn out this crap. Generic, lifeless thing, bad particle effects, mediocre animation, stealing from God of War and god know where else. Buyers of today , if they buy this worthless junk must be themselves made of same material what they consume.

Then to you Witcher 2, Dark Souls, Darksiders .. etc. are all god of war copies! From your comments I assume you are a console gamer mainly.

Spiders' games have creative ideas and talented rpg team behind them that goes beyond just very good combat.
 
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Not sure why is that game ignored, but I'm gonna buy it.
No matter if it's short or not. Better a short bugless game, than 400+ hours bug-o-rama.
 
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Their games are rather shortish and linear, but at least they are well done and immersive. And looking at mars: far from overpriced, in comparison.

God of war? LOL.
 
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I've played Game of Thrones, Mars: War Logs, and one of the God of War games and don't even see a remote resemblance between the games by Spiders and God of Wars. There was one big difference though and that I enjoyed both games by Spiders that I played but didn't even remotely like the God of War game I played. (I don't remember which God of War game I played)

PS. It would be great if they would have a bigger budget so that they can make the games better.
 
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God of war? What on earth….?

GoW is an all-out balls-to-the-blood-spattered-walls action adventure series. It's fantastic fun for what its worth, it was never positioned to be an RPG.

Bound By Flame looks more like it's inspired by Dark Souls/Witcher.
 
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She said bigger, probably about 25 hours and add the fact that different playthru's open different paths. I'm interested, this looks like it will be substantially deeper then Mars.
 
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