[Role Playing Game] Call of the Swarm: The Chosen One DEMO

[The Nightmare Book]

CALL OF THE SWARM

THE CHOSEN ONE

"Answer the Call, Embrace the Darkness."

OVERVIEW

A single-player, story-driven RPG, positing itself as an official spin-off to the "Call of the Swarm" campaign, cause story upholds in parallel to the original campaign.
This project was deeply inspired by Baldurs Gate 3, Cult of the Lamb and Dune.

You are qiraji prophet Zaqash, an ancient evil reborn who seeks to purify and restore faith in this "god-forsaken" land.
Visit iconic wildlands - Barrens - and claim them for All-Seeing Eye. Or fall, trying.
Solve difficult problems, convert infidels into righteous faith, and seed disarray among your enemies - "The Chosen One" deeply focuses on role-playing and cult building, and trust me - you'll see many unusual situations, and who knows - which way you'll complete your impossible task.

STORY

"Barrens.
So many emotions invoke this one simple word.
Nearly endless lands of once verdant lush forests, now Barrens are short of supply and green, land of constant strife and struggle for survival.

But in this sea of centaurs and quilboars, there are unusual aliens called silithids has been saw here.
You are prophet Zaqash, and with their help, you will subdue the untamable energy of Barrens...
Or die, trying."

FEATURES

EXPLORE WILDLANDS
Discover iconic Barrens - even a thousand years before their iconic entrance, this land is still plagued by eternal conflict.
Explore, hunt, corrupt, dominate - only the fittest survive here.

STRANGERS IN STRANGE LAND
You are aqirs - aliens to this land.
Your choices matter a lot. Your freedom is nearly absolute. What will you do to peaceful taurens? Or cunning quilboars?
Think twice before acting as locals thrice to remember actions and words. Bloodshed should be the last argument.
Arrange alliances, dismay enemies, and convert unfaithful - "The Chosen One" allows you to choose.

POWERS OF THE VOID
You are a powerful qiraji prophet - a creature, born out of darkness incarnate.
Master different shadow-powered spells, break the minds of weaklings, and change your appearance by will only.
This is playground and who knows - are you master... Or puppet?

LEAD THE FAITHFUL
You are Prophet and what prophet are you without a cult? Raise your hideous, shadow empire under the noses of petty warlords.
Charm the lustful, break strong, convert doubters, and control the weaklings in the name of the All-Seeing Eye.
All in the name of God.

MEDIA

MODEL CREDITS	ICON CREDITS	MISCELLANEOUS CREDITS	KNOWN ISSUES
TBA	TBA	TBA	TBA

DEVELOPMENT LOG

1. DevLog #1: "Disguise Self & Combat System" - 11/04/2024;
2. DevLog #2: "Map Art: Barrens in Camera" - 19/04/2024;
3. DevLog #3: "What about Music? More about Map Art" - 05.05.2024;
4. DevLog #4: "The Chosen One Demo: Teasing Locations..." - 08.06.2024;
5. DevLog #5: "The Chosen One Demo: Select Your Hero" - 13.06.2024;
6. DevLog #6: "The Chosen One Demo: State of Development" - 25.07.2024;
7. DevLog #7: "The Chosen One Demo: Speak With Dead!" - 03.08.2024;
8. DevLog #8: "The Chosen One Demo: State of Development #2" - 12.08.2024;
9. Urgent Message #1: "Call of the Swarm - For Willing & Unwilling Support!" - 20.08.2024;

<DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION>

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"Remember - Nothing is hidden under His gaze..."

 

[The Nightmare Book]

And here we are!
Another unfinished project, huh?

Maybe you didn't understand anything, so let me clarify:

• I'm not a fan of Baldur's Gate 3, however, during its walkthrough I enjoyed how many possibilities and unusual features this game offers to players, still not transforming into an immersive simulator;
• "The Chosen One" won't be a turn-based RPG, but rather a classic story action RPG similar to "Call of the Swarm" and "Pearl of Azshara", if I compare it to my other projects.
• Choices. I want to give you many different variants for every situation in-game, different endings, etc. Let's say that the prologue part of the map will show it to you, so I will ask you - your bugs have caught a night elf pair, who casually walking in your nest, what you will do with them?
• Disguses. You can morph, and change your alliances with that simple feature. And Rise of Qiraji will contain some kinky stuff...
• NPC will "remember" what you had said to them and act accordingly. Do not expect Radiant AI, it will be a simple but fun system.
• I'll explain your main hero abilities system later, even I can do it right now.
• You can speak with the dead like D&D;
• You can speak with animals like D&D.
• Giraffes WOULD NOT want to conquer the whole of Azeroth, what nonsense is that?!

In the coming days, we will talk and watch about disguises and combat systems.
Ah, and in the topic start post, I uploaded a simple video with Diablo-styled walking - you can hold your left mouse button and Zaqash will walk toward the cursor. Simple yet nice.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

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Today I want to talk with you about 2 things: Disguise Self and Combat System. All of these are related to our main hero, Prophet Zaqash.

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Disguise Self

casually morphin'

• Disguise Self is powerful trickery - albeit you need to steal the desired guise. How? That's an open question...
• Inspired by Baldurs Gate 3, changing your form means changing your person. Like did you kill one NPC as qiraji? Don't worry, without proper magic skills, no one would suspect you in your quilboar guise as a murderer.
• Changing guises means a change of your alignment: as a centaur, you can freely contact other centaur and their allies or friends. And your allies/enemies list will change freely as you change your guise. Aqirs and one another race can sense you through guise, so your relation with them won't change;
• You are a priest, remember? With some mind magic and proper words, you can easily convert people to the will of the All-Seeing Eye;
• Your crimes in one guise won't put on another;
• You can take all quests on the map, even from hostile factions!
• Cinematics will adapt to your current form;
• You can achieve some endings more easily if you acquire and use particular disguises.

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Combat System

• Unlike disguises, I cannot show much for now as I didn't implement it.
• However, take a close look at this table:

Spell-Filler [Q] =>	Spell - Help [W] =>	Spell - Seria [E] =>	Spell - Ultimate [R]
Use it to acquire combo points and generate mana for the next spells; mostly auto-use if you want	Use it to buff yourself or heal; the effect benefits from filler.	List of spells: from weak up to big; benefit from fillers too; rotation is circular	Uses a lot of mana, even if its passive; benefits from all other spells

• Spells won't be hard to understand, you will be able to freely change and choose new spells for slots;
• You can fight without casting, but it will be harder than active casting.

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That's all for today, folks. Thanks for your attention.

The next development diary will be focused on map art, featuring prominent locations and views.
See you soon, cya!

 

[The Nightmare Book]

The next development diary will be focused on map art, featuring prominent locations and views.
See you soon, cya!

And here we are, in another, very short development diary.
Today I'll show you... Pictures, mostly. Continuing my work over "The Chosen One", you'll see that the main landscape work is finished, and now started doodad and actual location creation.
Some locations were teased in the previous development diary if you look closely into a morphing gif...

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Map Global View: Current State

Gallery of Locations (WIP)

Yes, I'm slightly dumb and sleepy, just open images on a new page for the full screen ;P

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That's all for today, folks. Thanks for your attention.

The next development diaries will focus on races inhabiting The Barrens.
As my part of the story RPG teller in D&D style, I see it like a book and I'm a humble storyteller only.
But, just as a prelude, the next development diary will tell you more about NPC's in "The Chosen One" - it's important to know before we start the actual story.
Oh, and maybe I'll share some actual gameplay videos for that.
See you soon, cya!

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Hey, how are you? I hope that is not bad. Even I'm myself got slightly ill and busy with irl tasks, I can find some time for answering that swarm call...
That post was not on schedule, but I decided to share some information: screenshots and... music!

Lets start from some screenshots. They represent only some locations I want to share with you, don't mark up them as finished, everything is work in progress!

Gallery of Locations (WIP)

Yes, well, screenshots feature some iconic oases from Barrens, where centauri live, and total map look - already old.

Music? AI? (WIP)

What else? I said "music"? Well, recently I got myself stuck with blasting Suno.ai service and for testing purposes, created 2 next "soundtracks" - mind them as examples, not rather actual music in this map. And with free package, all tracks are limited to 120 seconds of sound, before suddenly abrupt.
Albeit I like both tracks in some ways...

Here goes nothing!
"Man Who Sold The World"

"Under All-Seeing Gaze"

Those names are deeply related to map story and consequences of actions of yours. Who knows, who will sell his current world and with whom you fell under All-Seeing Gaze?

Instead of Goodbye

...I'll say - to next development diary, that was scheduled! It's content is actively developing and, and, and...
Thats all for now, folks. You see, this post is rather exprompt due "why-not?" reason.
See ya soon, cya!

 

[The Nightmare Book]

A long time passed, but IRL tasks needed to be finished, The "Call of the Swarm: The Chosen One" developing process was slowed down to 0.001% of the usual speed.
Anyway, you can learn more about other projects in my Discord (hey, link below), but don't worry - soon I'll share more cool info about characters in this story, including some unusual heroes of WoW in their unusual role of storyteller...

Spoiler: she gazes on you, boi

 

[The Nightmare Book]

The next development diaries will focus on races inhabiting The Barrens.
As my part of the story RPG teller in D&D style, I see it like a book and I'm a humble storyteller only.
But, just as a prelude, the next development diary will tell you more about NPC's in "Rise of Qiraji" - it's important to know before we start the actual story.
Oh, and maybe I'll share some actual gameplay videos for that.

Recently I decided to change something in such a plan, cause I want to share with you, in the coming future, a demo version of this project - featuring a short yet eventful story prologue.
I won't tell you much now, but I can swear it - the decision here will greatly affect your main game.

And don't worry - just before releasing a demo, I'll tease a bit of it here and tell some information about its characters, enough to know them for now.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Recently I decided to change something in such a plan, cause I want to share with you, in the coming future, a demo version of this project - featuring a short yet eventful story prologue.
I won't tell you much now, but I can swear it - the decision here will greatly affect your main game.

And don't worry - just before releasing a demo, I'll tease a bit of it here and tell some information about its characters, enough to know them for now.

...Just in time, huh!

---

This post starts with small teasers for the upcoming "Call of the Swarm: The Chosen One" release. Today I will be short and say next - here are the screenshots of locations you'll visit in the demo.
Without context, for now - heavy spoilers...
Or perhaps you'll find it without my hints...

Gallery of Locations

 

[The Nightmare Book]

...Just in time, huh!

---

This post starts with small teasers for the upcoming "Call of the Swarm: The Chosen One" release...

Another short post, related to map demo development.
Feature the first choice you will make when you open the map - who shall be your main hero? And trust me - this choice is deeply valuable...

 

[Chaosy]

Some quick thoughts for a promising project in regards to the latest video:

Hide unnecessary UI elements during character selection, either with the fancy UI natives or use cinematic mode. I believe you can still listen to arrow keys.

Also the board shows a lot of cool details but it's difficult to say how good a hidden artifact is, for example, will I enjoy finding clues? basically maybe a tutorial to showcase the mechanics should be added optionally before selection.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Some quick thoughts for a promising project in regards to the latest video:

Hide unnecessary UI elements during character selection, either with the fancy UI natives or use cinematic mode. I believe you can still listen to arrow keys.

Also the board shows a lot of cool details but it's difficult to say how good a hidden artifact is, for example, will I enjoy finding clues? basically maybe a tutorial to showcase the mechanics should be added optionally before selection.

First of all, thank you for your reply! I appreciate that

About UI - yes, this is just showcasing small-scale character selection, and I'll try to make more UI/UX design corrections, probably reducing the amount of info on board, for the actual demo version release.

Regarding your question about "hidden artifact", and "enjoying clue finding" - currently I'm making this simple mechanic and I don't want to spoil what kind of artifact is, and what role it plays later. For instance, I would like to say that this "archaeology" is a rather specific location-related mechanic, similar to World of Warcraft Archaeology.
And next development diary will cover up more details, related to Elise Starsurge and her mechanics.
And yes - small tutorial will be added for this "archaeology" just in time when you reach it during story progression - it's just in the beginning of demo

 

[The Nightmare Book]

So long after the previous development post, but still - not today.

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...But why? - I asked myself. Thus I want to say only the following things:

STATE OF DEVELOPMENT

TL;DR: Returned from irl tasks, and now can finish the demo.

• Polishing some sort of what I have finished. Thanks to @Chaosy's suggestions, I have slightly reduced the overcomplexity of in-game UI - which you will see in the next gameplay video teaser.
• Each demo quest - there are not too many - will have its proper "quest/story progression" board, where you will find all the required details to progress. Sometimes it will show hint messages if you feel stuck.
• Liked @Med. MapGuy Codex system - added it too, with some flavor. So reading lore when you read lore is now possible!
• Sometimes you'll find one particular elf girl... Don't be shy - interact with her.
• The final boss of the demo will feature 2 different boss fights. More details later, I'll throw you a thought - Elisabeth and Booker's gameplay.
• Started work on my "Speak with Dead" feature - more details in the next post, which will showcase a video of that.
• @Antares, your "Neat Text Messages" rock!

speaking with the dead feels like D&D

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So... To summarize: this is not the post I wanted to post after such time. But anyway, here we are.
If you have questions, suggestions propositions, or perhaps critics - feel free to write them down below, I'll gladly read them and try to answer them all!
Ciao, until next time.

Your Hush.
25.07.2024.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

So long after the previous development post, but still - not today.

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...And here we are!
Small demonstration about What I understand under "Speak with Dead". Dont wanna talk too much, just watch it by yourself.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Some days passed, and time to review the current development state!

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STATE OF DEVELOPMENT

TL;DR: Working on the demo finale and first part.

Typical workday for sanitation

• Completed part 2 of The Chosen One demo. Yes, now that Cactus Valley has different encounters and can eat a lot of your nerves thanks to enemies you meet in. And yes - each enemy actively uses their spells, so don't expect an easy walk.
• Added 2 mini-bosses: one is the big tentacle you see in the GIF, and another - well, I hope you enjoy kicking some bu--bugs.
• Thank you, Baldurs Gate 3 - many of your actions are commented on by a mischievous narrator.
• @Antares, your Fixed Camera Lock is another great tool. Click-And-Hold is a must-have for any single-player RPG or any map at all!
• @frostwhisper, your "Troll Campaign" inspires me to continue - and that floating text message usage I "took" for myself

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So, not so big, huh? Well, cause we are on the ride and there are more to come! Bi-final boss fight, archeology, replayability...
But. But. All of that I'll show you when it will be ready. Deal? Deal.
Ciao, until next time.

Your Hush.
12.08.2024.

 

[Antares]

@Antares, your Fixed Camera Lock is another great tool. Click-And-Hold is a must-have for any single-player RPG or any map at all!

Thank you, I actually still need to update the Click-And-Hold Movement to work well with a locked camera (because your hero stops moving when you stop moving the mouse).

Map looks great btw.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Thank you, I actually still need to update the Click-And-Hold Movement to work well with a locked camera (because your hero stops moving when you stop moving the mouse).

Map looks great btw.

Thank you! And I wish you to create more interesting systems and libs for our common usage

 

[The Nightmare Book]

urgent message from the Aqir government:

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SWARM NEEDS YOU!

Yes, I'm continuing to develop a prologue of "The Chosen One" aka "The Chosen One DEMO". I had already finished some of its parts and tested it myself, so I call upon you, mighty HIVE-users and anyone who reads this...

Download by next link the current map version and play it.
Requirements? You need the latest Reforged version, and I prefer playing on Classic graphics.

"How I can download it?" It's simple!

<DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION>

yes, by this gigantic link;
why do you read this? Go and download it!
okay do what you want to do