IMMORTAL: Gates of Pyre is the latest game to attract attention on Kickstarter. In just four hours it raised the entirety of its $31,000 goal, and in ten days it made 300% of what was initially planned. Now a little over two days until the Kickstarter ends, IMMORTAL is sitting pretty at $137,403.
This RTS title from developers SunSpear Games promises to be a “new take on strategy games”, with a particular focus on cooperative gameplay, but also featuring PvP and limited single player.
The team also speak of a “IMMORTAL Conquest System", a mechanic which they say
“binds deep and evolving strategy to the Game-as-a-Service business model”. This service model takes the form of being able to purchase the titular Immortals to your cause, some of which are available exclusively in the Kickstarter reward tiers. Otherwise Immortals are available on rotation, and it seems that the microtransactions allow players to select which one in particular they want to use in battle.
According to the team, the Immortals act like “godlike commanders of your forces”, who appear on the battlefield to use powerful attacks.
One of the other selling points of the title is its detailed plan for video game accessibility, predominantly achieved through the difficulty. SunSpear Games set out in a lengthy document that explains the idea of “opt-in complexity”. In essence, this translates to “easy to learn, hard to master”, as the team say they’re focusing on having a low skill floor, but a high skill ceiling for veteran RTS players.
Of course, crowd funded projects that take off so rapidly have a rocky history. They range from the universally disappointing Mighty No. 9, to the critically successful Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
Anyone interesting in seeing which camp IMMORTAL will fall into can pledge to join the beta. As for release, SunSpear Games aim to have the title out sometime in 2022. It's aiming to be free-to-play and available for PC.
Source: Kickstarter