After a long stint working on a number of projects for other studios and developing a few prototypes for future projects we are back to building our action-RPG ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale’ from its prototype. Everything from the art-style to the gameplay has been refined and improved from play tester feedback and we’ll be letting you have a look and visit the Flawless world very soon.
The past couple of years have been hectic, we’ve finished the protype of ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale’, moved country, developed a few games with other studios, and done some prototyping of our own. We programmed and helped develop ‘Maybot Run’ for Bloodline Games Ltd; a funny, political infinite runner which you can check out on Steam.
We took part in a few game jams the most notable of which was The Manchester Games for the Many Games Jam. We created a fun little game called Strong & Stable leader in just 12 hours over 2 days. You can grab it for free from itch.io.
We developed a sh’mup prototype called ‘The Last Pilot’ which is set in the same brutal cat world as ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale’ and may feature as a (rather large) mini game in that very game.
We worked on a prototype for a story driven VR game inspired by games like ‘Papers Please‘ and ‘Please, Don’t Touch Anything‘. The game is set in a dystopian future and deals with issues of technology making the human work force redundant, over population, and sentient AI. The game will likely be released after ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale’.
Finally we are back to working on ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale‘. The testing of our prototype has taught us a lot and has led to a number of changes. The game is now a sidescrolling action-RPG with metroidvania elements. The turn based battles have been axed in favour of a more action orientated approach keeping you fully immersed in the world. The shooting element is still present as Art has a droid that shoots and damages machines while his swords deal damage to the living. This leads to interesting gameplay where the player must take down an enemy’s mechanical armour with the droid’s guns and then hack ‘n’ slash the living enemy with Art’s sword based combos and power-moves. The game still tells the epic story of a young boy called Art trying to find his way home from a brutal world of cats.
He will still be able to collect numerous weapons, use a variety of potions and buffs, talk to the locals, and make choices in the conversations. We have made platforming a larger component and developed skill trees that not only allow Art to develop his fighting abilities but also his platforming abilities. The biggest change is probably the art-style. The game’s art-style is still largely influenced by kids drawings and surrealism only now we aim to make the game look more like how you remember the drawings you did as a kid as oppose to what they actually looked like. While we have kept the game largely grey-scale a few colours have been introduced, and as Art progresses each area/level can be unlocked in colour.
We will have loads more information about ‘The Flawless: Art’s Tale’ very soon along with a load of screenshots, animated gifs, and videos of the new style. Until then you can keep up to date with all thing Flawless and Bare Knuckle on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
#FlawlessTheGame #TheLastPilot #MaybotRun
Ste Wilson is a director, game developer, and programmer at Bare Knuckle Development Ltd. When not coding away on BKD games he can be found playing video games on console and PC. He also makes music under the music maker name of ‘Electric Fan Death’ and loves playing guitar, writing tunes, and producing music.