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Dungeons of the Amber Griffin
A Kashubian tale in first person - Dungeons of the Amber Griffin DevGAMM Interview
In the very Land of Amber Tomasz Rozynski from Frozengem Studio talks us through this ambitious UE5 cRPG trying to leave grounds about the Kashubian language and folklore.
Audio transcription
"Hi Gamereactor friends, it's the first day at DevGAMM in Gdańsk and this is going to be probably my last interview.
People are wrapping up already, but then I realized there is this very interesting game which is called Dungeons of the Amber Griffin, which looks really, really good and has a very interesting historical concept behind it."
"So thank you so much for joining us, Tomasz.
What can you tell me? You've got some success with the game already, you've got some awards.
Which would you say is the thing that is catching people's eye about your game?
We have many different and unique things like graphics, visual quality of course."
"We started the production of the game on Unreal Engine 4, but this engine can't handle the complexity of the graphics of the nature.
We moved forward to Unreal Engine 5.
It was a difficult decision because the development of the game is delayed all the time, but we want access to the newest technology and this opens doors to the possibility to increase the quality of the characters, of the environment."
"Because this is a CRPG game, we want the best experience of exploration with the newest technology and characters like metahumans change every aspect of the quality of the game.
How many of you guys are working on this game? Because of course, you know, we've been seeing indie games and then you stop by this game and of course it looks technologically complex, artistically.
So what is the size of the team?
For now, it's a solo dev team. I made almost all alone, but I have friends who made programmer work."
"This game is based on marketplace assets to create Dungeon Crawler type of games, but we changed a lot, almost everything.
Without a programmer, it's impossible.
And also we have a translation crew, the writers and historians, because the game is based on the Kashubian real beliefs, medieval pagan beliefs.
And also we have Percival Schuttenbach, who made music for Witcher 3 and Witcher series, because they believe our mission to propagate the culture and Kashubian language, because this language will die after 30 years, UNESCO thinks. And yeah, Percival Schuttenbach believes in our project."
"Now they finished their own album, a new version in the studio. And after that, they start producing the soundtrack to our game.
We will see something new from Percival, because we are focused on a more Nordic, Slavic style.
Okay, it makes sense with the cultural background of the game.
Yes, this is North Poland. The other Slavic games are more focused on the Balkan style, and we are focused more on the Nordic style."
"The inspiration of Vikings culture.
And now that you mentioned the writers and the story, what else can you tell me about what's going on in the game, the story of the game?
Of course, we are in the land of Amber right now, here in Gdansk. So what can you tell me is going on here?
The main story is based on an old legend about òpi. This is a phantom. The Kashubian believes that the phantom stands from the ground, from the grave, kills families, kills every people in the land. And when òpi goes to the church tower and rings the bell, everybody who hears the bell rings will die in suffering."
"It's a really amazing story. Almost a hundred years ago, in Pomerania, people still cut the heads of the people in the grave, because they believed in òpi.
That they could wake up again.
Yes, and also Kashubians don't doubt the history and these beliefs. It's amazing. It's an amazing story.
I'm going to have nightmares today, because it's going to be my second night in Gdansk, but that's of course really cool, really interesting."
"And what can you tell me about the game system? You mentioned it's a CRPG, so what can we expect in terms of RPG systems and mechanics?
The core mechanics is the grid-based dungeon crawler system. It's the system from games from the 90s, like Eye of the Beholder, Lands of Lore.
The people, developers, have forgotten these core mechanics, because when Doom comes out, everybody wants to turn around and move without a grid, because it's a grid-based system."
"But the grid system gives you a possibility, like a tactics fight. You have to predict when you come to the aggressive fight, when you have to come back and refill the mixtures.
You don't see your back, and it's different.
This is the core mechanics of movement, of exploration, and the grid-based system gives you some cool ideas.
When you start exploring after battle, you can slowly look around, searching for the hidden treasures, hidden buttons, hidden walls."
"There's many hidden dungeons with a loot system. When you open some box, you can randomly catch the items, almost 1,000 items, weapons, armors, belts, rings.
Every item has a unique color and class, because we have nine Kashubian classes, similar to warrior, necromancer, shaman, etc.
But in Kashubian language, originally, names, and all the loots have some colors like Diablo. You can collect armor in one color, nightmare armor, phantom, nightmare, viking."
"It's a unique thing. Also, we have day and night full system cycle, and weather system. This gives us an opportunity to play the same location in the game with different conditions, different weather, snow, and, of course, rain.
Yeah, a lot of systems, a lot of things for solo developers. So, what can you tell me about the status of the project, and when can we get our hands on it?
We are in full development for now. We create quests, locations, upgrade NPCs, metahumans, characters. We have published them. We have a public demo on Steam."
"Check it out.
Yes, we test mechanics with the players on the Discord. So, invite to the Discord, because many mechanics, cool mechanics, we implement, because players said, hey, this will be cool. Maybe do this in your game.
Yes, of course. Interaction with the players is more important for us, because we create games for the players, of course. Yeah, this is the best way."
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