Elysian Shadows: A Modern JRPG for the Dreamcast/Other Systems

About

Hello everyone, I am here to share with you a project I've been following for some time. It is Elysian Shadows, a JRPG in the style of classics such as Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy, and Dragon Quest with some interesting new twists to keep it fresh. It started off in development as a Dreamcast only title, but has branched out to other platforms. The Dreamcast version will have unique features that other platforms will not, such as games with the VMU among others. A kickstarter will be started this summer to help finish the development of this game.

Screenshots

One of the first towns in the game, Loren.


A test of the new advanced lighting system.


A work in progress dungeon map and tileset.


A powerful custom made toolkit to match a powerful engine. Will be made available for modding and creating your own games using LibGyro, the backbone of Elysian Shadows.

Follow!
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elysianshadows
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/GyroVorbis
Website: http://elysianshadows.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/elysian_shadows

Thank you for your time and support! We hope that you will follow the project

 

Lead developer of Elysian Shadows here.

Just wanted to say that I have been a long-time fan/lurker on these boards, following lots of the amazing shit going on. I'm a computer engineering graduate student, and I have fallen in love with a bunch of your projects... like emulating the DC GD-ROM drive on an FPGA... Jesus Christ.

Anyway, ES on Dreamcast specifically is going to be a hell of a feat for us. I know you guys like to hear the gnitty gritty, low-level details. We have a buddy of ours developing a texture tool to analyze a series of textures for levels and determine the best compression scheme for DC (paletted, hardware compressed) for least loss and minimum VRAM footprint.

Pulling off some of these lights will also be quite challenging for us. Obviously they will have to be done per-vertex, and we have been seriously looking at trying to use the Dreamcast's bumpmapping capabilities in-game for important lights in the scene. We also have an SH4 assembly-optimized transformation pipeline making use of the Dreamcast's 128-bit SIMD instructions for performing vector/matrix operations.

While we're doing a lot of things with shaders and dynamic audio the DC will not be able to handle, the entire engine has been developed with the DC in mind, so we will either be emulating or ignoring this functionality... Either way, ES will probably be bringing the console to its knees.

Thanks for taking the time to read about our development. If you're interested, we have a pretty famous series on Youtube called "Adventures in Game Development" where you can get a behind-the-scenes look at what we are working on... it's kind of like a reality game development show:

 

Will you be doing a publishing deal with Dreamcast homebrew publishers? Id gladly buy a disc. Every new dreamcast game is a good thing. This looks very nice. If you need someone to beta test on real hardware let me know. Id be glad to do it!

 

Looks really (really!) impressive

Just want to wish you good luck with the project, as a huge fan of the vintage SNES RPG's this looks like a title that could be really popular if you can get it to disc.

 

Looks great! I'll definitely be following your progress and will keep an eye out for the kickstarter!

 

Thank you all for the interest! I will keep you updated as news develops. The team is working on a new episode of their behind the scenes series which will focus more on gameplay mechanics.

 

Tight! I want this!

 

looks incredible!

 

Hello, I'd like to share with everyone some exciting new updates!

- A brand new website has been launched, with more details and information specific to the game and kickstarter. Please feel free to check it out, and post any comments or questions.

- A new episode of the behind the scenes series Adventures in Game Development 24 was launched. You can check that out here!

Thanks for your time and support!

 

The kickstarter page has finally launched! The team looks forward to your support and we hope that you will enjoy the game!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1945059142/elysian-shadows-next-gen-2d-rpg

 

Threw $49 into the pot for a signed copy.

 

Probably not getting this since watermelon keeps on picking up other games to publish when they can't even finish their own. They haven't handled the whole situation very well at all with them pushing the release of pier solar HD back more and more and we haven't even heard about project y or n in a long time. I feel sorry for the people who have been waiting 3 years for the reprint and still haven't gotten it yet.

 

Elysian Shadows Kickstarter Now Live (new 16-bit style RPG)

[Moderator note: merged from a duplicate thread]

Not sure if you guys have heard of Elysian Shadows yet, it is an extremely ambitious multiplatform game that has been several years in the making. It bills itself as a "Next-Gen 2D RPG" -- what they mean by this is that it is a 2D based 16-bit style RPG, but uses effects and elements that weren't possible on the real 16-bit platforms, such as particle effects, dynamic lighting, shadows, physics, 3D positional audio, etc.

It is the dream project of Falco Girgis aka GyroVorbis, a longtime member of and staff at my site (DCEmulation.org), hobbyist Dreamcast developer, and personal friend of mine. Since he was 14 he wanted to publish a Dreamcast game, and now 10 years later, he is realizing his dream.

The initial platforms will be the Dreamcast, Windows/Mac/Linux, Ouya, and Android/iOS. He recently quit his job to work on Elysian Shadows full-time due to getting a publishing deal from Watermelon Corp., the guys who released Pier Solar on Sega Genesis/Sega CD in 2010. The game's development has been chronicled in the popular YouTube series Adventures in Game Development. Today their Kickstarter went live, with their funding goal at $150,000 and stretch goals all the way up to $800,000. The Kickstarter is about 6 hours in, and they have secured $27,000 so far. Personally I have pledged $500 to them, as I am extremely excited for the project. I am really hoping they hit at least $500,000, as that stretch goal is for user created content, meaning that end users will be able to take advantage of their engine and tools that they have written for this game and make their own multiplatform RPGs, including for the Dreamcast.

Take a look at it, and if you think this is something you'd be interested in seeing come to life, please consider backing the project.

Edit: oh yeah... I should probably include the link, haha. Elysian Shadows Kickstarter

 

That's the life of a small dev studio. Though I am glad I didn't splurge on the first print of the HD version.

 

Heya dudes! I'm the lead engine and toolkit developer for Elysian Shadows. WE DUN GOT FUNDED!!!1111


I basically just wanted to sum up what I said over at DCEmulation:

I really wanted to address this, because we hear this a lot. I truly understand your frustration, but you have to understand what the term "publisher" means in the case of small indie companies. Basically Watermelon is pressing our games to disc and is producing physical goods for us. That's it. We're completely separate teams with completely separate funds with a completely separate development process and creative vision. You're literally taking your frustration over Pier Solar's delays out on a development team who has had nothing to do with Pier Solar's development, and Watermelon has had nothing do with ours. I just wanted to clarify.

Furthermore, I am always morally obligated to back up Watermelon when comments like this arise. I have met Tulio personally. He drove out all the way from Iowa to Alabama to help mentor us and prepare us for a Kickstarter campaign. He's one of the most genuine, hardest working, passionate individuals I have ever met, and I truly owe our success on Kickstarter to him. I have personally seen and played Pier Solar HD, and it is literally in the very final stages of completion. I understand everyone is upset due to a perceived lack of communication with Watermelon, but I have to assure you guys, as a fellow developer working on his own dream project, that those guys have honestly been working their asses off nonstop to release Pier Solar.

 

Congratulations!!!

I can't wait to get my copy for the Dreamcast

 

Congrats. Seeing as this has been posted about a year ago, how is your project doing?