Developer Blog #2: Striking the right balance between action and survival

This is Akira Kurochi, the director of DEADCRAFT at Marvelous.

In this post, I will talk about how action and survival work in our game, and how crafting is at the foundation of everything.

Since the game is set in a post-apocalyptic world, I thought about what life would be like. I imagined a world where resources are scarce, food and water are difficult to come by, and even just surviving is a daily challenge.

We wanted to incorporate realistic gameplay elements that would make the struggle for survival feel more intense and desperate, such as expending energy when running and attacking, and becoming thirsty and hungry as time passes.

Although thirst and hunger do not kill you immediately, they do put you at a disadvantage: the screen becomes blurry with thirst and your character’s movement becomes slower with hunger. To prevent this from happening, players must always be thinking about their next meal, and remember to sleep to recover energy.

But just how can you obtain these items necessary for survival?

We thought about this question and decided that in addition to finding items or buying them at stores as you might in another game, it would make sense in this setting to be able to threaten the townsfolk and shopkeepers for their belongings.

Of course, you can’t do these things with impunity, and raising your notoriety can put a target on your back. Since NPCs also live in the same post-apocalyptic world, it is only natural that shopkeepers hire bodyguards to protect their business. You can fight for the items you want, or you can choose a more honest method of gathering resources and paying for those items instead. We hope you enjoy playing the game your way.

Finally, I would like to talk about crafting. This is the foundation of the game, so much so that we included it in the title.

You can craft all the food and drink you need to survive, and beyond meeting your basic needs there are even food items that grant powerful buffs.

You’ll also need a powerful arsenal to take on your enemies, and you can craft a wide variety of weapons from scratch, as well as upgrade everything in your collection. There are all kinds of weapons, from melee to long-range, so not only does crafting make you stronger, but it can also let you change up your playstyle. You can even create placeable items, such as automatic turrets to mow down large numbers of enemies, or grow a team of zombie companions to fight for you.

We hope that you will try making and using all kinds of items to survive the world of DEADCRAFT.

Akira Kurochi DEADCRAFT Director

*Screenshots captured from a game still in development.