The VG Resource

Hello! We’reTeamSweepy, a group of hobbyists developing a pixel-art based hack n’ slash Steampunk RPG in our spare time. We just released our public alpha for feedback, and we are now preparing to dive into the creation of the core content of the game. While our game, Greywater, is deeply inspired by the original Diablo, our goal is to apply some of what the world has learned about game design over the intervening years towards designing our game, to make it as wonderful an experience as possible.

Here is our protagonist, a gifted engineer named Tavish Gordon, doing battle against a mechanical horde. Instead of the standard health/energy orbs, we felt odometers would be a more genre-appropriate solution.

Note the central console, which serves as a universal tooltip window, and will likely be used in a more retro gaming capacity (text-games and point and click adventures, anyone?).

Our game begins in the oldest district in a dystopian city now known Greywater (named for its polluted rivers). It was once a place of industry and prosperity, but now is the last refuge of a poor underclass. The city lies cloaked twilight and pollution as it sits in the shadows of a towering megastructure which houses great, sprawling factories, and at its peak, a city for the wealthy elite.

Tavish (a reluctant hero, inspired by the likes of Martin Freeman), becomes involved in a struggle to which he cannot turn a blind eye, and must travel up the great structure, through sewers and railroads, and factories, doing battle, solving puzzle, and fixing what's broke.

Along his journey, he will face such terrible foes as these:


And make some unexpected friends along the way:


Our goals for a finished game include the core of what you'd expect to see in a hack n' slash game—leveling, magic-like-abilities, fancy loot, and hordes of enemies, all wrapped up in a gooey coating of Steampunk eye-candy, and an engaging story. In addition to this we're also working on designing a robust crafting system, some borrowed elements from point and click adventures (such as investigating game-world objects and witty repartee), as well as some puzzler elements (involved in challenges like opening treasure chests, getting past locked doors).

Here is Tavish doing his darnedest with a rudimentary demo of our crafting system (visible in the upper part of the inventory). Voila! A lightning-wrench!

Crafting is going to be pretty simple: component A + B + C= D, but you'll know exactly what the result is before you commit. To emphasize the importance of crafting (Tavish is an engineer after all), Tavish's combat abilities will all be derived from equipped items.

As a result, how you play the game will be highly adaptable, although the strength of Tavish's abilities will be based on item levels and character stats, in conjunction with Tavish's proficiency with the item class (with permanent bonuses chosen upon leveling up). The most powerful item components will be hardest to come by.

We're not 100% sure on the games other features, as right now we're still focusing on realizing core gameplay, but we've got a wiki full of ideas that we're messing with every day. I don't want to give anything away, but among other things, we've got some exciting plans for a pretty unique currency system.

We're shooting for a short to medium sized three act narrative which spans three (small) towns, and four multi-level, procedurally generated dungeons. The first act, and a good chunk of the second are already written (with the full skeleton of the story already outlined). Our composer is working on an original soundtrack, which so far is sounding pretty good! You can listen to the entire first track in our Alpha trailer (which basically talks about the same things we've said here):
This is the current state of our game, as we're in the process of moving our engine from Java to LibGDX to add Mac support. The gameplay is admittedly very basic right now. You can download the alpha build here to play it for yourself. It's basically exactly what you see in the video. The file window that opens at the beginning is asking for permission to save a log file; the game will boot even if you decline.

We've had some promising discussions with some additional programmers, and a concept artist, and the biggest thing slowing our momentum on the project is the creation the game's of art assets.

That's where you guys come in, if you're interested!

What we’re looking for:
Spriters/pixel artists to help transform ideas and concept art into in-game assets to help bring the game world to life.

It's a labor of love
While this is (for now) a profitless affair, we do intend to launch a Kickstarter campaign when the project is farther along to help support the team. Until then we can’t compensate you monetarily, however we will validate you emotionally by shipping you a spiffy team T-Shirt and buttons, and by featuring your work in the game.

Our expectations:
We are fairly transparent about our development process, and you’re welcome to use your work on the project in your portfolio (though we’ll ask that you avoid releasing spoilers into the wild). We don’t expect a full-time commitment, but we do ask that you contribute on a semi-weekly basis, and stay in contact. The team holds weekly audio meetings over Skype where the departments update each other on progress, and discuss issues, ideas, and internet memes.

Contact us!
Post or message us any questions you might have! If you're interested, you can shoot us some samples of your work by email at [email protected].

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I spoke with the OP and he agreed to make changes to the post above. Thread reopened.