MINIMAL RPG

I wanted to boil down the mechanics of an RPG to it’s more pure form, and put it in a card game-esq format. For this prototype I focused on just the mechanics of the typical RPG experience. I went with a simple 16-color palette aesthetic to keep things minimal.

Below is the outcome.

This is a broad look at where the project ended up. It has procedurally created dungeons the player can explore with simple lock/key based layouts.

There are areas of interest for players to investigate that can yield treasure or enemies, and items to pick up.

This was early days on creating the battle system, where the player was focused on defeating enemies, and mining for ore they could sell at the town store.

It was import to me to lean into the discovery aspect of an adventure game, as such card revealing and animations were important factors.

Weapons could range from melee to ranged, with ranged weapons requiring loading and aiming.

As development progressed, gameplay became snappier and more reactive to player skill.

A final form of the battle system in which the player had two hands to hold two different weapons at once.