The Abbot Trilogy

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6 days ago – Thu, Sep 26, 2024 at 04:20:56 PM

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Layout is in!
2 months ago – Thu, Aug 01, 2024 at 02:52:03 AM

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June is almost done!
4 months ago – Sun, Jun 16, 2024 at 03:20:51 PM

A little late with this month's update. My Normie job has taken its toll on me.

However, we have lots of progress!

Artwork is flowing

Kiril and I worked out a production schedule, and he has been absolutely smashing the artwork out of the park. Every few days, he sends something through and I just sit and stare at it for a while. I am loving how this is all coming together. Below is a little collection of pieces from Abbotsmoore. I will keep the artwork for Bitterpeak and Steelhollow under wraps until we’re ready to share the PDFs (maybe).

Writing becomes Editing

I have brought Will Jobst on as editor for this project. They’ve done some excellent work and I’ve had some really excellent feedback already. Writing is a very insular activity. When working on a project for many months you can become too familiar with it. It becomes something very closely connected to you and it is hard to see what is really there. An editor lets you release the writing. Allows the very personal piece of art remove itself and become its own entity.

This moves back the completion of layout slightly, but still well within expected time frames.

Stay tuned. By the end of July we will have a lot more to share.

Long days and pleasant nights.

Stuart.

Things progress! Some art and writing samples.
5 months ago – Sun, Apr 28, 2024 at 12:50:48 PM

Hello all!

Writing is complete and going through the editing phase. I wrote myself into a hole for the last scene. I knew what I want to be there, but I didn't know how to make it some gameable and interactive. So, for the last month or so, every time I sat down to write it, I would stare at the screen, drag out a few sentences, get frustrated, and walk away. BUT! Last week I had a breakthrough, and after a long back and forth discussion with a close friend, I found my solution. 

Here's a brief sample from Steelhollow (this is not the ending scene described above:

Herenja, the Endless Desert

The dunes roll on forever, and the sun radiates each grain until they’re blisteringly hot. Walking in the desert while the sun is high in the sky is not advised. Death is likely. The dunes are interspersed with occasional rocky outcroppings jutting out from the sand. These rocky bastions can make for good shelters but should be used sparingly, as they will be swallowed by the moving sand within a few days. Steel ruins will also be found in the deep desert. They’re the remnants of an ancient civilisation. Any structures found here are stripped bare from looters and the sand. There is other strangeness out there. Most of it is real, but some is a result of too much heat.

Mirages and hallucinations

1 Purple scales slither through the sand dunes above. A huge beast, a dragon perhaps. It disappears as fast as it appeared.

2 You hear running water, a stream or small creek, bubbling just over the next dune.

3 The sand dunes move like waves crashing on the shore. You see them rise and fall and as you approach their chaotic swirling subsides to nothing.

4 A dozen people walk, single file, across the desert. Their black hooded cloaks cover them from head to toe. As the last one steps over the crest, they’re gone. Swallowed by the desert or they never were.

5 A glistening silver structure extends high into the sky. Towering hundreds of feet over the dunes. It flashes bright in the sunlight. (as the party approaches, it slowly changes to a gnarled, dry tree with steel spikes hammered into it).

6 Flashes of violence. A scene of full scale war. A few huge purple scaled creatures fight with thousands of soldiers. Blood and terror soak the sand. The empty desert is filled with the wild fury of battle. These visions flash like lightning.

Art!

Kiril has been flying though initial sketches. As there are a quite a large number of pieces across the three zines, he is getting the sketching and getting the rough designs done before cleaning them up. So, the things you see today are not the final pieces and will be given fine tuning in the coming weeks.

These three faces sparked quite a bit of back and forth. Two of them are portals and one leads to certain death. The art and room descriptions hint at what each one leads too. But players will need a leap of faith to find out for sure.

Overall this project is progressing at a good pace. While a little slower than I first thought due the ending scene, it is still way a head of schedule.

Stay tuned for more news!

Long days and pleasant nights.

Stuart.

It's been a while but I teaser for you!
6 months ago – Mon, Mar 25, 2024 at 11:16:24 PM

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