Gears of Obscura

There is little known about the realm of Obscura. Most believe it does not even exist. Others believe it is the gateway to immortality.

This mysterious world can only be reached through portals known as Obscura Gates. However, these gates will only open to those with Obscura Mechanisms.

Dan Marshall, an apprentice machinist from Oakley, is about to get sucked into a whirlwind of trouble. Unknown to him, two dept collectors are tracking him down. The broken watch his father gave him before he died, is far more important then he could imagine. Dan will be faced with the dark truth of his father's past, as fights for his life in a world where nothing is as it seems...

(Character art coming soon)

Dan Marshall.

Following the death of his parents, Dan Marshall was moved to the town of Oakley to live with his Grandpa. He now spends his days working for him as an apprentice machinist. Apparently, his mother died of sickness, and his father was killed in a factory accident.

Three years later, however, Dan is about to find out that there was more to his families deaths then he has been led to believe. 

Rowland Wolfe.

​In a world full of weird and mysterious characters, Mr. Wolfe might just be the most unpredictable of them all. Constantly speaking in riddles, Rowland is as witty as they come. He has built quite a reputation for being the most untrustworthy person in the world.

Apparently, Rowland Wolfe was a friend of Dan's father Lester Marshall.

Baxter Finn and Barnaby Doland

These two well spoken individuals, are the best dept collectors around. Also the most feared. If you find yourself with these two after you, you'd better say your prayers.

'The Client'

No one has ever seen his face, not even his two most trusted employees, Baxter Finn and Barnaby Doland. He seeks to enter Obscura to gain immortality. 

• A beautiful, highly detailed steampunk/fantasy world to explore.
• Interact with the environment to find hidden items, and gain more insight into the world.
  
• Sideview battle system with no random encounters.
• Pixel Movement.
• Use your skill as a machinist to repair and hack machines and locks. Level up your machinist skill to be able to repair/hack more complex machinery.
• A dark, gripping, and unique story with unexpected twists. Nothing is as it seems.
• Travel to the Realm of Obscura, a strange, mystical land, and uncover the truth of your families past.

This looks promising. Looking forward for the demo. 

Looks pretty cool. I'd like to see battle screenies, of course...but I'm just weird like that. XD

I like the second generation tie-in between Rowland and Don  (or technically, his father, I suppose). But what I really like here, is the mapping.

It's cohesive...cluttered to perfection... and proportioned well. I really like the map that seems to be in some sort of clock tower.

Is this a dark game as far as the story is concerned? Or at least the world of Obscura, itself? If so, the darkness of the first few screenshots is very fitting. These shots gave me the impression that it is a dark place.

Looking forward to seeing what becomes of this. 

@kingmakerspider.

The connection between Dan and Rowland is a major focus of the story. As you progress, you will learn more about his father's dark past.

Yes the game is dark.

I will upload screens of the battle system soon, it's still a WIP right now.

I will also add some screens showing the realm of obscura very soon.

The detail in the tiles are really good especially the rugs. I find myself paying close attention to those. You really captured me with the screenshots. They are well done and creative.

Well it doesn't look like I'll have a demo out at the end of the year like I planned. Spiriting has been taking forever and I'm redoing the battles, I'm planning on using the Luna script but that's not out yet. I have about an hour of gameplay so far so I might put up a video soon just showing the maps in motion.

Just after abit of feedback here: I'm considering switching to a front view battle system for this game. SIdeview is becoming rather tedious and restricting in a way and Thalzon has some great front view battlers I'd love to use. I can't make up my mind though. Any opinions on this would be very helpful. Cheers.

I personally don't mind either way. I like both front view and side view battle systems so long as effort is put into them and the battles themselves are interesting and fun. I think it also depends on your audience. I notice a lot of people outside of the RM community tend to really prefer the sideways battle system (maybe because they're used to it from the popular old school games that used it).

But you're right, there are probably nowhere near as many sprites/battlers available for a side view system at the moment than there are for a front view system. If you feel you need that large diversity in the enemies in your game, then front view might be a better one to go for. I'd highly recommend making your own custom animations though (even if it is from the RTP images). It's just the pre-made ones that are already in the database can be boring to look at by this stage where many games have utilised them. What sort of weapons and attacks does your game have? If it uses guns and firing weapons, then in my opinion front view battle system is very suitable for that (it could make the player feel like they're themselves aiming the gun and shooting; you don't get this feeling as much with swords and melee weapons).     

Those are some amazing maps.  I love the glow from the light sources, and the setting looks rich and detailed.  Can't wait to get my hands on a demo.

As to your battleview question:  Personally, I find front view works better for games where you are the main character (ala the first Shin Megami Tensei) while side view works better for games where you observe the main character's story (ala most Final Fantasy games).  I tend to equate front view with first person and side view with third person, and they both have their pluses and negatives.  I have played and will play both, however I'm a bit of a sucker for properly animated battlers, so I hope whatever option you go with has that as a possibility.

Thanks for the feedback guys. I've been messing around with front view, I think it's the way to go.

The shadows in those screenshots look amazing! Well done sir!

Too bad there wasnt a demo I was actually in the mood to play some rpgm games.

There's still a fair amount of work to do, but I'll hopefully have a demo out early next year. I want to make sure it's as polished as possible before I release it.

Your screen caps look absolutely fantastic! I will certainly love to play your demo when it is available.

Wait, weren't you working on that other game? If I remember right it was called "The Legend of Jak" or something like that. It was nice by the way....can I ask you what happened to it?

I see high quality mapping and strong atmosphere on this one, you're a talented parallax mapper.

Good luck with this.

The legend of jak has been put on hiatus for now. It was my first project and not alot of planning went into so I'm having to redo almost everything it's abit chaotic. I may go back and finish it one day but this project has taken off alot more then I expected and I'm really enjoying working on it so it is my only priority right now. Thanks for the compliments:)

Hey peeps. Just a small update. I've added and changed a couple of features in the game. The battle system is now front view, I've added pixel movement for better exploration of the environment, I've removed crafting as it felt unnecessary, instead there will be a special skill you use to repair/hack machines and locks and you will have to level up this skill for more complex machines. I've also been working hard at making the environments interactive, you will be able to interact with nearly everything in the game, this will give you more insight into the game, or you could even find hidden items. Still working on the battle system and I hope to have something to show of it soon.

For now, here's some random screenshots showing the new MC sprite and some interaction:



Search every nook and cranny for hidden items:



Speech bubbles:



And a random shot of a new map:

Loving the screenshots! Always glad to see more parallax mappers out there ^-^ kudos, I know how time consuming they can be. Definitely looking forward to a demo here. :)

After taking a short break I'm back to working on this. I've just finished mapping out the cave where you will find the first Obscura Portal. Here's a little screenshot:



So I'm probably about 80% complete with mapping for the demo, still alot of other things to do, but I'll try release a demo soon.

Here's the character art for the main character Dan I've been working on. I thought I'd give it a go myself instead of trying to commission someone else.