Dreamland Devlog 1: Catching Up
Starting a Devlog to just ramble about the thing I've been working on. Figured it needed to go somewhere.
I began Project: Atom back in April(ish) of 2024. It started as the idea of "what if Call of Cthulu and Fallout had a baby?", and from the concept of one of my players and his Call of Cthulu character, Micky Smith. I won't say too much here in case someone ends up reading this, but what's relevant is that I had the thought to make Micky Smith one of the presidents within the timeline of my world, and that idea started a hurricane.
Through the support of my friends, family, and loved ones, I found myself getting more and more progress. I laid the groundwork for a great deal of systems, and since have gone back to refine and clean much of the data.
To this point, I have successfully created:
- A working character sheet generator, which in itself includes:
- A clear and concise builder simple enough that those with RPG history should be able to sit down and make a character with ease.
- Four playable Kindred(races, heritages etc.)
- A part targeting system that incorporates limb damage & protections
- An inventory & equipment system
- A status effect tab that incorporates a wide variety of conditions and item effects.
- A bestiary with a stat randomization system.
- This also includes an initiative/turn tracker.
- An entirely modular vehicle system that allows players to build cars, trucks, vans, motorcycles, mechs, helicopters, planes and boats.
- Over 2000 items(and growing rapidly daily)
- 25 Skills that are inspired by a wide variety of games and media.
Weapon skills are the primary means of outputting damage.
- Sidearm - Rifle - Shotgun - MG - Sniper - Tech - Explosives - Melee - Unarmed - Throw
Knowledge skills tie to certain item categories and give general lore knowledge based on their category
- Survival - Medicine - Science - Crafting - Society
Social skills help guide you through dialogue and interacting with others
- Intimidate - Leadership - Persuade - Deception - Observation
Exploration skills allow one to open their paths within the world
-Pickpocket - Stealth - Pilot - Lockpick - Hack
- A weather system(which is the current task), which I plan on incorporating fluctuating temperatures based on time of day and season.
- An action system inspired heavily by Pathfinder 2 and D&D 5e
- The weapons system itself includes bullet penetration, weapon ranges and noises, weapon condition, projectiles, variable ammunition
- Intended features later included attachments & weapon traits for even more variation in weapon types
- A radiation system, with intent to include mutations at a later point
- A sanity system; this is a loose foundation and needs to be expanded on, but I have plans to include obsessions, phobias & hallucinations.
- A faction system, inspired heavily by Fallout New Vegas; the armor and clothing system will also have faction-centric armor that can be worn both to represent your favorite faction, or to disguise yourself by sneaking into an enemy faction's territory.
The system entered playtesting on 01/14/25, just two weeks after announcing to friends that I was interested in starting a playtest.
My first party consists of:
Bellemere "Gemini" Emmental, girlboss streamer and employee of Redemption Technologies.
Ezra Douglas, a veteran of several corpo-wars, now a janitor facing the edge of retirement.
Dustin, a hacking specialist with a penchant for discovering the undiscovered.
Liam Byrne, a felon with a strong belief in the extraterrestrial and a wonderful way with words.
I could not have picked a better first Cast. I am close friends with all of the players, but the storytelling ability, adaptability and honesty have kept me pushing forward and itching for more sessions while I teach them the core mechanics of the game step by step.
I've also got a plan to include FromSoft's style of lore and storytelling; tell just enough to get the main tale across, while telling hidden stories in item descriptions and setting.
The long term for this is to get it put into game format. I have this concept of being able to play it as Turn-Based or action based, whichever one would prefer. I don't have much more to add to this right now; the next Devlog is probably going to be more focused on my ideas for the game itself.
Peace and Love, N20