Hey folks!
We'll start by saying, we are fully funded!!!
Thank you to everyone who has supported us so far, we are reading everything and the team has been blown away by the kindness we've been shown.
We’re now on day two of our campaign! Let's check in with our latest updates to our Stretch & Social Goals…
Stretch Goals
Last unlocked: €100,000 - Fully funded!
Current goal: €150,000 - English Voice Acting
Next goal & unlock: ??? - Motoi Sakuraba on the entire soundtrack!
We are now fully funded and working towards our first stretch goal, english voice acting! The voice acting will primarily be found in main cutscenes, and combat. After that, we have a goal to have composer Motoi Sakuraba take on even more of the soundtrack!
Social Goals
Last unlocked: Jokes & puns [3 goals]
Current goal: Avatars & Banners [5 goals]
Next goal & unlock: Discord emojis [7 goals]
We unlocked our first social goal! Which means all of our updates will now have jokes. Well, it will have attempts at jokes. Here's a few for you folks:
Q: Why does Kayla always seem to get into trouble?
A: She likes to get into some heated debates.
Q: Why did Kayla drop out of cooking class?
A: She got out of frying pans, and more into fire.
Q: Why is Kayla always getting wax everywhere?
A: Because she's burning the candle at both ends!
Celebrating what we grew up with…
Last week, ahead of our Kickstarter launch, we celebrated some of the inspirations that helped pave the way for ALZARA Radiant Echoes. JRPGs are such an important part of our gaming history, as we have memories of seemingly endless summer vacations, rainy Sunday afternoons, quiet 1am nights, and dark car rides by the light of the streetlamps spent saving the world.
As ALZARA is a throwback to these times, we wanted to create fun assets that celebrate these games. I still remember a time when magazines were one of the key places I learned about games. I would pour over previews or even ads as they were my small window into possible adventures. Sometimes, all I had to go off of was a game's box art at a rental store.
We hope these bring back some fond memories and help get you excited about the new memories you’ll make while playing ALZARA!
…and sharing what comes next!
Yesterday, we introduced one of our collaborators, Motoi Sakuraba!
We hope to have our entire score created by him, which is one of our upcoming stretch goals! To help push towards this goal, we wanted to talk about music.
Music is incredibly important to a JRPG! If I even mention something like “The Man with the Machine Gun,” you can hear the opening notes in your head. (If you need to go listen to it, I’ll wait. I’ll be here in your other browser tab.)
In our game, our characters fight against an invasion, hoping to bring peace to their lands. Hope is, therefore, a central element of the game as well.
We also noticed that game music today is often used simply as background music today. For ALZARA, we want music to play a key role in the player’s perceived emotions, and that's why the soundtrack of the game will consist of melodies that players can hum along to.
Our main musical references come from games we grew up with, such as Golden Sun, Baiten Kaitos or Valkyrie Profile. We want to recreate the feelings we got from these games, but with a more up-to-date approach.
This is why we called on Motoi Sakuraba, a renowned composer who worked on the soundtracks of those exact games we mentioned.
With that in mind, let’s listen to the main theme of ALZARA that Sakuraba-san has been working on:
Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/g4f-records/main-theme-alzara-radiant-echoes/s-rDPsKEJdTjO
Main Theme - Motoi Sakuraba
Social Goals
So you're asking yourself... what is a social goal??? They are kind of like our stretch goals, but are focused on growing our community while also giving back to it! The goals range from growing our social accounts, to sharing photos in our Discord server.
Most of the social goals are straightforward, but our community goals might need some clarity!
Fan Art - We'd love to see any fan art folks make! You can share it on socials and tag us so we see it, or you can share it in our Discord server!
Closet Cosplay - While cosplay can be a lot of hard work and preperation - we'd love to see our community try and dress like our characters just by using whatever they have laying around! You can tag us in the post on socials, or share your outfit on our Discord.
Favorite JRPG Merch / JRPG Inspired Pets - We have a channel in our Discord (aptly named #jrpg-merch-and-pets) where you can share your favorite merch you own from JRPG games, or share your pets (especially if they are named after something or someone from a JRPG)!
??? - You'll have to wait and see!
Social Goal Rewards
The rewards for completing social goals with range from expanding our Discord server to digital bonuses, to even physical merch upgrades and additional rewards! They are our way of saying thank you to our community, and some rewards will be available to everyone - whether you're a backer or not!
Just in case you need 'em, here's some links to all of our socials!
Twitter
Facebook
Instagram
TikTok
Discord
Keep an eye out later in our campaign as we share an interview with Motoi Sakuraba about his work on ALZARA, his favourite music, and some answers to some other fun questions we got to ask him!
That’s it for this update! I’ll be back tomorrow with a check-in on the campaign, a round-up of press coverage, and some answers to some of your questions!
Until next time!
💛 Colin & the team at Studio Camelia