Welcome to the fifth devlog of Ways of Alchemy! This time, we are talking about the in-game friction points – Inquisition and Tax inspection. As the old saying goes, no one cares more about your well-being than the people who tax you.
🚀 Don’t forget: a free demo is available if you haven’t tried it yet! Soon it’s going to be updated with some extra tweaks and a new tutorial, so don’t miss out on it!
King’s servants in the flesh. Perhaps you should be kind to them – they’re just doing their jobs.
How We’re Using Law and Order to Spice Up The Game
One of the key elements of our game is the King’s servants – the Inquisitor and the Tax Collector.
They present quite a challenging obstacle for players, but also serve some other functions. They “notice” what players are doing and how they play and represent a “point of view” on what happens in the players’ shack.
As you design videogames, it’s very important that players’ actions can be seen by the world they’re interacting with – and for that, we have the inculpation and exculpation systems. Let’s look into it.
A pretty simple morality system that blends with other gameplay mechanics – pretty happy with how it all turned out!
We deliberately divided this system in half to show that people remember both good and bad deeds, which turn into something in the middle with the passage of time. This system enhances the players’ actions very well – the king’s orders and treating illnesses will eventually not only make you richer but also allow you to be indulged. Surely you don’t want to punish a person who helps others, even if he previously did something bad, right?
Inquisitor and The Dillemma: Clean Hands or Cuffed Wrists?
Yes, salvia powder is considered an illegal ingredient. You may want to hide it away from the Inquisitor.
Inquisitor comes to a player to search for illegal potions or traces of other crimes, threatening imprisonment for the player.
- If he discovers poisons, points of inculpation will be scored.
- But if something even more illegal is discovered, he will also, in addition to scoring, take it as evidence.
This leads to the necessity for a player to avoid this process, which makes gameplay a bit spicier and sharper.
Bad Reputation: How It Affects Your Interaction with the Inquisitor
You can hide your dark secrets from the Inquisitor if you don’t have too many of them. There are solutions, even if you have a human corpse on your patch yard. But you can’t hide everything, some evidence can’t be hidden. And a bad reputation is even worse. If your neighbors noticed you went to the forest with someone and came back alone, with a shovel on your shoulder, they start gossiping and only a big amount of time can wash away a smear like this…
No one wants to live near a place that reeks of death, right? Even in harsh medieval times.
It’s pretty dire when you have tons of forbidden items on your patch and people don’t look you in the eye and whispering around and spreading rumors – persuading the Inquisitor that everything is okay will be pretty difficult. A king’s order that says you can do anything could be pretty convenient in a situation like this, but if you don’t have it, you can rely on shiny coins and brutal murders. Let’s talk about these!
Bad reputation, sadly, doesn’t really provide you with cool-looking horns on your head, so you’d better avoid it at all costs.
The Inquisitor can be bribed to be quiet. But inevitably, he will want more and more. Sooner or later, it may become a burden. Sure, you can try to bribe a greedy servant again, this time with a one-way ticket to Heaven, and whether you succeed or not, it will be considered as one of the worst crimes. And even if you manage to do that, an Inquisitor’s successor will come by and try to investigate what happened to his former colleague. It’s a never-ending situation: the authorities will keep getting stronger.
Tax Collector and The Dilemma: To Pay or Not To Pay?
Tax Collector is a simple mind – all that glitters is gold, no additional questions asked.
Tax Collector is not as dangerous as the Inquisitor, but he’s definitely more methodical:
- He comes to your area, knowing exactly what you are and what you’re worth.
- He wants a tenth of your money as a “tax fee”, but he can’t take it unless you give it to him.
- Pay him – and he will be eternally grateful.
- Give him a few more coins and score some exculpation points.
- Or don’t pay at all! It will result in a crime card appearing, which will inevitably attract the Inquisitor.
That’s what makes a Tax Collector different from the Inquisitor, he’s like a light version that you can “work together” with and only leads to more obstacles if you choose not to.
Conclusion: Inculpation & Exculpation Bind Gameplay Together
As you can see, these inculpation and exculpation systems are interconnected and overall glue together other things that happen in the game, such as scars from being imprisoned, which we covered in devlog #3. In addition, it makes you consider things that make gameplay more challenging – there are some obstacles that won’t let you breathe too easily!
How do you feel – aren’t the king’s servants a bit too aggressive for a relaxing vibe we’re striving for? Let us know what you think.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3519740/Ways_of_Alchemy_Demo/