For the past few weeks, I’ve been up to my metaphorical elbows doing game design on Steel Dragons, an upcoming new game from QuickCharge Games.
Steel Dragons is a co-op adventure board game in which each player takes on the role of a hero who fights monsters, uncovers ancient secrets, and works with the others to complete their quest before the world falls into chaos. Broadly speaking, the gameplay feels like Runebound meets Arkham Horror… in a steampunk version of medieval Japan.
The Steel Dragons setting has all your favorite feudal Japanese elements (Samurai! Ninja! Warrior monks!), but in a steam-driven world quite different from our own. For one thing, there are steam-powered vehicles and automatons. For another, the setting is infused with a mysterious substance called “smart steel” which gifted people can use to create weapons, armor, and even living creatures—such as the eponymous steel dragons.
The most unique element of the Steel Dragons project is that it’s a digital board game. That is, while it’s totally a board game, with card decks and dice rolls, there’s no set-up, clean-up, or endless card shuffling. You just install it once onto a laptop or tablet, which serves as the game’s board, then log into the game using your phone, which serves as your hand of cards and your personal play area. It’s pretty cool.
If this all sounds a little bit familiar, it might be deja vu. Or it might be that you remember me talking about this game a couple years ago. The game slid to the back burner when our lead programmer got recruited to fight off robots from the future in a shadow war that devastated much of Nebraska, but now we’re back, and the future is safe from robots. You’re welcome, America!
Want to stay up to speed with the project and feast your eyes on a steady drip of awesome artwork? Just join the mailing list, follow QuickCharge on Twitter, or like QuickCharge on Facebook—or all three, just to make sure you don’t miss anything.
