The Lighthouse of Meirh

So we go back to early 2000's and that's me, with my brand new first computer amazed by the technology.

We just entered the new century already but computers were not that common in Brazil at that time, neither in my city. Ok, let's say that we had few but the internet BOOM just came after the 2010's.

So I struggled a lot trying to have that working… Ow, I remember the virus and the terrible attempts to see some porn. Yeah, I had 11 at that time… give me a break.

After one year of "breaking my head" with the Windows environment I discovered two important things in my life: The first one was a full game that was small enough for me to download that using my dial up internet (the game was Rollercoaster Tycoon 1), which became for years my favourite game franchise (until they release the third game… what was that?). The second one wasn't a game, but a game tool to make games! RPG Maker 2000. Yeah, that was definitely a gold mine. "What??? Can I make games now? Can I just build anything that I want to and play that?" I thought at the time. It sound amazing, isn't it?

Of course, this is a childhood memory and of course it will pass through the "it wasn't what I was expecting" part. That happened when I realised how hard was to build anything on that software. I always needed some new asset or custom graphic for some reason. After some terrible games, and the RPG Maker 2k3 and XP, secondary school came with a technical course and, quietly, I stopped using that. Ain't that I didn't want to create my own game, but as you grow, people start to teach you that you can't make things that easy. "It isn't as easy as you are expecting.", "You are not going to be able to finish this!", "Don't even bother…", and so forth…

But then "The game has changed", and after some semesters in an architecture college and after almost finishing a Computer Science degree, the universe conspired to bring me to Ireland to study Game Design. Yeah… a lot happened until now but, the most important lesson that I've learned here was "JUST FUCKING DO IT".

Meirh is a city created inside a much bigger world that concentrates all my desires into game developer for a first "big" creation. The world of Eirm was first imagined as a simple RPG scenario but with a lot of me in it. Differently from all I've created before, this world is the "translation" of a wish. The first "try" was in a text-based game where the world wasn't completely organised. Then, for another lecture, I made the world much more consistent and, after some advices, its genesis was finally created.

Defining the beginning of an RPG was definitely necessary for me and for this game since, from it, I was able to see clearly the path the game and its story would follow and take place. Since the "logic" is a bit complex, the most difficult part was to keep everything consistent (There is a lot of problems in the main plot, probably, but they are solvable now).

After almost 12 years without even touching RPG maker, I was able to face it again and, guess what?, I just loved it! Again! First cuz I was able to finally start focusing on the mechanics and the things that I really would like to see in a game, because the "graphical part" wasn't on my hands anymore (at least for the first look of the game), second, because it was just so easy. Of course, after all those years, without some hard hard hard work with the default tool, I would not be able to satisfy myself with the game, so I used the resources of the MV version of the software and imported them into Unity. After that, I was feeling light and ready to start thinking in a game that I could ignore one big barrier I always faced at the beginning of all virtual games (the first asset design).

Still under development, I'm focused on having the world feeling more alive and the main NPC and the player to act more independent from the player decisions so, taking any decision in the game, will impact and will face some resistance. Though it is a RPG, the idea of the game is to build a world where the player is almost as a inner voice on the main character so taking sides and having decisions will feel real, like a discussion.

Story

Eirm is a world where spirits need to find their own way through the eternal dream, realm of Ayna. As a spirit, you've been wandering around for some decades by now. Being able to possess some animals and, maybe, some humans are handy and the way you use to move through the world without losing your mind. You start the game possessing a cat and, in order to find another Vessel, you discover this fisherman that, for some reason, you don't feel safe to try a possession (also, you need a good place to do that). Following him to find a good opportunity, you end up discovering and exploring the city of Meirh through its population gossips and conversations.