shaman1High Iron studios are trying something a bit different from everyone else with their Kickstarter campaign for Shaman : Shadows of the Last Immortal.  Their strategic spell casting game features a strong female protagonist, isn’t set in a generic medieval world, and doesn’t focus on killing.

Here’s a rundown, in the developers words, of the main elements :

Explore : The secrets of an ancient culture sit atop great peaks under centuries of dust, water, stone, and decay. Explore them freely, gather what you need, and avoid the shadows that are hunting you.

Collect : The game has over 200 different components to use when making spells.The purity of the components used, along with how well you perform the forging tasks, will determine the final power of the spells you generate. A few examples of components you will need to find to forge the Veil of Purifying Ash are sulfur powder, black sea water, and pine smoke soot.

Forge : Players can forge more than 100 different spells, each with their own unique effect that can influence one of 15 different properties on a player. However, in order to be able to cast a spell, you must first forge its seal. Fail to complete the required steps in order and your precious components will be ruined. Succeed at the task and your toil will have produced several small disk-like seals that you can place on your sling and later use in combat.

Test : Now you must test yourself and your spells against the Shadows. Do you have what you needed to withstand the Shadow’s attacks? Which of your spells has an effect? Is there anything you can not defend against? Did you see any weaknesses in the Shaman’s defense?

So it’s essentially a spell crafting game that doesn’t just involve you clicking a button to memorize.  Novel!  The Kickstarter page, as well as the funding video, has more details on what the actual spell casting looks like, well worth a look.

The Kickstarter campaign for Shaman : Shadows of the Last Immortal runs until November 15th and has a funding goal of $27,000.

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Greg Micek

Greg Micek has been writing on and off about games since the late nineties, always with a focus on indie games. He started DIYGames.com in 2000, which was one of the earliest gaming sites to focus exclusively on indie games.

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