Everlasting Journey

I've kind of alluded to what plot points of part 2 will be about via gamepage comments, but I hadn't actually connected the dots to them until a few weeks ago. Here's the questions that had to be answered:

- At the end of Part 1, Paul casts a Gravity spell that basically sends Sparrow & co. through the Southern Winds. "Gravity" magic will be a big deal, but how did Paul cast it?
- Paul has lost Athesis, his troops, and his sanity. What's next for him? How can I go darker while still retaining a comedic/ironic quality?
- How did the Southern Winds get there, and how will Sparrow & co. get to freely travel from the northern hemisphere to the southern hemisphere?
- The obvious: Where does Sparrow & co. land and what's next for them?
- What's next for the Sparrow, Athesis & Miles love triangle?
- Is the airship okay??

I decided the smartest thing to do was to either answer or make the player start thinking about these questions within the first 15-20 minutes of Part 2, before going back into battles. The end of Part 1 had a lot of fighting, so at this point the player needs a break anyway to digest everything.

So for the obvious, the airship flat-out crashes. Roger clues you in on what needs to be fixed (and what Sparrow needs to find). He also has prior magic & worldly knowledge, so he can share his speculations to Sparrow about what the Southern Winds are. This is a fairly long cutscene that I rewrote several times over this past year. It was tough to get right, but I think I nailed it at this point. That answers two questions.

Next was Athesis. She has to patch things up with Sparrow, so there's a private 1-on-1 conversation on the airship for her to clear the air. This short little scene was a little hard to write since I didn't want it to be awkward, but it came out pretty clever. Sparrow actually comes out slightly ahead of Miles, and makes a good setup for stuff later on. That squares away the love triangle question for now.

At this point, the gang gets out of the airship and sees the Azure Coast. Years ago (back in like 07 when this game was still shitty), I had this blue forest/frog city idea, so this is a really exciting part to work on. The continent you land on is called Ghandek, which you learn from a couple thieves:



The section you land on is the western-most coast, which is supposedly the "birthplace of magic", according to the frog city of Ribt (might change this name. ^_^ ). Bren serves as kind of your guide to what's to see in Ghandek. you learn that the Azure Coast is where all the frogs who get exiled from Ribt are sent. Sparrow & co. tells him how they got there (passing through the Southern Winds via some kind of "powerful" spell). Bren speculates that it was Gravity, so this gives me a chance to explain what it is.

Gravity is an extension of Dark magic and kind of a legend. A mage must master the darkness before he can attempt what lies beyond (matter). Bren states "many dark mages have ripped their bodies apart trying to learn." This was kind of a cool idea, because that's basically what changes in gravity could potentially do. At this point the player knows that Paul cast a gravity spell, but at what cost?

This sparked one last cutscene, a "meanwhile" that shows what Paul is currently up to. I basically wrote the scene in one go and it's definitely one of my best to date. It's awesomely dark/intriguing and covers the Paul questions, but I won't say what happens. :)

At this point, the player is ready to get back into the swing of exploring/battling. Sparrow & co. have goals, the villain's ready to kick things up a notch, and the player has enough information to feel comfortable in the new surroundings. Great success!

This weekend, I've been doing a lot of mapping & the usual stuffs, in order to get the player to Ribt, since that's next!


So overall, I hope do get the player through numerous areas of Ghandek by Feb-March since I tend to get more work done in the winter months.