About a week ago, a terrifying phenomenon descended on San Francisco during a storm. Escaping from these otherworldly forces as they threw trees, chairs, and Web3 developers everywhere, I fled to the G Hotel, where I found greater horrors awaiting me…
It’s Red Hook Studios game design director Tyler Sigman and creative director Chris Bourassa – a dangerous duo lurking in the dark, armed with Darkest Dungeon 2 On the laptop, prepare to pounce. Resigned to fate, I sat down and spent the last 30 minutes of my sanity asking them when they were in early access on the Epic Game Store, and some of the differences between Darkest Dungeon 2 and the original. If you’re reading this, I’m gone.
As of this writing, Darkest Dungeon 2 has about six weeks left in Early Access before it hits a world unprepared for its horrors. According to Sigman, the game has been in development for around four years and has hit the beta phase — selling an initial 100,000 copies, with early access sales of just over 300,000 as of our interview. After a near-constant process of development, feedback gathering, and rework, the team has gone into the dark and buried itself in preparation for a full release.
“A lot of Early Access is about finishing content, but with this game, we’re not afraid to go back and revisit systems that might not line up the way we’d like them to,” Bourassa said. “We’re really happy with where it is now.”
Since the game launched into Early Access in 2021, the team has been digging new content while gathering feedback on three main areas: the richness of the relationship system, overall progression, and game traversal mechanics.
Before the Altar of Hope was added, the progression system was initially considered “boring”. The relationship system – while initially presenting a complex aspect of the rapport between your teams – confuses players. When characters fall in love, there can be party jealousy and other side effects of complicated love relationships. While the team dug it up at the time, “it wasn’t interesting enough,” according to Bourassa. Based on this feedback, the team rebuilt the system several times over a nine-month period to create what it is today.
The duo say the enthusiastic install base of early access players has brought them a lot of criticism, leading the studio to feel comfortable with tweaks and changes today. Of course, some things were axed. Gone for a while, but far from forgotten.
“We wanted to rearrange our roadmap a bit after launch, just because there were some things we weren’t happy with and some features weren’t up to our standards. So we had some neat ideas for extra stuff that might about– will appear later.
These include, but are not limited to, underground areas, and each battle will pit you against a colossal enemy that subverts the typical combat system in a unique way. “So, we’ve got a huge four-slot enemy in there, so every fight is going to be a protracted feast of big slugs,” Bourassa teases. “We kind of thought it was going to be a neat twist on combat and had a lot of implications – if you only had one target, you could really set up and execute combos.”
Then there are the characters. Funky, scary crones, crones, gargoyles and other scary monsters. None of this was thrown out the window. Instead, they will likely come back as post-launch content injections. As Sigman pointed out, they’re all looking for potential post-1.0 content. The dungeon is cold, damp, and nothing is left on the cutting room floor.
A lot of thought fell into this potential post-launch curiosity, thanks in no small part to the wider scope the game offered, taking players away from the first game’s manor and into the wider world of Darkest Dungeon.
“This excites us,” Sigman said. “The idea that it’s a journey made sure we got very creative early on in Darkest Dungeon 2’s development.”he pointed out crazy colors The DLC from Darkest Dungeon serves as an example of stuido’s previous creativity within the boundaries of the original, but acknowledges that Darkest Dungeon 2 allows them to go to different, darker places.
Sigman elaborates: “There’s a freedom that comes from saying what the world would look like? It’s fun imagining the whole region. It opens the door to things that might not fit within the scope of Darkest Dungeon 1”.
This range goes further than the places you visit. If Darkest Dungeon 2 has become anything during its early access period, it’s more expansive in all areas. Take character backstories, for example; your Highwayman is no longer just a tool to deal with. He’s a real character, and players can join a narrative journey throughout his journey–an aspect of the game that both Sigman and Brassa are particularly proud of.
But despite all these differences, despite its wider scope, despite its shift in direction from deep into the manor to a righteous road trip, Darkest Dungeon 2 is still a challenge to the typical power fantasies found in other games.
“It’s not a game about acquiring riches and resources,” Sigman explained. “When you’re on a road trip, like these expeditions in Darkest Dungeon 2, it’s kind of like a ride-or-die quest, where the riches have no real value.” . So you’re actually using whatever you can pick up on the side of the road”.
However, there is a glimmer of hope there. You always need something to cling to on those long, cold nights when the wind is whistling past your caravan, right? Following the often hopeless tone of Darkest Dungeon, and the horrific real-life events that occurred during the development of Darkest Dungeon 2, the team believes that everything in their game will build a more desirable experience.
Bourassa concludes: “For ourselves and for the places we live in, we’ve had a sense of relative progress and security for a long time. I think that lets you enjoy your entertainment, you can go darker, Because you don’t feel like you’re in danger yourself, it’s an interesting space to play in. But I think for this game, we just feel like as creatives, accepting the other side of the coin and something more promising It’s going to be a huge challenge.”
When Darkest Dungeon 2 version 1.0 launches on May 8, 2023, you can see for yourself whether the folks at Red Hook Studios have pulled it off.
