Alcarys Complex

The continent of Elcaea’s most notable feature – more notable than its beautiful mountains, rivers, and gulfs – is the corruption that stains every cobblestone, runs down every wall, and leaks from every faucet. This is thanks in no small part to national leaders who sweat bile at the thought of doing something venerable.

The citizens of Elcaea detest this corruption, and they’d sooner approach a cloaked, hooded figure wearing a necklace of bones than someone in a business suit. Six of these citizens try to make a difference in a world where the word citizen is a pejorative.

Unfortunately for them, there’s no turning point. There’s no magic spell that’ll make it all better. There isn’t even a villain to murder in the name of justice. These individuals came too late to save a world brought to a slow boil by the blunders of the privileged.

But they’re resourceful. They’ll make up for lost time.
  • Enjoy a main narrative about the nature of power and violence. This narrative strongly relies on characterization to govern the main characters’ interactions with each other. More details on the story here.
  • View the perspectives of six well-defined characters with strengths and flaws that reflect their upbringing and experience. Meet the characters!
  • The story doesn’t stop when the cutscene ends! Real-time banter and informed, ever changing non-player characters (NPCs) add to Elcaea’s atmosphere and ensure that you’ll never go uninformed.
  • Use the Sociability system to gain strength by interacting with those around you and progressing through the main narrative. You’ll be rewarded for knowledge about the personalities of your party members!
Q: When is Alcarys Complex going to be released? On which platforms can I play it?
A: We plan to release Alcarys Complex sometime mid-2012 for PC. An OSX release is also in the cards, and a Linux port is not out of the question. We’ll let you know when we have more information.

Q: How much is the game going to cost?
A: $20.

Q: Is there a demo I could try out to see whether or not I like the game?
A: Right here. We’d also be very grateful for bug reports and critique of the game. If you have any bug reports or notes, please send them to help at modestarcade dot com.

Q: Couldn’t you have just written a book?
A: We thought about it, but we decided not to. One of our goals with Alcarys Complex is to subvert RPG genre convention and it’s kind of hard to do that from another medium. That being said, there’s a terrible early draft of Alcarys Complex in book form that’ll never see the light of day unless you give us a million billion dollars. True story.

Q: What is the game made in?
A: Alcarys Complex was made using Game Maker 8.1 Standard.

Q: How long has the game been in development?
A: The first alpha build of Alcarys Complex was made in September 2006, and we’ve been working diligently on a full release since then.

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