The narrative elements of role-playing games can often fall to the waysides amidst combat. While not necessarily a bad thing, it’s somewhat hard to focus on the beautiful backgrounds when you’re trying to choose which move to use in battle or avoid running into an enemy you can’t beat, or any other number of woes to contest with.
Book of Travels, a Kickstarter project in the works, seeks to remedy this sort of issue. Tossing you into the well-crafted fairytale world of Braided Shore that blends fantasy and industrialism with magic and nature, you have no major goal, no central plot or apocalypse to thwart. The journey is one you make yourself. No plotlines or quests/sidequests, just you, and this fantastically lush world.
Book of Travels comes into the role-playing gaming world with a change to the multiplayer genre. Rather than a massively multiplayer experience, Book Of Travels focuses on minimizing the online encounters, but making each one memorable, referring to it as a TMO–tiny multiplayer online. While you’re more than able to venture out as a solo agent, the servers can hold a small amount of people at a time, and you’re able to join up with them of you so choose.
Might and Delight, the creators of Book Of Travels, emphasize that no aspect of the game will be missed out on whether you go alone or partner up, and that the game is constantly changing, providing a different experience each time you open it up to play. As you navigate the world, you’ll see things like flocks of animals passing by, townfolk wandering the streets, and a multitude of events, some that only trigger during certain conditions like raining or appearing only at night. “We’ve worked on this part of the game more than any other,” says Might and Delight. “Making the world ever-changing, and giving it a life of its own.”
Free exploration, social interaction, and freedom of choice are the defining aspects of Book Of Tales. You can enjoy the splendor and majesty of the world by yourself, or make it more exciting as you venture with friends.
Book Of Travels has been fully funded, and is expected to see a PC release October 2020.
