Book of Travels News

We’ve used the term TMORPG ever since Book of Travels was announced back in September 2019, and if you’ve ever wondered why, we’re here to explain... The T in TMO signals an alternative to the more common industry standard MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game) putting 'tiny' in the place of 'massive'. Essentially, it means that players per server are limited and meetings between players will be uncommon.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

If you’ve seen our Kickstarter campaign video the abbreviation may sound familiar, and we’ve been really pleased to notice that for some, it’s one of the game’s biggest attractions. While it’s not exactly a genre, we think it works pretty well to describe a game where the amount of online players is capped. The result is that meeting other players is not commonplace and therefore, something a bit special.

[h2]It all began with Meadow[/h2]
Might and Delight’s first networked game, Meadow, was something of an experiment, bringing the style and ambience of the Shelter series to an open game world where small groups of players can bound around together in animal guise, unlocking magic obelisks and communicating with emotes. The response we had from players was incredibly positive – they loved the magic of sharing wordless adventures together. Four years on, we’re proud to say that the Meadow forum and Discord channel is filled with stories of special moments of meeting and connection.



[h2]Find the Few[/h2]
Feedback on the emotional impact of these connections took us by surprise, and we soon knew that the TMO experience was something we wanted to explore further. Players of Journey will know exactly how moving it can be to chance upon another player, especially in a non-directive, non-linear game world. In Journey, the multiplayer aspect is pushed to the limit of its definition: meetings with ‘companions’ being as few as one per game (and make for a truly sublime emotional beat). In Meadow up to fifty animals share a grove, and in Book of Travels we’ll be using our Early Access period to experiment with player numbers.

[h2]The game design challenge[/h2]
While this isn’t entirely new ground for us, we know it's going to be a challenge. There are many table top roleplayers in the Book of Travels dev team, and they know just how important player interactions are in bringing adventures to life. So, striking a balance between rich roleplay and sparsity of player meetings is the challenge that we now face! We’ll be counting heavily on your feedback and the help of beta testers to finetune that balance.

[h2]Help us in our endeavours![/h2]
What games have you enjoyed where player meetings are infrequent? Do you love RPGs? How do you feel about fewer meetings? We’d love your input, right here in the comments section. If you'd like to join our mailing list for updates and occasional free extras, join us here.

And of course feel free to add “Book of Travels” to your wishlist using the button below!

Thanks again for spending time with us!

Best Wishes,
Helen and the Dev Team x


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/

[h2]Want more info?[/h2]
[h3]Become a traveller[/h3]
Sign up on our mailing list for news and an in-game treat in our upcoming game at www.TMORPG.com.

[h3]Inspirations for Book of Travels[/h3]
We’ve been deeply gratified to read all your comments on Kickstarter, Steam and Discord. In particular those that have lead us to books, art and other media that you feel share similarities with our TMORPG. Therefore we’ve dedicated a post to the key inspirations behind Book of Travels.
Read more in this post: Inspirations for Book of Travels!

[h3]Revealing the Early Access World[/h3]
Later this year Book of Travels will be available for Early Access on Steam. In Chapter Zero parts of the Braided Shore will be open, and among the places to visit is the gem of the region – the city of Kasa. Read more here.

[h3]Join our Discord[/h3]
Join our super friendly Discord to exchange ideas on all things Book of Travels as well as art, games and books. Join here.

Narrative Designer Dennis Gustafsson has previously published nine comic books and worked on 35 games. Book of Travels brings him from Malmo to Stockholm, usually by motorbike, but soon as a permanent relocation. We hope you like his Q&A. Be sure to ask any questions in the comments, Dennis will be popping in to answer them!

[h3]Where have you been until now?[/h3]
I have been in too many places to mention since my first game was released in 1991. Most recently I worked for King as a combined Art, Level & Game Design Lead in King's Malmö studio.

[h3]How did you find your way to Might and Delight?[/h3]
I’m an old friend of Joel’s [Studio Manager], and when Book of Travels needed to evolve its narrative, he got in touch and offered me a position supporting the Game Designers as a Narrative Designer. I’ve always dreamed of working on a game that’s as ambitious as Book of Travels is, but until now I’ve never had the chance. As a professional Game Developer getting the chance to influence the type of game you work on is the rare exception rather than the norm! Book of Travels will be my first indie game and I'm honoured, humbled and delighted in equal measure to be invited to join the team and the studio.

[h3]What do you most enjoy about your work at Might and Delight?[/h3]
Being part of a game team who's design vision is driven primarily by aesthetics and feel, all else follows in its wake. Another rare exception in game development.
[h3]
Where you get your inspiration from?[/h3]
Music, mainly – it has a lovely habit of kicking down hidden walls in my imagination!

[h3]What other experiences do you bring to the role?[/h3]
I'm a fully trained train engineer!


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/

[h3]Hello Travellers![/h3]

Today we’re really excited to begin our fortnightly programme of updates with this video of gameplay clips. For many of you this will be a first glimpse of the fully functioning game world - we hope you like it!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

These clips were recorded on a single player server, so they give a sense of the game world without the presence of other players. We hope they give you a glimpse of some of the areas, environments and features that we're currently working on. Book of Travels is a TMO and we're looking forward to sharing more about how you'll interact in those occasional player meetings at some point in the future. Our next video update comes in November, when we'll be sharing longer, uninterrupted gameplay footage!

As always we would love to hear your thoughts, and the team will be checking in to answer your questions, so please ask away! And if you have something about the game that you want us to talk about or show, let us know right here in the comments section.

[h3]Best Wishes,

Helen & the Dev Team[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/

Game Designer Beto was brought onto team to help balance the play experience in Book of Travels. Currently he's working on resources distribution across Early Access levels alongside colleague Andreas Wangler. We're super excited to have Beto with us all the way from Brazil! Here's his Q&A – we hope you like it, and if you want to ask him any questions, pop them in the comments section!

[h3]Where have you been until now?[/h3]
My arrival in Sweden happened in 2017, after working as a game designer in different Brazilian studios – Aduge, Aquiris and Black River. Here in Sweden, I studied Serious Games in the University of Skövde and worked at Attractive Interactive in Karlskrona.

[h3]How did you find your way to Might and Delight?[/h3]
After playing Tiny Echo, I got inspired to reach out to the studio. Joel [Studio Manager] was super sweet and invited me for a coffee. It wasn’t until 2018 I managed to get there, and it was such an inspiring day! It was also the coldest day in a long time, haha.

[h3]What do you most enjoy about your work at Might and Delight?[/h3]
The nurturing environment and kindness of everyone. No wonder the studio creates such unique heartfelt experiences. It seems very natural to me that the games are what they are. After all, they carry bits of several beautiful souls.

[h3]What are you most excited about with Book of Travels?[/h3]
To me it’s the fact that the game is built around the aesthetics of serenity. That, combined with the genre defying aspect – a TMO instead of an MMO – frees me up to explore so many unique designs.

[h3]What do you love doing when you're not working?[/h3]
Making more games? That shouldn't count, right hahah! A few years ago I rediscovered nib calligraphy and that's been a passion again. Either writing or drawing with nibs.

[h3]Do you have a favourite game?[/h3]
Kentucky Route Zero


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/



We hope this update finds you well. It’s been a long and strange summer for us all, and during its course the team realised they needed to make a new schedule for Book of Travels – that schedule means a bigger, better early access gameworld and a new programme of regular game dev updates here on Steam.

[h3]Our first gameplay video drops in November[/h3]

As you can see in the graphic above our next stop is going to be a gameplay video along with a major update in November. We're REALLY looking forward to this and we think you're going to love seeing the progress that we've made!







[h3]Fortnightly game updates[/h3]

Your enthusiasm and anticipation really have been soul food to us through these trying times! And we're going to be much more present from hereon. With our new schedule in place we've been able to make space for a new series of regular, fortnightly updates which will give details about where development is at and how the game is shaping up as well as lots and lots of screenshots. They'll start on October 2nd and we'll be waiting for and responding to your questions and comments. Later in the year we’ll be continuing our series of insights into different aspects of the development process in our Ask the Devs videos.

We’ve also heard your desire for merchandise and will soon have an Art Station store which we'll be adding to as our library of artwork grows – we'll post an update when it's ready.

We're enormously grateful for all of your encouragement and kind words these last months and we're looking forward to connecting more on our travels on the road to release. Stay in touch!

Best Wishes,
Helen and the team at Might and Delight

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1152340/Book_of_Travels/