Heroes of Science and Fiction News

Join us today at 19:00 CET for the first developer stream of our upcoming turn-based strategy game Silence of the Siren. Our PR and Community Manager Vojta will guide you through the game mechanics, providing insights gained from months of testing.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2147380/Silence_of_the_Siren/

In today’s development update we’re going to have a look at some nifty features and quality of life improvements we’ve already added to Silence of the Siren in the early stages of development.

Let’s start once again at a Fossorian base.

[h3]1. Dependencies[/h3]
When expanding the base, there are various dependencies between the different upgrades. In the catalog, we directly highlight these when you’re browsing through the options. You can also see them all listed in the building details window of course, but that would mean opening another panel every time.



[h3]2. Shortcuts[/h3]
Next, let’s have a look at how easy it is to recruit units: there are shortcuts to hire all units of each type and even to recruit the full army at once.
If you don’t have enough resources, the two white buttons allow you to automatically hire as many units as you can afford, starting from the weakest or from the strongest type.



[h3]3. Mini shortcuts![/h3]
We can go one step further though, some buildings have a mini version of their shortcut panel that appears if you hover over them, so you can save one more click. :)



[h3]4. Trading[/h3]
The final place we’ll visit at the base will be our Trading Post. Sometimes you’ll need to exchange resources to be able to afford units or buildings, sometimes you’ll need to exchange a lot of them.

We found out that giving a few options of how many to trade is more convenient than trying to fine-tune a slider.



[h3]5. Reorder your commanders![/h3]
Now, we’re out in the desert with Bulletproof Benni and Captain Holester. Sometimes you’ll realize that your commanders might have switched roles and they’re not in the order you’d like them to be in - no problem, let’s just swap them!



[h3]6. One by one![/h3]
Army management also allows quite a few options. You can split a unit stack in half or in any ratio, but for distributing for example your starting ranged units into several slots, you can drop them one by one by right clicking.



[h3]7. Outlines everywhere![/h3]
While all the interactable and pickable objects on the map have quite distinct graphics, we’re finding ourselves quite capable of missing one from time to time - not if you press [Alt] though!



[h3]8. Dialogs in check[/h3]
The next two are closely related, so let’s keep them under #8: some dialogs will have a shortcut button for the most common action, saving you for example going to your commander’s inventory and using or equipping an item.



Clicking the end of turn button will check if you still have any available actions at your bases or any commanders that can still move. Still, if these dialogs don’t make sense for your playstyle or for example in the late game, any dialog with the eye icon can be disabled and for example all picked items will just go to the commander’s inventory.



[h3]9. Mini me?[/h3]
For the last two, let’s go into a battle!
When big armies clash and the situation becomes a bit hectic, feel free to hold the [Ctrl] key.



[h3]10. Tactical knowledge![/h3]
At the start of the battle, you often want to move as close to your enemies as possible without letting them reach you - no need to check their movement number in the unit info panel and count hexes, just hold [Shift] while hovering over them with your mouse cursor.



So, these have been some of the ideas we had and have implemented in the game (that we’d already find hard to live without). :)

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Do you have any other suggestions of for example features you’ve missed in other games or found useful when added by the modding community? Let us know in the comments!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2147380/Silence_of_the_Siren/

If somebody wrote a Fossorian Encyclopedia, the cover of the book would display cute space moles dressed in ornate uniforms in front of a pompous military parade in the background. Row after row of soldiers marching in tight formations through the vast, clean streets lined with crowds of cheering workers dressed in colorful overalls.



The introduction of the book would speak about their impressive army relying mainly on the overwhelming numbers and brute strength of the ground forces. High morale, uplifted by watchful officers of the Commissars Core and inspired by stories about the brave deeds of heroic commanders. Despite their undisputed ground force dominance, there is a small chance that the author would mention some vague information about the relatively unsatisfactory state of the faction’s Space Navy and the dismal technical condition of most of their ships still recovering after a rather dramatic escape from the Fossorian homeworld, long journey to the Siren System and the unfortunate clash with the much more technologically advanced fleet of the UNSS (United Nations of the Solar System).



Another few pages of the very verbose encyclopedia would be addressing underground bases. These fortified marvels of brutalist engineering sprawl in gargantuan caverns. Flipping through the pages, the next section would elaborate on the steadily growing network of tunnels used for safe and quick transportation of units and materials. Fossorian colonies are capable of producing a seemingly endless stream of goods far below the Fairtrade prices, but to unveil the secrets behind their economic efficiency the reader must wait for the later chapters.


If we overlook the aforementioned military dominance and economic strength, the end of the book's introduction would surely list a few other good reasons why the other factions trapped in the Siren System fear, tolerate, and even like to cooperate with Fosorians. Let's discuss at least some of them here.

Metaphorically speaking, all factions are stranded on an island surrounded by a sea of hostile natives, alien and mostly dangerous wildlife. Unstable ecosystems are always ready to wipe out whole colonies with ravaging storms, and remnants of the Holy War are an active threat even after centuries. Under such harsh conditions, striving for peaceful cooperation seems to be a much smarter option than risking an open conflict with the neighboring faction.


The Fossorians are also known for their successful land conquest, biting chunk after chunk from the tribal territories. This slow but steady effort is expanding the amount of land secured against the raids of natives while helping to export the danger far from the most populated areas. Every now and then a courageous Fossorian explorer uncovers another piece of mysterious technology hidden amid the dangerous ruins of the ancient Primals. Thanks to the fact that the overseeing organizations of the Fossorian command are prone to look aside (usually for a reasonable contribution to someone's "pension fund"), many of the artifacts and rare technologies end up on the black market and subsequently in research facilities of other more technologically advanced factions.


Now if it wasn't Fossorians themselves, but researchers from one of the other races who wrote this book, it would also list items like Totalitarian fanaticism, Sadistic junta, Slaver business, Pathological traitor syndrome, or Endless spiral of revolutions after which you slowly begin to realize that maybe, just maybe, the Fossorians are not the nicest or the fairest players in the Siren System. But as the Fossorian ambassador has stated on the last peace summit: ”Even if a small fraction of those unsupported claims would reflect reality (which it certainly DOES NOT, my Goodfellas), it would be classified as a inner state business of the Fosorian nation, with absolutely no impact on the international politics of the Siren System and unworthy of your concerns. Now, gentlemen, if you excuse me, I have spotted an unattended bowl of Tunnel worm caviar over there.”

Of course, the whole idea of a ‘Fossorian Encyclopedia’ is absolutely ludicrous. Nobody is dumb enough to write such a book and mark himself as the next target of the Fossorian death commando.

We are happy to show you the first commented gameplay video of Silence of the Siren.

In this playthrough we focus on the main features - exploration, base management and battles. We hope it will give you more insight about what to expect from the game. If you have any questions, of course don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments.

We plan to release the game in Early Access sometime next year. If you are interested in playing the game sooner, we plan to run a closed beta test a few months earlier. The best way not to miss it is to join our Discord: https://discord.gg/qaQQat2dbC


If you are a content creator or journalist who is interested in the game, make sure to contact us by email: [email protected]. We might have a demo for you very soon.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]