Project Witchstone – PAX East Preview
There is quite possibly too much promise in Project Witchstone. Six months into development, the game’s framework is stellar for it being such a short amount of time since they began. Spearhead Games has wasted no time in detailing how this sandbox RPG is ready to change the way RPGs are made. Taking the methodology of tabletop gaming’s freedom, Creative Director Malik Boukhira emphasized that great RPGs like Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls games offer action often without consequence and spoke about how others take it even further, providing neither actions nor consequences. In Project Witchstone there is both, and it stresses how a fundamental balance of the two is being kept in mind while developing their largest game to date.
The time spent in the PAX East demo was time spent entering a town that was under siege. Not from any external forces but, rather, from within with this small town being torn in two as two rival gangs antagonized each other. Interrupting a few of one of the factions brigands accosting a local merchant leads to a series of choices. For the more action oriented player, this might mean attacking the gang members and saving the merchant. Others might let it slide and walk past it, or put their tongue to good use and convince the men to disperse and cease their cruelty. If you kill the men, the merchant doesn’t thank you. Instead, he reports it to the local Sheriff which leads to further complications.
There were more than just the generic fantasy choices. While I had the option of hoodwinking either gang or joining one outright and securing dominance, I instead decided that neither gang should exist. Carefully, I assassinated both leaders, their lieutenants, and anyone else that stood in my way of restoring this town to peace. I also killed a blacksmith I had recruited to save his son from prison. It wasn’t personal to any of the men I killed. I was just some stranger that walked through their town and changed it forever. This town would always remember the day when the two gangs’ leadership were killed – the day their town was saved. But they’d never know who did it, nor why.
There is a lot of promise to Project Witchstone, but so early in development it remains to be seen how much promise can be delivered upon. Spearhead Games Kickstarter for Project Witchstone is set to debut sometime later this year, 2019.
