It's another Kickstarter success as John Rhee's Liege earns $ 81,458, five times the original $ 15,000 funding goal and far past all the stretch goals. This really is the kind of success most crowdfunding campaigns dream of.
As a result of meeting the stretch goals, the game is coming to PC and mobile platforms, including Linux, as well as Wii U, PS4 and Vita. Furthermore, several game assets, including mounts and horses, ships, ports and seas, bigger battles, upgraded art direction and an expanded portion of a game sequence, called the Burning City, will all be developed and added for the game.
Liege, simply put, is a party based tactical RPG, with a fantasy world more in line with Game of Thrones than Final Fantasy. In fact, developer John Rhee goes out of his way to point out how he's taking Liege in a dramatically different direction than most Japanese RPGs, in terms of story, art and gameplay.
The gameplay itself is inspired by the likes of Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy Tactics, and chess. Each character can enter certain classes to be imbued with certain characteristics, and gain additional stat bonuses when choosing banners. The game also emphasizes strategy in where you place your characters, so that you will be playing a constant game of cat and mouse. There will be grinding, but don't expect to be doing it anytime soon.
The story is not the usual kidnapped princess theme or evil conqueror theme, although there is a kingdom in peril. In a fantasy world, a king, along with his queen and heirs, fall into a deep slumber they cannot wake from, inciting the kingdom into civil war.
The game takes inspiration from design ideas from RPGs of old and updates them, so instead of the pixel/voxel look you'll get a lush, watercolor fantasy world. Similarly, the soundtrack is inspired from RPGs of older generations, but makes the natural next step to current gen technology.
For Rhee, the next few steps are opening up funding in Paypal and Humble Store, Steam Greenlight, and looking for artists to help him execute his vision.
Source: Kickstarter
