Each god can bestow powers and gifts, can you talk about some of the specifics and do you have a personal favorite?
Some of the gifts are obvious – for example Poseidon can teach his hero spells that are of water or healing nature; while, on the other hand, those who follow Hades will be able to resurrect themselves or even drain energy from dead bodies. My favorite would probably be Water Affinity which makes your spell stronger when casting from water, Brilliancy which allows you to draw magic power from light, Reopen wounds which does exactly what it says or Luck of the brave – you sacrifice a large part of your hit points but get very high chance of finding great loot.
What was the biggest lesson you learned while developing the game?
Well, for me it would definitely be - if something really doesn’t work, throw it away as soon as possible. No matter how much effort you put into it. There were several times when some of features didn’t feel like we expected. We’ve tried to tweak it here and there but still were not satisfied with the result. In the end we had to completely redesign some of them. Although it cost us additional time, it think it was really worth it.
Numen has a very interesting art style, can you talk about some of the influences behind the art direction of the game?
Right from the start we wanted the game to look a bit different from all the mainstream RPGs but didn’t want to go as far as cartoon or similar technique. Also, because the Numen takes place mostly in Mediterranean areas which are rather arid with no deep green forests so common in RPGs we had to find a way to stay as much accurate as possible while keeping the visuals interesting.
Downloadable content (DLC) has become an important part of the game industry. What are your thoughts on this trend and will Numen have post release DLC?
I think that DLC is a really great thing. Once a game is finished you have the know-how, the tools and the feedback so you can develop a great expansion in a relatively short time and the players who liked your game are happy to spend some more time in the world you made – so it’s a win-win situation.
There are some really interesting places that didn’t make it to the game so there’s definitely enough material to release DLC. Whether we’ll actually do it depends on how good Numen sells.
We'd like to thank Aleš for taking the time to answer our questions as well as Tony for coordinating the interview.
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