On a stormy night…
Detective Stanson scowled at the open case file sitting on his desk. The constant drumming of rain against the street outside matched the rhythm of his fingers as his scowl grew into a grimace. A one-page file for a murder like this. An impossible case, or business as usual. He stood up. His imposing frame and rounded shoulders filled the room the way a bull would fill a phone booth.
“All that blood and not one damn clue,” he muttered.
Darla, leaning against the oak bookshelf, raised an angular eyebrow at him. She reached her long red nails into her pocket and brought out a coin, its purple glow sitting stark against the dark corner she was smirking from.
“Not but one,” she said with a wry wistfulness.
“Yeah and where has she disappeared to? We’ll have to search the whole city.”
“Maybe she fell into a portal that took her out of this place.”
Elzinger lifted his square head from the table he was working at, a contraption of metal parts and purple ooze whirring at the ends of his fingertips.
“I could do with some quiet right now, I’m about done with the bullet analysis. And stop pointing that thing at me,” he said, flinching his head away from Darla’s partially outstretched arm. She smiled and brought down the coin she had angled at Elzinger’s face.
“Sorry Elz, you know how antsy I get, cooped up in this office.” Stanson looked out the window onto the lamp-lit street. It was the dead of night and there was nothing to do but wait. The bullet analysis was a long shot and he knew it. He turned back to his desk. The top drawer was locked, like always, and inside sat his brass knuckles. He pulled at the air out of habit. One break in the case, and he knew he could set everything right. Or at least, he could try.
“Analysis is done,” said Elzinger. The others moved to the table. Elzinger lifted his head again, the overhead light reflecting against his glasses.
“You’ll never guess whose gun the bullet came from.”
Introducing Wrath Noir
My next game, Wrath Noir, is a tactical turn-based RPG with a future-noir aesthetic. The player controls Stanson, Darla, and Elzinger as they unravel the mystery of an inexplicable murder and a disappeared girl. Their investigations will take them through cramped offices, expansive factories, eerie sewers, and even onto the very streets of Saint Isere.
Noir is an excellent and underutilized aesthetic in tactical RPGs. Its dark and cynical undertones mesh cleanly with the kind of slow and deliberate storytelling that makes tactical RPGs engaging. The setting of cramped city streets and dark building interiors lends itself well to the kind of precise combat that makes the genre so compelling. The new setting offers players an entirely different range of weapons and enemies than the fantasy and sci-fi games that dominate the genre.
The key tactical mechanic in Wrath Noir is portals, a commonplace technology in the city of Saint Isere. These portals don’t just define city life; they also define the shape of battle in every fight. Each character has their own combat style and uses portals to give themselves unique advantages. Combat is all about positioning, whether the player is ducking in and out of cubicles or fist-fighting on top of conveyor belts.
These portals enable a more dynamic form of combat. Portals allow each character to have a distinct way of moving around the battlefield and accessing key positions. They also open a lot of design space in environments. Arenas can be more complex and force more demanding conditions on the player, because the player can react with a richer set of tools. This can include blocking or destroying sections of the battlefield, making certain tiles damaging or impossible to move through, and creating mechanics that must be interacted with to avoid devastating consequences.
The Characters
Stanson is a walking mountain. His brass knuckles aren’t just for knocking down enemies; they also let him rip apart space itself to create portal connections between two points. The openings don’t last long and he needs to find a seam to rip apart first. When he comes charging through, though, enemies feel it. Capable of taking more than a couple of blows, Stanson is used to standing face-to-face with the people he fights. He doesn’t need to trick his enemies; he picks them up and puts them right where he wants them.
Darla is a dangerous shot and a cunning investigator. Her tall form and sharp features blend into the shadows like a stalking raven. Her Colt 1911 is equipped with a small portal on its end, connecting to her gold coin. Throwing the coin can give her a new angle on enemies from behind cover, or even redirect enemy projectiles to new targets. No enemy is ever out of Darla’s sight. Her Fade ability makes attacking her at melee range feel like swinging at smoke.
Elzinger’s unusually small form is offset by the large rectangular backpack that he straps to himself before every fight. He’s as nimble with his fingers as he is with his mind; with enough Scrap, he can build anything. Between roaming turrets, deployable walls, and explosive traps, Elzinger changes the battlefield to suit him and his allies. He creates what he needs and takes nothing as given. He can build permanent portal connections across the arena, or just use his jetpack to fly to where he needs to go.
Look out for Wrath Noir coming to Steam in 2027.