E3 2016 - New Trailer, Gameplay Info for Obsidian's Tyranny

Published: June 14, 2016 12:28 AM /

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Tyranny E3 Trailer Obsidian

Obsidian Entertainment showed off a new gameplay trailer for their upcoming isometric RPG, Tyranny.

The trailer gives the players a hint of the combat and conflict found in the game, which has the forces of evil, lead by the powerful overlord Kyros, have conquered the known world. The player plays a Fatebinder, a judge of Kyros' law under the eyes of Kyros' own archons of Justice, and the player will decide the fates of thousands by either "instituting the law from above, or instituting your own."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNXV5SWi2Z8

The trailer shows us a snippet of the gameplay, which is reminiscent in the graphical style of Obsidians previous RPG, Pillars of Eternity. Tyranny, however, is built on different role-playing mechanics, as stated in one of the developer diaries already posted about the game by game director Brian Heins.

Tyranny's role-playing mechanics are based more on a skills system; combining three primary skill categories in Weapons, Support, and Magic, which all determine different aptitudes for your character; Weapons, for example, determines accuracy for a specific weapon type, while Support skills can determine how good you are at dodging attacks, how sneaky or how knowledgeable your character is. Magic, of course, focuses on your magical power, which is done through various magical sigils that control different elements and forces for the player to tap into.

Your character also has six core attributes, such as Might, Quickness, and Wits, that help determine the base value of your numerous skills. All skills also have a primary and secondary attribute attached to them, which would equal your base values in your skills. In an example in the diary, a One-Handed Weapon skill would use the Might attribute as its primary statistic, and the Finesse attribute as its secondary statistic. If a player character has a 15 in Might, and 10 in Finesse, they would total a base skill of 28, after the math behind attributes is calculated.

The character sheet of Tyranny is fully detailed, as you would expect it to be for an RPG.
The character sheet of Tyranny is fully detailed, as you would expect it to be for an RPG.

Perhaps the key feature in the skills system in Tyranny is how open-form it is. Invoking a similar system to the old Elder Scrolls games, such as Daggerfall and Morrowind, skills level up independently, increasing in rank with use. However, instead of being locked at level 1 grinding skills to rank 100, as your skills increase in rank, you gain experience towards leveling up, meaning increasing ranks in your skills also increases your level. Social skills also gain ranks through conversation, intimidation, or interacting with the environment, and skills or player choices gated by certain skill levels also receive experience to those skills if they are used, meaning failing at certain skill tasks still grant you experience in that skill.

Finally, level ups allow you to increase attributes scores, and to pick from one of six distinct talent trees to refine the abilities of your character further.

Obsidian is promising to post a developer diary every two weeks at this point, with the latest information about the Tyranny world, such as who the Fatebinder is and who are the Archons. Tyranny still does not have a release date, but is slated for a late 2016 release.

Remember, you can find more of our E3 coverage at our E3 2016 Coverage Hub.

What do you think of Tyranny? Leave your comments below. 

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| Staff Writer

A longtime player of games, creator of worlds, and teacher of minds. Robert has worked many positions over the years, from college professor to education… More about Robert

More Info About This Game
Learn more about Tyranny
Game Page Tyranny
Platforms
PC
Release Date
November 10, 2016 (Calendar)
Genre
Adventure
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