Hi,
I'll tell you the story you heard a thousand times before. I always wanted to make games. Six years ago I started learning Unity and C# programming. Couple of friends with 3d design and drawing skills joined because they wanted to make games too (and I guess I manage to persuade them). We are all in our late 30's now so we have our jobs, family, and other responsibilities. Long story short, with no guidance, we learnt how to do things by tutorials, forums and all sort of sources. We did a playable test but then things started to cool down with the development. Things happened to all of us and my dream started to fade away after I realize I needed much more 3d/2d assets and my friends just had no time or interest.
So here I am. I guess I don't want to give up and need some feedback from you.
First I would like to share with you the plot for the game which is named Steamwings.
I wanted it to be a shmup with much more like Sine Mora in the looking but with RPG and leveling concepts. It is set in a steampunk world ruled by an harsh empire that won a war years ago. I know, nothing new as for the storytelling standards. But I wanted to tell this dark story my way and maybe it would be interesting for some gamers.
I want to share with you the preface I wrote and I would appreciate any comments or help you could give.
And please, forgive my english as I'm not an english native speaker and I used just google translate for the story. If someone have interest, I'll translate it better.
Thank you all.
Steam Wings
Chapter 1: Helmut
Helmut always kept the same routine. He got up early and looked grudgingly through the window of his rented room in the working-class neighborhood of Halstaff. After slipping out of bed, he moved with the crutch that he left every night leaning on the table to the closet where he kept, in addition to his official clothes, the mechanical leg that replaced the one he had lost ten years ago years. It was placed on the burned stump with a grimace of pain and remembered how shortly before losing the leg, the population had received their endowment as if they were heroes when they managed to expel the hosts of the Imperial army. Now he was just an outcast. Another crippled parasite, a good for nothing that lived on the pension that the magnanimous Empire granted to all the military of one side or another that could no longer do decent work. That pension paid the room rented to Mrs. Hans and little else for what Helmut was forced to work as an assistant in Gregor's workshop. He had been friends with his father before and during the war and although he did not maintain the same relationship with the son, they both fully trusted each other. Finally, she washed with cold water from the basin that Mrs. Julia left ready every night and dressed in parsimony ready to approach the workshop.
Gregor's wife had died in one of the incessant bombings with which the Empire subjected the rebel provinces after the battle of Yorguen. A large explosive cannonball shot down the north facade of the hospital where she worked as a nurse and Ania only had time to save a five-year-old boy pushing him through the dirty laundry room and giving him a paper for her husband in which only said "Take care Greg." And that Gregor did, took care of him and fed him as if he were his own son.
One afternoon, after a hard day at work, Helmut was sitting at the doors of the workshop. He had helped disassemble a huge cycle engine from an aero node. The cooling filters were usually clogged by carbon particles and it was necessary to disassemble them every couple of hundred hours of flight. That ensured a well-paid newspaper job. The child Greg was taking care of approached slowly with his eyes fixed on Helmut's mechanical leg. It always caused him fascination. It was a set of tubes, nuts and wire cables that mimicked the shape of what a human leg should be.
The boy liked it, was awake and always helped in the workshop. I had seen him grow since the end of the war. Seeing him when the huge cycle engines arrived was a spectacle. Always running with his notebook in his hand drawing and pointing details about which he would later ask.
But that afternoon it wasn't the engines that intrigued the young Maximilian. He stayed with him for a while, as if he were fighting an internal battle. Finally he gathered enough courage and asked:
What happened to you?
Helmut looked at him, the boy looked awkward, he knew he should never ask about the war, his father had told him many times. However, curiosity overcame caution. For this time, Helmut wanted to tell him something that nobody had told him before. The truth.
He leaned back in his seat, narrowed his eyes and remembered.
The Empire had finally stifled all the revolts in the rear and marched on the capital of Yorguen. In the plains that extended to the south of the city, the great anarchist army (or liberator, as they themselves liked to call themselves) waited in formation. In the front line were the famous red arcabuceros with their new mechanized weapons with greater range and rate of fire. The incessant needs of the battles had fueled the ingenuity of the mechanics and their ideas applied to the war had been generously subsidized with money from the great merchants who supported the cause. All of them were contrary to the restrictive laws of control of goods of the imperial government and wished that the balance of the war inclined in favor of the liberators. They knew perfectly well that a war is won with money and that was their greatest asset.
Helmut had been promoted after Halstaff's release and commanded a unit of 15 men. They knew that war would be decided today, in that vast green sea. All the reactionary units behind the lines had been captured or eliminated. The Empire no longer had cracks in its core and could now move on its true enemy without fear of sabotage.
He stroked the handle of his saber again and rested the mechanized weapon against the ground. Many of the youth in his unit joked because they knew they were victors. They were more effective, their weapons were new and powerful. As they saw it, this battle would be a bloody process that they had to complete in order for the Empire to disappear once and for all. With the corner of his eye he saw his friend Ern stroking a locket he had on his chest, in which he kept a picture of his wife and another of his son.
In the middle of the morning they began to hear the roar of slow enemy armored cars approaching. The columns of black smoke could be seen from kilometers away. The wind brought them the smell of ash. They were already close. In half an hour the great canyons with the new cycle engines that were behind them would have the enemy army shot. Those who could dodge the great deflagrations would have to do with the long-range arcabuces and finally, in the melee with the saw blades of the noble sabers.
When the first lookout gave the alarm, the first line of attack of the arcabuceros plunged the knee into the ground while the guns were loaded and began to move aiming at the target.
There was a festive atmosphere and many joked about the promises of leisure that the Yorguen fools had professed once the battle was over.
The trembling of the ground was remarkable and the smoke that the wind brought began to redden the eyes of the soldiers. At one voice, everyone put on their combat lenses so that he did not reduce his aim.
They could already see two huge armored cars. They were undoubtedly a new model because Helmut had never seen them before. They looked like tractors. Apparently, the imperial army had applied and intended to demonstrate its power with new war machines.
One of the cannons at his back thundered and everyone could feel how the legs of their uniforms moved violently by the force of the wave that generated the recoil of the cannon. The projectile hit a few meters from one of the armored vehicles. As if it were a warning, a warning. It was impossible for the Empire to have such long-range weapons.
Both armored vehicles stopped and there was a shout of euphoria between the ranks. It might not be necessary to fight and die after all. Maybe only that one shot was necessary.
The engines of the enemy war machines were still on and their revolutions went up while they expelled a black smoke that prevented seeing what was behind. Little by little, among the scrolls that rose through the sky, a structure, a framework, seemed to be sensed.
The liberating soldiers felt restless, they sought an answer in the lookouts that kept their telescopes pointed at the enemy. In the meantime smoke, they couldn't see much.
Suddenly, a great rumble shook the ground. No one knew what it had been, there were no casualties, they had not shot. Soon, a blue circle began to be seen over the armored ones. At a height that made Helmut think it was an airship. But that would not make sense since airships were not used in war, they were easy to knock down and expensive to replace.
That blue circle began to grow in size and intensity. Whatever it was, it was approaching. There was a strong wind blow that cleared the plain and then they saw it. It was an airship without a doubt, but not an ordinary one. They had never seen anything like it. It seemed to be made entirely of metal, no engine could put such a weight in the air and yet there it was. The blue glow sprang from its center. As if they were several concentric rings that spun at full speed emitting what appeared to be electric shocks. At that distance it seemed to measure at least one hundred meters in diameter. The blue glow intensified and suddenly went out. Helmut could see how his heart was beating once before the entire east side of the vanguard of the glorious liberating army disappeared into an immense crater. The violence of the explosion caused everyone to fall to the ground. There had been no projectile. Nothing had impacted them and yet, the corpses of their companions, their members violently torn from their bodies, the cannons melted like butter were there. As he turned towards the city, he could see how pieces of incandescent shrapnel had pierced the walls as if they were made of paper. In the stillness after the deflagration he could hear the cries of horror of the citizens of Yorguen.
The commanders tried to regain control by ordering a massive charge to all units against that airship that approached slowly and inexorably towards them. At a signal, all his men aimed and shot in unison. They could see the bullets of their arcabuces glowing orange describing a parable to the ground since the target was still too far away to reach it with those weapons. The long-range cannons aimed and fired. Everyone relied on the devastating power of these weapons, however, none of the huge cannonballs hit, bounced off the metal skin of the airship whose center began to emit a blue glow again.
Helmut advanced his men until he could shoot that mechanical monster. He ordered them to point to the center, to the blue fire. They waited for patients with loaded weapons and in maximum impulse settings. No one had had time to test them at that capacity yet.
The cannons were still trying to destroy the immense enemy without success. The men began to feel fear. An atrocious fear of the unknown.
Again, the glow began to be more intense and then went out. Helmut ordered them to make fire and the outbursts of weapons overlapped one after another. Just behind them, another great crater had appeared causing his companions to fly dismembered through the air.
Several of Helmut's men saw that image and ran towards Yorguen dropping their weapons. No one held them.
They almost had the airship on them and could already clearly distinguish the immensity of what they faced.
It was metallic, no doubt, the huge rivets the size of a man's head could be distinguished. In the back were stabilizing fins and in the belly a cabin in which instead of windows there were embrasures. Helmut could swear that in the darkness of those embrasures he saw bright eyes that glowed in blue. Lifeless eyes that pierced his soul. The monster's belly was flat and its entire structure seemed propped up in golden beams between the riveted metal plates. It emitted a sound of friction and occasionally a slight explosion, like armored engines. Large pipes crossed the entire structure from the nose to the tail but did not seem to expel smoke, at least not the black smoke from a cycle engine.
A gate with several pipes opened under the cabin. Helmut knew that this was an organ cannon. The support he was on began to turn slowly and he pointed at them. He wanted to order them to dissolve, to unfold, to run in all directions, to save his life. But he didn't, he stood still, looking through his glasses to death. He aimed the best he could at one of the embrasures and fired as the tubes of the organ cannon began to glow blue.
They were annihilated. Helmut fell to the ground and watched as the impact of those invisible projectiles split his men in two. Ern Stehndal, his good friend from Halstaff, fell to his side and lifeless with half of his skull surgically sectioned. Helmut could see his internal organs still functioning. Ern was a good man, a great mechanic. His son Gregor almost touched the majority. He was lucky not to be older so as not to suffer his father's destiny.
He fell unconscious for not knowing how long. When he woke up, he could see horror scenes in Yorguen, the whole city was being systematically annihilated. House for house. The airship was on the cathedral turning and reorienting itself in a horrible ballet of death. Around him, small biplanes he had never seen were firing endlessly on either side. These had a huge double rear tail and their upper wing was one third of the lower. And at ground level, Helmut saw armored articulated on mechanical legs that gave them an insect appearance by throwing arcs of flames over the rooftops and the town.
Large towing trucks with anti-aircraft batteries had been posted at the city gates that were not aimed at the sky, but at the people trying to escape.
He tried to stand up, justify this second chance of life that he had left and take some imperial pig ahead but he fell to the ground with a sting of pain. His right leg was not. Instead, just below the knee, he had a horrible cauterized wound that reeked of chemicals. His left lens was cracked so he took off his brass glasses. Thus he could let out tears of helplessness while watching how the Empire had not only won the war, stifled all present and future revolts and laid the foundations of terror with that new war machine that did not need huge force-based engines of steam He thought of committing suicide, ending the pain that surrounded him and while he occupied his mind in this, he felt a tremor behind him. A vehicle was approaching, I couldn't hear clearly. He turned sitting as he was and saw a fast three-wheeled vehicle approaching him. It had no cover so Helmut could see the Imperial infantry.
I had never seen any member of that endowment before. Their uniforms were dark blue, almost black, with gold trim on the shoulders and chest. Their faces were covered by modified combat masks with built-in lenses. The lenses emitted that strange and unnatural blue glow.
The vehicle stopped at his side, passing the wheels over the bodies of his companions. One of the soldiers came down and crouched beside him. After a moment, he spoke looking at what was left of Yorguen.
What a horrible panorama. - said. - Someday the Empire will realize what it did here and feel shame for it. Someday, we will all be remembered as butchers and our story will be told to terrify children in their beds. Today is not that day. None of us, imperial soldiers, will live to see it and it is better that way.
Kill me, for mercy. - Helmut asked in a pitiful voice. - Let him rest. We have all done horrible things in this war but I would have never imagined that anyone in their right mind could order something similar to this. I do not want to live in a world capable of creating this destruction.
You will not die today arcabucero. You will live and this memory will torment you day and night while you live. Just as it will with us. Believe me if I tell you that I was not very different from you a few months ago. He believed in ideals that have nothing to do with that filthy slaughter. But everything changed with the damn Dr. Hirlstein and his subject 9.
Silence! Have you gone crazy? - The driver of the vehicle thundered.
The soldier stood up and looking at Helmut said to his partner:
How important is it? You know perfectly well that we are already dead.
Helmut fell silent. He looked at Max and he could see how the stubborn and serious face of that stubborn man contracted in a grimace of pain. Not a physical pain, it was something deeper that I could not understand. A single tear slid down Helmut's wrinkled curd cheek to end up shining on the scar that crossed his chin.
No more was said about the war that afternoon. The defeated soldier rose with difficulty leaning on his crutch and walked slowly without a definite course.
Chapter 2: Gregor
When Max told his father what had happened, he released a great reprimand and reminded him that he should not ask or discuss the war with anyone. And much less with Helmut. However, he did tell him the whole story that Helmut had shared with him and once it was over, he was silent for a long time.
When the war was over - Gregor said while keeping his eyes fixed on the wall - Helmut came to our house directly from the Yorguen field hospital to notify us of your grandfather Ern's death. I had been taking care of the workshop and we all believed that the war would end and Dad would come home. His last letters told us about great victories and how the general feeling was to have overcome all that once and for all. I remember that the loss, perhaps because of such an unexpected, was a terrible trauma and my mother, your grandmother, held Helmut responsible. He just nodded and apologized again and again. In tears, I remember pushing him and he fell to the ground. I ran to the workshop and it was a long time before I returned home.
It was the first time his father had told Max about this and made him feel restless while curious to know more. However, he did not dare to say anything that could interrupt that moment even though the questions gathered in his mind.
I have never been a great mechanic Max. However, when I finally understood that this man had been nothing but a friend of my father who until last looked after his safety, I wanted to do something for him, so I made a mechanical leg and looked for him to hand it over. I found him in a corner of a tavern in the worst neighborhood of Halstaff sunk in his pain. I left my leg on the table and he, surprised, looked at me and asked me to sit down. He told me what he told you today and how those new machines, once the massacre was over, silently retreated back to the hell they had left. Days later he appeared in the workshop with the leg that I had broken. I was embarrassed to have made something so unfortunate and apologized. He smiled and told me that he would help me repair it and add some small improvements. Seeing what skill he used to handle the tools, I asked him to help me out with the work. He accepted without conditions and since then he worked with me gladly. These were convulsive times and the echoes of Yorguen reached all locations. People did not believe the stories of the few survivors. After that battle, there were small armed groups that tried to maintain a resistance against the Empire. I worked day and night repairing old weapons and turning tillage machines into something capable of killing. Helmut frowned and asked me not to accept those jobs. However, I just wanted to get revenge in some way. I met your mother in those years. At the beginning things were going well, small skirmishes here and there that showed that the Empire was not prepared for this kind of war. It seemed that we were beginning to gain ground. However, it was only a mirage. A handful of peasants could not win Max. When they discovered where an organized group was hiding, they sent small crews of bombers and soldiers wearing blue uniforms and lenses that glowed in that color. They selectively eliminated a percentage of the population whether or not they were guilty of something. Hallstaf was no exception. On multiple occasions they bombarded the city and killed many of its inhabitants. Innocent people and not so much. It did not matter. The empire wanted to teach a lesson to all those who did not believe in surrender. The day Ania died, one of those planes seemed to lose control and collapsed in a nearby field. Helmut and I ran out there and we could see that device up close. It didn't look like anything we had seen before. It had no propeller, it didn't stay suspended by a balloon, it didn't have control surfaces. It was impossible that that could fly. We opened the access gate and between the scrap bent by the impact we could see the crew. Their bodies were intact and yet all were dead. Everyone wore those glasses but there was no blue light on them. We tried to recover material that perhaps we could use in favor of the rebels and we got some pieces. However, when we struggled to try to remove what appeared to be the engine, that thing started as if by magic and began to rise. We left quickly and watched as his ascent accelerated until we lost sight of him. We couldn't get their occupants out. Even today, sometimes when I look at the sky I hope to see that metal crypt above us. Then they told us that the hospital where Ania worked had been bombed and when we got there we found you disoriented wandering between the corpses and the stone rubble that had jumped everywhere. You may not remember it, but it was Helmut who found you with that note.
After that attack there was no more. There was an armistice and all rebel groups realized that it was useless to fight. They handed their weapons to those strange imperial soldiers who loaded them into their impossible machines. Never again, in all these years, nothing like it has been seen anywhere again. The empire has never explained what happened or where those machines had come from. Nor is it known where those soldiers are since they seemed to disappear.
After a long silence. Max's father left the room leaving him alone with his thoughts and the constant noise of the second hand on the wall clock.
Chapter 3: Max
Months later, Max checked his notebook sitting in a wooden box containing engine spare parts at the workshop door. It was a peaceful June morning and the temperature was cool. The workshop was slightly out of the city, surrounded by wheat meadows that now looked like a green sea that swayed with a light wind. Helmut and his father were inside engaged in the construction of a wooden and canvas frame for a small plane that the Hallstaff inspector wanted to give to his son. It was an elegant design. His father might not be a great mechanic, but he was certainly a great designer of flying machines. He used many of the pieces he had removed from heavy aero-nodes by modifying them and giving them their own quality seal. On the road that led to the city, Max saw the postal carriage approaching. He notified his father with a shout because he was always waiting to receive orders for material.
Soon, his father left while cleaning his hands stained with brownish grease with an old cloth rag. He looked at Max and painted grease on his nose with his index finger while smiling at him. Annoyed, Max cleaned himself with his jacket sleeve.
Good morning - said the postal emissary before stopping the carriage in front of them - Today I have no shipments for you Gregor. I have a package for Helmut.
Wow, that is unique, how come you haven't taken it to the Hans' house?
I did it, but there was no one to receive the package and it has been traveling too many years to delay it one more day.
I will call Helmut.
Gregor entered the workshop again and soon the hammering noise stopped and Helmut limped.
Hello Helmut. - The emissary said
Good morning.
I have a package for which I first assume that I must apologize on behalf of the imperial postal service.
How is that?
Well, this is embarrassing, apparently its shipment came shortly after the war ended. As you know, those were confusing days and not everything worked as well as it should. So this package was sent to your name, it was received but apparently, the records of survivors were not clear and was long stored in a forgotten corner of the office. A couple of days ago, we were trying to organize lost shipments and packages for delivery to the, well, the "retired" and found yours under a considerable layer of dust. Anyway, I do not want to extend more, I hope you accept our sincerest apologies for this abnormal delay. It has imperial seal.
It is surely a letter from the emperor telling me that they have found my leg. - Helmut said as he grimaced with his lips trying to be a smile.
The emissary, visibly uncomfortable with that comment, delivered a small package without weighing down from the carriage but weighing enough that he had to use both hands to support Helmut, said good morning and left with some hurry back to the city .
Max approached Helmut and asked:
What do you think it can be?
Of course, not my leg. Let's see what it brings inside, it weighs enough to be something so small.
Helmut left the package on the floor bending his legs with visible effort.
The imperial brand was printed on all sides of the package and there was no shipping information or sender. Helmut cut the seal with a small pocket knife that he took from his polished leather work belt and removed the top cover.
Max looked out to see inside the package and was speechless. From the inside came a faint blue light that came from a glass vial with a small stone inside. That stone was the prettiest thing he had ever seen. It was like a jewel with its own light.
Helmut took out the astonished vial with one hand while with the other he pulled out a notebook similar to Max's but of considerably greater thickness. A small note fell from the notebook to the floor. Max picked it up and read aloud:
To Helmut Fellner, who fought bravely in the battle of Yorgen and to whom I did not kill when he asked. I hope your external wounds have healed as much as possible. I know that what you carry in your heart will not be able to do it just as they have not healed mine. Right now I am at the end of the road. There is a horrible death for me and hell waiting for me behind her. I want you to use this that I send you to understand what all the Imperial soldiers of division H did to us and use it so that all our deaths have not been in vain.
And so it began.
