How Soulash came to be

Greetings fellow gods. What better way to start the Patreon than by introducing myself and the game I'm working on. My name is Artur Śmiarowski, I live in Poland, I'm a father of 2 little kids 1 and 4 years old, and I'm the creator of Soulash, a fantasy roguelike where you take the role of a forgotten god set on destroying the world.

I've been a programmer since 2008 and got into coding through my love for games. My first ever project was a web-based MMORPG called Annihilation, released in 2009 in polish only. It featured tons of descriptive locations inspired by MUDs of the past, loot system inspired by Diablo, PvP, Team-based PvE, and some other cool stuff. I was able to continue working on this game for a couple of years until it became unsustainable due to high server costs and high taxes.

After Annihilation, I've worked on multiple prototypes of different types of games, using different technologies. I've tried building a couple of MMO web games, but their popularity started to diminish. I've tried a top-down multiplayer shooter in javascript. A space strategy card game. A dungeon raiding team-based MMO and many, many more, including a roguelike in rot.js. I even went for a procedural world generator in javascript once. For years I couldn't find an idea that would stick with me to go through till the end, but I couldn't stop trying to make games due to my drive I can't really explain. I would probably just feel incomplete if I ever stop making games.

Below some images from those prototypes.

Annihilation 2 prototype, no longer heavily text-based.

Some characters from a prototype I called "Dungeon Raid". Did I mention I was never good with graphics? League of Legends and D&D inspired turn-based game where 5 players pick a character with predefined skills and try to raid a randomized dungeon.

I even tried some 3D action. This was supposed to be another massive game with a fantasy world. Ended up just being this cat. 3D is hard.

Just one of the folders on my google drive, with tons of concepts for different games. A "Fallout roguelike" even. Good times. :)

A lot has changed in 2017 when my son was born, I've decided to commit this time. I still didn't know what I wanted to make, so I started with my own engine to eliminate one of the excuses I've often had - "the technology doesn't work for my vision". I picked seemingly the most efficient language that would make sense for me - C++ and started building my own engine. After 6 months I had to test it to prove it works, so this little monster came to life in additional 2 weeks of time Shields up!. Then I settled on a roguelike.

The very first tileset drawn for Soulash, you recognize the pink wizard? Mr. Magnificent in person, ruining player runs to this day.

But it wasn't Soulash yet, the game didn't have a name. The idea was to make a trading roguelike, where the game would not focus on combat, and you would run from town to town, trading resources with different NPCs, buy low sell high, build your business, and so on. I was really into X3 Albion Prelude and Guild 2 at the time. But I couldn't find a way to make it fun, at least I didn't feel it was a good option to pursue further. That was the time I usually abandoned projects and just tried something new from scratch, but because I've started with my own engine, I didn't need to start from ground zero anymore. So from the ashes of this unnamed game, Soulash was born. Magnus stayed as a memento of the past. The idea was simple - go back to the roots of roguelikes and focus on making the combat as good as possible before expanding further. That's why Soulash is so combat-oriented still, even though we now have some survival mechanics and crafting to support it, and a story revolving around it.

Soulash is the game I am so passionate about that I cured myself of almost a decade-long sickness called project abandonment. It's no longer about "I have a better idea for a game", but "I can make this game so much better". For the past 4 years and going still, I could only work on the game part-time, to support my family, and to invest in the game in areas where I'm just not as good, like graphics or music. The first goal of this Patreon is to be able to enhance the game to another level. One way to do it is by adding a fitting tileset as an alternative to ASCII, to get the game to a wider audience and continue the growth. Another one is to create a unique GUI, to replace the store assets that make the game look less professional than it could. Then we could get more professional sounds and a couple of unique soundtracks to elevate the game further. But the final goal would be for me to be able to focus on making Soulash, or its sequels full-time, so we can go for the really big features like a procedural world generator, factions, building, skill-based leveling system, and much more in a realistic timeframe.

Did you find it interesting? Would you like to know more? Maybe peek into one of the design concept files? Let me know. :)