LVL Up Expo 2018: Indie Corner Recap

Hello everyone I am Steve T, senior editor at Shock Site Gaming and creator of our new initiative  . . . The Indie Corner. The Indie Corner is the result of years of studying the videogame market. We at Shock Site came to realize how powerful this market can be. When an 16 bit rpg made by one person sells more copies than a triple a developer, well it paints a verys tark picture of how the market is shifting. I came to see that Indie games and their developers need more coverage, need more attention, need more people like us talking about them and reviewing them for the world to see. I looked over out sites analytics and saw that we have the install base to provide these games with the exposure they need. So without further ado, let's dive into the first game that caught our attention at the convention.

Once again LvL Up Expo rolled around, making its first appearance in the Las Vegas Convention center. There was a lot to love here, so much in fact we're still sifting through all our notes and prioritizing which games need to be reviewed. Speaking of priorities The first game we really should be talking about is Dotware's newest indie gem, Akhenanten: Rule as Pharaoh.

Pharaoh stole the Show

My team and I spent a great deal of time talking to the developer of Akhenaten, picking his brain and trying to sift out the future of this project. Connor Torres was kind enough to sit down and walk us through the demo, pointing out the fascinating facets he had added. The demo was quite the experience and I will not sugar coat the fact that I really enjoyed what I played. 

So the demo starts you out in a bird's eye view of a small part of a pyramid. You're then left to your own devices to feel around and place whatever columns, statues, ad palm trees you see fit, but don't get too carried away. You have a limited amount of resources and each project requires a certain amount. 

I liked the fact that everything you do in game has a consequence, which segways into our next topic . . . Random events. Every so often a random pop up box will appear giving you some difficult scenario to deal with. The one our team got said something along the lines of 'One of the slaves have just been caught stealing food. What should you do with him?' And from there we had various choices like publicly execute him, let him go free, etc. etc. It was a nice surprise and even though I don't have the full game Connor assured me that all choices will have an effect on the world around you.

The world around you . . . Now when most people think about city builders, they wish they were able to explore what they had built right? Well thank Torres because that's exactly what he did! He's programmed a 3rd person into the game with no loading time whatsoever! At first it was so jarring being able to put something down in bird's eye view then switch instantaneously to see it from the ground level.

Though the 3rd person mode isn't quite together yet. Torres has assured us that he'll be adding jump, swim, and various actions to make sure you as the player can traverse the land in ease. I personally applauded him for the decision because there are too many games of this style that do not allow that level of freedom.

So I've ranted on about how this game's got potential up the wahzoo, but none of that really matters unless Dotware delivers, which I'm positive they will. There are many more features Connor and I talked about including a potential Nintendo Switch release, but I've decided to keep my mouth shut. I don't want to spoil the many surprises the team has in store for it's playerbase. Be sure to stay up to date with the development of this game as the news will come straight from the pharaoh's mouth.

Links to everything Akhenaten

https://store.steampowered.com/app/719160/Akhenaten_Rule_as_Pharaoh/

https://twitter.com/dotwaregames?lang=en

http://dotwaregames.com/press/