#devblog highlights

“The game is set in a time of cold war in a world that never was. Off the coast you can occasionally spot airbound coalition warships keeping the peace. Further beyond the horizon there is the Pale that divides the continents. You play this guy: The finest officer from Precinct 41 of the Revachol Police Department! Sent away on a special mission to investigate a special report from the relatively remote port of Martinaise. There may be a slim chance the higher ups just want to get you out of their hair? There may be some haters who call you "a disgrace to the uniform", but you know what you really are; you’re a Super Star and the only cop who’s capable of getting anything done in that chicken-shit outfit. You’re here to represent the fledgling self-organized and semi-recognized police force of Revachol and goddamn if you’re not gonna rock at it!” (x)

“It is hard for us to imagine writing the game without it already. We can do really weird stuff. Like Half Light – the skill that controls your adrenaline gland and your prey drive – can railroad you into a rage spiral where you hound an innocent suspect on something they clearly didn’t do. And it takes another skill’s intervention for you to get out of it. The next moment a skill can wildly expand the options you have available, for example: Drama whispers insane method acting ideas into your ear. Or your Pain Threshold tells you to stab yourself in the hand to make a point. Whatever you do – don’t. Pain Threshold is an unstable masochist. It will only leave you screaming with your hand nailed to the table. And then – while screaming with your hand nailed to the table – Rhetoric to the rescue! Make a political point out of this. Tell them you’re a victim of your own macho mentality. Tell them (with your hand still nailed to the table) that years of chauvinism have led you to this low point in your life.” (x)

"Sometimes we keep buggy code to use for a potential dream sequence." (x)

"What follow is a spread of assorted items, or rather, icons for the inventory items. Some of these the player can drag and drop onto their character to wear or equip, some they can interact with in other ways: sniff, imbibe, snort, smoke, read, throw away, or put on their face. Nailing down the aesthetic balance between clear and easily recognizable shapes did not happen overnight. It is the result of months upon months of painting. There are around two hundred distinct items in the game. Or are there more? We've lost count." (x)

"Concept art for the Ice Bear Sarcophagus, a novelty fridge made by the inexplicably unsuccessful ice cream manufacturers Revachol Ice City. Someone in Revachol Ice City had a friend who was a taxidermist. The formidable Ice Bear Sarcophagus is made of real polar bear." (x)

"No Truce’s fantastical realism does not lend itself to clearly distinguishable character classes that look so much alike you could get away with just a texture swap. What we have is more or less everyday clothes on more or less (mostly less) everyday people. That calls for underwear, shirts, pants, boots, coats, hats, gloves, etc. In other words, a truckload of assets to be combined in a truckload of ways." (x)

“The heavy cavalry of Innocence Franconegro, sweeping over the plains and nations of the enemies of man kind, 5th Century style. Unified currency and the concept of “cool” came in their wake. They wore lamellar and carried guns. But first and foremost, Franconigerian heavy cavalry was really, really wide.” (x)

"While interactions with visible objects are placed within world space, other senses (smell, hearing) that do not have a pinpoint location are placed in an orbit around the player’s head. Because if you happen to be a humanoid, that’s where most of your sensing happens. This concept art depicts your sense of smell being a bit… saturated by your surroundings." (x)