A Rooftop Tale is a 2D narrative-driven metroidvania with pets, supported by exploration, puzzles and action.
THE STORY
A huge flood blocks every road of a countryside. All stray and domesticated animals, lost or left behind, decide to occupy the roofs (and not only), to survive and take control of the various territories.
The protagonist, Francis, a french bulldog raised by a stray cat, decides to embark on a journey to reach the city, find his human family and unravel the mystery behind the flood, but first he will need to deal with his past.
Along his way, he runs into several inconvenients and problematic characters who twist and darken the story with legends, folklore and myths.
CORE MECHANICS
Broomstick: what's better than a hard wooden broomstick combo? Everything, probably. But few things are funnier than a french bulldog handling a broomstick like a great weapon.
Upgrade your Broomstick with Trinkets, making your combo longer, faster or more powerful;Dropkick: perform a dropkick, as powerlful and funny as a french bulldog can be;
Scarlet Blanket: Francis lucky cape shields him from damage, but it gets worn out easily, so be sure to collect enough Bobbin Threads to repair it regularly;
Stun: use the stun attack to earn crucial time against enemies and bosses. Careful, though, not every one of them is vulnerable to it;
Tornado: perform a tremendous fast rotation by charging up your strength. This tornado would cause much more damage and stun the opponents for a longer time;
Defense:
-- Built Differently: Francis is not a tank, so you need to be smart and agile to defend yourself. Sometimes the Scarlet Blanket is just not enough;
-- Kibbles: in A Rooftop Tale, pets introduced Kibbles as a currency, you can collect them in many ways and you can also consume them to heal yourself;
-- Food: be a master french bulldog chef and cook delicious meals to regenerate health, increase attack or defense and create more buffs;
-- 9 Lives: cats have 9 lives, right? Well, Francis has been raised by a stray cat, therefore, you get nine lives before permanently losing all your Kibbles. So, remember to heal yourself regularly or save your Kibbles at the Squirrel's Depot.
If you reach 0 lives, you will wake up at the last Pet Bed you used to save, but with 0 Kibbles and the 9 lives restored;Dash: it comes with Nerfed Dash and Buffed Dash, it depends on what moment you use it: the faster you dash after a jump, the higher you dash, and vice versa. This allows you to overcome better certain obstacles if you keep the momentum;
Smash: this allows you to stun enemies from above when necessary or possible. It's also the only way you can discover new paths or secret places.
GAMEPLAY
Immersive Narration: this is the most essential part of A Rooftop Tale. I always believed that a good story or a good scenography are such a waste without a great narration.
I'm planning this game to amaze and intrigue, to not just tell a story but to actually make the game believable and support the gameplay through various aspects: cinematic animated cutscenes; funny, interesting and useful dialogues; enriching missions, lore and graphics; memorable encounters; beautiful and touching moments; and more;Intuitive Exploration: I never liked losing myself in over-complicated, poorly-designed maps.
I want you to experience the awe of discovering, thanks to what I call "intuitive exploration": when you roam around the world, you are able to memorize paths, places and whole areas thanks to distinctive elements, symbols, faces and scenes.
In-game I want you to feel the same way, to not simply explore, but to visit, enjoy the beauty around and find hidden secrets without pointless frustration;Diverse Scenography: your journey will be divided mainly between the surface and the underground, generating a fascinating contrast between generally chill, safe outdoor areas and dark, mysterious levels below the ground.
This will create more interesting, curious biomes and lots of equally beautiful, different scenes;Puzzles: A Rooftop Tale is a big elaborate world and the more you follow the story, the more mysterious it becomes.
To find your way through it you will need to solve puzzles, enigmas and riddles. You may find them while exploring, reading lore or even fighting. So, study the environment, pay attention to the hints and read carefully;Mixed Combat: Francis is not the classic extremely powerful hero. Although he is very agile and determined, he is squishy and clumsy too, so you must be careful how you approach the enemies, especially the bosses.
I designed the combat to be strategic and entertaining, so here are its most important aspects:
-- Logic: you can hit how much you want the bosses, but they are generally much stronger and resistant than you. So, you must find a way to break their defenses, earn time, stun them, block them, make them ineffective or defeat them.
To do so, you will need to use certain skills, exploit the environment and solve puzzles;
-- Agility: Francis' unnatural agility will help you to overcome certain attacks, resist longer against bosses and develop successful strategies. But, keep in mind that you won't have all upgrades since the beginning. So, be careful who you go against;
-- Trinkets: they will be a helpful ally to buff your skills. You can wear them or you can mount them on your Broomstick, arrange your set wisely before confronting certain bosses.
THE GAME
There are some aspects that railed me into this vision:
Rooftops: as probably many of you, since I was a kid, I always fantasticated about animals and monsters running, exploring and fighting on rooftops, especially when driving on the back of my dad's car. That vivid imagination took a solid path on a hot summer day of 5 years ago while looking at rooftops out of my window, when I finally decided to create a mockup which got an overwhelmingly positive response;
Curiosity: I always loved to explore, either in real life or in games.
I think that, at some point, we all ended up to glitch our character in some dark corner of the game because we were so curious to find hidden loot, new areas or easter eggs. This is something that always fascinated me since early age while playing point-and-click, adventure and role-playing games;Personalities: since I can remember, I adored to imagine, sketch and write stories. And in those worlds, the thing that enriched them the most were the several, different personalities, the funny and interesting dialogues, and the unique and memorable characters.
RELEASE DATE
A Rooftop Tale is going to launch on Kickstarter within summer 2025, you can follow the pre-launch page to get notified!
Based on the campaign result, I could set a release date for Steam and eventually consoles. If you decide to support me, I'd be eternally grateful.
