Swords and Sorcery: Sovereign announced

A little bird tells me that OlderBytes (a.k.a. Charles Clerc), creator of first-person dungeon crawler Swords and Sorcery: Underworld Gold (previously covered here), is embarking on a sequel by the name of Swords and Sorcery: Sovereign.

The sequel is set to be much larger than its predecessor, with 17 towns to the original’s three, as well as “48 surface maps, underwater maps, caverns and even a few uncharted territories” spanning mountains, forests, glaciers, desert, ocean, marshes, caverns and dungeons.

The plot summary, such as it now stands, follows:

The ancients spoke of a first coming. This had happened before and was likely to happen again. After years of peace disturbed by growing doubt and quiet rumors, subversity set in. The official response to the people’s demands for disclosure, as to the identity and whereabouts of the heroes that had once saved the realm, as to the nature of the evil they engaged and defeated, was continuously one of denial of any form of subsiding danger.

Then the dead started rising again. Albeit in small, easily manageable numbers, they were enough to turn subversity into rebellion. And rebellion was met with ruthless repression.

Baronies and Duchies seceded. While some renewed their oaths to the Crown, claims arose of the King’s madness and unfittedness to rule, followed by claims to the Crown itself. Others still crafted Royal Circlets of their own and war banners floated to the high winds. Winds that carried a renewed hint of the pestilence past, but few took notice.  The scent of blood spilt on fields of agony grew to such strengths as to make the subtle smell of ancient death next to unnoticeable.

Sovereign is due to introduce more spells and abilities, item crafting, two new character classes (druid and hunter), and competing factions whose affairs you can choose to meddle in.

Clerc states that he’s made a lot of progress on the game’s backstory, with 30 pages written, and that he has the character creation system nearly done. It also looks like he’s making headway on redesigning the game’s GUI. There is no planned release date yet; if this is anything like its predecessor, this should be a Windows-only affair.