The Kingdom of Armello — whom was formerly enjoying an age of stability — has now fallen into a dark era of uncertainty, with the King having recently been infected by a mysterious force known only as the rot. With his time alive now limited — and the troubling illness driving him to madness, causing him to issue ever more vicious edicts — the four great clans of Armello have each decided that it’s high time they did something. Each clan, to this end, has chosen a hero whom they have set forth to train — amass an army of followers and artifacts — and then eventually storm the castle and overthrow the mad ruler, all so that their clan alone will become the future leaders of Armello.
In a game for one-to-four players — either against friends locally, strangers online, or against computer controlled bots — the goal of Armello is to eventually become the new King or Queen. To accomplish this players will compete against each other across a randomly generated hex-board, featuring a variety of quests — an array of valuable cards representing gear, spells, and more — and even dice with real watchable rolling physics. While there will be four different heroes — one from each of the great animal clans — to play in Armello’s initial release, the game’s developer — League of Geeks — has already stated plans to add many more via extensions.
There will be many ways for the heroes to accomplish their goal: either by amassing enough power to personally storm the castle, seeking out the aid of alliances to speed things up, or even by aligning with the king so that he directly names them his successor. While players will move about the randomly generated hex-board on each turn in search of fame — power — and valuable treasures, the fantasy action does not stop when waiting on asynchronous players to log in. During their down time the various players may equip gear — place a plethora of traps upon the board to slow down rival clans — or even attempt to form valuable alliances, thus letting there never be a dull moment for anyone.
However — above all else — players must themselves be wary lest they too succumb to the malevolent rot, or else the throne they claim will be done so entirely in the name of ever enduring darkness. Those interested in this dark and mysterious rot, as well as the mystical kingdom of Armello – and the many intriguing animal races that live there – can discover more through a series of novellas that League of Geeks has commissioned. Furthermore — assuming things go well — the team has even mentioned that they’re in talks with various groups to produce even more novellas, as well as entire animated TV series, based upon the unique land of Armello.
Which finally leads us to the entire crux of this article, the fact that League of Geeks needs a cash infusion if they are to properly crack down upon Armello and push the product past the finish line. Although they have already long been at work on the project — entirely on their free time, sans any form of pay — the content creation phase at the end of a game’s development cycle is the most time intensive part. Being able to focus themselves entirely on Armello — rather than juggling it alongside all of their collective day jobs — is the difference between finishing the game next year, rather than next decade.
To that end — for a pledge of just $15 (AUD) — you can earn a launch-day PC copy of Armello (while the game will also be available on iOS, the rules of iTunes prevent League of Geeks from giving it to backers), and furthermore help to keep the rot at bay. Meanwhile, those whom donate even further will be recognized for their generosity with: digital soundtrack downloads, a PDF copy of the first Armello novella, a special additional clan of four bandit heroes, a Guppy plushie (based on the trailer), and more. Finally — for those whom are ready to become the greatest benefactors ever, donating $500 or more — the developers even have a line of detailed miniatures based on their various heroes, each of which will proudly stand anywhere from 4-to-6 inches tall.
Although League of Geeks’ Kickstarter has been successful so far — securing over $190k of their $200k asking total — there are currently only three days remaining before the fundraiser ends, after which the entirety of Armello itself just might succumb to the rot.