Developer Longdue has revealed more details on its upcoming narrative-driven RPG Hopetown, including new key team members from the Disco Elysium development.
Olga Moskvina has been announced as joining the team of Longdue working on Hopetown, and Olga was the writer for Disco Elysium character Ruby, Bird’s Nest Roy, and others. Ogla is also, says Longdue, “credited with delivering the final language polish across the entire title”.
“I am thrilled to have such a talented professional join the team. Her proficiencies as both a writer and editor are likely to get us to a level of polish befitting our audience, as evidenced by her undeniable contributions to Disco Elysium.” – Narrative Lead on Hopetown, ZA/UM co-founder and Disco Elysium writer Martin Luiga.
Check out the new trailer for Hopetown, as well, which shows off gameplay:
Longdue adds: “Olga joins a talented team of new voices and industry veterans, including ex-ZA/UM founder Martin Luiga, Veljo Hagu – Disco Elysium’s first software developer – and renowned art director Astri Lohne. Prolific sci-fi/western novelist Stark Holborn, lead writer on indie detective hit Shadows of Doubt and writer on Nivalis, has also been confirmed as part of the development team.”
Hopetown takes place in the fictional mining town of New Greenwich, decades after “The Flare” – a coronal mass ejection that fried all electronics and communication devices across the globe. It was here that the De Luna Corporation unearthed Quicksilver, a substance capable of reconnecting a fractured world.
Until now. In the wake of a devastating aurora storm, there are whispers of disappearing miners and the flow of Quicksilver halting. The official narrative of the De Luna Corporation is being brought into question.
The people want The Truth. As a journalist, players step into the role of witness and investigator, chasing stories as they unfold across the island of Entre.
The developer has also reveal that you’ll “delve into the island’s seedy underbelly and scale the caustic ivory towers of corporate surveillance as one of three distinct journalism classes”, as follows:
- Correspondent: the investigative journalist – eyes like a camera, hands like a clock.
- Columnist: the voice of culture and taste who decides what’s in and what’s out.
- Gonzo: the clickbait mouthpiece, willing to say anything to keep eyes on the page.
There are multiple mechanics related to journalism, too:
- Photography: your camera lets you extract meaning from images, uncovering details and hidden connections through photographic inspection sequences..
- Interviews: question a wide range of characters, drawing on investigative instinct, cultural critique, or gonzo exaggeration.
- Observations: read and record people, places, and objects for contradictions, tensions, and details others may overlook.
- Publication: the system that brings it all together. What evidence you present (or even decide to fake), the quotes you use, and the observations you make allow you to pick your story, define your angle, and write in your chosen style.
- Psychogeography: Your mental map of the world – told through the stories you choose to publish – changes the state of the playable environment and the unfolding story, altering relationships between characters, your standing with different factions, your popularity with the public, and the fate of the island’s future… because word travels fast.
Hopetown is coming to PC via Steam, but doesn’t have a release date yet.
