Project Witchstone – A Living World Sandbox RPG Coming 2020

Spearhead Games, the team behind Stories: The Path of Destiny (a narrative-driven action-RPG from 2016), is currently working on Project Witchstone, which, by the looks of it, is shaping up to be a fairly promising sandbox RPG. The game’s standout features include a living open world where all your actions have consequences, turn-based tactical battles, and plenty of opportunities for emergent gameplay.

Project Witchstone is expected to launch in 2020 on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC, with a Kickstarter campaign coming later this year. Check out this trailer to see the game in action:

The game’s official website shares some additional information:

• Enjoy an authentic “pen & paper” feel as you freely explore a conflicted world defined by your every action.
• Be forthright or deceitful, your moral path is not linear. Plant evidence to incriminate others, protect the innocent by slaying oppressors, or do anything in between.
• Enhanced turn-based combat featuring real-time class-based modifiers. Intuitive battle systems encourage and reward creativity.

A Reactive Living World

This world is alive; its inhabitants acting with purpose. They own properties, have unique personalities, befriend some, and make enemies of others. They have likes and dislikes, forming appreciation of–or disdain for–factions as well as you.

You & Your Growing Influence

Jump right in using actions familiar to any RPG fan like dialogue, combat, spells, etc., then experiment with even deeper agency through systems like stealth and the influence interface. Manipulate and shape this world as you see fit, pitting others against one another, incriminating whole factions, and aligning powerful allies to your cause. Witchstone offers you the freedom to live the adventure you want. There is no overarching pre-defined story. Your decisions will craft a world and experience unique to only you.

Unlimited Possibilities

The consequences of your actions are both far-reaching and powerful. Want to frame a soldier for theft, or a blacksmith for murder? Ever thought about joining a faction, becoming their leader, and decimating the opposition? Prefer to create chaos, secretly dismantling the established order from the shadows? Want to just become a treasure hunter instead? Or even attempt to unify everyone and bring peace to the world? All of this is possible in Witchstone.

Unprecedented Design & Technology

With each new game release, our studio has evolved our expertise in the field of branching narrative. Our systemic approach tailors events based on all previous actions, applying a complex web of causality that drives all inner workings of the world. For instance, crimes result in investigations. Investigations result in arrests. Arrests result in retaliation. Retaliation results in new conflict. Conflict results in new crimes. Logic, awareness, purpose, and place all factor into these systems. Secretly murdering a homeowner and taking control of their house will work fine for your cause until the deceased’s relatives or friends come to visit. Your actions have repercussions, and those repercussions have a ripple effect. How you deal with that ripple effect will determine what kind of adventure you experience. You alone decide.