Songbringer: The Zelda-a-Like That’s Different Every Time You Play

“What if each time you played The Legend of Zelda it was a different world with unique secrets and mysteriously new dungeons?” the maker of Songbringer, a new dungeon crawler seeking funding on Kickstarter, asks. It sounds very appealing: a procedurally generated experience, unique to each player, not only increasing re-playability but offering gamers a playthrough that will never be replicated, for them nor anyone else.

Songbringer’s pitch on Kickstarter continues:

“Songbringer is a Zelda-like action-adventure-RPG in which you can explore over 300 million unique worlds overflowing with recently awakened demons, virus androids and other sullied creatures. Along the way you will uncover long lost devices and combine them into powerful artifacts. If you are skilled with the nanosword you will vanquish giants and save a planet from being overrun.”

Developer Nathanael Weiss explains the mechanics of the game’s procedural generation:

“You choose a 6-letter world seed every time you begin a new quest. This seed is used to procedurally generate the planet, overworld, secrets and dungeons. As a player, you can choose to enter a unique seed and play an entirely surprising world. Or you can enter a seed you are familiar with and can rip through at a speed run pace. Maybe you are going for the global record?”

“Lore, cooperation and competition can be shared between you and friends because entering the same world code will always generate the same world. While the events of Songbringer take place on a single planet, if a sequel game is produced, the same world seed can be used to continue into a wider galaxy based on that seed!”

The idea of having your own sui generis world to explore is very exciting, but the worry is that the lack of a creator’s hand on the details may pale in comparison to the deliberate craft of, say, a Legend of Zelda game. As effective a shorthand as it may be, it’s possible that the Zelda comparison does Weiss’ game a disservice. I’m still anticipating Songbringer with a sense of hope.

The Songbringer Kickstarter has already raised over $1,000 of its $9,000 target, with 30 days still to run. The game is also featured on Steam Greenlight.

Thank you Kotaku for providing us with this information.