14 DAY TRIAL // Great news for fans of Dark Souls and Spelunky: there's an indie procedural action role-playing game with heavy roguelike elements on its way to PC, Mac and Linux, called Perish.
The game is currently undergoing a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo, asking for a negligible amount of money, and its trailer looks great.
The video game's most prominent feature is the deep combat system, inspired by From Software's punishing creation, Dark Souls. Players will have to block, dodge and maneuver around their enemies in order to get an opportunity to land a blow while making sure that they don't allow their opponents any openings.
Perish's levels are completely randomly generated, and its structure borrows heavily from Spelunky, with a full play-through taking around an hour, but with the game being so difficult that it will most likely take many, many attempts to master all its mechanics well enough to reach the end.
The levels, although randomly generated every time, contain numerous specific encounters and items that will always occur at a specific level every time, and learning the patterns behind them will allow players to uncover many secrets and unlock many new areas and content.
The game throws players into a vividly colored world, having them delve into long-forgotten ruins and discover mysteries long lost to the world, and take on a wide range of opponents, both regular undead as well as the fallen heroes who attempted to reach the entombed secrets.
Although the game features permadeath, there are some patterns that will become apparent as players progress, allowing them to exploit them to their advantage. There are also several classes to choose from, each one with its own strengths and weaknesses, some of which will be unlocked as the game goes on.
One of the most striking features of the game so far is the gorgeous details found in Perish' backgrounds, carrying a very unique and interesting artistic style, which the game's rhythm plans to capitalize on, as its creator notes that he intends to offer "long periods of exploring beautiful environments, punctuated by intense dangerous combat encounters."
The development process of the game lies on a single man's shoulders, an Australian developer who has been working on Perish for over a year and who says is dedicated to making the game a reality.
Perish is being created in Unity and will launch for the PC, Mac and Linux platforms, sometime later this year, supporting both keyboard and mouse as well as gamepad controls.
