Fractal Odyssey (AppID: 3638380)

Overview

“Break the mirror, eat the glass, and sing a song of what has never been”

Fractal Odyssey is a modern take on the tactical RPG, blending a traditional core with modern and innovative mechanics. Taking both gameplay and narrative inspiration from Final Fantasy Tactics, Project Moon, and System Erasure, Fractal Odyssey creates something entirely new.

Your goal is simple - journey across the harsh and frozen wasteland to reach the Capital and claim freedom. You are a guide, a reader of another's story whispering them forward. The story's author, the ever-present and mysterious Narrator, is your companion. 

Features

“A Serpent with Ruby eyes appeared and spoke to me”

• Unique combat system blending classic TRPG structure with new and innovative mechanics.

• Attrition-based campaign where defeat is inevitable and mastery is demanded.

• MMO-inspired boss fights provide unique and genre-bending challenges.

• A deep and resonant story about finding hope within a bleak world.

Gameplay

“A blade of tongues, speaking razors through the mind”

Combat in Fractal Odyssey plays out on a grid and uses a dynamic initiative system. Every turn, a unit can move and take an action. All random events (such as damage rolls) play out with dice, which can be influenced. While randomness is present, it won’t ever define your strategy - only complicate it. 

Despite this, you face overwhelming odds. Mistakes will be frequent and damage is often crippling. Your main resource, Ember, can heal the party's wounds. That same resource is used to unlock abilities and upgrade your characters, to open optional paths, and to stay alive in the frozen wastes. These Embers will inevitably die out and your party will fall. You will return to the first page of their story, and begin again.

None of them will remember their deaths or their triumphs. You, and the Narrator, will. Your most successful clear of any level is remembered by the game - you can get the exact same result with the click of a button. You will never need to replay content that you have mastered. But, as you grow closer and closer to the end, other paths may become clear.

Story

“and She tore the moon from the sky, and She birthed the sun, and She Shattered our souls, and She”

At the end of fate and birth of time, She spoke the Decree into being. This act sundered the land, and bound it to Her will. The Decree became an inviolable set of laws, as fundamental as gravity, which forced Her order upon all of man. Servitude was carved into their souls, bound to the cruel whims of draconic masters. In that moment, the Shattered Lands were created. 

Each of these lands is ruled by a Lord, a dragon which has become one with a fundamental concept of the world itself. The northernmost land, Eisendreik, is ruled by Vyrix, an eternal blizzard which buries its domain in ice. The peoples of Eisendreik are spread apart, mining the hearts of mountains in a desperate pursuit of warmth. These colonies are doomed, harvesting resources for their Lord before they inevitably starve. 

At the northern tip of this northern land, fate begins to burn. With most of their colony dead, a trio sets out into the cold. They seek freedom - an alien concept to their minds. This is impossible, of course, the Decree cannot permit it. Thus, they will fail. Again, and again, and again. 

You, the Reader, join the Narrator as she tells the tale of these doomed souls. She is not a mere writer, she is just as much a part of this story as they are. She will be your constant companion. 

This is a story of pain, loss, death, and trauma. It is a story of fighting against truly impossible odds. It is a story of hope, redemption, and growth. 

This is Fractal Odyssey.