Roguelikes have a hell of a reputation: unforgiving, inscrutable, and not for the faint of heart. After all, the genre is a lineage of games that emerged from Rogue, an ASCII game known for being notoriously challenging. But the genre’s penchant for loops and repetition – which stems from its games’ deadly combination of brutal combat, limited health and permadeath—also makes it a rather unorthodox medium for developers looking to deliver a narrative-driven experience. This is a mould that the roguelike Hades has already broken with its atypical accessibility and multi-layered storytelling, and it’s this particular formula that Midautumn is inspired by. To its team of developers, Hades has paved the way for the game to impart a story about an Asian diaspora community, faced with the threat of gentrification.
MidautumnDeveloper/Publisher: Team MidautumnPlatform: Played on PCAvailability: Out now on Steam Early Access and Itch.io. Targeting late 2024 for a full release
“We were very excited by the idea of roguelikes in telling stories, in types of stories that are harder to tell,” says creator Sherveen Uduwana. “What [Hades] opened up for us was, suddenly there are a lot more people that are familiar with some of these conventions and mechanics of how you tell stories in roguelikes, so it’s doing some heavy lifting for us in being able to tell a less well-tread story in games.”
On the surface, Midautumn bears some striking resemblance to Hades with its evil spirits, celestial beings (albeit those based on Chinese mythology), and the roguelike loop. But the similarities pretty much conclude there. By contrast, Midautumn is a slower-paced game than Hades, and this is due to its combat system, which can feel unwieldy at first for the uninitiated – and for roguelike veterans. The core of its attacks is a curious form of energy called Lunar Blood. It’s what you’ll use to retaliate against enemies, but you’ll need to absorb your enemies’ Lunar Blood projectiles before you can deal any damage. In other words, attacking enemies means first taking hits – but not necessarily damage – from them. It can seem a tad counterintuitive for seasoned roguelike players who are inclined to avoid blows, but Uduwana points out that this design is deliberately skewed towards new players who aren’t well-versed in the genre, as well as action games that demand a lot of dexterity from players.
Midautumn Steam Early Access Announcement Watch on YouTube
“One of our initial design goals with Midautumn was we wanted to make a game that was more accessible to people that don’t play action games, because we realised there are a lot of folks that were interested in the type of story that we’re telling that aren’t big, actiony game players,” says Uduwana. “So the additional step that we did on top of that was we decided to make a combat system that was completely different from what is typical, [such that] there’s a kind of blank slate for everyone who’s coming in.”