Punchbag Entertainment has canceled the kickstarter for Gravia Tactics, and posted a new update with infomation on the games future.

Looking to the Future

Jun and I have discussed it and we've decided to postpone the Kickstarter for now.  It's a shame because we really wanted to start full time development right away, but we're just not getting the exposure we need - despite everybody's best efforts.

It's not a gloomy outcome, though, as we've learned and gained a lot and haven't lost anything to the process. Thank you to everybody who gave us feedback one way or another and an even bigger thanks to those who pledged. Whether it be the mountains of positive or the small portion of critical, nearly all of the feedback was constructive and we truly appreciate that!

What We Did Right

The game - We really felt like we had a good thing with Gravia... Now we know it! The feedback, enthusiasm and interest we've received throughout the campaign has been really inspiring. We're honestly so grateful to you all. Thank you so much!

The Kickstarter Page - We're proud of the page and the great feedback we got. Thank you all!

The honesty - This is a big one for us, we wore our hearts on our sleeves and everybody made us feel really glad that we did. We're lucky to have met some of the most awesome people the internet has to offer.

What We Missed

A Demo - We should have released a demo of the game alongside the Kickstarter. We didn't, because it hasn't been robustly tested on multiple systems and we didn't have the time to perform that kind of Quality Control, but we should have found a way. A demo would have put us on Let's Play streams, more news sites would have picked us up and you - our amazing and growing community - would have had something tangible to get even more excited about!

Handheld Support - We see PC, Mac and Linux as our first targets. We've always wanted to play a game like Gravia on a HD monitor using a mouse! What we didn't anticipate is just how enthusiastic people are about playing tactical games on their handheld consoles like the Vita. Quite a few of you got in touch telling us the Vita should be a stretch goal. We've definitely heard you, and we've planned accordingly.

Punchbag Entertainment has more information on a new party member with the next kickstarter update for Gravia Tactics. The game still needs more help to get funded.

Jun here, artist and creative lead for Gravia Tactics. In today's update I'd like to show you some new concept artwork that I've been working on, a party member not previously revealed before- Aura! Alongside this I've including some notes as well, which I hope will give a 'behind-the-scenes' glimpse at my thought process when designing our characters.

The developers of this game has updated their Kickstarter page with an explanation of their funding goal.

Here's the explanation for why they have set the funding goal for £100.000:

With that in mind, we've been asked a few times why we've set such a high funding goal. The honest answer is that this is the minimum amount that we need to be able to deliver a game worthy of your attention, on time and within budget. We could cut out voices, animated sequences and halve the story and ask for half the amount, but then the game we'd be delivering would only be half the quality. That's something we didn't want to do and believe wholeheartedly that fans of the genre wouldn't want either.

You can also get an inside into the budget for the game as the developers have broken down the budget into what they are planning to spend on say salaries, sound effects and VAT.

Punchbag Entertainment posted a kickstarter update a few back for Gravia Tactics with information on the status of the project, and outlined future goals.

Thank you so much to everyone who has messaged us with kind words about the game, advice and assistance and especially to those who have backed us already. A special thanks goes to Calbert Warner and Franggio C. Hogland for being our two highest pledge backers so far! If Gravia Tactics is successfully funded they'll each be receiving a copy of the very cool Physical Special Edition, two of only a thousand available - so pledge early to ensure that you don't miss out on the limited-edition, signed, hardback artbook!

We still have a long way to go if we're going to make Gravia Tactics a reality. There are articles about our crowdfunding campaign popping up on news sites around the web as a result of our continuing efforts to bring the game to as many people's attention as possible and everyone we've spoken to is as excited as we are about the project, but we can always do more and with a goal as big as ours, we need to get as many people to see the game as possible.

That's where we you can help us! You've already made our year by backing the project yourselves, but for us to reach our goal within the next 29 days we need you to go forth to your Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, any interested forum accounts, friends houses, local games stores, nearby mountains and public access TV stations and scream at the top of your lungs "Gravia Tactics is a Tactical RPG for the PC and it's freaking awesome!" alongside a link to our Kickstarter page!  It really is true that the more people that see our page, the higher the chance that we'll succeed in reaching our goal.

So once again, thank you all for the incredible support so far and anything you can do to help us meet the fans-to-be would be fantastic. Jun has produced the Kickstarter Badges/Forum Avatars at the bottom of this update for you to draw attention to your fine selves on our behalf. Feel free to use them liberally!

The G.A.M.E.S. Blog posted an interview two weeks ago with the developer of Gravia Tactics Punchbag Entertainment. Here is a small sample of the interview.

Candy:  How long have you been making Gravia Tactics?

Steve: Just over a year now.  In that time we’ve built all of the development tools we’ll need, fine-tuned the plot, character concepts and proof of concept gameplay demo.  We’re about to start work on a content creation phase, so this is where we’ll be adding a lot of value to the game using those tools, systems and concepts we’ve put together.  We’re really excited because this is the phase where people are going to really start to see what Gravia’s made of.

Candy: Tell me a little bit about the plot behind Gravia Tactics. Does it draw any inspirations from other games?

Jun: To give a very general overview; the story is based in a waning ecosystem and the struggle that ensues over limited resources, involving the antagony brought about by the appearance of a mysterious new power that eclipses the old ‘sludge’ technology. Gravia is a place where almost every possible environmental disaster that we worry about today, has happened. It’s not a great place to live and mankind struggle just to continue living their frugal lives but even in this oppressive, rotting world, are souls that dare to challenge those in power and enact change. There will be hardships, villains and personal conflicts for our group of characters to face.

The plot does share some common elements and conventions that are a staple in the genre, things like the opposition of technology and nature but are rehashed to make something fresh (and did I mention summon creatures and airships?!). I wouldn’t say the plot owes to any one game, more like it is a result of our exposure to the wide range of fantasy plots from games, novels, manga and anime that came before it along with our own feelings on the state of human activity on our planet- we ought to look after it!

Steve: Yeah, we grew the plot organically without any particular game or movie or other media form as a reference point – I think there’s a danger of being too influenced by one source that way.  Like Jun says – and without giving too much away – there’s this huge social and industrial change happening that sets the backdrop for the plot and it’s definitely one element of it, but as the player and the party head out and take on the challenges of a world gone bad, there’s recurring themes of coming of age, hope versus naivety and overcoming really extreme adversity.  My favourite stories are always the really personal ones, the ones where one minute you’re laughing with the characters as they’re messing about together and the next you’re in a stunned silence because they’ve been struck by some awful misfortune, often due to their own shortcomings.

I lost track of Gravia Tactics in the news lineup, but the games developer Punchbag Entertainment have announced the game is now on Kickstarter.

Here is the usual video, and game description in-case you guys forgot.

Gravia Tactics is a mature, narrative driven Tactical Role-Playing Game for the PC that focuses on small party mechanics, aiming for depth over breadth of gameplay. 

Customisable gear, environmental buffs/debuffs, position-changing abilities and chainable effects are just a few of the gameplay mechanics that put the power to defeat otherwise unbeatable foes in your hands. 

For the player who enjoys an additional challenge, Bonus Goals in every battle - such as defeating your enemies in a specific order or ensuring that an NPC remains unharmed - offer unique rewards in the form of rare items and additional XP. 

And that's just the battles! There's also a Legend System in the works where you'll piece together tidbits of information from around Gravia, tracking down powerful, ancient treasures and the behemoths that guard them! 

All of this is wrapped in a powerful narrative that follows a painful yet heroic journey of a few good souls in a world pushed to its limit, where they'll face darkness they didn't know existed... including their own.

The developer also has a thread on our game forums to ask questions.

Gravia Tactics is a new SRPG being developed by a small studio called Punchbag Entertainment, and the game is described as the following.

What is Gravia Tactics?

Gravia Tactics is a mature, narrative driven Strategy Role-Playing Game for the PC that focuses on small party mechanics, aiming for depth over breadth of gameplay.

Customisable gear, environmental buffs/de-buffs, position-changing abilities and chainable effects are just a few of the gameplay mechanics that put the power to defeat otherwise unbeatable foes in your hands.

For the player who enjoys an additional challenge, Bonus Goals in every battle - such as defeating your enemies in a given order or ensuring that an NPC remains unharmed - offer unique rewards in the form of rare items and additional XP.

And that's just the battles! Narratively, there's a Legend System in the works where you'll piece together tidbits of information from around Gravia, tracking down powerful, ancient treasures and the behemoths that guard them!

All of this is wrapped in a compelling plot that follows a painful yet heroic journey of a few good souls in a world pushed to its limit, where they'll face darkness they didn't know existed... including their own.

Right now all they have is a few screenshots, and concept images so I don't have much to show you. You can also ask any questions on our forums.