It’s kinda wild that I’ve been doing this for seven years.
Like, I still remember when I was in my apartment, working in Los Angeles over the summer, and creating a board game to keep myself sane while my sister was in the hospital.
She’s alright by the way. And way better at social media than me.
But yeah, I’ve come a long way.
Look at this, for example. This was what Tyrannis was, when I got started:
A board game on the back of cardboard with that was too big, held together with duct tape with stones from a fish tank as game pieces.
I’ve been taking some time off from Tyrannis, but I’ve got some new things in the works. And I can’t wait to show those off when they’re ready.
But for now? Just a lot of research and playing free-to-play mobile games. And research about free-to-play mobile games.
Because I like video games. I mean, that probably goes for most people who work in games, and I’m no exception.
That being said, I also like having income to afford healthcare, which means I need to make money one way or another. And game studios are no exception, if all the gacha/lootbox mechanics are anything to go by.
“If I ever start a game company, I’m going to call it ‘Number 8 Production Department.'”
That was, what, a year ago? Two years? Honestly, I don’t know. All I remember is that Kojima was on his way out of Konami, I was still playing MGS V, and I had no idea I wanted to get into game development. Hell, I was looking at getting a Master’s up in British Columbia. Continue reading “So Where Do I Begin?”→
Welcome to the Continental States of America, the conqueror of the New World. Thirty years after the last world war, the Continental States reigns from sea to shining sea and pole to frozen pole. The star-crossed banner waves proudly over citizen and non-citizen alike, taunting the ever-despised Europa as a reminder of their most recent military failure.
However, all is not well in the CSA. In the South, rebels have taken up arms once more against the forced assimilation, ethnic cleansings, and the abuses by their thirty-year occupiers. While in the more-assimilated Central Regions, corruption has reopened the century-old scars of colonialism. Even the North, the very heartland of Greater America, the impoverished masses chafe against the American Caesar’s brutality and his cronies’ corruption.
The year is 1976. Will you liberate the Americas from a totalitarian dictatorship led by a monarch in all but name? Or will you destroy the last holdouts of resistance against the American Caesar?
So if you noticed that there have been about a dozen updates in the last 24 hours, that’s because I’ve been working on two things.
The first is a glitch where menus wouldn’t reset after exiting a loaded Skirmish. That’s been fixed.
But the second, and the real reason I’ve had to push about a dozen updates or so in the last day, is because I’m happy to announce a new mechanic for my games called Cross-Content.
What Is Cross-Content?
Cross-Content is an experimental feature I’m rolling out today where owning one cGh ONE game in your Steam Library will unlock additional content in other cGh ONE games.
For example, if you own Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity or Infinite Voyager, Cross-Content would allow you to unlock additional maps in Tyrannis, and vice-versa.
Also it wasn’t my first pick for a name, but my that one was taken by an Adult Entertainment company, so that wasn’t an option.
How Does Cross-Content Work?
Cross-Content works by having the files for two or more cGh ONE games installed in the same folder. When loading up a game, the game will automatically detect any other cGh ONE games and unlock the relevant Cross-Content in the game you’re currently playing.
For example, you’ll want to have Steam save your files Tyrannis and Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity installed in the same location. Once you load up Tyrannis, the game will detect that Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity is installed. If Co-Prosperity is detected, an icon in the lower right-hand corner will be highlighted to indicate that the game is present in your library, which will unlock the relevant Cross-Content.
Note that if you do not have Co-Prosperity, the icon will still appear but it will not be highlighted.
Once the Cross-Content from Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity has been unlocked, you will be able to play with it in Tyrannis.
Cross-Content in Tyrannis
By owning and having Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity installed in your Steam Library, you will unlock the forty maps in Tyrannis’ Skirmish Mode. These maps can be selected like any other map, so long as you have access to them.
From here, these maps play like any map Tyrannis’ base game.
Cross-Content and the Future
At the moment, the only Cross-Content between Tyrannis and Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity is unlocking the latter’s map in the former.
While this is relatively low-priority (at least compared to developing Infinite Voyager and job hunting), I plan on adding more Cross-Content in the future as a “Thank You” to all of you who’ve bought more than one of my games.
Conclusion
Anyways, that should do it for this update. I’m going to go enjoy the last hour or so of Christmas I have left. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy Holidays.
-Chris “cGh ONE” Providence
Sole human employee who gets worse healthcare than the dog I have as a mascot
In all seriousness, I’ve been busy with a few prototype projects.
But enough about that. It’s time for a surprise update.
Intel Rework
While I was happy with how the writing turned out on launch, there was a lot of room for improvement. Whether it’s not having to click through about forty times to the story just… honestly not making sense.
Which is a fancy way to say I though I could do better.
So with half a decade’s worth of practice writing, I figured I’d rewrite it into something that is not only better-written, but also actually readable.
Long story short is that I basically rewrote the intel files into a shorter, more-comprehensible format that isn’t just speech boxes. Instead, you can select a piece on intel and click on the arrows in the upper-right-hand corner to cycle through the text. When you’re done, you can click the “X” button to return to the intel menu.
Credits Rework
While I think the old credits looked cool, a big problem was that it was a pain to update.
Throw in adding a whole lot of people who either got missed or changed their name, and… yeah, this is way faster.
Anyways, this credits system works similarly. Use the arrow buttons to switch pages and click the “X” button in the upper-right-hand corner to return to the Main Menu
Music
This is more of a minor thing, but I reworked some of the songs that are played during gameplay.
Which is a fancy way to say you don’t have SOS or morse code messages blasting into your ear unless you’re playing Survival Mode now.
Conclusion
Anyways, this might actually be the final update for Tyrannis. Reworking the intel and credits were really the last things I had to do, so outside of a few hotfixes, this might be it.
Until then, thank you for your support for the game!
Best,
-Chris “cGh ONE” Providence
Sole employee at this company who does basically everything except audio, music, and mascot stuff.
So yeah, it’s been a while. Wrote a book, designed a few prototypes, published that book on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and reworked the multiplayer for Tyrannis.
Mainly that last one.
What’s in the Multiplayer Rework?
While I was able to get online multiplayer working at launch (or at least I think I did – been a while), the problem was that I came up with a completely different map-making system for all 27 other maps that came as free post-launch content.
Basically, you could only play in the Americas. Without Modifiers or any other later features. It was also held together with the computer equivalent of duct tape and chicken wire.
Because of that, it wasn’t simple as just applying the same code to the new values. Instead, I had to basically go through every single script and add a few more to make sure they were all compatible with the new map-making system for the post-launch maps.
But after a long wait (and a lot of pounding my head against a wall and cursing my younger self for his mistakes I had to fix), it’s finally here.
Tyrannis multiplayer is back, and it’s better than ever!
How to Play Online Skirmishes
To play multiplayer, go to “Skirmish,” then “Online,” and then select “Host” to set up your own Skirmish or “Join” to join your friends’ hosted session. To connect to another session, enter the host’s IP Address.
When setting up a Skirmish, your player will be highlighted in gold. Click on that slot to select your Faction.
Hosts will also be able to select the Modifiers, Game Mode, and number of Regions for the Skrimish.
When you’re playing Online Skirmishes, be sure to look at the bottom of the screen to see player Readiness. The game can’t continue until all Players are ready and their pieces are highlighted in the boxes.
Anything Else?
I should point out that this only works for new skirmishes right now, since I’m working out the bugs with loaded games. Figured it’d be fairer to you guys to be able to play online at all instead of waiting another week for me to get the loaded games working.
Hope you guys have fun!
-Chris Sole employee of cGh ONE who, for legal reasons, came up with this game over a decade ago.
After months of development (and a whole lot of QA for all the glitches I should have seen over the last four years), I am happy to announce that Tyrannis’ new campaign mode, “The Revolution,” is live!
What Is “The Revolution,” Anyways?
To make a long story short, “The Revolution” is Tyrannis’ new campaign mode that pits you, an Agent of the Office of Strategic Actions, against the dictatorial American Caesar, whose dictatorial regime across the Americas is backed by his mercenary army.
As an Agent, you will create your own faction and bring the fight to Caesar across 41 “Military Districts,” unique levels of increasing difficulty across the Americas. As you progress, levels will include up to 8 Difficulty Modifiers that give a roguelike-inspired twist on Tyrannis’ asymmetric turn-based strategy gameplay to create a brand new experience.
The Chaos System
There’s a saying about winning the war and losing the peace, and that definitely applies here.
Revolutions tend to be chaotic affairs. Assuming you’re successful, you’re left with the task of actually running the society they liberated.
Sure, it’s probably easier if it’s peaceful (on account of things not being as exploded), but you’re still stuck with actually running things now that the last guy is gone.
This campaign is no exception.
As you plan out your liberation of the Americas from Caesar’s dictatorial rule, you need to keep Chaos in mind.
Chaos is a sort of catch-all to represent the social and economic devastation in a Region or a Military District. Things that tend to happen as a result of armed conflicts, like a loss of utilities, trained professionals, infrastructure or logistical failures.
You can see the Chaos Level of the Military Districts you control in the upper left hand corner.
To lower the Chaos Level of a Military District, click on one of the Military Districts you control, then select the Region where you want to lower the Chaos. Here, you can lower the Chaos Level in exchange for a fee that’ll go to reconstruction.
Just remember that it costs more to go from Medium Chaos to Low Chaos than it does to go from High Chaos to Medium Chaos.
Armed Rebellion
Sure, an outright armed rebellion is faster and good for short-term rewards, but doing so will increase the Chaos in the local Regions and the Military District as a whole.
While you can pay money to rebuild the Military District, Region by Region, it’s going to cost you. Hey, utility infrastructure isn’t cheap, and that’s before the supply chains stopped working and everyone stopped showing up to work because they were worried about getting shot.
Well, that’s assuming you can be bothered to rebuild the Regions that are destroyed in your war of liberation, but there’s nothing stopping you from ruling over the ashes without any utilities.
I mean, except for all the avoidable deaths and human suffering and the bad ending.
Peaceful Uprisings
A less-chaotic way to liberate the Americas is to use the Peaceful Revolution mechanic to build Rebel Support and launch Uprisings in the various Regions during each Operation.
Rebel Support can be increased by stationing Units in the District, building Rebel Cells, and defeating Mercenary attacks.
As you increase Rebel Support, you will gain Rebel Perks, such as additional Units to defend against mercenary attacks and intelligence on enemy troop sizes. You can see this information in the District Info window when you click on a District.
Once you reach the maximum Rebel Support and have Uprisings enabled, a Velvet Uprising will occur during the next phase. The District will be liberated, and any and all Mercenary forces will be defeated.
Does it take longer than attacking a District? Yes.
But the advantage of Peaceful Uprisings is that they allow you to liberate territory without increasing the Chaos, which means lower costs in the long-term.
Difficulty Modifiers
As you progress, you’ll have to face additional Difficulty Modifiers that’ll throw a wrench into your plans.
Some are useful, like “Kindness,” which lowers Rebel Perk thresholds by 20%.
Others, like “Sloth,” will make you unable to attack one of your Districts that you previously attacked for another Turn.
But as you progress, you’ll be dealing with additional Difficulty Modifiers that’ll make you wish you had more than 3 lives.
Updates and Bug Fixes
Text has been aligned correctly in the Y axis.
The glitch where certain Districts were unable to be selected or moved to has been fixed.
The number of Lives available to the player in Revolution and Reconquista are reduced from 9 to 3.
Icons have been added to Reconquista to show who is in charge of each Region.
Custom Faction Pieces are now aligned correctly.
Additional Notes
Tyrannis and its sequel Tyrannis: Co-Prosperity will be on sale during the Steam Summer Sale, and they can be purchased as part of the Tyrannis: The Co-Prosperity Bundle.
Now, the bad news is that I’ll have to increase the price of Tyrannis back to its original price of $10 in the near future. While I don’t want to do that, money’s pretty tight on my end, and I’ve been working on a shoestring budget for years at this point.
I mean, I personally think all the free content added over the last four years (27 Maps, 2 Campaigns, Custom Faction Creator) justifies the return to $10, but I can see how frustrating it sounds.
So consider this a heads-up if you’re interested in purchasing Tyrannis. I’d recommend doing it before the end of the Steam Summer Sale.
Also, I just want re-emphasize that the pack with Tyrannis and Co-Prosperity is renamed to something less stupid.
It’s been bugging me for a while.
The Future of Tyrannis
I’ll be honest, this is probably going to be Tyrannis’ last major update. With the campaign mode finished, I think I can finally say the game is up to the quality I envisioned when I started out development 7 years ago.
And with my new job, I don’t have as much time to develop new features and mechanics for Tyrannis as I used to.
Of course, I’ll still be here to continue fixing glitches as they pop up.
Anyways, this concludes what might be the final update for Tyrannis.
If you’re reading this, I want to say thank you for playing a game I’ve spent the better part of a decade developing. Whether you were here from the start when I was doing the Kickstarter or you just picked it up during a sale, I want to thank you for being a part of this journey.
Note that if you do not have Co-Prosperity, the icon will still appear but it will not be highlighted.
From here, these maps play like any map Tyrannis’ base game.
cGh ONE 