Tyranny

Tyranny is an upcoming role-playing game being developed by Obsidian Entertainment and will be published by Paradox Interactive for the PC and Mac on November 10th, 2016.

Plot
Tyranny takes place in a fantasy world where The Overlord Kyros has already overtaken the land by force, subjecting most of the citizens to his rule. The player takes the role of a Fatebinder, a high ranked soldiers in Kyros' forces, tasked to travel the world to maintain order. The Fatebinder acts as judge, jury, and executioner in service to Kyros.

By the time the game has started, the world has already been mostly conquered. The last major region to resist Kyros is the Tiers and the player has been sent to quell the rebellion.

Gameplay
Gameplay is similar to that of Obisidan's previous game Pillars of Eternity or to the Baludr's Gate series. It is an isometric RPG where the player controls up to 4 party members in alternating tactical combat and dialogue-heavy interactions with NPCs.

Combat occurs in semi-realtime, where the player can pause the game to issue specific commands to party members. The abilities available to the character will depend on which factions the character is aligned with, and their relationships with other party members. Improving these relationships will open the door to more powerful combo attacks. A new magic system is also being introduced into the game, where players first pick an element (frost, lightning, etc), then an expression which can effect how the spell is targeted (line, cone, etc) or how long it takes effect for. The spell may then be enhanced by "accents" which can increase damage, add range and more. As the number of accents increases, then so does the cost of the spell. If the cost is too high, then the player will be unable to cast the spell.

How challenging combat encounters are will depend on the difficulty selected at the beginning of the game. The game will ship with four difficulty settings: Story Mode, Normal, Hard, and Path of the Damned.

Development
Tyranny was first announced at the 2016 Game Developers Conference in March 2016, and was exhibited in a playable demonstration form at the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2016 that June; the E3 demo included the same battle though presented from three different scenarios based on the choices the player would have made earlier in the game, as to demonstrate how these choices affected combat and gameplay.

Tyranny is currently scheduled for release on Microsoft Windows, OS X, and Linux systems on November 10, 2016. In addition to the standard game, two special editions are planned: the Archon edition includes the game's soundtrack and other digital art assets, while the Overlord edition further includes a digital art book and collector's guide.