Blackguards Interview
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Strategy Informer: You mentioned playing as the bad guys. The central character a convicted murderer and his companions a collection of misfits and rogues. It's quite a change from the usual virtuous heroes of RPG games. Can you talk about how the story plays out in Blackguards, and why you chose to go down a darker route?
Daedalic Entertainment: The story is pretty simple. You start the game with a choice of making your main character male or female, you return from a long journey to your home city and you find your best friend has been murdered by a wolf. You try to slay the wolf, but it's you that gets in big trouble, as no one else witnessed the wolf and you're the one near a body with a blood-stained sword in your hand.
You're thrown into prison, tortured by your best friend and condemned to death row, due to hang the very next day. And then the real game starts, as you escape from prison and find yourself on the run and meeting up with various teammates along the way. And you start to wonder: was there ever a wolf there? And if not, what actually happened?
Unlike other games, you're not out to save the world - you only want to save your ass! And all your companions are only out to save their asses too. During the story, the player will have many decisions to make, and those will change the overall storyline - there are three different endings - but also the relationships between you and the other characters. And while you're on the run, you'll find yourself drawn into a much deeper story about an ultimate evil, but if this bunch of bad people end up saving the world, it'll be very much by accident.
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Strategy Informer: So I presume from that you're basing it on The Dark Eye Fourth Edition rules, which brought in more flexibility in character development?
Daedalic Entertainment: Yes, that's right. Probably about 90% of the systems, items and so on are direct from The Dark Eye. The remaining 10% is where we've had to change things because they didn't work in the context of a video game.
