Genre: Role-playing (RPG), Strategy, Adventure, Indie, Card & Board Game
Silk
Silk Nominated for Two TIGA Awards
We are thrilled to report that Silk has picked up two nominations in this year's TIGA Games Industry Awards, one for Best Role Playing Game and one for Heritage in Games.
Silk is our homage to classic square-based exploration videogames of the 1980s, and a personal tribute to the late Mike Singleton, whose game The Lords of Midnight was a classic of the 8-bit era that doesn't receive the praise or recognition it deserves. In paying tribute to Mike's work, and creating an entirely new style of play riffing off his 'landscaping' visual rendering system (which is reproduced - in a slightly modified form - in Silk), our game is expressly intended to be a contribution to the great heritage left to us by the British Bedroom Coders, and to be nominated for a award that recognises what we were trying to do here is a genuine honour.
We're not expecting to win given the tough competition in each category, but as fellow nominee Jon Ingold of Inkle said to us on the day the news broke: "nominations ARE a win". We couldn't agree more.
Hold-to-move and Camp-on-Demand Now Available!
The new v1.6 build of Silk is out now in the Beta branch! This adds our two most requested features - holding a key to keep moving in that direction, and the option to camp wherever and whenever you like. Just press Enter when you reach the place you want to camp and choose 'Yes' in the popup window.
To access the Beta branch, select 'Properties' on the right click menu for Silk on Steam, go to the Betas tab, and 'Check Code' with nothing in the box. The Beta branch is now available in the dropdown menu.
May every journey be safe from storms!
A Map for the Biggest Open World of All Time
You can now download the complete Silk Landscape Map from this link, or by right clicking the above image and saving it. It doesn't have any text labels - you have to chart your own journey! - and it does contain spoilers. But if it was the 80s, a magazine would have given you a map by now, so we felt it was time to give you this one.
Coming soon: v1.6, with some of the most requested features, like 'camp on demand'. Watch this space!
Silk 100% Completed
We're pleased to announce that the winner of the competition to be the first player in the world to complete Silk is Sebastien Chaume, who lives in Orléans, France. He not only beat all four Destinies, but completed each of them with 100% Mastery to claim all the Steam trophies as well. His final Destiny was the Rebel - notoriously hard to beat! - but he eventually overcame the Parthians to claim victory and his prize.
ihobo games congratulates Seb on his victory! He has already received his prize, a Limited Edition Retro-USB Cassette with exclusive making-of features.
Version 1.5.6
We are releasing the current beta branch of the game, which includes a few small bug-fixes, primarily relating to the Temple of Celestial Horses, outside of Khujand in the Kushan Empire. There was a bug preventing sacrifices here counting for the task in the Traveller's Destiny, preventing getting 100% in this Destiny. Thanks to everyone who helped out in fixing this bug!
We'd like to remind everyone that there is no password on the beta branch, so feel free to opt in using the settings in Steam if you want to have the most up-to-date version of the game.
The old Beta Branch has now been made live; this fixes a number of small but fatal bugs in Nomad settlements on the far east of Takla Makan. A new Beta branch will be going up in the next few days which fixes a few script bugs recently reported.
Win a Limited Edition Silk USB Drive
You can win one of these exclusive, Limited Edition Silk USB drives, previously only available to high-tier Kickstarter backers, in a special competition for all Silk players! The Limited Edition USB drive will never be available to buy again, and is one of only seventy that were made, each valued at $50.
The Limited Edition Retro USB is styled to look like a 1980s videogame cassette, and contains:
Silk game files for Windows, Mac, and Linux, DRM-free
Unique cover image which shows the development team as characters in the world of Silk (left to right: Becky (Portrait Artist), Patrick (Producer), Jamie (Artist), Nathan (Programmer), Chris (Designer/Writer)
Silk Original Sound Track album by composer Chris Shutt, also DRM-free
Silk Manual and Almanac PDF
Silk Videos - a collection of videos shot for the Kickstarter, including all sorts of footage that isn't available anywhere else
Silk Project Files - the complete collection of all the files used by the development team in making the game, including the final Core Design document and all its development stages, artwork, Excel level editor, maps, scripts, reference images, landscape maps, and more beside.
Custom Obi strip styled after a silk bolt
Full body cassette printing with UV highlights on the logo
The winner is the first player to have posted in the Discussion Forums with screenshot evidence that they have beaten all four Destinies in the game - the Traveller, Rebel, Warlord, and Noble.
To claim the prize, you should submit the following screenshots for each victory:
Victory screen, showing days at time of victory
Inventory (North), showing your winning caravan
Hero (North East), showing your starting character's final skills
Map, showing your complete journey for that Destiny
Feel free to submit screenshots for each Destiny as you complete them! We'd love to see how you're doing. There's no end date for the competition - we'll keep it running until somebody wins.
Note that ihobo games reserves the right to ask follow up questions of the winner to confirm that they haven't been faking it... victory means nothing without honour.
Good luck, and may your nightfall not be troubled by storms!
ihobo games
How To Beat Silk
So you like to think of yourself as a gamer who can beat any game... But you haven't beaten Silk. Maybe 1% of gamers are going to beat this game - maybe 1% of those are going to 100% it (and then complain that the game is 'too easy'!). That's because beating Silk doesn't just require quick reactions and stubborn persistence... it requires players who can think - smart, shrewd players able to rise to a mental challenge like no other.
The Traveller
Anyone can win the Traveller, the first of the four Destinies in the game, but that doesn't mean it's easy. You're going to need several skills just to have a hope of getting across the three million square miles of wilderness that makes this the biggest hand-crafted open world of all time.
History: you're going to need either a little bit of historical geography or a willingness to learn it (the Manual and Almanac has your back here) if you're going to find your way.
Geography: are you one of these smartphone cyborgs whose concept of navigating is to ask your robot to plot a route on Google maps? That's not going to help you here. You have to be able to navigate with a map and compass, and if you can't, you're going to have to learn.
Diplomacy: if your idea of videogame victory is wading into battle and hoping for the best, you're going to get yourself into deep water in Silk. It's very easy to declare war but it's extremely hard to overthrow an empire and as the Traveller you shouldn't even try. Instead, you need to figure out how to
avoid* fighting... and that requires serious thinking.
The Other Destinies
And even after you've won your first game as the Traveller, you have only encountered the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the challenges that await you! You're going to need to discover trade routes, work out how to raise an army - and how to feed it once you have it. This is a game where you could have a thousand infantry under your command, and be able to sack any citadel you encounter - and still starve to death because you didn't plan your campaign wisely. To beat all four Destinies is going to require more skills you'll have to know or learn:
Logistics: it matters how many horses you have vs how many riders, it matters how many days of provisions you're carrying. If you can't do basic math, you'll find yourself at a severe disadvantage, although if you're sharp you might be able to wing it
Tactics: you won't get far in Silk if you can't make good choices. Every day you'll have to face a crucial decision about how to camp for the night, and throughout the game you'll encounter tactical challenges where it matters what you attempt to do next and how you do it. You want to make a killing shipping silk from Kashgar to Antioch, but how? Take horses and carry less goods faster? Take camels and carry more goods but at greater expense? Or take cheap oxen but spend four times as long travelling? Every decision matters, because certain death meets the unwary...
Strategy: if you manage to make it to the final Destiny, the Rebel, you're going to need a grand strategy capable of bringing down an empire even the Romans couldn't defeat. Where do you strike first? Do you slowly recruit cavalry to your cause or quickly hire mercenary infantry and deal with the problems of marching? As you start to take citadels, how do you keep the people on your side? You could capture every settlement and still not win if you have a dozen rebellious enclaves turning against you. Victory is hard fought - and not just on the battlefield.
It's not just that Silk gets tough, it's that Silk is inspired by games from the 1980s which had little mercy and challenged even the most skilled players to step up their game. Maybe that's not for you. Maybe you're content to mess around with your toy guns in a game that's basically just tag with firearms. But for a few brave gamers, a tiny handful of the smartest, shrewdest players on the planet, victory awaits you on the Ancient Silk Road.
Like Alexander the Great you could command an empire that spans the world - and like Alexander, you might nearly die because you crossed the wrong desert rashly... that's Silk. It's not a game for the masses. It's a game for players who can think. All you have to decide is whether you're up to the challenge.
Some Small Fixes
Just a small update to fix a broken Moss City ruin in the Kunlun Shan mountains north of the Takla Makan desert on the east of the map. This update also includes some small fixes to the credits - including one glaring omission, the amazing Chris Shutt who composed all the music in the game. An incredible composer, and very tolerant of my request to get the orchestration as close to period correct as was plausible. My infinite and undying thanks to the Kickstarter backers, without whom we could never have had the incredible contributions of Chris or Becky (the portrait artist) to the final game.
We are thrilled to report that Silk has picked up two nominations in this year's TIGA Games Industry Awards, one for Best Role Playing Game and one for Heritage in Games.
We are releasing the current beta branch of the game, which includes a few small bug-fixes, primarily relating to the Temple of Celestial Horses, outside of Khujand in the Kushan Empire. There was a bug preventing sacrifices here counting for the task in the Traveller's Destiny, preventing getting 100% in this Destiny. Thanks to everyone who helped out in fixing this bug!
So you like to think of yourself as a gamer who can beat any game... But you haven't beaten Silk. Maybe 1% of gamers are going to beat this game - maybe 1% of those are going to 100% it (and then complain that the game is 'too easy'!). That's because beating Silk doesn't just require quick reactions and stubborn persistence... it requires players who can think - smart, shrewd players able to rise to a mental challenge like no other.
Just a small update to fix a broken Moss City ruin in the Kunlun Shan mountains north of the Takla Makan desert on the east of the map. This update also includes some small fixes to the credits - including one glaring omission, the amazing Chris Shutt who composed all the music in the game. An incredible composer, and very tolerant of my request to get the orchestration as close to period correct as was plausible. My infinite and undying thanks to the Kickstarter backers, without whom we could never have had the incredible contributions of Chris or Becky (the portrait artist) to the final game.