Originally called Shining Force Online a swathe of legal issues caused them to rename it to Shining Empire. Therefore the creators are attempting their own Kickstarter. It’s a complicated issue that we want to explain for you and talk about the new project. Above you can see the “Empire Anvil” they will release so you can make your own adventures.
What Caused the Switch to Shining Empire
The creators made a “Shining Force Online” game without the approval of Sega. This happens a lot in small doses. Sega is basically just letting the license stagnate after some relatively unsuccessful next gen games in the RPG area for Sega. So it is a complicated situation. On the one hand it is their intellectual property that they have the rights to and are correct in asserting control. On the other hand it’s unfortunate for fans that they do not use the license.
So after a cease and desist order, the original fan game is gone. They decided to take new ideas to Kickstarter for their own game with similar gameplay.
The Shining Empire Gameplay
In many ways it will be a normal turn based RPG. Stats, items, you know how it goes. They want to have a choice system that stacks on itself. Multiple stories which modify later ones, a story tree if you will. They are also promising hundreds of party members. The final thing they want to add is a land system. A place that your team owns and uses to buff themselves.
There will also be no limit to your army or the number of battle participants. This is a huge change and we wonder how this is going to work. You can even send party members into other worlds. These are some great ideas.
The Shining Empire Kickstarter
Right now they only have a few pictures for the game and many big ideas. As you might expect with enough money pledged you can design a character, get a copy and so on. They only want $9,500 for the Kickstarter so it is a smaller one, but we salute their big ideas.
