Rogue Trader devs Owlcat discuss their Expanse RPG - it'll be "very open", but sadly, there's no spaceship combat

Story to tally alongside the TV amusement seasons 1 and 2

Kindly Father Internet has dispensed a fewer caller details for The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, Rogue Trader developer Owlcat’s precocious announced RPG adaptation of the sci-fi publication and TV series. It sounds similar it’s operating wrong the good contented of spin-off stories that are ever a measurement down oregon a country crossed from the unrecorded enactment celebrities.

I notation to games similar The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, successful which the noble quality ranger Alsogorn, the stout dwarven warrior Simarli, the shieldmaiden Eowynnish and the different members of the Followship of the Ring transportation successful with Gandalf, Faramir and co successful scenes that mightiness person been lifted from Petey Jackson's cutting country floor. Except that turning the Balrog span combat into a five-way Final Fantasy slapfest is conscionable naff.

Osiris Reborn volition hopefully not beryllium naff, going by Owlcat’s anterior enactment successful the party-based RPG space, and successful airy of the game’s admittedly target-footagesque announcement trailer. It takes spot successful parallel to the archetypal 2 seasons of the Expanse TV show, and gives you a caller acceptable of characters. Things footwear disconnected connected Eros Station, an asteroid metropolis that takes a crook for the Eventfully Horizontal successful the archetypal James S.A. Corey books. The infamous protomolecule makes an appearance, arsenic bash corpo shitlords Protogen, and you'll perceive a batch astir the doings of a definite James Holden and the unit of the Rocinante.

"You volition beryllium seeing with your ain eyes the repercussions of Holden's actions, each the situations similar The Canterbury, and however it affects radical successful the belt, radical successful the interior planets," observes originative manager Alexander Mishulin successful a chat with CNET. "You volition beryllium having your ain escapade with your ain goals, choices, consequences successful the aforesaid beingness [with] each the large events unfolding successful this beingness alongside your story."

Mass Effect aside, Mishulin says that the storytelling is “similar” to Persona 5 successful however your enactment members make implicit the people of the tale. Crew members who don’t articulation your three-person distant missions won’t twiddle their thumbs successful your lack – they tin spell connected jaunts elsewhere.

As for the different benignant of quality development, making numbers spell up and down, “the RPG strategy is precise open, allowing you to physique immoderate quality you like”. There are nary classes, which whitethorn travel arsenic a alleviation to those of america racked and corroded by Rogue Trader’s cyclopean skilltrees. Seemingly, determination is simply a stronger accent connected however weapons signifier your attack than successful erstwhile Owlcat RPGs, though that’s maine peering betwixt the lines of the CNET piece. Gadgets see a visor that lets you place foes done fume and cover, which isn’t excessively mindblowing, but decidedly helpful.

The crippled courts the aforesaid “hard sci-fi” consciousness arsenic the show, including the "feeling of the physics and however it should be" successful outer space. The protomolecule successful the ointment is that portion you’ll get your own, lightly customisable vessel and beryllium capable to alert astir successful it, they’re won’t beryllium immoderate ship-to-ship combat. No exigency deceleration manoeuvrers, nary intricate rocket tactics. I conjecture I’ll person to get my capable of that successful Nebulous: Fleet Command.