The premise of Singularity: Tactics Arena is a simple one. Take one part science fiction, one part high fantasy, two parts SCP Foundation and shake well. You’re just a normal person stuck in a building full of monsters that want to eat your flesh and grind your bones down into gruel for their babies.

But beyond that premise, this game is also one of the first steps towards realizing a world that I’ve been developing for almost 10 years now. A world full of characters, not necessarily all of them human, but all of them hopefully relatable — besides maybe the eldritch abominations. Characters are the key to what makes a good RPG, and as I look back to those iconic games that convinced me of video games as medium for stories (Planescape: Torment, Mass Effect, etc), I wonder if I can measure up.

You can look far from the shoulders of giants, but once you climb down, you find yourself in their shadow.

I can only wait for the game’s release to see how I did. I hope it will be good. I hope it will be worth the wait.

“I’m not entirely sure if I can trust what I see.”

The main protagonist of Singularity: Tactics Arena, Eloise finds herself in the unfamiliar role of leadership as she tries to keep herself and her party alive while in the bowels of Facility 25. She puts up a brave front, but she’s beginning to suspect that even if her body survives the Arena, her mind might not.

“My mother died giving birth to me and my father… he was there, but he wasn’t at the same time. Eventually he left me too.”

“I used to wait up late to see if he came home. That’s kind of why I’m a late sleeper, because I’m so used to it. But it never really mattered. Me staying up couldn’t make him care.”

Strong-headed, foul-mouthed and kind-hearted, Orluna was never sure about the person she wanted to be. The Arena aims to break her spirit, but she knows better.

“He was a nervous looking man, full of small fidgets and little twitches. But… in the right light, you can picture him as someone else. Someone standing taller.”

Nobody would mistake Fenton for a heroic figure. His soft hands, soft voice and soft heart… there is nothing in Fenton that would intimidate even a field mouse. Yet, there is a reserve in his depths, a reserve of true blue steel.

“Truth is what you know about yourself when you are alone.”

The realist and pragmatist of the group, even if that means leaving the rest of the group to die. Antwoot brooks no nonsense, but his eyes have the glint of a hard man that is ready to crack.

The problem I seem to have with my games is I can never explain the plot without navigating a minefield’s worth of spoilers. After attempting to write a summary for my first game, The Singularity Wish, and reading its Steam reviews, I realize that just about EVERYTHING was a spoiler. It’s really no different with this project. So I kept everything vague, and I’ll let players find out for themselves.