Broken Roads™ is the upcoming debut title from Australian indie studio Drop Bear Bytes. Blending together established as well as all-new role-playing elements into a traditional isometric RPG, Broken Roads will see players traveling through authentic Australian locations in a desolated future.

Broken Roads will be shown off for the first time at PAX Australia between October 11-13. The game is in development for PC, Switch, PS4 and Xbox One, and is scheduled for release in 2021.

The game tells the story of a group of companions as they make their way across Western Australia, encountering new friends, overcoming terrible enemies, and uncovering a mystery behind ever-stranger happenings in the Never Never.

Broken Roads’ real-time exploration and turn-based combat is beautifully illustrated with hand-drawn artwork throughout, with the goal of offering an experience of playing in concept art – 3D characters, VFX, 2D environments and props all follow this painterly style.

“As a fan of computer RPGs since the 80s, it’s been amazing getting Broken Roads to this point,” said Craig Ritchie, Founder & Game Director at Drop Bear Bytes. “Being able to put our own spin on the post-apoc genre and get experimental with philosophy and morality has been a lot of fun. It’s been a busy year getting us to this point and I’m incredibly proud of what the team have done.”

The game also presents players with an original morality system: the Moral Compass. This novel design sees dialogue options and questing decisions influence, and be influenced by, a character’s philosophical leaning. Player decisions will shift a character’s philosophical leaning and alter their future choices, as well as open up Moral Traits which can help or hinder.

Drop Bear Bytes is comprised of industry veterans and talented newcomers, with alums from the likes of CCP Games, Riot, Ubisoft, Electronic Arts and Torus Games. The environments and props are being produced by Mighty Vertex, the art studio behind the isometric graphics in Harebrained Schemes’ Shadowrun series of RPGs.

Features:

• All-new post-apocalyptic setting
• Unique morality system influencing dialogue, quests and character development
• Authentic Australian locations and environments
• Blend of traditional and original RPG mechanics
• Up to 6 party members
• Turn-based tactical combat
• Hand-drawn artwork
• A content-rich and densely-crafted world