- INFO & FAQ -

General Concepts
The universal design encompasses an amalgamation of a futuristic world mixed with aesthetical designs of olden eras of kingdoms and empires, with a heavy emphasis on remaining grounded in terms of supernatural themes such as those that can be described as space wizardly.

The general setting and tone, although dark, is contrasted by prevailing elements of hope, which cast light across the darkness which envelops the universe.

In terms of the grand scale of the universe, a large amount of influence in its design is heavily inspired by olden slavic, as well as additionally ancient Greek and Roman themes & culture. Although there are many other cultural inspirations they are not as prominent in the grand scale of its design.

Environmental Design
The environmental factor in design will vary as the vastness of a space setting allows a magnitude of environmental themes & locals to be explored, therefore there is no one setting that can be defined.

Although keeping with the main theme of the universe, environments which happen to be found closer to that of war zones will be depicted as bleak and ravaged wastelands scarred by the horrors of war, In Contrast to those that happen to find themselves far away from the frontlines offering a glimpses of hope with brighter landscapes. This duality serves to highlight the light and resilience of those who endure the darkness that surrounds them.

Modular design & Progression
Many elements of technological and structural design within the universe focus on a modular system, this allows for a wide range of versatility in terms of both lore and development, allowing for a wide variety of varying elements to be added without an excessive amount of work being required to create each one from foundations.

This also expands to the concept of progression and development of technology. For example repurposing the same base vehicle platform to fulfill a different role, or being upgraded to the next generation, giving a more realistic feel to the universe.

Vehicle design
The design of each faction's vehicles will vary widely from faction to faction based on their core culture and doctrines, although keeping to the general theme and aesthetic of the universe as a whole. Although not limited to the inspiration for many of these will focus around the mid-late-20th century, as many of us find it to have had some very unique and interesting designs.

Additionally the design process for vehicles follows a path of creating modular platforms rather than individual designs, with each next generation over the span of the universe's timeline being an improvement on the previous design adapting to the needs and doctrine of a specific fashion. This approach allows us to save a lot of time creating individual models from scratch and also add a great layer of realism for better immersion.

Grounded nature
When designing the world the overall consensus on the laws and limitations was always to keep it in line with reality, avoiding what was coined space wizardly. Therefore when it comes to such concepts of the supernatural extremes, it will rather be avoided unless there is some form of justifying it in terms of the universe's structure. Although stating these concepts and ideas of paranormal activity and other phenomena that have some basis which fits, won't be excluded but rather tone down

In short, if it's a cool concept and we can justify it in terms of the lore without altering the universe's basis it might be included.

The tone of the universe is: 'A dark dystopian future driven into relentless war by the undying hope of a new beginning'.

The goal of the project is to create a universe through which rich stories can be crafted which for example: showcasing the struggles and enduring spirit of ordinary people in the face of the endless darkness before them, finding hope in the most hopeless of situations.

The development approach for the project has been split into 3 phases:

1. The World Building Phases - The creation of the universe's backstory and lore.

2. The Asset Phase - Creation of assets (models, art, concepts etc.)

3. The Media Phase - Creation of media (games, books, films?)

Although this project may have once started as a hobby game, the change in its approach to start with the world build has been chosen as on the bases of: If we make a game with no assets the time it takes to create the assets and lore will in turn result in the game structure already being out of date / new technologies and methods might become available making our previous progress obsolete.

While world building and assets such as models and art will not become obsolete in such a time frame. Allowing us to have a higher chance in successfully realizing this project.

The current team is small as it is currently only a passion / hobby project, with a few additional people contributing ideas and concepts that they like to ensure the project has a wide range of themes and ideas that more people will find appealing.

Although if the project gets enough support i will happily expand the team and bring on more people to help in its creation.

The funding of the project will rely mostly on our supporters and fans who want to see this come to fruition, as I do not wish to accept any forms of funding that will require me to change the soul of the project or hand over any rights, as doing so will compromise the very foundation of our initial vision.

Instead we wish to be self funded, but we do not like the idea of people just handing us money and getting nothing in return, therefore we have a plan outlined to provide multiple options to support us, by giving back to our supporters by providing some sort of products, (art, books, figures, etc) before fully reaching our intended goal of creating games. (further outline in the Development map).

For us, our stockholders are our fans! :)

One of the major elements of design is to make sure that all aspects of lore and the world fit together coherently, ensuring that there is as minimal as possible breaking of immersion.

Therefore the universe in which Ashes of Sins is based on has no correlation to the world we live in, for example the entire galaxy is completely different than the one we find ourselves in, with only common terms such as ‘earth’ although the earth that exists is completely different from ours.

Additionally political and moral issues within the universe are completely different then those that plague our times – (Which will not be represented or implemented in any form).

Note: Anyone pushing for them will be kindly told to go make their own universe (Perma Banned & Black Listed).

Although aspects of art design and some themes will be included that resemble those of our world, this is unavoidable but these have little to nothing to do with political or moral issues of our day, with any overlap being not intentional and rather an aesthetic or design theme.

In short:

Current day political & moral issues = No

A cool looking design = Yes

If you would like to follow development of the project please join the Discord to get the latest news and updates regarding development, alternatively you can follow any of our social media accounts for general news and updates regarding development.

All our Social Media accounts can be found under the social section of the website.

If you wish to provide feedback or suggestions please join our Discord and find the appropriate sections for feedback. Please don't post them under other social media as there is a chance that we will overlook it.

By following any of our social media account you can find updates and news associated with the project, although the best place to receive the most recent and up to date information is our Discord.

If you wish to support development please visit the support section of the page, alternatively contact the development team.

For any technical related issues with our site please visit our discord for more information and/or contact one of the staff members.

There are currently 10 main factions that are the primary focus, with additional sideline factions that may be added later. However, these sideline factions are more likely to be mentioned in lore rather than being fully developed, due to the significant amount of work already involved with the current factions.

Some may consider this to be a large number of factions, but there are several reasons for such an extensive roster:

Firstly, and most importantly, the goal was to create a universe that feels lived in and has enough space to accommodate the ideas we have planned. This also helps avoid the awkward situation of adding a new faction in the future and having to justify their sudden existence and their complete disregard for all previous events.

Secondly, in many sci-fi universes, there is often a lack of factions, typically boiling down to a generic empire vs. rebel group plus maybe some aliens. Our consensus was to avoid this by providing a richer experience.

Thirdly, the idea of trade and economy has been taken into consideration. For example, one faction might trade and sell equipment to another, thereby decreasing the amount of work needed to create a large variety of factions while keeping them unique through aesthetic or minor changes to suit the given faction. This concept is particularly prevalent in factions that are more or less considered mercenary or trade nations, which on a large scale lack the facilities to manufacture large quantities of their own assets.

Lastly, and most importantly, we wanted to offer something that a larger range of people would enjoy. What one person finds cool, another might find lame, so having a variety of factions helps cater to a wider range of tastes and interests.

The overall reason for this is that the universe was designed with the unique concept of "What if humanity became this...?" with the general consensus to take a concept which is generally considered "alien" and create a human / hybrid version of it while still retaining the overall aspect of humanity.

The main reason for this was that humanity in general is always depicted as either the 'United Vanilla Human Alliance' who is overly nobly boring or the 'Generic Evil Empire' who just want to kill everyone because "Generic evil reason number 696969", with the additional rebel group who somehow can't be defeated because everyone fighting them is completely incompetent, destroying any sense of stakes or tension.

The main focus therefore was always telling a story of what would humanity look like if they where to become something else and how far could it be pushed and still be considered human. While then the idea arose to reverse the roles for the alien council intern turning them into what humanity is usually depicted as.

These themes are further explained for each faction in the 'Main Faction Themes' section of the FAQ.

Initially, the idea of sub-factions arose from the need to separate the military structure of some factions into distinct groups. However, this concept soon evolved into a way to enrich each faction by adding another layer of complexity to their structure. Sub-factions introduce internal conflicts, power struggles, and other dynamics, transforming them from 2D to 3D entities with their own personalities.

Sub-factions can be categorized into two groups:

Nations: These are factions that could potentially stand alone as independent entities but are considered sub-factions due to the nature of the main faction. They are typically found in the core factions, such as The Coalition, The Alliance, and The Illuminate.

Orders / Groups / Parties: These include religious or military orders within a given faction, where their existence is intricately tied to the overall culture and existence of their faction.

While most factions have sub-factions, some might lack them due to their nature. For example, The Cyber Ascendancy, due to their structure, is considered to be a single unified entity.

Such a setting allows us to craft a variety of complex and interesting stories set in a vast array of environmental conditions and scenarios, in turn enhancing the story telling experience by not restricting it to a limited amount of environments.

Additionally this allows the Universe to exist longer then a few minutes before everyone tactically annihilates themselves in turn.

Given the setting, the idea of FTL (Faster Than Light) travel and the rules regarding space are major aspects of the universe. Like all other concepts, there is a set of rules in place. Although the universe is rather grounded in reality, these rules are implemented to enhance the overall strategic aspect and allow for better storytelling by introducing limitations and stakes even if they don't entierly make sense.

General Requirements:
- Limiting the range one can travel at a given time
- Creating choke points and points of strategic value
- Somewhat limiting the 3D aspect of space to a more 2D plane for ease of development

The extended version of these rules and concepts can be found in the lore section related to FTL and Space Anomalies.

Summary of Key Concepts:
Zones
- Yellow Zone: Conventional travel is safe, although FTL calculations are impaired due to environmental conditions.
- Red Zone: Hostile and non-traversable due to dangerous environmental conditions.
- Dark Zone: Unscannable due to space phenomena, potentially dangerous to traverse.

FTL Highways: Implemented to allow for tactical and rapid redeployment, adding strategic value to holding certain points in space.

FTL Altering Devices: Introduced to allow for more tactics in a 3D space environment. These devices are categorized based on their use.

In Ashes of Sin, there is no definitive good or evil faction. This concept is often overused and can become rather comical when a given side acts evil with no real reason for it. Instead, each faction's actions are justified by its stance and outlook on various matters. What one side might consider evil could be deemed justified by the other.

In short imagine a room and this room is full of war criminals, now point to your favorite and that one is the "Good Guy".

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