Many puzzle games have featured cryptic alphabets of symbols, languages invented for the player to decode as they play. I've often wondered: if deciphering a "fake" language is so fun, could a game create a similarly engaging challenge using a real-world language, without making me feel like I was in a classroom? That's exactly what The Land Forgotten hopes to do.
Designer & developer Daria spends her days working at a AAA game studio, and for more than 11 years she's been moonlighting as an indie dev, working on an adventure game with a focus on language puzzles. The Land Forgotten is an adventure in a gorgeous hand-painted world, putting you in the shoes of a wizard's apprentice who must interpret and piece together various texts to progress on her quest. In her first devlog video, Daria compares it to games like Chants of Sennaar and Heaven's Vault, revealing the game's big idea: "all the languages you encounter in my game are real."
In the devlog above, you can hear Daria talk through the game's concepts and mechanics, the ups and downs of the long development process so far, and see lots of in-progress footage of The Land Forgotten in action. Several real-world ancient languages are presented through the game's fantasy lens, including the detailed example she gives of the Ogham stones of Ireland, carvings dating back to the 4th century AD. She also shares that many of the games puzzles are inspired by or taken directly from the International Linguistics Olympiad, a language-deciphering competition that sounds fascinating.
Even though all of the visuals present in the devlog video are pre-alpha works-in-progress, the beauty of the game's art is already striking. There's a fairy-tale storybook quality to the watercolor landscapes and environments, yet in a grounded and muted way that gives it an almost Tolkein-esque feeling of depth. (Which is very appropriate, considering how much Tolkien's history as a linguist inspired the creation of his own fantasy world.)
The Land Forgotten is still deep in development, the story and puzzle structure being reworked for not the first time, but for now following along with Daria's devlogs on YouTube seems to be the best way to keep tabs on the game's progress. We'll definitely be following along too, to keep you informed of any big updates in the timeline.
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