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'Project Awakened' Kickstarter: Create The Video Game Character Of Your Dreams

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I think character customization---particularly in RPGs---fills the same basic, primal need that playing with dolls fills in little girls. Only in grown-ups instead.

At least that's how I feel, when I really peel back the layers of my own obsession with character customization.

It's why I think Borderlands 2 would have been a good third-person shooter.

It's why when I play role-playing games, I like to be able to create my own character from scratch rather than pick a pre-designed protagonist.

And it's why I'm interested in Project Awakened---a third-person shoot-em-up action game from Phosphor Games currently running the Kickstarter gauntlet.

The footage in the above video is Unreal Engine 3 material, but the final product is being built with the fourth iteration of Epic's game engine. Phosphor Games promises near-limitless gear and costume configurations, and gameplay that responds to your choices and play style.

While Project Awakened allows for players to make typical videogame heroes such as Ninjas, Snipers, or Urban Warriors, what makes Project Awakened truly unique is the potential to craft gameplay experiences and challenges that have never existed before. An invisible hero who can charm enemies to fight for her. A non-violent hero with super speed and agility racing past enemies to the goal. A man who spontaneously combusts at will and touches everyone to incinerate them. The possibilities are endless, and allow players to craft a gameplay challenge unlike anything anyone has ever seen before. The only limit is the player’s imagination.

Phosphor Games, the makers of Dark Meadow and Horn, also had a hand in Epic's Gears of War 3. But Project Awakened is all about the PC.

"PC games are now a thriving, dominant market of innovation," reads the Kickstarter, "with all new distribution models and available services- it really is a better way to get new ideas to gamers than through all the middlemen and barriers in the retail console markets."

The game editor will come with the game itself, and modding will be supported and encouraged, making the expansive nature of the game world even more compelling.

"Swap out soldiers for orcs or skeletons, use medieval armor, place it in a castle setting and create a fantasy game.  Swap out street clothes for sci-fi and create a space epic."

In other words, this is a title that the modding community could have a lot of fun with---if, of course, it's everything promised in the crowdfunding drive.

With 29 days left to go on the $500,000 campaign, Phosphor has a lofty goal for what appears to be an ambitious project. I've reached out to the developer with some questions and will report back. I'm always a bit hesitant when someone promises me something that sounds almost too good to be true. But this really does look remarkable, at least in concept.

For now, read more about the game at its Kickstarter page.

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