Early Access Disclaimer: Songs of Syx is currently in Early Access. We highly recommend that you carefully review the Early Access terms and experience the demo version before making a purchase to ensure it aligns with your gaming preferences.
Songs of Syx is an intricate fantasy city-builder that invites you to begin as a humble colony and strategically maneuver your way towards becoming a sprawling metropolis and empire. The game boasts deep, realistic mechanics where even minor incidents can cascade into significant kingdom-altering events. While easy to pick up, mastering Songs of Syx presents a formidable challenge. The game is set in a captivating low-fantasy realm, brought to life with graphics designed to ignite your imagination and immerse you in its rich tapestry. Imagine the rise and fall of civilizations, each with its own unique song, perhaps even a song of styx, echoing through the ages as empires crumble and new ones emerge.
A Living, Breathing World
Step into Syx, a world teeming with diverse races, distinct cultures, ancient and modern deities, and fantastical creatures. Experience the cyclical rhythm of day and night, the shifting patterns of climate and weather, and the ebb and flow of animal and human migrations. Brace yourself for trials of droughts and plagues, threats from pirates and bandits, and the excitement of unforeseen discoveries. Kingdoms and empires will rise and fall, shaped by events both within and beyond your control. Each playthrough offers a unique narrative, with all content, background lore, and hidden details generated anew, while staying grounded in a deep and evolving history that unfolds as you play.
Grand Scale Base Building
Elevate your settlement beyond its humble beginnings by earning the loyalty of your populace or enforcing your rule with an iron fist. Witness your small colony blossom into a vast metropolis housing tens of thousands of inhabitants. Exercise caution as you expand; every structure demands upkeep, and even minor disruptions in production or dips in public approval can trigger a rapid downward spiral. Your people will not hesitate to overthrow a careless ruler.
Deep Grand Strategy Elements
As your capital expands, it requires sustenance from a network of supporting villages, towns, lumber camps, fortresses, and harbors that constitute your kingdom. However, you are not alone in this world. Rival kingdoms and ambitious despots are also vying for alliances and territorial expansion. Cultivate diplomatic relationships and strive to maintain a distinct cultural identity. To bolster your power, engage in global trade where prices fluctuate based on supply and demand, not fixed currencies. Fortunes can be made and lost overnight if you are not vigilant.
Epic Tactical Battles
Assemble forces from allies and vassals, and recruit wandering mercenaries and legendary heroes to reinforce your armies, potentially amassing up to 20,000 individual units. Employ cunning tactics and strategic prowess to outmaneuver your foes, or let your fearsome reputation demoralize them before clashes of up to 40,000 units. The outcomes of these massive battles will determine the fate of empires, echoing like a powerful song of styx across the land, marking the rise and fall of power.
Nobility and Servitude
Utilize slave labor to perform menial tasks, from tending to your chambers to cleaning your halls. Grant them occasional rewards to prevent uprisings. Appoint nobles, either from within your kingdom or imported from abroad, to oversee various aspects of your realm, boosting production and prestige. However, choose your confidants wisely and reward loyalty appropriately, as some nobles may harbor ambitions of usurpation or align themselves with your enemies.
Immersive Soundtrack
Thanks to the generous support of our Kickstarter backers, Songs of Syx features a fully realized soundtrack composed by @jasinkamusic. Existing tracks seamlessly integrate with the prototype, enhancing the game’s atmosphere and drawing you deeper into its world.
Delve into the lives and personalities of your subjects as you establish the basic necessities for survival through the harsh winters. Engage in hunting, foraging, and farming to ensure food supplies, and produce clothing to provide warmth.
The inhabitants of your settlement belong to diverse races, each possessing unique skills and vulnerabilities. Every individual is distinct, with their own personality, motivations, preferences, social connections, and traits.
Direct control over individuals is limited; instead, you formulate plans, and your subjects execute them intelligently. Treat them well, and more will be drawn to immigrate to your settlement. Mistreat them, and they may become unproductive or openly rebel against your rule.
Expand your settlement further than ever imagined, either by gaining the favor of your subjects or through oppressive control. Construct cities capable of housing up to 30,000 individuals.
As your population grows, your focus will shift from individual needs to the management of groups. A group is defined by a combination of race, social status, religion, and trade affiliations.
In Songs of Syx, subjects tend to be wary of those who are different. You must decide whether to exploit these prejudices by discriminating against certain groups and favoring others, or to cultivate a diverse and tolerant society that leverages the unique strengths of each race.
Summon your banners, bolster your ranks with mercenaries, and inspire your soldiers with the presence of heroes. Engage in massive battles designed for realism, featuring lower kill rates and fragile morale, as you defend against invaders or reclaim your rightful kingdom.
Your city may face raids from bandits seeking to plunder your resources. If you refuse to yield, they will attack. As your kingdom expands, battles will increasingly occur beyond city walls, in open fields.
Battles carry significant weight. Building a formidable army takes years, and defeat can be devastating. Victorious enemies will pursue fleeing soldiers, annihilating your forces while sustaining minimal losses themselves. You may then be forced to negotiate a costly peace, unless you possess the manpower and resources to quickly rebuild your military.
Syx is a dynamic world, inhabited by diverse races, cultures, old and new faiths, and peculiar creatures. Experience the cycle of day and night, fluctuating climates and weather, and the constant movement of animal and human populations.
Expect droughts, epidemics, pirate incursions, banditry, and unforeseen discoveries that will shape the destinies of kingdoms and empires, with or without your involvement. No two games will be identical, as all content, background narratives, and hidden details are uniquely generated each time, while adhering to a rich underlying lore that you will uncover gradually.
Legend has it that Syx and its peoples were once united under a powerful empire, governed by the Gods of Order themselves. Centuries of harmony and prosperity ensued, with extensive road networks and outposts connecting thriving cities. However, tragedy struck when a faction of avaricious Men stumbled upon the prison of the God of Chaos and released him in exchange for the promise of immortality. As the gods clashed, cities were obliterated, and invaluable artifacts and repositories of knowledge were lost. Desperate and outnumbered, the Chaos Lord unleashed a plague upon the world, transforming the dead into soldiers to replenish his ranks, and wielded magical weapons of fire that ravaged the remaining kingdoms and strongholds. Ultimately, all avatars of the Gods of Order were slain, banished from the physical realm. Failing to fulfill his promise of immortality, the God of Chaos was assassinated by his fickle followers, and his demise ushered in an age of ice and snow that enveloped Syx for generations.
But there is hope! The ice has receded, and the world desperately needs your leadership.
Choose to play as the Dondorians, master miners with unwavering resolve. They dedicate their lives to excavating Dyhrlium, battling their ancient foes – the Amevias – and dreaming of rebuilding their legendary capital at Mount Cerebus. Born fully mature and naturally skilled miners, they possess long lifespans and prefer to dwell deep within the mountains.
Alternatively, play as Men, physically vulnerable and mortal, but endowed with free will and an ingenuity that could surpass their Dondorian counterparts. Unite their fragmented and warring kingdoms under a single banner, but resist temptations that may lead you down dark paths. And act swiftly, for whispers of the Dark Lord of Chaos’s return are growing louder!
After the War of the Gods, the few surviving Kantors retreated from the world, seeking solace in the frozen north for their remaining millennia. Filled with rage and disgust for men and their treacherous nature, they generally avoid civilization. But if fortune favors you, you might attract a few Kantors to your city, where their wisdom and power will be invaluable. Perhaps their ancient songs hold echoes of the song of styx, a lament for a lost world.
Here is what prototype players are saying;
“So I’ve been playing it for about 2 hours and holy crap… It’s really good… Like… Really good.”
“I have like 0-2 games every couple of years that check all my marks. Games that I will love and play.”
“I wasted an inordinate amount of time on your demo due to how good and compelling it already was and I can only wish you the very best.”
“I was initially put off a bit by the UX/UI but pushed past the first 15 minutes of the tutorial. Once I got the hang of it and restarted I, without realizing it, spent the next 3 hours playing… so good job.”
“Not too many games can suck me in like that.”
“This is one of the coolest projects I have seen in a long time… I downloaded it yesterday and already have 4 hours in… its amazing!!!”
This grand vision is unfolding over time. Currently, the base game incorporates 60-70% of the intended features, but these are still being refined, and the game is in an unpolished state. The September release will include a significant portion of the planned features, while some may be omitted, and others may be added. Songs of Syx has been in development as a prototype for six years and will remain in Early Access for an extended period, though our aim is to ensure it remains enjoyable throughout this phase. You are welcome to join us on this journey, but only if you appreciate the current state of the game, are excited about its potential, and are comfortable supporting development during Early Access.
The game is technically ready for Early Access launch on Steam today, but we are committed to adding further enhancements and polish before release.
To date, our focus has been on implementing and refining the core elements of a city builder. Ultimately, Songs of Syx is a long-term project. In the near future, we plan to introduce empire management and nobility systems. Early Access launch is scheduled for September 21st, 2020.
