Enter the Age of Azmodai

By KEITH COUSINS

Staff Writer

COEUR d'ALENE — Joe Matison has been dreaming up fictional worlds ever since he was a child.

One of those worlds will soon come to life in the form of a video game.

“The world it takes place in, and the lore for that, all started when I was like 12,” Matison said. “It's not just wizards and goblins and orcs. It's more of a mythology brought to life.”

When he was a teen, Matison, 31, and longtime buddies Max Newsom, 31, and Casey Davis, 30, started talking about and attempting to design and develop video games.

It wasn't until Matison was attending ITT Tech in Spokane that things got serious. That's when he met Corey Farmer, 27. Matison, who now works for The Press, and Farmer each studied graphic design and eventually went on to get their bachelor's degrees in digital entertainment and video design.

“We had lots and lots of failed attempts, but we kept trying,” Matison said. “We finally found a project though that we could really work on and had the knowledge to accomplish.”

With the help of Newsom, who worked on particle effects, and Davis, who created sound effects, they developed “Age of Azmodai,” the video game they hope will put them on track to become successful developers.

“Age of Azmodai” takes teams of three or five players and transports them to a fictional world where two city-states, the Medjai and the Theli, are engaged in a border dispute. That border dispute, Matison said, quickly escalates into all-out war. Teams of players will take the role of soldiers while competing against each other to see which faction rises to the top.

Gameplay is simple, according to Matison, with players navigating through a two-dimensional world armed with a variety of weaponry like swords and axes. If players encounter an opponent, or a computer-operated member of the opposing faction, they can attempt to attack, block, and dodge their way to victory.

“You can kind of see it coming and do something about it. It's not just some bullet flying out of the sky and taking you out,” Matison said, while adding players will still have to build their skill to meet the challenges the game throws at them.

“Age of Azmodai” is a product of Talos Studios. Created by Matison and Farmer, Talos is described on the studio's Facebook page as “a diverse group of young professionals, video game enthusiasts, and friends, each with years of experience in interactive media, striking out on their own to bring their unique ideas and focused discipline to the indie gaming world.”

Talos Studios just launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise the funds needed to complete and launch “Age of Azmodai” in a year. Kickstarter is a crowdfunding web platform that allows project creators — artists, musicians, developers, designers and the like — to seek and collect backing from a global community of potential investors.

Similar to creating music, or writing a book, there's a real possibility that once “Age of Azmodai” is completed it will not be a commercial success. That possibility, Farmer said, keeps he and Matison up at night.

It also pushes them forward.

“You can't be afraid of failure,” Farmer added. “Something that I really got used to doing in college is taking on a project and telling myself that regardless of how it turned out I gained experience from it and the next thing I do will be better.”

“For me it's just stubborn stupidness,” Matison said. “I refuse to stop trying.”

The other side of the coin is a hope, Farmer said, that those who play the game will experience an adrenaline-pumping fight for survival. Players who dive deeper into the game will experience a thought-provoking storyline involving struggles for power and fortune in the fictional universe.

Ultimately, Matison and Farmer said they want a competitive community to develop around the game, with groups of players forming static teams and using complex strategies to win. The rise of electronic sports, or e-sports, as a multi-million-dollar industry with support from media giants like ESPN and Yahoo gives them even more hope that the enterprise will be a successful one.

For more information on “Age of Azmodai,” follow Talos Studios on Facebook at www.facebook.com/TalosStudios.

To get a sneak peek at the game's visuals or contribute to the Kickstarter campaign, visit https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/talosstudios/age-of-azmodai.