The upcoming Souls-lite title Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn is part of a rising tide of games that blend fantasy and early firearms in recent years. Flintlock stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the survival crafting game Nightingale and the RPG Greedfall, the latter of which has a second installment on the horizon. There's certainly more, but "Flintlock Fantasy" is not everywhere when it comes to games.
At its core, Flintlock Fantasy is a level playing field between gods and guns, but this genre often takes technological and cultural influences from the 18th and 19th centuries as well, with an added touch of magic and mysticism on top. Flintlock and gaslamp fantasy are to magic what steampunk is to technology, embodying a distinct narrative that doesn’t usually take place in that backdrop. Literature and gaming can go hand-in-hand, however, with developer A44 Games looking to Flintlock fantasy novels while developing the game. Speaking with The Best War Games in an interview, Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn’s creative director Simon Dasan drew attention to a specific book series as a major inspiration for the forthcoming title.
Brian McClellan’s Powder Mage Trilogy
Dasan says the idea for Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn came from books like the Powder Mage trilogy by American author Brian McClellan, which was among a plethora of works read by A44 developers. McClellan has also written a follow-up trilogy, Gods of Blood and Powder, with the six overall books releasing between 2013 and 2019.
One of the paths was this interesting genre of book some of us were reading; flintlock fantasy (we recommend checking out the Powder Mage series if you want to get into the flintlock fantasy genre!). We were enamored by these worlds and thought it would be a perfect setting for a new game, which became Flintlock.
The first novel in the Powder Mage trilogy, Promise of Blood, follows in the immediate aftermath of a coup in the kingdom of Adro, focusing on the dangers and political machinations that follow such a tumultuous event. Though the technological level of Adro is comparable to that of Europe in the late colonial era, the mages of McClellan’s world have the power to metabolize gunpowder and use it to catalyze the casting of magic, use telepathy, or even ignite gunpowder without a flame. The Powder Mage trilogy was being developed for television, as of 2021, by Canadian producer Joseph Mallozzi, whose previous credits include the Stargate television franchise.
Ultimately, Flintlock Fantasy felt like exactly the right vibe to Dasan and the team at A44: a fantasy setting with a unique vibe and a strong identity inherent to its place in history, be it real or fictional history.
We created our own bespoke world and even consulted with a couple of Flintlock Fantasy authors early on in development. It seemed like a perfect location to set a game within – a really rich and engaging identity that isn’t seen in many other places.
Of course, both Powder Mage and Flintlock aren’t alone in the genre. That gives a wealth of tradition, themes, and an exciting emerging identity to stories in the flintlock fantasy vein.
The Growing Genre of Guns and Gods
Other novels in the genre include the Cinder Spires series by acclaimed author Jim Butcher, best known for the urban fantasy noir series The Dresden Files. Another example is the Alchemy Wars trilogy by Ian Tregillis, while The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club by Theodora Goss straddles the blurry line between flintlock and gaslamp fantasy. But to Dasan, McClellan is the perfect on-ramp to the genre that fascinated the team at A44 and formed the backdrop for their work on Flintlock. Of course, while heavily explored in literature, the fantasy subgenre Flintlock explores remains relatively untrodden territory for the game industry.
That isn’t to say the genre is totally Flintlock’s alone. As mentioned before, related themes of humanity from the general era fighting gods and monsters with magic and gunpowder have been on the rise in gaming lately. Greedfall and its upcoming sequel Greedfall 2 both look at colonialism through the lens of magic, myth, and monsters blending science of the era with mythology and genuine gods native to Teer Fradee. Nightingale introduced survival crafting enthusiasts to a humanity scattered across fae realms, guided by none other than Puck from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Though the times and themes of these games have largely remained out of the mainstream, with Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn adding to their ranks, it feels only a matter of time before this particular kind of fantasy narrative explodes. In the meantime, there is a suggested reading list.
Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn
- Released
- July 18, 2024
WHERE TO PLAY
From games studio A44, makers of Ashen, comes an explosive Souls-lite, where Gods and guns collide in a battle for the future of humanity.
The Door to the Great Below has been opened unleashing the Gods and their armies of the Dead. The lands of Kian are besieged, the city of Dawn is on the brink of destruction. It’s time for the Coalition army to fight back. Embrace vengeance, gunpowder and magic as you embark on an epic journey to defeat the Gods, close the door and retake the world.
Kill all gods.
Your battle begins now.
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ // Blood, Violence
- Developer(s)
- A44 Games
- Publisher(s)
- Kepler Interactive
- Engine
- Unreal Engine 4
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PC
- Genre(s)
- Action RPG
