Forgive me is a fantasy adventure focused on exploration and the player’s moral choices. The plot begins after the death of the main character, who finds himself hurled in an alternative dimension where the souls of those who committed suicide are gathered. In this lush moor he will soon find out that is soul is not eternal but is gradually vanishing. The only way to avoid complete oblivion will be finding five souls that will help him to gain strength and unlock the sealed doors of a mysterious Tower that dominate the landscape. But what the Tower represents and what’s in its insides will be unknown until the end of the game. In his search, the player will have to pay attention to an evil force that has the power to corrupt and destroy the surrounding land.

The gameplay mechanics will be based mainly on exploration during the sections set on the outside of the Tower. The player will have to unveil the mystery that links the five previous suicides,  in order to free their souls with a simple and intuitive mechanic. Every soul gained will then be necessary to the player to gain access to different floors of the Tower: two souls will be enough to get in, and a maximum of five can be obtained. This will unlock different choices and endings Inside the Tower there will still be exploration, with the addition of free moral choices concerning both the main theme of suicide.

The complete experience of Forgive Me is hard to explain in a few words since we prefer to leave space for personal interpretations. We don’t want to develop a linear game with a single explanation of the facts, but an adventure capable of adapting to the mindset of the player, without fear of kindling controversial feelings. The game is set to be released on PC (2014/2015) and Mac (late 2015).

Fabiano Zaino, game designer of Forgive Me, begun developing the idea at the beginning of 2013 as a simple hobby, soon making it an almost daily job. Towards the second half of 2013 it became obvious that other professionals were needed, and so it’s decided to create Gangster Games: a small group of people driven by a common passion.

The team is composed of Fabiano “deimos” Zaino who deals with the writing and the design. Luca Lo Priore is the one behind programming and visuals, while Stefano Cortese and Luca Bancone are the guys who take care of the concept art, respectively as character artist and environmental design. Alessandro Faiella and Giuseppe Cuomo are two recent additions that deal, the latter, with sounds and music, and the former with character modelling.

Forgive Me is our first game, and our intention is that of continuing developing the game with great care and to create a title capable of stirring up players, thanks to a mature story and a simple but captivating gameplay.

During 2013, Forgive Me grew both in ambition and people involved. Recently we realized that without funding, the game wouldn’t see the light of day for a long time.

Thanks to your contribution, we want to improve Forgive Me in terms of graphic and content: the gameplay is currently less dynamic compared to what it could be, if we get the chance to work on all the ideas we had to discard during pre-production.

The experience that we are trying to create, much depends on the resources invested: what is already implemented has been completed thanks to the few assets we could afford. Unfortunately many gameplay or stylistic choices aren’t viable at the moment.

Lets see what features we could improve with your help:

1) The plot is currently told through a series of diaries, scattered throughout the game’s world. Our greatest hope is to replace this text files with five animated 3D models with whom the player could interact with. Our animator is working hard on this option, but the development time of a single character is really long for just one person. Moreover we want to add various animated cutscenes that will add depth to the visual experience of the game.

2) Forgive Me is being developed with the free version of Unity which allowed us to realize a big environment, but with some small limitation, both from a management and graphical point of view. We would like to get the pro version of Unity so as to enhance the whole technical side of the title and grant a better performance.

3) One of the major aspects of the game is the audio, we managed to create some tracks and sound effects but with your support we could bring to life a full-blown soundtrack capable of underlying the themes that we want to deal with.

4) At the current state we could only achieve one of the three endings that we envisioned for the title, stripping it of all the moral choices we wanted the players to confront with. With the additional money we could complete the project without making any drastic cut.

5) We would love to add Oculus Rift implementation for the game, since we believe that it would fit perfectly with the overall tone of “Forgive Me”.

- 45.000€   1 more 3D artist and 1 more Composer.
- 55.000€   1 more 3D artist, 1 more programmer and 1 more Composer.
- 65.000€   2 more 3D artists, 1 more programmer and 1 more Composer.
- 80.000€   2 more 3D artists, 1 more programmer, 1 more 2D artist and 1 more Composer.
- 100.000€   1 more programmer and 1 more 2D artist

15€ Early Digital Edition – The Game (digital Copy).

20€ Digital Edition – The Game, Soundtrack (digital copy) + Your name as a Backers (Credits).

30€ Digital Deluxe Edition – The Game, Soundtrack, Ryan Gibson Postcard (digital copy) + Your name as a Backers (Credits).

80€ Collector's Edition – The Game, Soundtrack, Artbook and Ryan Gibson Postcard (physical copy) + Your name as a Backers (Credits).

160€ Extreme Edition – The Game, Soundtrack, Artbook, Ryan Gibson Postcard, T-Shirt (physical copy) + Your name as a Backers (Credits and Artbook).

300€ Please, Forgive Me Edition - The Game, Soundtrack, Artbook, T-Shirt, Charlotte Buchant Postcard, The Comic Book (art by Davide Pascutti) Prequel the game (physical copy) + Your name as a Backers (Credits and Artbook).

1) When will a demo be released?
- We planned the official release of a demo by the third week of May 2014.

2) How many hours will the game last?
- The length will vary from player to player but we estimated that it would go between the two and five hours. If we manage to reach the necessary stretch goals, a couple more hours of gameplay are expected.

3) What does the game actually consist of?
- Forgive Me is a fantasy adventure set in an open environment, completely explorable from the beginning of the game.

4) The game’s formula isn’t new, how does “Forgive me” stand out from the crowd?
- The main value of forgive me is its subject, an uneasy topic that we hope will keep you engaged from the beginning to the end of the story. There won’t be any fights, but you’ll have to reach the solution before your soul is completely lost.

5) Will there be any obstacles preventing me from reaching the end?
- As we said before, even if our character is already dead, there is a Game Over. Your soul is not immortal and needs sustenance from the NPC located in the world in order to reach the end of the fame.

6) What languages will be supported at launch?
- The game will have Italian and English text from the beginning. With the stretch goals we’d like to add French and German, together with Italian and English voiceover.

7) When will it be released?
- We believe that with your support the game will be ready by the end of 2014, but should we reach the higher stretch goals we  may need to postpone it to 2015.

The true power of crowdfunding is the possibility of including you, those for whom we are making this game with great love and passion, in the process. So, if you want to contact us please do so on our email, or on our profiles on Twitter and Facebook. Fabiano will answer personally your every question.

http://forgivemegame.com
gangstergames@forgivemegame.com