Heads Up: A new Facebook page and new Cyka details!

We've completed setting up the PolyKhrome Facebook page for the most part.  There's still much we will do to it, but for now, it's up and running.  Follow us on our Facebook page, where you can follow us for news and screenshots there as well as here and just say "Hi" to us (we answer your questions and reply to comments). In addition to the official Cyka website in development, we'll also use our Facebook page as a means to announce official Cyka online competitions and events at gaming conventions.

Now, you might be wondering, "Well, what exactly IS Cyka before I go Liking it?"

Well, here's a good inside look at Cyka:

Genre-wise, Cyka is a science-fiction game that takes the best of action, adventure, shooter, real-time strategy, tower-defense, turn-based strategy, and role-playing games, and blends them seamlessly to create a whole new kind of game.  We call this game in particular a "dynamic-turn action" game, due to its being an action game that plays on dynamically turning between real-time strategy and turn-based strategy elements.

What is the world of Cyka like?  In a nutshell, steampunk alien droids in a medieval-styled world with hints of cybernetic technology, on a large planet where continents are suddenly drifting around on the oceans and nobody knows why.  Imagine that.

Cyka has three main modes: Story, Versus, and Conquest.

In Story mode, you explore the world of the Raants race through the eyes of a Raant named Cyka.  King Cyka Auren, king and commander of the Knight faction of his Aurenda kingdom on the continent Zera, must lead his people through facing their world in crisis.  His vast planet, Rhye, is undergoing a mysterious shifting of the continents, new continents seem to appear near his and other known continents from the mists.  An even more mysterious continent has been floating in the clouds, to Cyka's wonder.  And furthermore, other factions from other known continents have begun warring over the presence of a normally rare metallic substance called gellium, which naturally occurs thousands of feet underground, now occurring in a rare abundance.  Gellium has several unique properties that have the potential to power the normally steam-powered Raant perpetually, and to replace their rust-capable Raant armor-like bodies.

Commander Cyka is a thoughtful and poised individual, left in charge as king by his father, the late king Samra Auren.  He's known for his notable skills in strategy and desire for peace, which comes in useful with leading his people through the various conflicts arising during this time the Raants have called the Gellium Wars.  While the world is in conflict, Cyka is in conflict with himself, wanting to bring end to the warring, and wanting to find a solution to the strange occurrences undergoing with his planet.  He has a theory, along with a few others (as he later finds), that the sudden abundance of gellium is related to the reason for the strange shifting of the continents.  As he leads his army in expedition to find out answers about their world, Cyka will learn of the mystery of continent in the clouds, which fascinates him.  He'll learn much about his world, which has stood in mystery for ages due to its rather inexplorable vast size, but what he'll need to find out the most is a solution to ending the Gellium Wars.

Story mode is about 20 hours long (which is long for a real-time strategy game) and will have extended replayability due to alternative perspectives (play as another commander of another faction) available as downloadable content.  The game's visual style is somewhere between realistic and illustrative, and the plot is rather dramatic but with touches of humor.  And while the action gets intense, the action never gets graphic.  In addition to an engaging single-player story mode, there are online multiplayer modes.

Versus mode is where players can play against each other online in set matches in a variety of ways.  Battle your fully-controllable army in two ways:

• Player vs. Player (PvP) Battle: Lead your army of up to 100 units against up to 5 friends and other players around the world, in customized or randomly-picked battles, with optional objectives.
• Team vs. Team (TvT) Battle: Join a battle as a unit of your choice with a team of up to 31 other players joined together as one team playing against another team of up to 32 other joined players to complete one of several objectives to gain your team victory.

Rule the leaderboards, unlock downloadable content, and engage in periodic official Cyka competitions for prizes.

Conquest mode is an online persistent-world mode where this game shines its brightest.  Explore the many continents of Rhye, secure new lands, build your faction army, collect resources necessary for building strongholds, create strategically-placed strongholds, capture neutral sites, and maintain your strongholds.  This is a persistent world, meaning that when you leave the game online, the game still goes on online, and your strongholds can therefore be affected.

You can leave the world for the day being on top of a continent, and come back to find your strongholds decimated.  Of course, there are ways to better ensure your protection with measures to try to hold your position while you're gone (such as strategic unit set-ups for your strongholds and employing tactics such as insuring key units with resurrections during battle and using single-use stat boosters), but no one is safe from a good strategy.  A good strategy can take down even the most secured stronghold.  You can be that unstoppable force on the field and totally rule your map one day, and come back the next to find you've been completely torn down, and you'll have to find a new place to set up and regrow your destroyed conquest.  No one proves immortal in this game--unless your just that good.

You can also seek neutral or abandoned castles, offer truces with other computer-controlled factions, and build powerful alliances with other player-controlled teams.  Or attack other castles, steal sites on behalf of your kingdom, and decimate other teams.  What you build in conquest, you keep.  It's totally up to you how you play.

The basic gameplay is synonymous in all three modes in Cyka--control a faction to accomplish your objective, be it to overtake the opponent or to seize their stronghold.  A faction is a style of army in the game.  You have five general factions to choose from, each bearing their own look, specialties and fighting style.  Play as one of five factions available in the game: Knight, Ninja, Tribal, Brawler, and Gunner. (Additional faction packs and costume packs will be released as downloadable content.)

• The Knight-styled faction (Cyka's style of faction) are well-rounded and are the most balanced of any faction.  They feature medium-ranged light shooter types, medium-strength brawlers types, medium-strength swordsman types, and medium-strength heavy artilery types.  They have good offense and good defense, and have the fastest fort-infiltration time.
• The Ninja-styled faction are masters of stealth combat.  They can briefly go invisible and have the fastest travel rate of all factions, but the trade-off is that during stealth combat their team coordination significantly drops and their defense is low during turn-based actioning.
• The Tribal-styled faction are masters of terrain advantage combat and health regeneration.  They excel in team coordination attacks during turn-based actioning, but feature poor defense.
• The Brawler-styled faction are masters of hard-hitting close-range combat.  They feature the most powerful attacks of all units and high defense, but they're the slowest units of all faction, vulnerable to long-ranged attacks, and the lowest repair rate.
• The Gunner-styled faction are masters of all forms of gunnery.  Everyone uses a projectile weapon of some form and they all have the quickest reloads, but the trade-off is that in relying exclusively on munitions, they have to skillfully manage stronger ammunition in battle or else its back to the weaker ammunition.

There are several unit types available for each faction, including fighter units, defender units, shooter units, heavy artillery units, and of course, the commander unit.  Typical units in a faction include:

• battlers (balanced fighters, including swordsmen)
• defenders (powerful close-range fighters)
• siege engine units
• riflemen
• snipers
• medics
• cannoneers
• commander unit (there's only one main commander per team)

There are several kinds of strongholds you can build and defend, and each are fully destructible.  The active playing fields are fully physics-bound and many objects are fully destructible.  Use fallen debris from destroyed strongholds, rocks, trees, and even your comrades (such as defender units) as cover.

The varying terrain heights of the active playing field also plays into effect, as short-ranged attacks from higher regions typically cause higher damage, though it leaves attackers in a more vulnerable position, which can instead give some defending units the advantage.  Long-ranged attacks from higher regions give greater protection and greater range of attack on lower enemy units, but these attacks' accuracy and strength reduce with distance.

Cyka will likely be rated Teen, as the gameplay is better suited for older gamers.  This game will be available for PC, Mac, iOS and Android, and for Linux through a browser version, and will play cross-platform across each.  Matchmaking will be in accordance to an account and not platform-dependent, so PC Cyka players can play free against iOS players, Mac players against Android, and Android players against iOS, so on.  Owners of both a desktop version and a mobile version of Cyka will be able to play the game on one platform and continue it on the other via persistent cloud-based storage of game saves.

This game will seek support through Kickstarter.  The Kickstarter supporters will received their digital copies of the finished game (both a desktop and mobile versions, DRM-free) straight from us here at PolyKhrome, and others gamers will be able to buy Cyka from the PolyKhrome Store (coming soon).  They'll also be able to buy the PC or Mac version of Cyka from Indievania and a web-browser version from Chrome Web Store, where Linux gamers can buy and play the web-browser version of Cyka.  The iOS or Android mobile version of Cyka will be available from the App Store and Google Play respectively.  There will be available a special edition of Cyka called Cyka: Cloud Quest Edition, which features a special Cloud Quest mode where you can finally explore that mysterious continent in the clouds and solve its mystery.

Steam will have its own special version of Cyka called Cyka: Steamed Edition.  Steam users will be able to utilize Steam's matchmaking, Steam Achievements, Steam Leaderboards, and Steam Cloud save service.  As the Steam version of Cyka will only be able to use Steamworks, the Steamed Edition game will include the Cloud Quest mode, a special Steam-inspired Commander Cyka model, and free exclusive downloadable content.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg!  There's a lot in the works for Cyka, and PolyKhrome is going into overdrive with its development.  Screenshots are on the way, and will be posted on here and on Facebook.  Be sure to follow us on our Facebook page.

Oh, and the first 100 people to Like our Facebook page and leave the comment "I want Cyka!" will receive a FREE PC or Mac copy of Cyka upon its completion.  Readysetgo!