Stray Kite Studios, a collective formed from some especially high-level industry talent, recently announced its upcoming game Wartorn. Wartorn, a roguelite indie game with squad-based strategy elements, will be delivering a whole new fantasy IP with its release.
Announced earlier this month, Wartorn is slated for later in 2025. The game will be the first standalone outing by Stray Kite Studios, a team that previously worked on some Fortnite minigames and the adaptation of a Borderlands expansion into a full game. Despite this being the studio’s debut original, it’s certainly not the team’s first rodeo. In an interview with Game Rant, chief creative officer Paul Hellquist—notably a senior designer on Borderlands and lead designer on Bioshock—sat down with Game Rant to talk about Wartorn‘s original fantasy setting.
Related
BioShock 4 Should Make Hay With Its Protagonist
The Bioshock series is known for its multitude of often tragic endings, a tradition that Bioshock 4’s protagonist should strive to break.
Wartorn’s World Of Talaur Explained
Making Talaur Unique
Wartorn is a unique, wholly new fantasy world—detached from much of the team’s previous experience in games like Borderlands. The announcement trailer presents a world that lives up to the game’s name, ravaged by war and a variety of monstrous creatures. Hellquist stated, “If you include all of the different units and their upgrades, we are shooting for over 50 different types of squads for early access,” hinting at an impressive unit variety for the game. That’s not all Hellquist had to say about the game’s world, however, going on to talk about some of his favorite aspects of Wartorn‘s world:
“I think what I am most proud of is how the world revolves around the idea of ‘Mantras.’ Mantras are the different philosophies that the peoples of Talaur belong to and identify with. Each Mantra has its own point of view on the world that affects not only what they think and how they act in the narrative, but the mantras also impact the kinds of abilities and mechanics they have in the combat portions of the game. We are always trying to tie our fiction to our game mechanics and the Mantras are the glue that connects those two parts of Wartorn.”
The concept of Mantras is in line with the more narrative-intense games such as Bioshock that members of Stray Kite have worked on. Philosophical outlooks manifesting as mechanical abilities is a brilliant idea for a game that wants to do a lot with its theme, as it handily ties story and mechanics together. It’s often the case that narrative themes inspire a game’s most unique gameplay qualities.
Wartorn‘s Mantras system is the premiere aspect of Talaur’s worldbuilding that Hellquist elaborated on. He spoke about the story that this world will frame, mentioning that the game will revolve around “help[ing] Yara and Elani on their journey across Talaur to try and find peace after their home is destroyed and reconnect with their family that has been scattered by the war,” re-emphasizing the idea of Wartorn‘s world being scarred by war.
The Inspirations For Wartorn’s Talaur
Hellquist went into some detail about the works that inspired Talaur. In particular, he cited not only the works of Tolkien but games like Dungeons and Dragons and Magic: The Gathering.
“As the granddaddy of epic fantasy, The Lord of the Rings is, of course, a big inspiration for worldbuilding and the sense of epic adventure. We also took inspiration from Dungeons & Dragons regarding how the different creatures are intermingled throughout our world’s society. I would also be remiss not to mention Magic: The Gathering as an inspiration. I’ve been playing Magic for 30 years now and have always been inspired by the huge amount of diversity in the creatures that are represented in the game, including a lot of types that are less common in other fantasy franchises.”
Magic: The Gathering is a particularly unique inspiration to be cited here. Though it’s a popular series, it certainly isn’t as often-cited as a fantasy inspiration compared to Lord of the Rings or D&D. A game that draws inspiration from the unique and memorable creatures from the beloved card game will likely bring some fresh ideas to the virtual table.
Wartorn is coming soon to Early Access on PC.