Who is Making Gothica?

‘Hi there, it’s me’ - Elliott (on the right)

Hi everyone my name is Elliott and I am the developer and creator of Gothica. I was introduced to RPG’s at a young age when my brother picked up a copy of an edition of AD&D, (I think it was 2e, I was very young at the time) and forced me to play a party of FOUR characters while he was the evil Games Master. As you can imagine, it did not end well and my first impression of TTRPG’s was not a good one!

Fast forward probably about 20 years later and I begin diving into the world of D&D 5e, Call of Cthulhu and a few other RPG’s. Wow… TTRPG’s can be fun! My first experience with 5e was as a GM for a group of friends, and I loved it! Voting myself to be the forever GM I created many one shots, adventures and even a few campaigns, until one day my wife said I should make my own game… HA! Oh no wait, that’s a great idea! So I began working on Gothica and now you’re up to date with me and my story. Now comes the fun part, watching and taking part in Gothica’s development. I hope you consider playtesting the pre-release material and I would absolutely love to hear what you have to say about it. Have fun and enjoy the dark high fantasy world of Gothica.

Gothic Inspiration

Although the development of Gothica only began in 2022, I have always been interested and fascinated by architecture, specifically Gothic architecture. Now I do not claim to be fully knowledgeable on all things brick and mortar, however when I visit these sites of historical value, my mind and imagination races with ideas of stories of the past, and of my own fictional world. I’m grateful that Britain maintains such marvellous historical buildings in such condition, if not just to inspire me to create some really cool RPG content.

Fun fact - My wife is always attempting to force me away from my computer and I often put up a fight, that is of course until she mentions an old abbey, or castle…
Then I accept.

Britain’s Nature

When I’m not furiously researching about dark Victorian medical practices, I can be found in some of Britain’s oldest forests and caves. Visiting areas of outstanding natural beauty and heritage sights of the country have given birth to some of the ideas that you’ll find in Gothica. Finding inspiration is easy in these quiet, calm and serene environments, so full of history and mystery, the mind can only help but wander.

Fun fact - I spent every waking moment of my childhood glued to a TV screen playing video games, now I plunge myself into the beauty of the natural world for inspiration to make my own game!

Historical Equipment

I think all little boys love to pretend to be knights with swords and shields… Well I’m all grown up now so I play with imaginary flintlock weaponry instead! The swords and sorcery genre of fiction and gaming has always been an obsession of mine. When creating Gothica I wanted to include my new love of dirty gunpowder firearms, if your firearm doesn’t blow up in a plume of smoke upon firing is it really a gun? My love for swords and sorcery as well as Renaissance era weaponry is prevalent in Gothica, and by embracing them both I hope to be able to create many unique and interesting weapons and pieces of equipment for players and GM’s

Fun fact - The family has a replica Ivanhoe sword which was given to me by my father and now sits proudly in my studio. (It might only be a replica but how cool is it to be handed a sword by your dad!)

  • When my wife told me to give making a TTRPG a go, I was originally going to make a sci-fi game. But science fiction games need knowledge of rockets, engineering, lasers and other sciencey things… But dark fantasy monsters and puzzles, ahhh, magic! The solution to all things is magic.

    But in reality, my inspirations have always driven me towards cool vampires and monster hunters. As you may see references to; Bloodborne, Van Helsing and Castlevania to name a few, throughout Gothica.

  • What a great question! A lot of the mental creation and designing of the game is already complete. I am currently spending every evening and weekend writing and expanding on the current material. While commissioning art from three fantastic artists.

    The ‘roadmap’ if I can call it that, is to create a pre-launch page on kickstarter sometime early Summer. With the aim to go live near the end of this year. But if you’re after regular updates then follow the development on either Instagram or Discord.

  • Absolutely! The way I see it is this game is a collaborative effort between the community and myself. If you have any ideas, suggestions or time to play test then please contact me on either Instagram or Discord.

    Financial assistance is not needed at this stage as I am writing for free and paying for artwork from my own personal funds.

Download the Pre-Release Guide Here!