The Depths of Valor
Genre
An open-world action-adventure game inspired by The Legend of Zelda, combining free exploration, real-time combat, puzzle-solving, and character progression across a richly layered world.
Setting
The game is set in a split world: a once-prosperous kingdom now divided into an open, ruined overworld and a mysterious, corrupted underground realm. These two layers are deeply connected, with secrets and challenges crossing between them.
Main Goal
Uncover the lost powers of an ancient civilization, travel through both worlds, and ultimately defeat the corrupted force residing in the castle above, bringing balance back to the land.
Main Actions
Players can explore, fight, solve puzzles, and switch between the overworld and the underground to progress. Actions include climbing, gliding, melee combat, and interacting with ancient devices and environments.
Player Experience
A sense of freedom, discovery, and growth. Players feel immersed as they piece together the story through exploration, overcome layered challenges, and unlock new areas by mastering skills and clever thinking.
Hook
Two Worlds. One Castle. One Destiny.
Every mystery, puzzle, and enemy is part of a grand design between the surface and underground. Your actions in one world reshape the other—leading to an epic showdown in the castle above.
Level Design Inspiration – Zelda: Breath of the Wild
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Freedom with Purpose
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Players are free to explore in any direction, guided by natural visual landmarks.
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The world encourages self-directed goals instead of forcing linear paths.
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System-Based Challenges
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Puzzles and combat are driven by physics, elemental reactions, and tool combinations.
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Multiple solutions are possible, promoting creative problem-solving.
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Strategic Verticality
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High ground offers valuable vantage points and reveals distant objectives.
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Mountains, cliffs, and towers serve both navigation and level pacing.
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Environmental Storytelling
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The world tells its story through ruins, decay, and ancient remnants.
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Players uncover lore by exploring rather than reading or listening.
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Curiosity-Driven Exploration
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Every strange structure, glow, or shape in the distance can be reached and investigated.
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Designed to trigger the “See → Wonder → Explore → Reward” gameplay loop.
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Level Design
The game world is built around a layered exploration system, where players must complete three major overworld combat zones, each tied to a connected underground segment. These five main areas form the core of the progression loop, with clever traversal and environmental storytelling bridging the two layers.
Semi-open exploration: Players are free to choose the order of surface zones, encouraging organic discovery and non-linear play.
Visual guidance: Environmental landmarks (like the looming castle, light towers, or smoke plumes) subtly guide exploration.
Puzzles as gates: Key underground access points require solving local puzzles or defeating mini-bosses.
Wells as symbolic and mechanical connectors, blending narrative, traversal, and progression.
Surface ↔ Underground puzzles: Some puzzles span both layers, requiring actions above to affect the world below, and vice versa.
Castle as a persistent visual goal, visible from almost anywhere, anchoring player orientation and long-term purpose.
The central underground canal is both a narrative climax and gameplay reward, turning the final section into a dramatic, earned transition.
