Tower in the Sky Notes

---

A place for me to jot down notes for a game that might never come out.

Three Endings

The False Ending

The ending where you don't retrieve Trevor's sword. When faced with the emergence of Sciferia, Naomi does not look, because she has faith.

... Or she thinks. This is the ending where Naomi leaves, broken, her faith not as strong as she thought, her brother dead, and the pressures of life and responsibility weighing down on her. How this manifests, or if it's ever shown will depend on how I feel at the time, but the important part is that she does not reject the facade of faith and loyalty and bravery and her life collapses.

The Good Ending

Naomi retrieves Verbanner from the depth of an Astral Column, but does not defeat Heidrian during the escape sequence. During Scifera's emergence, she doesn't look because it doesn't matter. By descending deeply enough to find Verbanner, Naomi has felt some sense of Scifera. She respects the wishes of the goddess to not be seen.

During the escape sequence, Cassara intercepts Heidrian as Naomi escapes. She never sees her again. This ending requires romancing Ashara. This should be the happy ending, but with the bittersweet note that Naomi is stuck the same rails as Trevor was. She takes his position as heir, his position as a hunter, and even, in a sense, his queerness. She has made herself stronger than Trevor so she bares the weight better, but the ending should give the sense that she is somewhat trapped.

The True Ending

Naomi retrieves Verbanner and drives the unstoppable force of Heidrian off a cliff, fighting with it. The diverging point in this ending is that she gets to confront Cassara again, in a fight that she will lose.

This ending is sadder than the good ending, but it gives less of a forward view of what happens next. Naomi's head-strongness breaks her from the timid cycle that caused Trevor to collapse on himself. She abandons her responsibilities, and even Ashara, to track down Cassara again.

Naomi must go lower to rise back up again, free from the social burdens that suffocated her brother.

Alt Character Paths

Realistically, I can't make new bosses for everyone so non-canonical confrontations might have be presented like "An Apparition of (Whoever)", though perhaps enemy positions can be remixed.

Trevor

Trevor plays the zeppelin crash to the confrontation with Cassara. He is given an option -- to refuse to yield, or to give in. At first the option to give in is greyed out. Upon dying and getting the True Ending, you can go back and yield. Trevor begs Cassara to not tell his sister anything and to stop her from following him. She reluctantly agrees. Trevor is ashamed. Upon killing Bauer (apologizing and receiving his lovers forgiveness), he looks down at his sister off on the mountain as Cass holds her back. He can't face her. He can't live with the guilt of everything that happens. He goes down with the tower when it collapses. False Ending.

Trevor's enemies might be remixed, filling the mountain with monsters, and moving amped up versions of mercenaries to the tower.

Cassara

Maybe played very similarly to Naomi's route but with a different end game? Cass lectured by Naomi before the end of the game by Kayin which goes back to memories of The Crystal Tower and the End of the World.

Doing that and the Temple of Mons fight with Zephan is probably too much so that could be a DLC thing? Tempted to also show The Long Autumn.

• During the Battle of the Crystal Tower with Zephan during the end of the world should involve Cass getting her ass kicked (maybe smashed through a wall and given her scar), Reese being yeeted out the window, and Kayin diving to save her.
  • While Kayin and Reese fall, the Rending begins.
  • Cass though starts going berserk, manifesting her flames for the first time.
  • Zephan realizes Cassara's purpose and Scifera's plan. Cassara is the one created to destroy Scifera's mistakes. But her, like all of Scifera's plans, are a failure.
• The two stay on earth longer as everything is ending outside the tower.
  • Eventually Zephan realizes that Scifera has a plan after all. He laments that the two of them won't be able to finish this.
• Cassara finds herself drifting through The Long Autumn.
• She arrives on earth again last, a few years after Zephan, in Ryaith.

What happens in Ryaith isn't worked out and might not be necessary for BE. Showing the end of the world seems like important lore though.

Will you Carry his Weight?

I like the idea of finding Verbanner, in the bottom of the world, down fissure that down into liminal hedonic space. The trip down through the abstract, these magical layers of reality under the tower, to then emerge in the ruins of New York City (gotta use subway iconography as a hint). The journey down exposes truths about the world.

When picking up the sword, it should be stated what this is.

This is the Sword Verbanner, weapon of the legendary Hunter, Trevor vos Cruz. He is not you, but in death, the expectations placed on him as a warrior, as an heir, and as a member of the faith hang heavily over you.

Will you carry his weight?

Or some variation like this. A thematic affirming that Naomi's life is to have to adopt her brother's position, and all the pressures and responsibilities that entails. In reaching the sword, she has come to terms with her sexuality, she has had her faith, and thus her trust the institutions around it, shaken. Yet despite this, despite how much this complicates her life, as much as these things complicated Trevor's life, she is heir now, and you must accept this prompt to not get the Bad Ending.

Verbanner

The first time Naomi uses Verbanner should be after Trevor's death, using it as the weapon to fight Cassara at the Mountaintop Cathedral. Upon defeat, both her and the sword fall, perhaps sinking into the water until she is forced to let go of it, sending it down deep into the earth. She has to understand herself better before she can tackle the same problems Trevor did. The giant oversized sword acts as a metaphor for Trevor's burden. Might even drown trying to hold on to it, only for Vincent to save her.

Fast Travel

Current thought for fast travel, keeping this diegetic.

Waterways

Horizontal fast travel. Should mostly stay around (or just under). Gets you back to town, maybe to a river inside the mountain, and to the lake at the other side that Naomi lands in after falling from the Church(The "second half" of the game) and whatever other little utility ones. Perhaps a weird one in the tower in a spot that has a waterfall flowing out of it (perhaps thats what's flooding the fissure). Flooding the fissure might also let you go down into the Astral Column.

Nutmeg

Nutmeg and Ari should be a way to get to certain aerial places. Up to the Church, to parts of the Tower, and back to town. Maybe more mountainy areas on other parts of the map. I like the idea of Nutmeg doing a crazy sequence to either get you to a high part of the tower, or perhaps drop Naomi onto The Titan (if the Titan survives as a concept). Gotta promise Nutmeg that she can be a knight if you want her to help fly you to the tower!

Elevators

Two major elevators will be the Mineshaft Elevators in the first area, where you manage to break barriers to allow it to go higher or lower. The Tower elevator should be a bigger deal and something that even goes unused through most of it. Unlocking it should be a big deal and getting it actually to go up to the end of the game should be a big deal. The elevator should be dead center in the tower and be an element that reflects in the level design, even if its in the background and not actually bifurcating each side of the tower.

I like the idea of using the final elevator ascent to call back to Naomi riding the elevator up in BEP.

Double Area Titles

I like the idea of having a name and a subtitle for each area and that the subtitle can change. Like how The Ascent, the final area, starts off when you get there, with no music and just wind and no way to get high enough and the subtitle like "The End of the World", but on the true final ascent, when the elevator fully gets unlocked, it's the Stairway to Heaven. Going down the astral column could have more literal names for areas either going up or down, maybe even using some terms from the Astral Diagram.

Cassara vs Trevor

Trevor should be trying to prevent Cassara from getting through to the tower. He wants to protect Bauer and he has sunk cost fallacy problems over the damage he's caused. Cassara, despite being a bitch, doesn't want to kill him. Cassara should get wounded by Trevor -- blood Naomi sees later and assumes is Trevor's should be Cassara's. Him scoring a hard hit is why she responds brutally and is pissed after. This can also explain why she doesn't just totally smoke Naomi at the front of the church. She's slowed down. It also explains why she doesn't attack Bauer right away. She needs time to recover. Cassara, as fought at the end of the game should move like lightning compared to earlier Cassara.

Alt Character / DLC?

Playing an 'openvania' with other characters would be fun, but I think adding alt-story routes to them would be good. Having Cassara's story include the Battle of the Crystal Tower and maybe some other stuff to set up the actual cosmology of the world would be great so it doesn't take me a million years to get there. Sinlen's bonus content could involve trying to find Naomi after tower, though this one seems hard to fit into the game format. BE mini-VN?

Pits and Atman

Current idea for pits is they either put you back on the nearest ground you touched. Atman pools literally cut to black instantly within a frame of contact with maybe a horrible crushing sound... then to title screen.

The Tower

The tower is a liminal space. As they construct the scaffolding higher, it fills itself in. The insides are all sorts of wild vania-y locations because they're sorta dragged in from the astral plane. The tower is probably dangerous to the mercenaries too. Perhaps signs of fortifications around the central elevator? They don't need the whole thing to be safe, they just need to make sure people can get up and down.

Heidrian

Heidrian discards his weapon and armor when he shows Naomi why his name was The Storm King because the lightning would interfere with it. So he goes from fighting with an axe or a sword to barehanded. He should be rather Raoh-esque, but as a giant, lightning wielding old man.

Heidrian should also note that he was surprised Donovon died, assuming he got too confident and got himself killed. Fighting Naomi, he know understands. For Heidrian vs Naomi, he has no animosity, and only respect. He, once he realizes what she's capable, sees her as a way to relive the glory of his youth.

Heidrian will not go Storm King mode until after Trevor is dead. He might even comment that he "wasn't supposed to kill you, but at this point it doesn't really matter."

Heidrian at this point is like a berserker and should be in this state until the end of the game.

---