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Press release:
Victoria, Australia – September 12th, 2023.
The Baltimore-based (Maryland, the US) indie games publisher Versus Evil and Victoria-based (Australia) indie games developer Drop Bear Bytes, today announced with great happiness and excitement that their post-apocalyptic turn-based RPG “Broken Roads”, is coming to PC (via Steam) and Xbox (Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One) via digital stores on November 14th, 2023.

Broken Roads is a narrative-driven RPG that brings exploration, strategic turn-based combat and meaningful philosophical choices to an all-new Australian post-apocalyptic setting.

Broken Roads skillfully blends traditional and all-new role-playing elements on top of a classless system offering near-unlimited character development options built around four philosophies: Humanist, Utilitarian, Machiavellian, and Nihilist.

Furthermore the game presents players with an original morality system: the Moral Compass which sees dialogue options and questing decisions influence, and be influenced by, a character’s philosophical leaning and the tough decisions they make along the way.

Broken Roads’ locations are all authentic recreated from the team visiting towns and landmarks in West Australia and taking photos, videos and audio recordings for it to be as true as possible.

Furthermore, even the game’s atmospheric soundtrack composed by Tim Sunderland is composed with instruments constructed from everyday objects which brings a wholly unique and distinctive tone to the game.

“With Broken Roads we wanted to make a deep, moving RPG full of a massive web of choices that allow for unprecedented choice in role-playing,” said Craig Ritchie, Game Director at Drop Bear Bytes.

“We also wanted to create a fully immersive world based around our native Australia, so a ton of work went into creating an authentic vision of this post-apocalyptic wasteland. Broken Roads may be set in the dusty desert badlands, but we wanted to ensure that it’s also full of compassion, empathy and humanity.”

“RPGs are deeply embedded into the Versus Evil DNA and Broken Roads is among the best we’ve seen,” said Steve Escalante, General Manager of Versus Evil.

“We are pumped to get ready to launch Broken Roads to the masses and are confident it will strike a chord with fans of Disco Elysium and Pillars of Eternity. Enjoy!”

What critics are saying:
“This narrative-driven RPG is absolutely massive in scope and size, bringing focus to meaningful philosophical choices and exploration of a beautiful Australian post-apocalyptic setting” – GamesRadar+

“If you like a unique story, an intense adventure and a real sense of decision making, I think this game will be perfect for you and that you’ll enjoy it a lot. Seriously.” – GameReactor

“Feels like a classic CRPG… More Bogan’s Gate than Drongo Elysium” – PC Gamer

About Drop Bear Bytes
Drop Bear Bytes is an independent studio headquartered in Torquay, Victoria, Australia. Drop Bear Bytes was established in early 2019 with the goal of developing a deep, narrative-driven role-playing experience. With a team comprised of developers, artists and writers from Australia, South Africa, Canada, USA and China, we are currently working on our debut title, Broken Roads, a traditional isometric RPG for PC, Switch, Playstation and Xbox platforms.

About Versus Evil
Founded in 2013, Versus Evil, LLC is the US based video game publisher behind critically acclaimed video games First Class Trouble, Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire and The Banner Saga trilogy and recently announced Broken Roads and Stray Souls. Publishing games on all major PC, console and mobile platforms, Versus Evil works with independent development studios from around the world. The corporate philosophy is to champion the independent game developer.

For more information visit versusevil.com