Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes Kickstarter campaign launched [Update 2]

The ambitious new RPG from the creators of Suikoden.

Rabbit & Bear Studios has launched the Kickstarter campaign for Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, its newly announced RPG headed by key creators of the Suikoden series. It is seeking $509,713 in funding for release on PC in fall 2022, with a $1 million stretch goal to release on PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo consoles.

(Update 2:10 p.m.: Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes has surpassed its initial funding goal of $509,713 for a PC release.)

(Update 7:10 p.m.: Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes has surpassed its stretch goal of $1 million for release on consoles.)

Here is a brief overview of the game, via its Kickstarter campaign:

About
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes:

Is a brand new, high quality Japanese RPG from Yoshitaka Murayama (Suikoden I and II) and Junko Kawano (Suikoden I and IV), in their first collaboration in 25 years.
Uses a traditional six-character battle system utilizing painstakingly created 2D sprites and gorgeous 3D backgrounds.
Follows a deep story with 100 characters intricately intertwined.
Our story begins in one corner of Allraan, a tapestry of nations with diverse cultures and values.
By dint of sword, and by way of magical objects known as “rune-lenses,” the land’s history has been shaped by the alliances and aggressions of the humans, beastmen, elves, and desert people who live there.
The Galdean Empire has edged out other nations and discovered a technology that amplifies the rune-lenses’ magic. Now, the Empire is scouring the continent for an artifact that will expand their power even further.
It is on one such expedition that Seign Kesling, a young and gifted imperial officer, and Nowa, a boy from a remote village, meet each other and become friends.
However, a twist of fate will soon drag them into the fires of war, and force them both to reexamine everything they believe to be right and true.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes‘ deep story and dialogue is helmed by Yoshitaka Murayama, the master storyteller that wrote the scripts for both Suikoden I and II.
Key Features
Exploration – Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes has a vast world to explore, full of lush biomes, bustling towns, creepy caves, and quiet villages. Talk to townsfolk to learn more about the region, explore remote locations and fight secret bosses, or maybe just enjoy the gorgeous scenery.
Turn-Based Combat – Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes employs a traditional turn based RPG battle system where players take command of up to six individual units against either an army, or a single large creature. Choose commands for each of your characters, then watch them carry out your orders in full motion combat. Over time, your heroes will also learn special AI abilities that they will perform on their own in battle, adding to the strategic element of combat. Characters will learn more AI commands as they grow stronger, and some characters will even link their AI commands together for added effects. Players will also be able to customize which AI commands their characters use in battle.
Enemies – As you explore the world of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, you will encounter all manner of creatures, whether it’s an ancient rune golem, suddenly awakened from its long slumber, or a noble dragon, protective of its territory and ill-gotten gains. You and your forces will have more than just an opposing army to worry about on your adventure. These creatures will come in all types, and will have incredible abilities and skills, for all of which you will need your wits and allies to overcome.
Recruitment – Through your adventures in the world of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, you will meet people from all walks of life, looking for something more. Whether it’s a fisherman, or a baker, or a brave warrior, each new addition to your army will bolster your ranks, making a worthy addition to your town.
Rebuilding the Fortress Town – The Fortress Town, the player’s base of operations throughout the game, serves as the main character’s military base, but also their home. When the player first acquires the fortress town, it will be rather small, but you will be able to grow it over time by recruiting other characters and putting them to work for you. Players will be able to customize the fortress town:
Build sturdy castle walls to protect from enemy invasions
Expand military equipment to develop weapons and recruit more troops
Cultivate fields for farming and creating granaries.
Create specialty products to trade in order to develop businesses such as the blacksmith, builders, souvenir shop, and restaurants.
Cats – Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes isn’t just a classic-style JRPG. It’s also full of adorable cats. Cats as far as the eye can see. Cats meowing, cats napping, cats exploring the world. Cats, cats, cats. CATS! Meow!

And here is an updated message regarding consoles:

In keeping with our theme of honesty, the reality is, with this game coming out in two to three years, it’s impossible to know what the current video game landscape will be. It would be ideal to have the game available for current gen models and next gen models but right now it’s impossible to say what those hardware requirements will be and what costs would be associated with porting to those platforms.
For this campaign, the launch timing will most likely put us right in the middle of a console transition period, meaning that some people will own next gen consoles, and some will not. This is less than ideal when trying to run a Kickstarter campaign that you want to cater to the maximum number of people. We need to determine a single quality baseline for the game.
Currently, we are offering Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes on Xbox One, Xbox Series X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and Nintendo’s next generation console.
The elephant in the room is that while nobody knows what Nintendo’s plans are for when this game releases, in just about every major Japanese game crowdfunding campaign, when a lower spec hardware has been listed on the campaign, it has invariably been too expensive, often times requiring downgrading textures, massive amounts of code rewrites, effectively meaning building two games.
For anyone that has backed one of these campaigns, you obviously know the outcome. These platforms usually get cancelled or dropped from the campaign. So, again, in keeping with 100 percent transparency for what is an incredibly difficult problem, if the console stretch goal is cleared, we will create a version of the game for Nintendo hardware.
Hopefully, that will be something akin to a Switch 2, allowing for similar quality and gameplay experience across all platforms. In the end, if no such console is announced by the time we need to create new console version branches, we will go through the major challenges of the aforementioned texture changes and code rewrites, or refund any backers who pledged to the platform, if there is absolutely no solution.

Read much more about Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes via our previous coverage.

Watch a set of videos below.