EXCLUSIVE: Indus Battle Royale Developers Open Up About the Lore and Gameplay Progression, Comparisons with Other Games, and Their Plan Moving Forward

We already know that SuperGaming is working on first fully made-in-India battle Royale title, Indus. From gunplay mechanics to some rough gameplay, we have already seen what the game has to offer. While there is still a long way to go for the game as we mentioned in our preview for the Community Playtest hosted by SuperGaming, there is a lot about that game that we still don’t know, which is a good thing.

We say this because we had the opportunity to sit down with the game’s ‘Loremaster’, Ankush Nishad, and game director, Jwalant Gangwar, to understand what they are building. Based on the interaction, it is safe to say that there is more to Indus than what meets the eye, and SuperGaming does have a plan in place to ensure that the game progresses correctly, in terms of the lore as well as the gameplay. Check out what both of them had to say about the game, below:

When it comes to Indus Battle Royale, Indo-futurism is at the center of it all. How did that have an effect on the lore?

Ankush Nishad: I think that a lot of Indian media generally tends to go more towards mythology or the fantasy side. But we wanted to go more towards the sci-fi side, which has not been explored much. So, that became the seed of the idea of Indo-futurism. And we also thought about how we can make it in a way that is more approachable for not just people in India, as we want to present it to the entire world. We are building it in India, but we want everyone to enjoy it. We want to represent India because we ourselves enjoy media and watch or play games from all around the world, and we want the same to happen for the global audience by giving back something that everyone can play and enjoy.

We want them to see things that they may have not seen or expected to be done before, because in a lot of the things that we create either consciously or subconsciously, we add elements from our culture and things that affect us personally. So, things that are created in the United States will have themes that are more prevalent in America. Similarly, things in Japan will have that feeling of cultural elements even if it’s a sci-fi or fantasy world. In the end, we want to do something similar with India by presenting those inbuilt ingrained themes of the country and bring those out while building this world. And we want to do all this in a way that also does not interfere with the gameplay aspect of Indus Battle Royale.

Why are the Mythwalkers fighting each other if they’re all after the same thing in Cosmium? Are they even fighting for the same thing? Like if the COVEN is after the same thing, why would they want to make it a contest? Is that part of the lore or is that something you’re still figuring out?

Ankush Nishad: It is part of the lore, and we won’t get into the details, but there’s a reason why these people are fighting. In Indus, you are a Mythwalker, who belong to the bottom rung of the COVEN, and the leaders of COVEN have made plans for hundreds of years in the future. In the beginning, you’re a Mythwalker who has no idea of the bigger picture, as you’re doing it for the sake of money and experience after being recruited by the COVEN. But, as you play and explore, you will begin to understand the reasons behind all this fighting, and that’s the journey you will take as a Mythwalker. As you play Indus, you will be able to unravel the secretive plans of the COVEN and its mysteries, and that’s part of the reason why I can’ reveal more about it. However, this is one aspect of the lore we have already worked on.

While I get that Cosmsium is mentioned as a mystery of the galaxy, there must be something that it inherently does? So, is there anything you can reveal about this mysterious resource and its functions?

Jwalant Gangwar: So, Cosmium is an interdimensional material, and it does not conform to the physical realities of a particular galaxy or universe. It has its own properties, and what it plays around with is space and time. So, one major example of that is interdimensional portals. There is a whole wide world of applications for Cosmium, and there will be glimpses of it in the game that you will get to see.

So, is it acting as a power source of some sort?

Jwalant Gangwar: In some capacity, yes. But, it is more than that. I don’t know if I should be saying this, but there will be weapons powered by the Cosmium as well.

Is that one of the reasons why the COVEN are trying to farm them?

Jwalant Gangwar: Not really. There is a very concrete story reason for why Cosmium is a thing in Indus, and it leads into time and space effects. We can’t go into too much detail about this right now, as it will impact what plans we have in terms of content rollout and marketing. But what we can say safely on record is that Cosmium does have applications beyond portals, and yes, you can expect to see certain weapons that are powered by it. Along with that, there are applications and lore-related elements that you can notice in a section of the lorebook called the Cosmium Research Facility, and at the moment, that’s all we can say right now.

I know you guys are aware of the comparisons that people have drawn for the game with Apex Legends, and by judging by the looks of things, the COVEN sounds a lot like Hammond Robotics from Apex Legends and Titanfall? Was any sort of influence drawn from this universe or this is an entirely new concept?

Jwalant Gangwar: It is an entirely new concept, because COVEN is more than what you’re finding similarities with. It’s a massive organization, and it’s bigger than most empires and nations in the world that we’re building. And while I can’t reveal much about the lore, the machine making aspect is a very small portion of activities that the COVEN are involved in.

The world of COVEN and Indus is bigger than any organization. We may believe the COVEN to be an organization, but it’s much more than that. Like we mentioned in the presentation, the COVEN have their hands in everything that happens in the galaxy. So, it’s much bigger than just robotics like you mentioned with Apex Legends and Titanfall.

Is there like a rough timeline in terms of years between the disappearance of the Yaksha, the formation of the COVEN, and the discovery of that one working portal?

Ankush Nishad: In Indus, you start out as a Mythwalker, who has received a mission after being recruited by the COVEN. The lore features myths and legends about visitors that came from far, far away. While you know that they came from a place called Indus, you really don’t know where Indus is. And for a long time, people believed that Indus is just a myth and it’s not real. However, after becoming a Mythwalker, you realize that the COVEN have found a way to Indus with the last remaining portal that they only have access to.

Indus and its legends are rooted in the long past of the galaxy, and at the moment the galaxy features several civilizations, and that’s the reason why we call COVEN as an interstellar organization. While the galactic community believe Indus to be a myth, the COVEN and its Mythwalkers have found a way to access it through a portal, and it feels like a discovery that is along the lines of mankind finding Atlantis.

So, now as a Mythwalker, you get to go to Indus and experience it, and the big mystery surrounding Indus is the disappearance of the Yaksha civilization, and once you get there you’ll find out that the planet is covered in a mist that we call Nirvana, and no amount of technology can breach it. With the blanket cover of Nirvana, Indus is inaccessible, and COVEN can only allow its Mythwalkers to go across it for a limited amount of time. While a small part of Indus is available to experience, we don’t know what happened with the rest of the planet.

When you visit Indus, you will notice that Nirvana is nearly encompassing the entire planet, and that’s probably the reason why Indus hasn’t made any impact in the galaxy for a long time. Along with that, it also could be the reason why the Yaksha disappeared. However, how it all happened is the mystery that you will have to unravel as you play Indus.

So, as the lore progresses, I’m assuming there will be a ton of flashbacks.

Jwalant Gangwar: Perhaps.

Why go with name Yaksha? According to Mahabharata, it was the form that Yama-Dharma, the God of Death took to test Yudhishthira. What was the thought process behind choosing this name and other names in particular?

Ankush Nishad: So Yaksha is not just limited to Maharabharata. The Yaksha generally representa nature spirits, and not just any nature spirits. Like in a local area in India, you have the tutelary deity, and the people who have lived there will know legends about these deities. I even had it in my village. When I go back to my maternal grandmother’s place, we hear a lot about these legends – like If you stay too long in the night, this person will come. Similarly, Yaksha has also been a legend that we can find throughout history, and we can point it through old statues and historical artifacts, with some of them even predating elements like Hinduism and Gods that came much later.

Yaksha is the more general term for nature spirits. And that’s one of the reasons why we chose that name, because the Yaksha were quite close to nature and the planet, and they have deep rooted respects for it. With the name, we want to present these people and their inclinations, which delve deeper into what they care and do about.

Jwalant Gangwar: This includes their ideologies for conservation and respecting the climate, and progressing with it instead of destroying it. So, with all of this combined together, we just thought it all made sense.

The lore says that Indus is unbreachable because of Nirvana, and the COVEN can only access the floating islands, which contain Cosmium for a short period of time. So, why exactly is COVEN looking to farm it? Is it for the purpose of removing the Nirvana and to further explore the planet, or will the lore progress in a different way?

Jwalant Gangwar: You’re asking the absolute right questions. But if we give the answers to these questions, it will spoil the story for you. And that’s because it is the biggest mystery, which is why this organization want this incredibly powerful resource that can change things at a massive scale.

Ankush Nishad: The COVEN has plans, and it is a type of organization that doesn’t partake in anything legally. They’ve always had a purpose and a longer plan for the things that they’re taking part in. Maybe, even multiple plans.

The one that we can add is that when we drew up Cosmium, we clearly had this one use case that for some people it can be used for jewelry, and they never realized that it has a grander purpose. So, even now the myth of Cosmium as some kind of a decorative item prevails. Very few people in the universe know about its true capabilities and powers, and that’s what our thought process has been.

What was the purpose behind introducing different weapons manufacturers in the game? Do they play a part in the lore?

Jwalant Gangwar: So like we said, the COVEN is a massive organization. They have their arms and they do everything – manufacturing trade, espionage, right? I think I wouldn’t go beyond that. But yes, the COVEN isn’t aligned with any empire, kingdom people, race or species. They have members from all across the galaxy, and there are people that work and operate with and for them. And that’s the reason why they have multiple manufacturers. They are hoarders of knowledge, and they’ll take whatever they can get. So, if you have new information and methods of manufacturing, the COVEN will want to know about it, as they want to be ahead of the curve.

The portals and the verticality reminds me a lot of Ubisoft’s HyperScape. Even the character models with those futuristic face masks, and the death animations where they kind of crumble into pixels looks like it. Was there any inspiration taken from it?

Jwalant Gangwar: Not really, no. Ubisoft’s attempts at all of these things, while we admire it, we can’t deny that it ultimately failed. When it comes to the masks, it actually stems from our roots with titles like MaskGun, where players don’t have any faces. That is something we have carried on for seven years now. This was actually a very important part that when we were thinking about, “Okay, what would the face of our first character look like?”, and we keep saying that we’re building it in India, but for the world, right? We didn’t want to make that character Indian, white, brown or any race in general.

There was definitely a conversation where we realized that we want anyone to be able to relate to that particular character, and it’s a trope at this point that people use masks. It makes it easier that you can see yourself as the character instead of something like Fortnite, where you see that guy with blue eyes and blonde hair that I can’t even remember. What’s his name? Steve?

In the end, we just didn’t want to force individuals to play someone who looks white or Indian. It was more of like, “Okay, we’ll stay away from that. We’ll just put a mask on,” and we’ll eventually see if we want to bring in faces.

With HyperScape, the game had a much higher skill floor compared to other Battle Royale games. You had such a high locomotion system, where you can jump over lanes and wall around things. For the average audience, it was difficult to get into.

And with verticality, that is something our developmental team has always preferred and enjoy, because it adds more layers to it. When we see PUBG or COD Mobile, the terrain is mostly barren, where there is almost nothing for players to interact with. You probably get a hut in a few sections and for the most part you’re mostly running around in the fields. With this layout, there isn’t any strategy or layers of intrigue.

So, level design has definitely been such a big part of what the player experiences, especially in a competitive game, and verticality was definitely one of the things that we wanted to experiment. Again, it’s still in progress, and we’re seeing how it plays out, and we will soon find out if it was too much or too little.

You mentioned that the objective of the game is going to be recovering Cosmium. So, how does that come into play? Do you eliminate all the other players while extracting the Cosmium or would players need to get it first and be the last person standing?

Jwalant Gangwar: So, there’s a separate win condition. You can win by Last Man Standing. But, you can also win by collecting Cosmium and not having to kill anybody. Of course, that answer might ring a lot of bells and concerns.

There isn’t any concern to be honest. But, will be there a ton of Cosmium to collect or will players have to fight for a single piece of that resource?

Jwalant Gangwar: There’s only piece at any given time.

And you collect it and hold on to it while hoping that no one kills you?

Jwalant Gangwar: So, we won’t go into the mechanics of how that win condition works. But yes, that is a win condition.