Left to Right: Pox, Shear, Capella, and Phlegm
"THE WORLD OF GLOOM...
... IS GOING TO DIE
FIGHT OR DIE WITH IT"
... IS GOING TO DIE
FIGHT OR DIE WITH IT"
— Announcement trailer
Hymn to the Earless God is an upcoming roleplaying game by Starseed Games, a company co-owned by Kasey Ozymy (aka Housekeeping), the developer of Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass, and Jason Vanderslice, a programmer with years of experience. Inspired by Paladin's Quest, the game features four main characters with their own interconnected stories, and a diverse range of recruitable mercenaries whose own personal quests and relationships may be beneficial or detrimental to their quests. The game has no set release date, though its Kickstarter campaign, which launched in August 2023 alongside a demo version, can be seen here
and has a tentative fulfillment date of August 2026.
The game takes place on a planet called Gloom, which is inhabited by sociopathic insectoid creatures that cannibalize each other to survive. Its main characters are as follows:
- Pox the Vile, the weakest member of the Verrick Horde that only values strength, who is discarded by their Queen Agony but is able to survive due to his ambition to become a tyrant that devours all in his way.
- Capella, the last of the empathetic Sua-Roo and The Chosen One destined to give birth to a God, but finds herself straying from her path to help those in need while questioning what her sacred duties will truly entail.
- Shear, the Wind that Cuts, the mantis-like Reiken'O whose mating ritual ended in disaster, and is prepared to commit ritualistic suicide in penance until the headless spirit of her husband manifests and guides her to severing the chains of tradition.
- Phlegm, the deadbeat Skyx pickpocket who unwittingly steals from one of Gloom's most powerful entities and is forced to repay the debt by engaging in corporate espionage and uncovering one of the planet's ancient secrets.
Tropes:
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Gloom is populated entirely by insect like creatures of varying shapes and sizes, ranging from tiny to giant, and from humanoid to monstrous.
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Capella and her protectors bicker between themselves while arguing over whether to save a child from being eaten or not. They go on for so long that the child yells at them to stop talking, and actually help.
- Crapsack World: Gloom is an unpleasant place to live in. The populace is comprised entirely of sociopathic insects, people will readily devour each other just to survive, and it is on the constant brink of total destruction due to the many calamities it has suffered.
- Field Power Effect: The four basic types of magic are Tree, Mountain, Swamp, and Wasteland, and the exact effects of spells from each group vary depending on the local environment. The example given on the Kickstarter page is a Swamp spell that deals high single-target damage in a swamp, but might instead have less damage and an Area of Effect in a forest, or be weakened in a wasteland. Each biome will also give each character MP every turn based on how many spells they know from the matching school.
- The Fundamentalist: Capella's two protectors are staunch believers in their religion. When Capella tries to get them to save a child from being eaten by a large spider, they refuse, saying that the spider is a part of 'God's family' too. It's unknown if this is a retort at Capella's empathy, or genuine belief, though.
- Handicapped Badass: Pox gets his right arm and left eye eaten during the very start of his story (the latter of which gets him a trait that reduces his critical hit damage), but doesn't let that hold him back from his tyrannical ambitions.
- Heroic Second Wind: "Heroic" is probably pushing it, but Pox has the "Grit" trait, giving him a chance to revive with 10% hp when he falls in battle.
- Hopeless Boss Fight: Pox gets two of these in the Demo:
- Defeating the Bloodbag in the village, and breaking the code of not killing each other in the process, initiates a fight with the locals, who are all leagues more powerful than Pox.
- The guard in the north of the Scum Hole counts as well, being high enough level to one-shot Pox with ease.
- Hyperlink Story: Possibly. Each of the four main characters have their own story, conflicts, and setting, however they are implied to either directly or indirectly affect each other as the game goes on. Unknown if the stories will actually all come together in the end or not, though.
- Idealist vs. Pragmatist: Capella's unique morals (being able to feel empathy) causes conflicts with others, both allies and enemies. In her first level, her protectors are reluctant to help a child about to be devoured by a large spider because that's how nature goes, and say it would be safer for them to leave, which is true.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The inhabitants of Gloom frequently devour each other to survive. This behavior is shared by entities as low as cave-dwelling dredges, to even highly refined priests and monks. In the Demo, this is reflected by the "Devour" battle action, which allows a character to consume a knocked-out enemy to regain some of their magic points.
- Literal-Minded: Implied to be most of the denizens of Gloom when it comes to empathy and sympathy. During Capella's first level, even an incredibly intelligent and dutiful warrior-monk is unable to understand Capella asking a "what if it was one of us?" metaphor while coming across someone in need of help.
- Lovable Rogue: Phlegm, as described by the demo's character selection screen even though he isn't playable in it, is a charismatic pickpocket that accidentally gets forced into a huge adventure.
- Mantis Mating Meal: The Demo implies that this is how the mantis-like Shear's quest begins, given the description of her story stating that the spirit of her fallen husband after their failed mating ritual appears headless.
- Messianic Archetype: Capella; in addition to being The Chosen One that will birth a god, she's also explicitly stated to be one of the few (if not the only) creature on Gloom capable of empathy. The Demo has her start with the "Vegetarian" trait that makes it impossible for her to cannibalize the dead to recover herself, and her first chapter is about convincing her guardians to go off the path to save another person in need instead of going straight to fulfilling her religious duties.
- Might Makes Right: The Verrick Horde believes in this, which is why the weak Pox is enslaved by the rest in his version of the Demo's first chapter.
- Non-Mammalian Hair: Some of the insects of Gloom have full heads of hair, most plainly visible in the main four characters.
- Simultaneous Arcs: Each of the four main characters, Pox, Capella, Phlegm and Shear, have their own story to play through, travelling through the same locations and occasionally influencing each other's paths as the Kickstarter describes.
- Slaying Mantis: Though not playable in it, Shear's depiction in the Demo is as a mantis samurai.
- Standard Status Effects: There are three described in the demo: Bleed deals Damage Over Time, Sleep makes a creature unable to act, and Poison deals damage when the creature is hit by an attack.
- The Horde: The Verrick Horde, nearly to a tee.
- Weird Currency: Teeth are the currency of Gloom.
- World Tree: One of these is the setting of Pox's first chapter in the Demo, after the Verrick Horde have already carved out its insides and are using it as their headquarters before taking over the rest of Gloom.
