by Dave Lloyd's incredible love letter to EGA graphics, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Robert Jordan's novels — The Telwynium — is coming to Steam, the developer announced over the past weekend.
Originally conceived during Adventure Jam 2021, The Telwynium was inspired by Lloyd's memories of growing up playing games like Conquests of Camelot: The Search For The Grail and the first two entries in the Quest for Glory series, as well as the classic fantasy fiction he read as a teenager.
It is a side project from his day job at Powerhoof, where he has worked on other games such as the critically acclaimed The Drifter, and is definitely worth a look if you happen to have a particular fondness for old Sierra games, Tolkien-inspired fantasy novels, or the EGA colour palette.
"Book One" of The Telwynium follows the adventure of a young boy named Pendar, who, having been forced prior to the events of the game to flee from his home, finds himself travelling in the company of a ragtag group of refugees, led by a wizard. One night, after taking refuge in a clearing, their leader is killed, and others are taken from their company, forcing Pendar and the remaining survivors to set off on a quest to figure out who's to blame and get their friends back, while discovering the dark art of necromancy.
Speaking to Time Extension back in 2024 for an article on EGA-inspired games, Lloyd described the game's story as, "What if you have a Wheel of Time book or say The Hobbit, but the first night Bilbo is away from the Shire, Gandalf is murdered?"
Ultimately, its story is divided into four parts or "books", with three of these already being available to download for free on itch.io. As Lloyd announced in a blog post on itch.io, Book 4 will also come to itch, but he now plans to bring the entire collection to Steam as well, with an additional layer of polish.
"Books 1-3 will be released on Steam in the future," Lloyd wrote. "Along with the as-yet-unreleased final part of the story, Book 4.
"My plan for Book 4 is still to put it up here on itch for free like the others, and then do a bit of a polish pass over the whole series, and package them together for the single release on Steam. (Those that donated so generously here, I'll hook up with a key when it's ready)."
He continued, "I'd have hoped to be further along with Book 4 by now, but been mostly busy on The Drifter still, almost a year on! But that's finally winding up, and I'm ready to get stuck back into Telwynia. So stay tuned!"
If you want to add the game to your wishlist on Steam, you can do so here. You can also download the existing books from itch.io here.