Hedgerow Hall

Hedgerow Hall is a social sandbox roleplaying game where you create and control a semi-anthropomorphic animal in an expansive 2D world. Learn skills, collect and create items, build and decorate your burrow. Seek out precious gemstones to harness the secrets of crystal magic. Search for hidden wisdom in the remotest corners of the map. Contribute to the lore of a living, growing world!

CURRENT STATUS

As of May, 2016, Hedgerow Hall is in active development.

FAQ (Featured Animal Questions)

What does "social sandbox roleplaying game" mean?

It means that open-ended roleplaying is one of the game's main points. While the server administrator may have some ability to create in-game events, there is no overarching storyline or quest sequence for players to follow. The game doesn't tell you what to do with your virtual life. The goal of the is simply to develop your character, in both the game mechanical sense and the roleplaying sense.

What does "semi-anthropomorphic" mean?

It means the characters you play as are animals with some humanoid traits, rather than humanoids with some animal traits. This is mostly a design aesthetic choice, though the idea behind it it carries through to the game; e.g., your character's home being a burrow rather than a house.

Why animals?

When I first created the long-defunct first version of Hedgerow Hall, my goal was to create a persistent world sandbox roleplaying game. I started with that broad idea rather than a particular setting or theme.

When I created the world, I was inspired by the childrens' fantasy series Redwall by Brian Jacques, Watership Down by Richard Adams, and Tailchaser's Song by Tad Williams, but using animals as the characters also helped simplify things. It meant I could tuck the construction element of the game away below ground. I could assume the characters wouldn't need things like clothing.

Why are the graphics so chintzy?

I am not an artist. The graphic tiles I use are a combination of my own scribblings, some pieces I commissioned, and other ones that I adapted from available sources.

I'm focusing on creating the basic game play for now. The thing is that any graphic tile used in the game will be easy enough to replace at any point down the line. Even things like simple four-directional walking animation for the character icons wouldn't take much of anything in the way of coding to implement, as the BYOND engine has the architecture for that built right in. I just don't have the resources, and I think it would be a mistake to commit to getting them while the game itself is incomplete.

How can I play?

Watch this space. Once there is enough content developed for extended testing, I will be putting up test servers from time to time. Once I have a stable version that is feature-complete, I will arrange for permanent hosting and/or a download option so players can run and host their own game world.