Introduction

House of the Dying Sun is developed by Marauder Interactive, which is (as far as I know) a one man band: Mike Tipul, former Bungie developer and goon under the name of Kairo. It was first announced in 2012 under the name Enemy Starfighter, originally looking like Rainbow Six levels of planning crossed with Homeworld and a healthy dose of TIE Fighter, but with Roguelike style permadeath.



Fast forward to PAX 2013, and Kairo is showing off builds of the game featuring VR support. The game at that stage was a story of a dominant Empire on a penitent crusade wiping out all life in its way. April 2014 sees press outlets such as Rock Paper Shotgun and Scott Manley getting hands on with the game, and they enjoy a very different version than the one we got: A kind of node-based FTL style game, where you pick your targets and build up your forces by taking on bounties.

After that, a period of radio silence on gaming news websites. On Twitter, his streams and the Enemy Starfighter thread we are still kept up to date as to the state of the game. Kairo doubles down on the overworld, dynamic roguelike aspects, introduces hostile fleet patrols, stealth, a dynamic soundtrack by Olivier Zuccaro whose credits include Space Hulk Deathwing and Diaspora: Shattered Armistice (the Battlestar Galactica total conversion for Freespace 2). Notably, it has lost the Rainbow Six style pre-mission planning, but instead it now has in-battle RTS control of your forces. Enemy Starfighter looks to become a classic.

Then, radio silence again for a period of time. Kairo removes the overworld features, removes the roguelike aspects and the dynamic missions, a strictly scripted campaign is introduced that clocks in at most at a 4 hour playtime along with a wave-clear mode. Just as Enemy Starfighter was going to be a breathtaking game. House of the Dying Sun however, is simply good. Almost to match the change in scope, the narrative was also changed. Instead of a dominant empire's show of supremacy, this game is now about a vengeful remnant, here to drag the enemy into the ground with it.

There will be at least 3 playthroughs of the game: One on Normal, one on Harbinger (Hard mode) and one on Dragon (Fighters only). Dragon mode gameplay will be done in VR via the HTC Vive to show off the game's VR implementation.

Table of Contents

Equipment

Part 0

Warlord - Part 1 (Video)

Warlord - Part 2 (Video)

Warlord - Part 3 (Video)

Warlord - Part 4 (Video)

Warlord - Finale (Video)

Harbinger - Part 1 (Video)

Harbinger - Part 2 (Video)

Harbinger - Part 3 (Video)

Harbinger - Part 4 (Video)

Harbinger - Finale (Video)

Dragon (VR) - Part 1 (Commentary) (No-Commentary)

Dragon Mode (VR) - Finale (Commentary) (No-Commentary)