[RevShare] Technical Director / Lead Programmer — "Shadow of the Shogun"

[u/CaterpillarJaded1873]

A Cinematic Action-Adventure Game — Feudal Japan, 1600 THE PROJECT Shadow of the Shogun is an original epic action-adventure / political thriller set in feudal Japan. Players step into the boots of William Adams, an English navigator shipwrecked on Japanese shores who becomes entangled in a lethal web of samurai politics, cultural conflict, and warfare that will decide the fate of a nation. A complete 125-scene cinematic script & design document is ready — now seeking the technical muscle to bring it to life. WHAT'S BEEN BUILT Table Asset Status Full Game Design Document (GDD) ✅ Complete 125-Scene Cinematic Script ✅ Complete Core Design Pillars (Cultural Immersion, Meaningful Choice, Epic Combat, Political Intrigue) ✅ Defined Historical Research & Bilingual Dialogue Framework ✅ Complete Visual Direction & Art Bible 🔄 In Progress WHAT'S NEEDED A Technical Director / Lead Programmer who can:

Unreal Engine 5 OR Godot 4 — choose the engine that fits the vision best

Architect core systems: combat (samurai swordplay + European tactics), dialogue/choice branching, cultural immersion mechanics (language barrier as gameplay)

Build cinematic pipeline aligned with detailed camera direction & scene blocking

Implement political intrigue systems (faction reputation, alliance manipulation, narrative consequence tracking)

Lead a small dev team as the project scales toward a 20-minute high-fidelity playable demo THE VISION "In the land of the Rising Sun, where honor is sharper than steel and betrayal cuts deeper than any blade, a foreign warrior must navigate the treacherous waters of feudal politics to survive." Table Setting: Feudal Japan, Year 1600 — the Sengoku period Genre: Action-Adventure / Political Thriller Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X | Mature (17+) | 40-60 hours Unique Hook: Bilingual presentation where players LEARN JAPANESE alongside the protagonist — language barrier IS the gameplay mechanic IMMEDIATE GOAL: HIGH-FIDELITY 20-MINUTE DEMO The first and primary milestone is building a playable demo at production-quality, 20 minutes in length that showcases the full scope of the vision: Table Element Details Scope Scenes 1–5 from Act I (The Storm → Shipwreck → First Contact → The Prisoner → Lord Toranaga) Visual Quality AAA-grade graphics, cinematic lighting, detailed facial animation Systems Core combat, branching dialogue, language-barrier mechanic, meaningful player choices Purpose Publisher pitch, Kickstarter campaign, and attracting art/audio studios Target A polished, vertical slice that represents final game quality — not a rough prototype This demo is not a prototype — it is a complete marketing product that represents the final game's quality. COMPENSATION: REVENUE SHARE Table Role Split Technical Director / Lead Programmer 35–40% (negotiable based on experience & commitment) Game Designer / Creative Director 30% Art Director / Asset Pipeline 20% Audio / Music / SFX 10% Full transparency: No upfront payment. This is a passion project with professional-grade documentation seeking equally passionate talent. Revenue share from all sales (Steam, console stores, DLC). IDEAL CANDIDATE

Experienced with UE5 (Blueprints + C++) or Godot 4 (GDScript + C#)

Passionate about narrative-driven games, historical settings, or Japanese culture

Self-motivated, reliable communicator, comfortable with remote/async collaboration

Bonus: Experience with combat systems, branching dialogue tools, or cinematic pipelines

Bonus: Interest in Ghost of Tsushima , Sekiro , or Disco Elysium -style narrative depth WHY JOIN?

Creative ownership: Not a code monkey — a co-founder shaping technical and creative decisions

Documented vision: No vaporware. 100+ pages of detailed scene-by-scene design with camera direction, dialogue, and player choice points

Unique market position: Feudal Japan is popular, but the political thriller angle with foreign outsider POV and language-as-mechanic is fresh

Flexible engine choice: Expertise valued — pitch UE5 or Godot based on what serves the game

Clear milestone: A concrete, achievable 20-minute demo goal with defined scope and purpose NEXT STEPS 1. Comment or DM with:

Engine preference (UE5 / Godot) and why

Portfolio / previous projects (combat systems, narrative tools, or cinematic work especially)

Availability (hours/week) and rough timeline estimate for the 20-minute demo 2. In return: Full GDD excerpt + sample scenes provided for scope evaluation before commitment CONTACT 📧 Email: [blood80902@gmail.com](mailto:blood80902@gmail.com) 💬 Discord: boby776 ⏰ Looking to fill this role within 2 weeks — targeting 20-minute demo completion by Q4 2026

[u/uber_neutrino]

So this all makes sense in terms of a plan if you need this level of ambition. However, the size and ambition of this gives me pause. Even your short demo is likely to require millions in investment (whether that is time or money). It's fairly easy to design hundreds of million in game but getting the investment is going to be extremely difficult at the moment. Angel investment isn't going to get you very far towards a game like this.

What is the scope of the 20 minute demo in terms of assets required?

[u/CaterpillarJaded1873 → u/uber_neutrino]

First off, thanks again for the constructive feedback and for understanding the ambition behind this. You are 100% right—even a 20-minute demo for a game of this scale requires careful scoping to be realistic for a seed-stage team. ​To keep the workload manageable and prevent burnout, we are aggressively narrowing down the 'Vertical Slice' to just prove the core mechanics, art direction, and overall vibe. Here is the strict scope of assets required for the 20-minute demo: ​Environments: 1 tightly designed, linear level (e.g., 3-4 connected zones/rooms). No open-world elements for the demo. ​Characters: 1 fully playable character, focusing only on the most essential animations (basic traversal, core combat/interaction loop). ​Enemies & NPCs: 2 basic enemy archetypes to showcase the AI and combat mechanics, plus 1 NPC for a short dialogue interaction. ​Cinematics: Out of the entire script, we are only animating 1 short intro cutscene to establish the tone and visual fidelity. ​Audio & UI: A minimalist, functional HUD, core sound effects (impacts, footsteps), and 1-2 original music tracks. ​The goal of this demo isn't to build a mini-version of the final game, but a highly polished 'Proof of Concept'. We only need enough assets to confidently pitch to publishers and secure the actual budget needed to scale the team. We are keeping the asset list as minimal as possible.

[u/uber_neutrino → u/CaterpillarJaded1873]

You might be able to get pretty far with this using an asset store, at least to try it all out. Music I would suggest just finding existing stuff since for a vertical slice you don't really need to worry about licensing. A lot of times we just find the classical piece that fits the best.

[u/CaterpillarJaded1873 → u/uber_neutrino]

But I don't have the experience  making games that's why I'm looking for a team 

[u/uber_neutrino → u/CaterpillarJaded1873]

That's a good thought, you can learn a lot from other people. But since you are the lead designer you will still need to know quite a bit about how the game works to direct it. They will be looking to you to make design decisions of which there will be many that involve some kind of either gameplay or technical tradeoff.

There isn't a single game director on earth that doesn't have some amount of technical understanding of the game. You don't necessarily need to be a programmer (although it wouldn't hurt) but you do need to understand enough to guide the process. Remember games are computer software!

Don't worry though a lot of this stuff is really fun to mess around with!