The Archives of Trevosa
"I am Ludir, oloth-til of Oreleth-cyno-taayen of Trevosa. If this signal has reached you, the situation is dire. The dreadful nyscet lies in wait to destroy, and theevei look to the solaam for an omen: who is the true heir?"
Search through the hidden archives of Trevosa, translate their cultural terms, and uncover the relationships within a complex royal family tree. Can you untangle all seven generations? A challenging narrative deduction game inspired by The Roottrees Are Dead.
How to Play
- Your goal is to identify the name and title for each of the 30 family members.
- On the right, read the documents you've discovered and search for clues.
- Search Trevosan words or family members' names to find the first three documents mentioning them.
- Click a word to search for it.
- Or go to the Search tab and type in your search.
- Based on what you learn, set each person's name and title in the tree. Once 3 people are correct, they'll lock in.
Tips
- Stuck? Enable undiscovered document count under Settings, then check the Archive. This will show how many new documents you can find by searching the words in each document.
- Click on the right side of a scroll to set a bookmark color - this is just for notetaking. Use it for documents you want to revisit, etc.
- Use the notes tab or your own notes!
- You can always use the Filter section at the top of the Archive to search for any text in the documents you've already found.
⚠️ Progress is saved to browser storage, except in Safari, which doesn't allow storage from embedded games.
Credits
Originally created in 72 hours for Ludum Dare 59. This is the post-jam version with some additional improvements.
- Bucktown did design and writing.
- Marcus did design, writing, and music.
- Celia did design, code, and UI.
- Rose did the art.
Want more Trevosa?
We have exciting plans for the game! To get the latest news, you can sign up for the Jamwitch Games mailing list. Join our Discord server to follow along with development or join in playtests.
Development log
Comments
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This is exactly what I was looking for after finishing The Roottrees Are Dead! I want a million more games in this niche genre I swear! The music and art are so lovely and it was great to be able to knock this out in one sitting :)
Is there going to be a download?
Lovely game! Trying to understand a language + doing a familly tree is everything I wanted to do
i looooooove this game. I had so much fun, i feel bad for L but his principles is so admirable.
sooo close to being done, but for some reason i can't find the Reign of the Stalwart part 1- only part 2
You can find it by searching the name of the Stalwart’s beelain.
Good job! I really loved this game!
What a fun way to unwind with a glass of wine after my oloth-til went to bed! Just the right amount of a challenge to really engage your brain, but still relaxing and easy enough to knock out in one session (it took me about 80 minutes from start to finish, without using any of the “Tips” listed above). I wish I could do it all over again!
It's a really good puzzle, but I feel like having to reveal texts by clicking terms is just adding busywork. After reading a couple of the entries from opening terms I felt like deciding to just reveal everything and read in chronological order would make more sense... and it was a way better experience
While it makes sense for Her Story to work like it since there are a lot of non essential videos, here p much all of the documents hold value for completing the game
Spent a few hours on this. I wasn't expecting to get so swept up in the story. It's so interesting how you can sus out what a word means even if you can't quite fully translate it. It really felt like learning a bit of a different language. Very fun!
Burned straight through it over the course of a few hours or so. Such a compelling experience. Or perhaps I'm simply easily swayed by a good senaar-like
Lovely game! Managed to keep me hooked through to the conclusion.
It was SOOOOOOOOO good! Thank you for this game, I loved every detail
Honestly, such a great game!!! I´ts been a while since a game caught my attention so much, i just could not stop playing, went from 21 to 2am really quickly playing this game, such a fun experience, really challenging but just give it a second though and you will get it! I strongly recommend it to anyone that wants a relaxing game that will still make you think!
10/10 wold play again and probably will
Genuinely a great experience, the UI is well designed and makes it easy to navigate the many documents you have to sort through. By the end, I felt I really understood the story, which I wasn't expecting given just how much information there is! Very well made.
Very fun game! Not too difficult but not too easy that you don't have to use deductive skills. Perfect quick detective game. World building is very well done.
made an account solely to say how much fun i had with this, it's confusing at first but soon all the pieces snap together
Me too lol gave me the courage to make an account just to say how good it is
It was so much fun to play this. It took some time to get into it but then you start to recognize more and more words and names. Truly one of my favorite puzzles I've done recently. Thank you so much
This was an amazing game. I cant believe you guys made such a quality game in 72 hours. Kudos.
scratched an itch i didn't know i had. i need to find more games like this
Me tooooooooo bro
So I'm an anthropology professor and my students sometimes struggle with making kinship diagrams and understanding how that is used for kinship terms. I'm assigning this as extra credit.
I had such a great time playing this!!! I feel so blessed now that this kind of game is getting more traction because I live off of this kind of puzzle. I'm always impressed by how interesting and in-depth people can make worlds in this format and this game is no exception! Really enjoyed exploring such a lovely world and a very interesting story! LOVE an in-game notes page, literally cheered when I saw it. Had a great time!!!! <3
I loved this game! Thank you for making it.
I had an amazing time finding all the details and taking notes. I didn't expect to like this game as much as I did, but it was sooooo good
Absolutly love it ! A medieval narrative deduction game based on linguistic with a good writting, it's exactly the type of game I search ! I like how we can just take our times, and takes notes freely. I just wish we'd have a vocabulary reveal because as a non-english speaker, there some term I'm not sure (some word do not have egual equivalent in French TwT) Also, I think I saw a music button, but I never heard anything while playing, is this something in progress ?
Other than that, I think it already work very well as it, in term of aesthetic. It's classic, clear, easy to use and easy research system, bref it's what I would espect from an archive. Maybe some simple sound design could add a little something.
ReBREF
Good game ! I recommand ! ;)
Thank you and thanks for the thoughts! This is the first time I’ve heard of the music not working, hmm - are you sure you didn’t mute the browser tab or anything? Can you hear sound from other games on Itch?
It's working again ! It was probably just my computer because, instead of turning it off, I’d just put it on pause with the game tab open. It didn't seem to like that. ^^' When I restarted the game yesterday it worked !
just finished the game, and the first thing I did was also go look for a "glossary" so I could compare my notes with what the game meant. I'd also love to see this!! amazing game
Best puzzle game I've played in a while. Surprised me with all the linguistic elements inside!
This game was so good that I had to make an account and tell you. Thank you so much. It scratched an itch I didn't know I had.
I was stumped in the beginning but once I got the hang of it all the pieces fit together! This was super cool!!!
This was the most fun I've had with a puzzle for a long while! I absolutely love the moment when confusion turns to understanding (which is also why I love language learning) and your game captured that extremely well. This was even better than I expected, thank you!!
Very enjoyable! Naturally very Obra Dinn/Golden Idol-esque, but I found the conclusions here generally more intuitive, only making a single mistake (I didn't realize that Taal died before the war, implying that she couldn't be the vaiteth, it had to be Lemal)
The choice of pure HTML/JS is excellent, as it leads to very fast load times here and nice quality-of-life features like copy-paste for free.
Some nitpicks that are understandable for a jam game:
(1) Having two different search functions, where one is limited to only three results, but the other can't discover new documents, gets awkward at the end of the game when you have almost every document, so you can't safely switch to the other search function with all results.
(2) As far as I read the rules of succession, an heir must have a beirvet or be betrothed at the point of the current cyne's death to be considered a 'suitable heir'. It seems to me that the 'true' line of succession is technically broken: Lemot's last words implies that Sartina doesn't have a beirvet, and by omission probably isn't betrothed; her obituary also seems to confirm that her tabeir is after Nolveth's cynvei, that is, after Lemot's death. Is the implication that even Lemot was kept in the dark about Sartina's betrothal?
Thank you! Good thoughts.
Totally agree on 1, that’s been one of our top priorities to redesign for the expanded Steam version. Now there’s a single search field that shows both the up-to-three new results and filters what you already have.
Point 2
I see, you’re totally right that the timing conflicts - her obituary says Lemot was exiled before her marriage, but his last words think she’s unmarried - tbh it was an oversight on our part, but I suppose being exiled and the marriage being secret could explain it. It’s not ideal you don’t see Sartina’s spouse on the tree, and we’re working to avoid those gray areas in the expanded version.
I’d say the timing matter doesn’t matter for succession, though. To be crowned ruler, you need to be married - the idea being a ruler should have the support of a consort, and they should be on the road to having kids to pass the crown down - but Sartina was never given the chance to be crowned ruler. She just passed on the royal bloodline to the current candidates.
If it helps, I didn't even register the Lemot being exiled thing, I just knew Taal died right before he was crowned, so it wasn't going to be her that would be the issue.
Okay, that makes sense – spiritually, Sartina was the heir even if the timing was a few years off, it just snagged me since the framing of the game is explicitly that I’m consulted to do rules-lawyering.
Rules lawyering (nice spoiler trick btw)
Originally, I was double-checking that Morfal was actually married when Sartina died, since I was worried that the game would pull out a twist of “actually, Soleel was the true heir because Morfal wasn’t married yet”. Before I figured that out, I concluded that the succession rules don’t really cover the case where none of the heirs are deemed suitable, and so I went double-checking all the marriage/olesata timings. Ultimately, I couldn’t determine suitability for either Sartina nor Ervala, and Lonara was definitely neither married nor olesata’d by her mother’s death, and had to headcanon that the succession rules allow for cyne-less ‘gaps’ where there are heir(s) who are not yet suitable, but whichever heir wins the suitability race can get crowned later.
Now that I look back at it, since I can’t confirm that Ervala was suitable by Morfal’s death, it’s possible that Soleel would inherit the claim to the throne after Morfal rather than Ervala, making Ludir the rightful heir-in-waiting, but then, that might be me overlooking some evidence.
100%, we’re asking the player to rules lawyer and then these areas are unclear. In the expanded version it’s a very different puzzle since we’ve reshuffled stuff, and we’ll make sure there aren’t any question marks.
Spoilers
To share way I see it working in the Itch version, we’re not answering “would the crown have passed this way in a hypothetical world where Norveth had never invaded”. We’re answering, “who has both the true bloodline and also meets the requirements to become ruler right now, after Oreleth’s death”. There is some overlap though since the bloodline prioritizes the younger child, Morfal’s, line over Soleel’s due to the ultimogeniture rule.
However, it would be better if it was just a single question of applying the rules at every step. We just need to make sure that’s clear and not annoyingly fiddly to sort out.
Thank you for asking about this, it helped clarify for me what we need to clarify in the Steam version! 😁
This was very enjoyable- I wish I could learn more about this lore you created!
Thanks! I must mention that we are making an expanded version with all new characters, words, and cultures. 🙂 Join our mailing list or discord for news on that!
As a lover of langauges, this was WAY too addictive! Such a good game and I really liked Ludir's message at the end - I like it when they're able to see their own shortcomings. Definitely struggled with Corvin!
I loved this game! the puzzle of course, but also got very invested in the characters and world.
this is so great!! finished it in about an hour & loved every second. sincerely, a lover of the roottrees are dead AND chants of sennaar :)
Caesar cipher 13 (potential spoilers, tho no solutions)
V ybir guvf! V terj hc va n pbhagel jurer gur cevznel ynathntr jnfa'g bar V fcbxr syhragyl fb guvf zrgubq bs gelvat gb haqrefgnaq gur zrnavat bs hasnzvyvne jbeqf sebz gur pbagrkg vf irel snzvyvne gb zr. Nz V evtug va guvaxvat gung gur fbynnz ner uhznaf? Gur alfprg vf n png naq gur znfprg ner zvpr be engf?
That’s right! Glad you enjoyed! 🙂
I was so deeply invested in figuring out this game that I brought my laptop out to the kitchen to play it while cooking dinner. I love it and I can't wait to see what else you have in store!!
This game was amazing. Thought I'd give itch.io a go and, wow, wasn't disappointed. Did it in around 2-2.5 hours but I made a glossary. Shockingly invested.
Wish there was a randomisation model where you could keep re-interpreting different translations and family lines. Brilliant work through.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed!
It would be technically possible to randomize the words and names, but I think you’d start to recognize the storylines pretty quickly, so I don’t think it would be that effective.
We are however writing all new story and puzzles for the expanded version of Trevosa! I’m asking people who want more to join our mailing list or discord for news. 🙂
I really love it.
I'd like to had it in other language ( like French )
Phenomenal game, so easy to get lost in that I played it all in one sitting! Love these kinds of games and this is an excellent addition to the collection of this very specific genre of gaming. 10/10
Really cool game!! Scratched that Obra-dinn itch for me and had me stay up late trying to figure out the solution to it all >:)
This was fantastic! There were some really cool "aha!" moments throughout the game where a new piece of information recontextualized older documents and I would get a few more names checked off.
I ended the game with 49/50 documents discovered (and the one I hadn't discovered was just information I already knew about the Stalwart, I found it with document count enabled) and I figured out who was the heir before filling in the rest of the family tree.
Lovely presentation style, very polished and well written, great game!