Otherside Entertainment has revealed a new direction for their successfully kickstartered RPG, Underworld Ascendant. According to art director Nate Wells, this new design philosophy, which he calls the “authored look”, is a direct response to the hyper-realism seen in recent movies and games.

Wells, who worked as art director on Bioshock Infinite, The Last of Us, and Rise of the Tomb Raider, had a lot to say about the new style:

There’s a ‘reality bug’ going around in TV, film, and games, where fantasy has become inundated by gritty photo-realism. With Underworld Ascendant, I want to bring back more whimsy and less brooding.

I asked myself, ‘What if the world bore the authorship of a tabletop game? Think of the old lead figures and miniature play fields… Everything appears hand-crafted, as if sculpted by an artist, with a genuine sense of levity and naiveté to the art.

Otherside founder Paul Neurath went on to say that the new look is intended to encourage exploration of the world by the player, and create a counterpart to Underworld Ascendant’s Improvisation Engine.

Underworld Ascendant has no official release date, but backers will have access to the prototype later this month.