Work In Progress / S P E C T R E

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Wolf
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Posted: 20th Jul 2020 13:45 Edited at: 26th Nov 2022 12:37


Title: S P E C T R E
Genre: Cyberpunk FPS Adventure
Developer: Wolf


VIEW AVAILABLE DOWNLOADS

Plot Outline: In the far future, a mutated special operative gets called in for a job on the edge of a dangerous exclusion zone. A supposedly routine mission quickly spirals into a crisis when an unknown assailant tries to harness illusive and extremely dangerous technology from a past global war.

Intro:


I've never been particularly good at filling my free time with constructive things to do, especially now that Lydia left me to fend for myself in this cold, unfeeling city ...and just when I felt that the ceiling was closing in on me I got the call.
A certain Valerie Strelkov was suspiciously careful to make it sound like just a routine job. 2 Weeks work under the banner of the Acythian Military, pretty good pay but she was really spotty on the details, said she'd fill me in on location.
The location being the exclusion zone around Yantai City, formerly China, a thick jungle littered with old tech from the war.
In my line of work, one thing is certain, any job in these exclusion zones is never routine and always dangerous.

Yantai is the last bastion of what could be considered civilization before endless irradiated jungles . The surrounding area is crawling with bandits, anarchists and if you're particularly unlucky: Old war drones that are still active and usually dangerously trigger happy. They can't risk flying me in as the location is known for military craft being shot down and having entire crews vanish in the difficult, overgrown terrain. So they'll handle all transportation with small boats, usually only moving in the cover of darkness. 3 days trip from the nearest base with functional air travel to my destination...

Well, I got bills to pay, no other employment options and after how I treated Lydia, I deserve every bad thing that is coming my way.




About: Hey there forum! This is my little project I have been working off and on for the past couple days. its a cyberpunk action adventure game with a decidedly small scope. The entire game can only have a total of 8 levels and there are no level overarching inventory or plot systems implemented. While simple at its core, I hope I can deliver something that is still a rich and atmospheric experience. This game is developed without a specific pace to it, I get to it whenever I can and feel like it, but I have made some major strides yesterday and figured it was time to open a good ol' thread. Truth be told, I wanted to hold off on publishing it before I had a playable demo but it just doesn't feel right to work without a work in progress thread
You might notice that I have re-purposed some levels from previous wip projects to speed up development. However, its all overhauled to work with this titles aesthetics that are decidedly more tropical than previous installments in the Acythian universe.
I'd also like to drop special thanks to Duchenkuke and Avenging Eagle which both inspired me to try my hand at another GG title... and well, I'm really having fun with it so far.

Planned Features:


5 handcrafted and detailed missions.
Carefully designed visuals that play to game gurus strenghts.
An arsenal of several customized and well balanced weapons.
Planned and scripted enemy encounters
Diverse cast of animated characters, animals and machines.
Dynamic environments with light puzzle elements
Occasional voice acting and branching text based dialogue.
Obnoxiously long loading screens

Work in Progress Screenshots:
































Thanks for viewing! And if you made it this far, please drop me a comment. I always appreciate your feedback!



-Wolf
Duchenkuke
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Posted: 20th Jul 2020 14:25
Love the mix of Dusty buildings and Vegetation & Nature!


Looking forward to this!
granada
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Posted: 20th Jul 2020 14:30
Number 6 from the bottom is my favourite, nice pics Wolf

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Avenging Eagle
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Posted: 21st Jul 2020 00:10
That's what I'm talking about! Beautiful screenies as always.
At last, Thor has picked his hammer back up

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Ertlov
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Posted: 21st Jul 2020 07:50
Nice to see Wolf back in action. Stunning visuals, as expected!
"I am a road map, I will lead and you will follow, I will teach and you will learn, when you leave my sprint planning you will be weapons, focused and full of JIRA tickets, Hot Rod rocket development gods of precision and strength, terrorizing across the repository and hunting for github submits."
Wolf
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Posted: 22nd Jul 2020 19:01
Hey! Thanks for all the warm comments! I really appreciate it.
I've picked up a few tricks regarding 3D on my hiatus from GG that I hope will allow me to make this shine (and end up being playable.) I will keep all the progress I make logged here so those interested will always be up to date.

Cheers!



-Wolf
JC LEON
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Posted: 22nd Jul 2020 22:20
great work Wolf as always... absolutely most talented enviroment artist on GG community
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Wolf
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Posted: 31st Jul 2020 22:25
Thanks for the huge compliment JC!

I've been hard at work to add to this project, there will be more content soon. I also have a vague aim for when I want to release this which will be october/november I think I can realistically make that dead line



-Wolf
Wolf
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Posted: 1st Aug 2020 17:36


Hello!

I've added quite a lot to the game and have blocked out enough of the environments, whats supposed to happen in those environments and of course how do I keep what is happening in those environments at a reasonable framerate to slowly start working on the characters.
That will be for the next update though, what I have done so far is detail level 2, the first mission and convert a whole bunch of the classics collection items to go with my art style.

I am also having a minor problem I have not yet found the solution for: LINK If you happen to have come across the same issue and found a fix, please drop me a line here or there.

Now I'd like to show you a few more screenshots




The warmer, tropical levels are incredibly fun to bring to life! To think that my previous concept was entirely set in a sewer
I'm sure glad I canned it in favor of this





The levels of SPECTRE are littered with the remnants of the long past eugenics war.







The old small fueling dock at the beginning of the level isn't particularly pretty but it does the job.

[img] [/img]

Thats all I got for now! More to come and your feedback is, as always, highly appreciated!



-Wolf
Medmatheus
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2020 23:24
Seeing those screenshots makes me want to know what kind of events and NPCs ure going to face out there. Great job

Wolf
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2020 23:44
Oh, I am sure there will be a strong dissonance between what I want to do and end up being able to do.
Level 2 (the forest above) has a guarded outpost, several snipers, a drone dropping EMP bombs and some crawler bots.
As for NPC's, you will only finde some corpses and the boatsman that is there at the beginning. This is a more action orientated area compared to the first level that only has NPC's to talk to
Events include a lot of com chatter, an enemy aircraft flying off and an aircraft flying through the sky. (none of this would have been possible without the talented scripters of this community offering content for free.)
So much for what I want to do... lets see how far I can go with this
granada
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Posted: 6th Aug 2020 00:40
Great mixture of shot's there from in and out ,looking very nice

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cybernescence
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Posted: 6th Aug 2020 11:26
Nice change to see the tropical outdoorsy stuff alongside the cool interiors.

Hope it keeps going to plan

Cheers.

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Wolf
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Posted: 8th Aug 2020 14:18 Edited at: 8th Aug 2020 14:27
@Granada: Thank you!

@Cybernescence: So far it does, but eventually it won't. Thats inevitable to some extend, I just hope I won't encounter anything game breaking. I think with a concept as flexible as this, I can work around everything else.



Hey gang!

Time for a small update. Now there is nothing all that new happening map design wise. I have made enough headway that I was mostly preoccupied testing things and creating game play. It will be quite a while until I will be able to show any of it but I started to import characters that will eventually populate this little world I am creating. Now I started with the easier things, basically the machine enemies as these are already rigged to a decent enough skeleton with single track animations. In this case it is the standard FPSC rig so I was able to just import them using the free DLC chars as templates. (If you can't do that by yourself, you silly goose, I will write a tutorial about it within the next 2 or 3 weeks. )

What I also am quite hard at work at is creating the sound scape. Now obviously these jungles, rivers and waterfalls require a very pronounced nature sound scape with birds chirping, insects buzzing, wind blowing through leaves and water running. I have to balance this rather "present" sound scape then with fitting music. I will go for the ambient synths I have used in previous projects such as Amytric Pulse, just with slightly more ethereal instruments. Then is also the task that I want these maps to have a certain spooky under tone that should reflect in the sound scape. Lots to do and we will see how well I can pull it off, after all, I am not really a musician or a sound guy for that matter.



Apart from that I finally sat down and converted the media from the classics pack to go with my style. Meaning I would adjust them to GG's PBR rendering system (just the materialindex value, I still refuse quite stubbornly to do any PBR maps apart from the obligatory normal maps and the occasional metallic map when absolutely need.) Made adjustments to the diffuse, in fact redesigned some to go with my cyberpunk theme and style and added default DNS shader maps. This took me longer than I initially expected (converting back and forth and changing values by hand) but I now have way more detail props at my disposal. I know that people complained about the quality of these models in spades but... well, making a game is a proactive, creative hobby. If you just wanna drag and drop content into the editor and expect it to look good out of the box, you might want to work with the vastly more expensive UE or Unity content (that still won't gel together if you use numerous packs in a single project) or just play in a video game level editor. Making things to go with my idea and tweaking stuff has simply always been part of the fun and attraction to me. But that is just a little aside and a bit of a defense of the quality of the free DLC pack as you can make really nice things with it if you just have a little talent and a slight bit of skill in an image editing software.
In fact, several people asked me what pack I used to make the dungeon on page 4 in my Shavra: Renaissance thread, someone even asked to buy it, and its mostly just retextured modelpack 2 stuff blended with some of my own 3d work.

Another thing I noticed in GG games, especially the ones where you traverse lengthy stretches of terrain with little to them (you get that a lot in these atrocious zombie games... no seriously there are numerous people out there that create these really large outdoorsy areas and populate them with stock GG zombies. There are either so few that they don't even remotely post a threat or so many that the engine starts to lack and their AI starts to break down. Its quite frustrating how common this is...) IS that the default camera movement is quite jarring.
To alleviate this I have shut off the head bob as it looks tremendously awkward when sprinting and increased speed slightly. My character is supposed to be very athletic anyway and the game is supposed to have a sense of flow to it so I felt the need to adjust this. I also increased jump height slightly which makes controlling the game a lot more enjoyable from the get go.
haha, excuse me for being slightly crabby but I have seen another iteration of these brilliant "zombie open world co op mega super" projects that look as appealing as getting gonorrhea earlier today ...its also unbearably hot despite my trusty old 90s fan doing its best to keep me functioning.

What I also did was add a basic mechanic that some NPC's will trade basic items with you if you bring them certain objects. This is to make exploration more attractive and add some more dialogue that amounts to something and isn't just there for atmosphere.

Now for some imagery:





This is an infantry support sentry. These machines are slightly larger than the average soldier and can generally be equipped with a fully automatic MG or a rocket launcher. Their programming is rudimentary but safe and effective making them the ideal heavy hitter in a gun fight. These are mass produced for security firms that generally maintain the peace and police farming settlements. While their shielding can take quite a beating they aren't entirely impenetrable to gun fire and they are not properly shielded against EMP blasts. Their power source is an ion-battery that will have them operational for 3 days before they start to run low. Its no where near as efficient as military grade hardware from the eugenics war but, again, very cheap to produce, repair and find spare parts.



HEPDD,the hazardous environment personnel defense drone is an infantry support drone mostly used by the private sector. These are very well shielded against EMP blasts, amytric radiation and just general wear and tear that they are ideal for the exclusion zones. However, the environmental hazard shielding left little room for proper combat proofing them so they are about as bullet proof as a kevlar vest, eventually you'll penetrate their hull. These operate quite well when remote controlled but their AI systems have always been flawed due to running on an outdated BIOS hard-coded into their firmware. Their targeting system is imprecise and so is their environmental awareness. While they do well with small groups of infantry being marked as friendly, and every one else as hostile, they have proven to be disastrous as automated security unity in chaotic places such as villages or military outposts. However, despite all that, they are more affordable than better alternatives and therefore still in use as automated guards by war lords around the world. They can be equipped with any current small arms, however, the less moving parts the better.

- These are models by Disturbing 13 that I have adjusted and converted to GG. You might have seen them in a previous game of mine. Compliments to D13 as they have held up really well! The good thing is that importing them was very straight forward. I have some more meshes like these stowed away that I am really looking forward to dusting off. Never mind the lenghty, rambling descriptions, I just wanted to add a little flavor text

Now on to screenshots, some areas you have seen before but I have improved them slightly:





















More to come soon! With me in a better mood too Cheers!

And as always, feedback is welcome.



-Wolf
Duchenkuke
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SpaceWurm
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Posted: 9th Aug 2020 12:53
You given those models a new lease on life!

The sentries serve a similar purpose to what Protrectrons do in Fallout 4? Will the sentries patrol settlements to ensure people aren't misbehaving?
osiem80
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Posted: 9th Aug 2020 17:36
i am sure this will look amazing in max
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Wolf
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Posted: 13th Aug 2020 12:22
Hey guys!

Quote: "The sentries serve a similar purpose to what Protrectrons do in Fallout 4? Will the sentries patrol settlements to ensure people aren't misbehaving?"


In the lore, its written that they are used like that but in the game they are just enemies that support human infantry and make fire fights more challenging and interesing

Quote: "i am sure this will look amazing in max"


Haha, looking forward to trying
Nerf Rhett Games
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Posted: 15th Aug 2020 02:56 Edited at: 15th Aug 2020 02:57
Looking great Wolf The levels have a great atmosphere, and as osiem80 said, I’m sure it’ll look great in MAX with all of it’s Wicked goodness.
Seems like you modified the textures on some of the weapons, or is it just the lighting? Either way, awesome screenshots.

-Rhett R., Outlaw Software
(Yes, I know my name is incorrect, waiting on a name change to go through.)
Specs:
Building a new PC at the moment, so these are predicted:
CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 - 6 cores, 12 threads @ 4.2 GHz (overclocked)
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Games I'm making with GameGuru:
None yet...

Websites:
Outlaw Software: outlawsoftware.mozello.com
Wolf
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Posted: 17th Aug 2020 21:48 Edited at: 17th Aug 2020 21:49
@Nerf Rhett Games: Thank you! I appreciate it! Atmosphere is important to me, I know I won't be able to have flashy visuals in GG so I try to make the areas seem as alive as I can with what I got to work with. The weapons are just slightly modified at this stage and some are placeholders.

UPDATE


Working on these makes me realize once again how much I rely on community content to make these levels. So I'd like to thank some long standing community members who's media is featured prominently in this title. Now, I am not going to mention all of you here or it would be a very long list, just the folks that really did the lions share of things that are seen in this game.

So in no particular order:

Lee Bamber: He made Game Guru after all.
The Cosmic Prophet: Who's Scifi Media has been a staple of my games for years now.
BSP: For his wonderful foliage and the weapons.
Lafette: For his great and extensive library of assets.
Errant AI: For the character models that will be used prominently in this title.
Arteria 3D: Once again, another creator who made plenty assets seen in this game.
Rolfy: For numerous rocks, the terrain and skies.
Teamhalo: For his useful basic assets such as walls, debris and so forth.
Amen Moses and smallG: A large amount of gameplay related scripts from their free sections.
Gtox: Animals to bring these forests to life
Wizard of ID: his modular architectural packs.

So what is new? well first of all, some of the areas have been re-designed to work better within Game Guru's limitations. Mainly performance has been greatly enhanced, meaning that the levels now rarely dip below 40 FPS on my aging I5 computer.
This is despite the fact that the camera distance slider is currently not working as intended. If you happen to have any intel on why that might be, please post here and let me know.

Here are some samples:

Performance 2
Performance 3
Performance 4
Performance 5

All in all, given the smaller scope and setting of the game, this is the title that I enjoy working in the most. Its also great fun to me to just jump in the levels, walk through these areas with the lively foliage and the critters buzzing around. Its really like making a little world to me which is oddly relaxing. Game Guru is now, all these years in, also in a very use - able state... so if you haven't tried it in a while, you can do so now, I'm sure its performing far better than you remember.

I'm about to show screenshots of a level that I added in between level 1 and 2, as level 2 has proven to be a bit too difficult right off the bat so I needed a tutorial sequence. That is what happens in the new level 2. Balancing wise this also allows me to ramp up the difficulty more smoothly and introduce better equipment more gradually. (this means that you will not have access to the guns seen on the screenshots now when you play this level yet.)





































Well, I couldn't decide what screenshots to post so I figured I'd just drop all of them. There will be a video eventually, but not until music and full SFX are in, so thats quite a while off from now. As always, feedback is welcome and than you for reading!



-Wolf
Duchenkuke
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Posted: 18th Aug 2020 08:52
Great screenshots - looking forward to explore these Buildings myself!
n64
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Posted: 23rd Aug 2020 16:14
Hello Wolf! It`s me, Nidal Nijm. Also hello to all Game Guru folks here. As you know, I moved to Unreal Engine many years ago, but my roots are in FPS Creator, where I learned game development. Even then I regularly visit the forums here to appreciate the amazing work done in Game Guru. I did no post too much because I had lost my login password, and access to the email. Today I was able to recover access to my email, so I recovered access here to this forum.

Man, sincerely, your work is FANTASTIC. I loved the level environment, especially the mix you made on the forest level. These assets trully shine in this map you made.

Congratulations.
https://sites.google.com/view/udkultimate/

Wolf
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Posted: 25th Aug 2020 08:19
@Duchenkuke: Thanks!!

@Nidal: Thanks! Nice to see you stop by every now and then. I appreciate it!
GG has nothing on the unreal engine, but to me its more fun to use (:
Wolf
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Posted: 22nd Sep 2020 09:02 Edited at: 15th Jun 2021 15:04
Hello! Just letting you know, the project isn't dead, I just took a break from it for a while to focus on other things
Wolf
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Posted: 15th Jun 2021 15:22
Hello everyone.

As mentioned above I took a break from my exploits here to learn different tools, make some free time for other stuff and because I was rather disillusioned with what GG has to offer. Now don't get me wrong, I know exactly what game guru is and what it lacks but people like Duchenkuke, C4ever and Avenging Eagle have inspired me to keep at it... and the simple fact that its simply fun.
As you might have been aware, I was teaching myself UE4 in these past months and its quite the package. I still recommend at least giving it a try if you have the hardware to run it and see if its for you. If you are interested at all, you can see a couple pics of what I was doing in other engines than GG on my Artstation account.

Now back to Spectre. I am taking a fresh look at it and have rewritten its GDD. Now to make this short, the main changes are that there are more areas set in urban environments and less forests/tropical islands as GG handles urban areas far better. The occlusion culling does its job splendidly and to be honest, its more fun to design and populate with gameplay than stretches of wood that end up in small outposts.
Its a lot more ambitious too but I will get to that later when things are more refined. Now I think I said this in older long form projects as well, that never got released but let me just say: have not been released yet and some of them where developed during GG's early days (you know, when an empty terrain would run at 20 fps for some lower mid range computers, that old chest nut) and most of its content was outdated and obsolete. So its a lot easier to take what I learned and pour it into this project and see what I can come up with.

As always, I can't promise anything but you are all very welcome to join me for the ride of developing this thing and drop me your opinion as I go along.

So yes, screenshots.
This is a small town outside of the main city the game revolves around. A place where the mere working folk house in cobbled together ghettos while the walled off tower of their corporate overlords dominates the skyline. An industrial type area:





























Well, thanks for viewing. I will ramble a bit more coherent about my goals with this project next time. Now as always, feedback is welcome and also feel free to post if you have questions.



-Wolf
Solar
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Posted: 15th Jun 2021 18:18
Wow Wolf, the city scenes look absolutely amazing! This is incredible work. Top notch and five stars.
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Tarkus1971
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Posted: 15th Jun 2021 20:46
Yeah Wolf that is just mindblowing.... superb cityscapes.
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Posted: 16th Jun 2021 03:33
Honestly Wolf I Don't think GG would be the same without you, When I started using game guru it was redacted and redacted 2 that got me inspired and wanting to make something amazing with this engine. Whether your using Unity, Unreal engine or Game guru you manage to pull out the best design and environments, Also your knowledge and honesty when it comes to looking at someone else's project's and seeing what can be done with it is usually bang on.

But with this project its amazing, I can't wait to see what comes next GJ
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Wolf
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Posted: 17th Jun 2021 13:08
@ Solar and Tarkus: Thanks a lot, especially coming from seasoned GG users like yourselves. Well, I used a lot of restraint as its supposed to be a smaller city so I couldn't show large skylines in the background. I still think it worked out okay, altough some of the buildings ended up somewhat "amateur hour". But if the whole package works out, I think most players will be okay with it when the game is in motion.

@c4ever: Thanks
Quote: "Wolf I Don't think GG would be the same without you,"

Hmm, I think because I already knew a lot about TGC software quirks from using FPSC that allowed me to teach new users how to rig guns, import and create media as well as use some more obscure GG features. I think the team work and helpful nature of the community kept GG alive despite its flaws and I tried to return the favor with as many small things I knew how to do as possible.

Quote: "Also your knowledge and honesty when it comes to looking at someone else's project's and seeing what can be done with it is usually bang on."


Glad to read that! I believe that most people post work in progress stuff to gather feedback so I try to point out what I can and deem realistic to do/important. I know that there are some that, for whatever reason, want to fish for compliments and react negatively to you pointing out flaws in their work but it has always been that way. As it is, I always found honest critics from others way more useful than the plethora of "good job" comments you get in some communities regardless of what you actually did. I'd probably still make artwork on a high school level or 3d models with terribly unreadable textures if it wheren't for some harsh comments from people who knew what they where talking about.



-Wolf
Wolf
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Posted: 28th Jun 2021 14:18


You know, its never really easy to start a work of art that is supposed to play out in a sequential sort of way. Especially a video game.
The first level is monumentally important as its where you make that dreaded "first impression" people are so anxious about when they attend the dehumanizing ritual of job interviews.
In the first level the player will form his opinion on the vibe of your game, the controls, the graphics and wether or not he should play on once its completed. This is also why I always recommend people starting out a new project should write out their general idea in kind of a bullet point format and start somewhere in the middle. If you start making your game by starting with level 1, you either end up with a game that gets better as it goes along as you learn more yourself while developing it or you will inevitably remake those first few levels which is, of course, a much harder and longer process than starting level 1 in the middle of development and having a pretty good idea already for what it needs to have and what is realistically within your skill set to achieve.

So, now that I laid the ground work for this project I feel comfortable in attempting to make the first chapter. This will later also be a playable alpha just to gather your feedback and see how it runs for everyone. This is a new approach for me as in the past I've just shown screenshots until I released a v1.0 to the public and with my latest finished Project Atropos Mandate having turned out as kind of a disaster, I think this will be the smarter way going forward.

If you want to play said disaster for yourself, you can do so here: LINK

This level is a war memorial. Inspired conceptually by the statue of liberty and that famous first Deus Ex mission set in the same location, it allows me to organically drop a lot of exposition on to the player through environmental story telling that I would otherwise have to deliver via walls of text or dialogue. This would be clunky... really clunky. However, in this setting here, I can just add in optional content to explain some elements of the lore in a believable and optional way.

This also means that I had to make a lot of custom detail props that are not all implemented yet. Info panels with pictures about the eugenic wars, black marble memorial walls covered in the names of fallen soldiers and small statues of the heroes of said war.

Gameplay wise its a relatively open map that gives the player 3 objectives that he can then pursue in any order before moving on. This too seems to be a good way to introduce gun play and some other things that will be fundamental to the game. The multiple choice dialogue system, the hacking system I want to implement but don't yet have a killer idea on how to best approach it and the com-channel banter between the disillusioned protagonist and his more virtuous handler. its just a static prop, but you can also see some scifi-esque looking military barrieres that serve as cover for the enemies. These are designed to look fold able / portable, because the mission states that the hostiles took over the island 24 hours ago which would not have been enough time to set up the typical concrete road blocks you often see in fps games. Just goes to show that I tend to over think certain aspects of my game worlds.

Like a lot of my cyberpunk/scifi stuff, this island is also strongly inspired by eastern cold war era architecture and vibe mixed with a more tongue-in-cheek early 2000s vision of the future.



































-Wolf
Duchenkuke
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Posted: 28th Jun 2021 15:14
I am really looking forward to this.

I can already hear the "wolf soundtrack" playing in these levels. I like that city area a lot!
PCS
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Posted: 28th Jun 2021 18:19
Wolf
Yes,....... What can i say... only one thing. Topnotch

Really awesome work . Like always.
Really cool work. Hope all of the best for you with this project.
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Wolf
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Posted: 30th Jun 2021 12:23
Hey Thanks guys!

Quote: "I can already hear the "wolf soundtrack" playing in these levels. I like that city area a lot! "


Thanks! Well, you already heard a couple tracks but every level with have its own renditions

Quote: "Hope all of the best for you with this project."


TY! Trying to get there slowly.

There is now a gamejolt page for the project. Feel free to stop by: LINK
Duchenkuke
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Posted: 8th Jul 2021 10:04
Nice Gamejolt Page. Should post there more often myself too.
Wolf
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Posted: 13th Jul 2021 06:41
Thank you! There is an indiedb profile now too : LINK. Trying to show the project to people outside of the game guru community as well
cybernescence
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Posted: 13th Jul 2021 09:02
I really like that large statue focal point, it's all looking great so far.

Perhaps some hostile ships on the horizon or in the bays would add some 'eyes out' vistas to the island world?

Cheers.
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Medmatheus
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Posted: 14th Jul 2021 13:27
Good job Wolf. Hope theres a download button for the game soon
Wolf
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Posted: 8th Aug 2021 18:06
Hello everyone!

Quote: "Perhaps some hostile ships on the horizon or in the bays would add some 'eyes out' vistas to the island world?"


That wouldn't work plot wise as such an enemy or allied presence would make it hard to suspend the players disbelief that you are sent in alone. But as I will have to remake larger chunks of that level, some kind of horizon clutter might be implemented.

Quote: "Hope theres a download button for the game soon"


Thank you, that is still some time off but I do plan to release some beta builds on discord, maybe the first one will be done later this month

Alright, update! I haven't posted on here for a while so there is quite a bit to talk about.

First thing to mention is maybe the war memorial basement which will be the second level of the game. Its far from done and I have only a few things to show you. Also the lighting in it is a bit too krass and will likely need some touching up in the future before its in a playable beta state. Combat has also been overhauled so its currently about...maybe...sorta 30% less awkward and pathetic than regular GG combat.
I've also taken some care replacing the hit and bullet miss sound effects to make the combat at least sound less jarring.
There is a lot that still has to happen on this front and I am curious to see what I can really do with it. No telling if it ends up any good or fun but I will certainly try to make it that way.









The war memorial museum is built on a former military base that has been captured from the enemy, hence its basement structures are remains from that installation. Its labyrinthian in design and features quite a few statues, paintings and former exhibits for flavor. The panels of the "deep sea war graves" presented above are based on a special exhibit in the trier museum of history that had similar informational pieces on the 30 year war. This also gives a greater glimpse in the world around you as it suggests the oceans to be littered with wrecks from the eugenics war. Kind of a "missing link" between the show - don't tell approach and just describing things in info dumps. Optional info dumps presented as visual story telling.

There is more to this level such as a war hero crypt with the names and faces of prominent historical figures as well as a wall blown out by explosives to show a hidden cavern. These areas, however are far from being done.

The SOCOM hand gun featured here is a place holder and will most likely be replaced by a far superior model of a silenced USP pistol later on.

The whole start of the game is very important as its the part that makes the player decide wether or not he is interested in the game so I decided to halt development on it and focus on some later missions first. Otherwise I will end up remaking it all from scratch anyway and this way I try to improve it as the rest of the game develops so it has the same or even better quality as other parts in the game.

The mission that is the furthest along is mission 3. Given that each mission is more or less self contained, I might also release the game in episodic formats or at least with a starter that allows you to launch each mission individually. A mission is 2 or 3 levels long.
Now this all largely depends on wether or not GG runs a larger game without crashes or media failing to load in due to poor memory management.

Mission 3, Level 1, Part 1: Arrival

























When the player arrives at the loading docks, he can first explore the surrounding areas leading up to the actual docks. This is a small section with some smaller businesses, derelict apartment buildings and a dingy bar. Here you can either hack the door to the industrial loading dock or find another way in, involving some rooftop climbing.
Now, just to say, I managed to get working ladders into GG with a simple trick that I will present later.

I understand that the pronounced sun-set visuals with the orange tint and the oppressive concrete and rust nature of the cities design does not appeal to everyone but I am trying to create a somewhat immersive place rather than trying to wow the player with lots of neon advertising and flashing lights. There just wouldn't be that much of it in an area like this and I hope that the restrain will make the game world feel more believable. Besides, I can not hope to impress someone with the way GG renders but I think I can make someone get hooked with some world building and exploration as well as believable places.

Mission 3, Level 1, Part 2: The Caiman Bar

You can also enter the bar and chat with some civilians. Who knows who might have information that could be helpful to you on your mission?

This however led to another issue... err... civilians. What do I do here? I own a large collection of low poly characters from FPSC that would allow me great variety in models and are easy to retexture. However, as this game has loads of civilians, the extremely awkward idle animations and the fact that the characters, something players look at more than some random level prop, would be much lower in quality than the rest of the map. Then there are the higher poly characters I own. I'd have to do a whole lot of messing around with the meshes in fragmotion to get those ready and given that that would mean an hour or 2 of work PER CHARACTER, that idea was a pipe dream. Now there is also fuse, but again, I'd have to make every character individually and then need to set them up properly. What I did do was just use GG's integrated character creator. Why? These don't look half bad if you tweak them a little and I have several more of Bond1's models that are quick and easy to import into GG. You will see more of those at a later date as so far I just populated the level with CC NPCs for now.











The caiman bar is supposed to be a run down, harbor side dive and I think it comes across

Mission 3, Level 1, Part 3: The derelict loading docks

Now on to the other section of the mission, the combat area. This is a long abandoned loading dock that has been occupied by militia forces...err...the militia forces don't have a name yet but they are simple terrorist types that will be the enemies for the first half of the game.

This area is simplified in geometry to allow the occlusion culling to do its thing and provide good FPS while fighting enemies. This will be a trend throughout the game that should not be too noticeable. Areas where the player explores and can talk to npcs are more detailed than areas the player will fight in. Optimization like this needs to be done in a weak engine like game guru.















And that was it for now. Long post, I know but if you made it this far, thanks for your interest and thanks for reading!

As always, your opinion is greatly appreciated!



-Wolf

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Posted: 9th Aug 2021 14:44 Edited at: 13th Aug 2021 17:41
Always a pleasure to read your thought process, both technically and creatively. I for one am super excited to see how this turns out

AE
Wolf
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Posted: 12th Aug 2021 20:20
Thank you! I'm always happy to see when people read my arguably long and meandering threads Cheers!
PCS
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Posted: 10th Sep 2021 19:33
Looking Good as always.
the screen Shots are excellent
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Wolf
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Posted: 25th Sep 2021 12:58
Thanks!! There will be 2 or 3 more image based updated but then I should have the first video impressions ready (sound design needs to be done for the vid which is why I usually show screenshots as I tend to do audio work dead last) After that I can publish a rough demo and take a break from the project until winter or so
Tarkus1971
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Posted: 27th Sep 2021 06:59
Wolf I don't think the word genius hasn't been used yet, but well yes, genius level design, lighting and of course the atmosphere.... this really shows what classic can do in the right hands.
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Wolf
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Posted: 5th Oct 2021 16:48
@Tarkus1971: Thanks a lot!! I really appreciate it. I just hope I can manage to get it out the door despite GG's quirks.

*************
U P D A T E
*************


Hey folks!

I notice that I have not updated this games online profile in a while. I have been busy working on it quite a bit and some of you who follow my work on discord have likely seen a lot more than I will show now. This is because I try not to utterly flood the thread with screenshots.

If you've been around the indie game development scene for a while you might have noticed that its pretty terrible compared to what it used to be... but thats not why I bring it up... I bring it up because you likely also saw statements like this on your own, Duchenkukes or my work in progress media across the web. "If you can do this in GG, imagine what you can do in unity or unreal". Well, there is a certain amount of ignorance inherent to this statement as I have lamented many times. This kind of particular feedback usually comes from players who might have a relatively warped perspective of what goes into making an entire game. Making a video game is meta art. Meaning that you have to be relatively proficient or at least semi competent in all the artistic and technical skills it entails. 2d art, 3d art, music, code, writing and more. The reason I can make this kind of game is because game guru is easy to use. Believe me, I have many hours in both unity and unreal and can tell you long and drawn out tales about just how difficult it is to make a full game, on your own, in your spare time in such an engine. Sure, if you are the type that works well in a team and if you have the relevant skills to bring to the table, by all means... but for lone wolves like myself? Just nah.

Unless you are willing to make an entire game out of random stuff you got from the asset store in which case...why bother?

Well, the above tangent aside, I only bring this up because I have begun adding minor details to the third mission, which will serve as an early beta demo for the game. (its most of what you have seen in the more recent updates and what you will see in a couple more to come).
This meant that I had to do things I never actually made before with mixed results. My first attempt in making an animated decal is ... well, almost decent. Some frames are out of order and the playback speed is warped but it shows some promise as can be seen here.

Another thing I needed to do was adding more variety to the characters. I went with the stock characters by choice and in fact, the CC system allows for relatively easy imports when it comes to custom faces and attachments. I've never done much character related work...you might have seen some in my 3d threads throughout the years...it must have been like 4 to 5 in a decade so I am quite glad that the hair I got going for my lasses looks more than alright.





As importing these into the character kit is relatively straight forward, I have also penned a tutorial about the whole ordeal which can be found here.

***********

So much for that. Another thing I added is the sewer level, this will be quite an eeriee level that will have a few surprises you might not expect. In any case, its mostly done and some screenshots can be seen here. Not too interesting to look at in pictures but I think it will make for a decent romp.... I mean... as far as sewer levels are concerned, its probably not going to be the worst in gaming history.





















Yes, ladies and gentlemen its that most delightful place you all wish you could visit. The sewers! Wether you fancy a romantic picnic or a relaxing evening walk, the delightful scenery of the sewers has got you covered. Visit one of our many attractions such as "rusty pipe", "wet concrete" or the all time favorite: "unidentified floating object in water". Visit the sewers! Soon to be featured in the demo version of SPECTRE.



Oh well, thats it for now! Than you for reading and feel free to let me know what you think.



-Wolf
Wolf
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Posted: 18th Oct 2021 19:36
Hey all,

there will be another progress update soon but I need to mention that the beta demo version I have been working on for the past weeks will be delayed as one of the maps gives me a runtime error 7018 when trying to open it.
I know that this is due to an entity not being able to load so I figured I could fix it myself by removing lines from the map.ent file. This has now completely killed the map so I will have to remake the whole thing. Brilliant

Ah well, game development...eh! Setbacks are to be expected.
Duchenkuke
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Posted: 31st Oct 2021 19:22
WHEN DOWNLUD THIS GAME FREE???






haha, those are the famous comments we get on youtube. Seriosuly, I am looking forward to this.
PCS
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Posted: 2nd Nov 2021 14:05
One day when im all grown up or very old i also want to make a game as good as this.
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Wolf
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Posted: 3rd Nov 2021 02:48
Hey gang!

@Duchenkuke: CAN U SHARE MODLEPACK LINK PLS? Joking aside, I got some personal stuff to work on as well right now so I can't predict a release date for the demo but I think I'll still make it this year. At least for an internal alpha I'll share with you guys

@PCS: Haha! Thanks for the compliment. (I hope the game ends up being good )

*************
U P D A T E
*************


First of all, special thanks to Preben for helping me out with my issue. If you ever have the runtime error 7018 problem, you can activate log generation in the setup.ini and read out which mesh is causing the trouble. It was a character creator head, which I would have never figured out if it wheren't for Preben.

SO, I'd like to share some impressions from the industrial area. It plays pretty well and looks cool in motion but with the way the engine renders, idle screenshots can look a bit harder to read. You'll also notice some things I will fix later like inverted text. These rounded signs on the main building are animated and I accidentally inverted the text on export. Rookie mistake when it comes to working with .x files but it happens occasionally.

I think I did manage to convey the inhospitable vibe for the industrial area I was going for, here are some screenies:

























-Wolf

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Posted: 5th Nov 2021 14:21
Wow! That industrial area looks simply amazing! Great work, Wolf!
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Duchenkuke
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Posted: 5th Nov 2021 16:26
perhaps the gg project I am most looking forward to this year.
I want this for christmas! at least an alpha or something.

The screenshots look really great. Its damn time we get to see some gameguru magic by wolf again. Its high time.
Hope you can sort your stuff out soon man. If you need to talk, you can write me anytime.

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