107 réponses à ce sujet

[Burdokva]

About difficulty: I've made mods back in the day for Star Wars: Galactic Battleground (the RTS that used Age of Empire II's engine)... it's not hard and if you enjoy painting mosaic-style it can be a lot of fun, even. But it's very time consuming process... at least on that engine each frame was a different sprite. Smooth animations will require a lot of work. Otherwise you may cu corners and they game will look awful.



Though I'm sure there are enough great ME-fan artists who would be willing to paint high quality backgrounds.



As for the plot, I was thinking something more serious, with the occasional black comedy joke thrown in (I mean darker humor). Maybe you're investigating the sudden disappearance of a Citadel Council diplomatic agent? Not someone high-ranking, even an assistant. Or just a regular "dark alley" murder or heist. The latter could be pretty short, actually.



But something very tongue-in-cheek just wouldn't fit Mass Effect (as much as I love Monkey Island)...

[Phaedon]

By the way, Sindrome, I'd love to write the plot if you want me to.

[DarthCaine]

If you wanna use humor in a murder mystery, I suggest using quotes from old Bogart movies.

I suppose the making of the story and mechanics wouldn't be too hard, my problem would be the sprites, animations and enviroments, I can't draw for ****

Modifié par DarthCaine, 10 janvier 2011 - 01:53 .

[Phaedon]

It looks like Uszi could do that. I could also ask Norton or criz if they are interested.



Darth, do you agree that a 'Black Dahlia'-ish murder mystery would work? You know, the murder of somebody unimportant to the ME universe, but with their murder becoming a public sensation.

[dtye]

Sindrome, just thought I'd let you know that you've had a few responses at the MEC website as well.

[Uszi]

Phaedon wrote...

It looks like Uszi could do that. I could also ask Norton or criz if they are interested.

Heh, if people don't mind my level of work.  I imagine Norton or criz would do a better job.

Btw, any and all feedback on what I could do differently or to improve would be much appreciated -- from anyone.  I think when I first messed with AGS I put together 1 sprite with enough animations to actually walk around and stuff.  And I did that by initially copying and pasting sprites from other AGS games and changing them to my liking.

Garrus I made from scratch though, so I'm pretty damn proud of it right now. 

I did keep working ont these things because I had a lot of fun with my first mock up:


http://uszi.devianta...view2-192934141

Side views don't have arms right now because it will be easier to make walking sprites from an armless reference. 

Edited the original a bit to keep it consistant with the sides.  I am going to keep updating it because I'm not happy with the width of his arms, the shading on his collar, or his lack of face paint.  The face paint is hard to get to look like anything though, especially at this resolution---let alone to get it to look like actual paint on his face.

And as far as self criticism, right off the bat I noticed that his shoulder spaulder things don't go as low in the front view as they do on the sides.  So yeah.

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 06:51 .

[Phaedon]

I really like it!

[Uszi]

Burdokva wrote...
Though I'm sure there are enough great ME-fan artists who would be willing to paint high quality backgrounds.
 

Backgrounds...
now that's more challenging.  I need to take a couple youtube classes
on vantage points and stuff...  I never set them up right, so the
perspective in my backgrounds always looks super strange.

Burdokva wrote...
But something very tongue-in-cheek just wouldn't fit Mass Effect (as much as I love Monkey Island)...

Meh, half of ME2 seemed pretty tongue-in-cheek to me...

* Mordin sings Gilbert and Sullivan.
* Grunt tells puns. Get the point?
* Legion dances the robot.
* The priize.
* Punching Khalisah bint Sinan al-Jilani... again.
* The final boss is Arnold Schwarzenegger.
* You blow up space monkeys with a missile launcher on Tuchanka.
* You headbutt a krogan.
* Garrus and Tali conversation about Elevator Rides
* The "Fleet and Flotilla," conversation you overhear on Ilium.
* The volus buying the 100,000 credit enviromental suite on Illium.
* The ability, in general, to bring Legion on Tali's loyalty mission.
* Conrad Verner
* The "Great Biotic Wind."
* All of the post mission content in the SB's Lair.

Mass Effect is definitely not completely tongue in cheek--it has its serious moments. But the developers were always a bit facetious with us, and that tone runs from start to finish.  It would not be Mass Effect, to me personally, if you didn't throw your players a couple of light hearted bones.

That said, a detective story with a serious tone would be fun to play.

I just hope that one wouldn't pass up the opportunity to have, say, Garrus break up a gambling ring where Volus are intentionally destroying Citadel station components and then betting on which Keeper finishes the cleanup first.

Phaedon wrote...
It looks like Uszi could do that. I could also ask Norton or criz if they are interested.

TBH, if you want to get done in any reasonable period of time, you'd need to have a couple of artists making sprites.  If it's just little old me then we'll be on this for the next 10 years.  The last preview pic was like ~7-8 hours of work total.

For a Citadel Mystery, I'm sure most sprites won't be walking around too much, so it shouldn't be too hard to crap out 4 sprites for each facing 1 of 4 ways.  Er, and, TBH, one can use a lot of shortcuts.  Generally, any non-important Turian, Volus, Salarian, etc could use the exact same model.  And with any important one, you can always just edit the head, maybe some of the coloration.

I also would personally like to see some sort of zoom in conversation system like Gabriel Knight, with a ME convo wheel of course.  Here you would go to a different screen and you'd have a convo between character face sprites that would be more like 100x100.
Example of Gabriel Knight Dialogue

Example of creating it in AGS

Again, cut corners by using generic Volus, Salarian, etc for most conversations.  Edit the existing defaults slightly for important characters.

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 07:21 .

[dtye]

If I wasn't working my butt off developing the Mass Effect Chronicles, I'd love to help out. But, I can imagine I'll be working on this game for quite some time to come.

[SinDr0me]

I really like those sprites mentioned in some of the posts. But something made me think... do we want it to be looking super duper old? or more something like Monkey Island 3 more cartooney and stuff or like this one http://www.hourgames.net/ . I love those styles of graphics too.

[SinDr0me]

Something like this!

Modifié par SinDr0me, 10 janvier 2011 - 07:49 .

[DarthCaine]

I don't think you'll be able to make thing as high res as in Curse of Monkey Island with AGS.

Phaedon wrote...

Darth, do you agree that a 'Black Dahlia'-ish murder mystery would work? You know, the murder of somebody unimportant to the ME universe, but with their murder becoming a public sensation.

I think any story can work as long as it's done well. Personally, I'd do the story as if a series of unconnected murders that nobody pays much attention to, all lead up to giant conspiracy

Modifié par DarthCaine, 10 janvier 2011 - 07:59 .

[SinDr0me]

DarthCaine wrote...

I don't think you'll be able to make thing as high res as in Curse of Monkey Island with AGS.

The link i posted proves otherwise "http://www.hourgames.net/" but maby that would be more work... and i really love those sprites! Haha

[SinDr0me]

Oh btw, i really love the style of this game... love the game also! =D
www.youtube.com/watch

[Uszi]

Post redacted in the face of it's incorrectness. 

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 09:14 .

[SinDr0me]

Uszi wrote...

SinDr0me wrote...

I really like those sprites mentioned in some of the posts. But something made me think... do we want it to be looking super duper old? or more something like Monkey Island 3 more cartooney and stuff or like this one http://www.hourgames.net/ . I love those styles of graphics too.

AGS does not support resolutions as high as the examples you've given.  When your resolution is 320x200 (that's the screen size) you're pretty limited with your art style.  Old games look "super duper old," in part because of the limitations of both the hardware (ye olde computers) and in part because of the software used to make them.

AGS specifically mimicks that ye olde look.  For nestolgia, yes, but also because within those limitations people with a wide range of skill levels can create some impressive looking things.  Even if you have the art skills of a monkey (yours truely) you can throw together some good sprites.  I mean AGS lets you make 8-bit games, which most people's computers can't even run nowadays.

The development time is going to increase the more advanced your technology gets.  The games you posted look like they're probably at least 640x480 in resolution, but more likely 800x600.  Think about it:  Every single sprite and background in an 800x600 game has 3x more pixels, which means 3x more detail potentially, which means 3x as much work.

Again, I'm not familiar with GM, so I don't know if it supports higher resolution graphics or not.  If you wanted to shoot for a higher resolution game, and have more options for your art style, then maybe you could use GM instead of AGS.

My recommendation is to stick with AGS or GM, and keep the resolution low to keep development time down.

You are totally right and i think those sprites will do fine, it will be like what would mass effect have looked like if it was released 20 years ago! =P and for the fans (i bet they will like it no matter what...) i messaged you on Deviantart btw... i also pm'ed you over here!

[Uszi]

SinDr0me wrote...


You are totally right and i think those sprites will do fine, it will be like what would mass effect have looked like if it was released 20 years ago! =P and for the fans (i bet they will like it no matter what...) i messaged you on Deviantart btw... i also pm'ed you over here!

Well actually I might not be.
I'm looking into higher res games built with AGS.  One way to increase the detail would be if we didn't mind the character taking up like half the screen.


Most of the games, the sprite detail looks more like what I made, example.


But some people get alot more detail in at that resolution...

People have made more stylized stuff for sure.

Lol, and the game does support  640x480.  -.-;

And what's crazy to me is that Beneath a steel sky, which you linked to, is 320x200.
Heh, guess I should take a look at it again >.<

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 09:04 .

[SinDr0me]

Uszi wrote...

SinDr0me wrote...


You are totally right and i think those sprites will do fine, it will be like what would mass effect have looked like if it was released 20 years ago! =P and for the fans (i bet they will like it no matter what...) i messaged you on Deviantart btw... i also pm'ed you over here!

Well actually I might not be.
I'm looking into higher res games built with AGS.  One way to increase the detail would be if we didn't mind the character taking up like half the screen.


Most of the games, the sprite detail looks more like what I made, example.


But some people get alot more detail in at that resolution...

People have made more stylized stuff for sure.

Lol, and the game does support  640x480.  -.-;

Heh, guess I should take a look at it again >.<

Yeah, but it will also take alot more work.... like if you see a character talking you also want to see him showing emotions like talking with his hands and stuff.

I also like the outcome of this game...


I have absolutely no problem with that! :innocent:

Modifié par SinDr0me, 10 janvier 2011 - 09:00 .

[Uszi]

heh. This is what Garrus looks in Beneath a Steel Sky:



So maybe I just need to work on my technique.

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 09:06 .

[SinDr0me]

Btw Uszi, could you reply to me on here or deviantart? i messaged you!

[SinDr0me]

Uszi wrote...

heh. This is what Garrus looks in Beneath a Steel Sky:



So maybe I need to work on my technique.

Why? it looks quite awesome!

[SinDr0me]

Okay, i decided the game will revolve around garrus in c-sec before meeting Com. Shepard... Now i'm looking for an awesome title...Uszi will deliver some sprites (Garrus anyway) and i guess some more... is still need someone who can make some backgrounds (of a c-sec office for example) A good story would be nice... and i guess it would be nice if the game containts a certain amount of grimness but also maby some sadistic/dark humor.

[SinDr0me]

Not to forget, we need permission from bioware!

[Burdokva]

@Uszi



Garrus looks great, but in my humble opinion, scale down the head and the back "hump" a bit. They look just too massive in the side views. Front is perfect as is!



As for the story - yeah, it had a lot of humor. I meant that if we have several jokes thrown in, it would be great, but basing the entire plot (no matter how simple or short may it be) around, say, the "mysterious murder of the clown Elcor"is just way too much... besides, dark, mature humor is always preferable to overly simplistic jokes.

[Uszi]

Burdokva wrote...

@Uszi

Garrus looks great, but in my humble opinion, scale down the head and the back "hump" a bit. They look just too massive in the side views. Front is perfect as is!

Thank you.  I really appreciate this, I agree that there is something... off, about it.
I was referencing this, btw:
http://img696.images...1385/garrus.jpg

As for the story - yeah, it had a lot of humor. I meant that if we have several jokes thrown in, it would be great, but basing the entire plot (no matter how simple or short may it be) around, say, the "mysterious murder of the clown Elcor"is just way too much... besides, dark, mature humor is always preferable to overly simplistic jokes.

I am no longer pitching the completely tongue-in-cheek idea since the thread seems to have centered on the murder mystery type theme.  Just wanted to say that.

Yeah, agree.  If you go that goofy, the whole thing needs to be goofy.

For tongue in cheek I had something in mind of:  "It's 12 hours after the suicide mission, and the Cerberus crew is cleaning up the confetti and balloons from the 'Post-Suicide Mission Party' on the Normandy when it turns out that Shephard is missing!  Now it falls on Garrus to save the savior of the galaxy in this fan made prediction of what the Bridging DLC might contain.  Cure the pandemic infection of scale itch crippling the crew, work with Jacob to produce effective armor for squadmades that made due with latex in the past, and avoid a drunken Zaeed Massani who is wandering the ship, waxing nastolgic."

Buuut...  I think "Garrus: C-Sec Noir" has a bit broader appeal as a game.

I do still think Garrus' direct supervisor should be a volus.

How about "C-Sec Effect" for the title? 

SinDr0me wrote...

Not to forget, we need permission from bioware!

To pull a quote from MEC:

Is this legal?

Thankfully...YES! After weeks of trying to contact BioWare/EA via e-mail, I ended up calling

them directly. After a short discussion with an official at EA, they told us that we could make a

fan-game so long as we:

- don't claim to be BioWare/EA Staff/Team.

- don't claim rights to the content.

- don't profit from the project.

- give credit where it's due.

I imagine that the same exclusions apply to any fan made game, especially one as small in scope as we're talking.

Essentially, as long as your okay with Bioware technically owning the game when you're done, you're golden.

Modifié par Uszi, 10 janvier 2011 - 09:49 .