HELP: Interactive fan fiction

[s_d]

Well, Troels, I suppose that we could work on the IF the way they actually made our favorite IF games; as a team. I'm not particularly an expert in SQ canon & history (I'm no Fact Checker or Historian, to be certain!) but I do write code for a living and have played plenty of IF.

 

I'd love working with someone on an Inform implementation of their own IF game story. I'm sure I could learn the game language like any other programming language.

[pcj]

I'm sure I could learn the game language like any other programming language.

Yeah, Inform seems to be fairly easy.

[Lunchbox]

Personally I have been trying this out and I am using a program called Adrift. I paid for it years ago when I was trying to make my own SQ fangame. The old computer I was running on it is long gone so I I may need to start from scratch lol.

[Troels Pleimert]

Well, Troels, I suppose that we could work on the IF the way they actually made our favorite IF games; as a team. I'm not particularly an expert in SQ canon & history (I'm no Fact Checker or Historian, to be certain!) but I do write code for a living and have played plenty of IF.

 

I'd love working with someone on an Inform implementation of their own IF game story. I'm sure I could learn the game language like any other programming language.

 

I'd be very much up for a project like that! Actually, Cadbury Wookie and I have been kicking around some stuff in the Space Quest universe lately (yeah, we're back and up to our old tricks). One of them was a plot idea I had for a text adventure that Dan went off and started writing as a fiction story. The working title is "Bea Dies." ;)

 

Shoot me an e-mail (troels@pleimert.dk); let's see where this goes.

[Akril]

Well...I've held back on jumping into this thread for a long time, but I figured that there wasn't much point in prolonging the inevitable any longer.

 

Are there any particular art assets that people are interested in (e.g., walking characters, idling characters, backgrounds)? I'm willing to do one or two characters and/or animations if I have the time, though as the production time of PQ2 may have hinted, animation takes a long time to do. Also, has any particular style been agreed upon (VGA, SVGA)? How about a walk cycle for Roger himself (that isn't from the official games)? I may stick with the low-res, shaded look of PQ2, since that has proved surprisingly easy to work with (most of the time, anyway).

 

I've also amassed several 3D models of futuristic cities, plus a sci-fi-themed room or two (most of these are freebies from various 3D model sites). I could make some renders of these models from various angles, then run them through a couple of filters to get rid of the stiff, sterile look that 3D tends to have. I may even have a 3D prop or two that I could render to use as inventory items.

[Troels Pleimert]

Hey, Akril! I was dearly wishing you would drop by this thread. ;) Insert long, blathering, sycophantic run-on sentence about how fantastic the graphics in Pledge Quests 1+2 were.

 

Well, we haven't really talked that much about specifics. But just to get the ball rolling, I could lay out some details for a "starter kit" and we could build from there. Or people could break off and do their own thing.

 

But -- even though I can't speak for others -- here are the bare minimum of what I would need to build a generic Space Quest fan game:

 

Resolution: Since you suggested keeping to the Pledge Quest style (and I really like that, because they were great), let's stick with 320 x 200 SCI VGA style.

 

Color depth: As high as you want.

 

Backgrounds:

Inside of Aluminum Mallard with cockpit

Xenon in orbit

Space shot - just space :)

Space station hallway

Some planet surface 1

Some planet surface 2

 

Any planet surface you dream up is good. Gets the imagination going. Surprise us. :)

Also, the 3D models you had lying around would be great.

Game makers could use elements from the backgrounds to construct new ones in Photoshop to spice things up.

 

Sprites:

Roger (walking, talking, crouching, grabbing)

Beatrice (walking, talking, crouching, grabbing)

Some kind of alien 1 (walking, talking)

Some kind of alien 2 (walking, talking)

Some kind of robot 1 (moving, talking, special move)

Some kind of robot 2 (moving, talking, special move)

 

The "special move" could be anything, like breathing fire, shooting electricity, falling apart, whatever. Surprise us. :)

 

Assets (to be photoshopped in wherever needed):

Face of Vohaul as a hologram

Aluminum Mallard outside

Wrecked spaceship outside

Xenon Orbital Station outside

 

Inventory items - just your standard fare:

Keycard

Flashlight

ID Card

Crowbar

Batteries

Piece of paper

Bizarre electronic doohickey of no obvious description

 

I can think of a hundred ways the above list could be morphed into a game with very little Photoshop effort.

[Akril]

Well, no surprise, but it will definitely take a while to do all that, even if I do take a lot of shortcuts.* I'll still try to work on some of that art and animation when I have the time. In the meantime, though, I'd suggest using placeholder graphics in AGS until better ones can be made/found -- either stuff from the games themselves, or even something as simple as a circle with the word "blaster" written on it.

 

It would also help if I knew more about the animations for the characters: are the talking animations going to be portraits, or LucasArts-style animations? Should the "grabbing" animations have Roger and Bea reaching out and taking an object at chest height, or lower/higher? Are Roger and Bea's "crouching" animation supposed to be them preparing to crawl through a low tunnel, or just bending down to pick something off of the floor? Also, what should Roger and Bea's clothing look like?

 

And in case you get tired of waiting for me up upload something, there's also a bunch of graphics, music and other game assets available on opengameart.org, which are all free to use as long as you comply with whatever conditions the artists set (which usually are just making sure to mention them in your game's credits).

 

*Speaking of which, I'm sure I've seen at least one 3D model of the Aluminum Mallard out there...

[pcj]

*Speaking of which, I'm sure I've seen at least one 3D model of the Aluminum Mallard out there...

I made that, and while I'm sure it could be done better (it's pretty basic), anyone is free to use it.

[Troels Pleimert]

Hey, Akril! Yeah, sorry for not being more specific the first time round. If you haven't noticed, I'm basically making this shit up as I go. ;)

 

Well, no surprise, but it will definitely take a while to do all that, even if I do take a lot of shortcuts.*

I wasn't expecting you to do all that. ;) Just whatever you feel comfortable with, then I'm sure someone else will step in and fill in the blanks. Okay, raise of hands? No one?

 

Are the talking animations going to be portraits, or LucasArts-style animations?

LucasArts-style, to start off with. Someone else can fill in the glorious portraits, if one should need them.

 

Should the "grabbing" animations have Roger and Bea reaching out and taking an object at chest height, or lower/higher?

Chest height. Standard fare.

 

Are Roger and Bea's "crouching" animation supposed to be them preparing to crawl through a low tunnel, or just bending down to pick something off of the floor?

The latter. That animation could be used for anything, including bending down to crawl through something.

 

Also, what should Roger and Bea's clothing look like?

Who said anything about clothe-- er, standard "purple Xenon janitor's uniform" for Roger and "green StarCon power woman" suit for Bea. Again, standard fare.

 

Thanks for playing, by the way. I know this isn't a lot to go on, but this is sort of "reverse game design" philosophy at work here: whereas artists usually await inspiration from the game designers, this time we're all (I guess?) waiting for the art to inspire us. But think of it this way: this means you get to throw us a few curve-balls, and we'll have to design around it. Or at least Photoshop our way out of it. ;)

[Akril]

In case anyone is wondering: No, I haven't bailed out on this project. I've been trying to get some work done on walk cycles for Roger and Bea, and it's been a pretty lengthy process. Here are some turnarounds for them:

 

 

The colors are a bit off (since I did most of the work on my laptop), so I've got a lot of tweaking to do. I also notice that Roger's head is a bit large in his side views, so I'll have to adjust it as well.

[Frede]

Those sprites are awesome. I really like the style. Makes me want to start up another fangame :)

 

Geez, I was joking. Put those guns away, please.

[Troels Pleimert]

Pardon my absence. Those look awesome, Akril!

 

I especially like how Roger has his head hunched forward, the lazy dope that he is. ;)

 

And also, the shading and the coloring is ... er, for lack of a better word, yummy! (Yeah, 'yummy' is the best I can do right now.)

[pcj]

Back on the IF front a bit...Linden Labs, creators of Second Life, just came out with dio, which looks pretty cool:

 

https://www.dio.com/about

[Troels Pleimert]

Back on the IF front a bit...Linden Labs, creators of Second Life, just came out with dio, which looks pretty cool:

 

https://www.dio.com/about

 

Wow! That looks really cool! Just think of the amount of mayhem we could wield with that thing ... Has anyone got an invite? :)

[pcj]

Yes. Sent one your way (via Facebook, apparently)