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Squirminator2k
1 Jul 2006, 22:03
A quick browse over at the [GameIndustry.biz (http://www.gameindustry.biz/)] Jobs section reveals that Team17 are currently looking for a number of Developers and artists with experience using the Unreal 3 game engine. For thems not in the know, the Unreal engine is primarily an FPS engine developed by Epic Games, used to develop games such as Unreal Tournament. There are rumours that the PS3 DevKit includes a version of the Unreal 3 engine, but the engine is equally viable on other systems, possibly even the Wii.
This sort of flows nicely into thoughts I've been having recently regarding the next Alien Breed title. AB2004 was shelved because of a lack of publisher interest, but Team17 have hinted that a new AB title is in development. Sadly, given the current market, it's likely this will be yet another FPS. I don't mind FPS games, provided they're done well. They either need to be really clever, really simple, or focus mainly on multiplayer gameplay. This is why the only FPS games I give any merit to are Doom, Serious Sam, TimeSplitters: Future Perfect and Half-Life 2. Everything else is, well, quite pants. Anyway, if this is the case then it's not unlikely that the Unreal 3 engine is being used to create the third game in the Alien Breed 3D series. Perhaps Alien Breed: Conflict has been taken back off of the shelf (not entirely impossible - what is Addiction Pinball if not a continuation of the work Team17 put into Team17 Pinball, a shelved pinball sim for the Amiga?). Or perhaps this is going to be a wholey new AB FPS altogether.
It's also possible Team17 may be working on an FPS title using new or licensed IP. Since they've started working on other people's ideas (the market, sadly, not being open-minded enough to allow Team17's creative wings to spread), or that they're using the engine as a base for a different type of game. Who can say? We can have a guess though, that's what this trhread, and ultimately this forum, is for.
Any thoughts? (Oh, and if anyone even considers the idea of a Worms FPS, you'll be shot. Really. It's not needed.)

bonz
1 Jul 2006, 22:39
The thought of a new FPS game including aliens is a nice one, since Fox/Sierra haven't come up with Aliens vs. Predator 3 yet.
This is why the only FPS games I give any merit to are Doom, Serious Sam, TimeSplitters: Future Perfect and Half-Life 2. Everything else is, well, quite pants.
Are you nuts? :eek:
What about these games:
Deus Ex 1
System Shock 2
No One Lives Forever 1 & 2
Thief Series
Aliens vs. Predator 1 & 2
Personally, I think Half-Life 1 is slightly better than Half-Life 2.
Serious Sam just gives me shivers when I think of it though.
Oh, and if anyone even considers the idea of a Worms FPS, you'll be shot. Really.
Seconded.

Squirminator2k
1 Jul 2006, 23:02
Okay, AvP and System Shock 2 are noteworthy. I didn't think of those when I wrote my above post. But the other games you mentioned don't appeal to me.
Personally, if they can do something interesting and new with the FPS genre rather than the cookie-cutter stuff we've had thrown at us from all angles over the past 10 years, I'd be happy. That said, AB3D might not have been particularly groundbreaking* but the level design was good.
* From an FPS point of view. Hardware-wise, getting an FPS like that onto a humble Amiga was definitely groundbreaking stuff.

M3ntal
2 Jul 2006, 01:59
Deus Ex didn't appeal to you?
Oh, and i reckon (hope) it's AB2K7.

bonz
2 Jul 2006, 02:15
Deus Ex didn't appeal to you?
Freaky, isn't it?
Oh, and i reckon (hope) it's AB2K7.
If they're hiring at the moment I doubt it'll be released in 2007.
If it does, I think they should not call it like that.
Licensing the Unreal engine doesn't force a developer to number their games after the intended year of release, I hope. :)
I suggest: Alien Breed: Ressurection.
Hehe. :D

Preasure
2 Jul 2006, 09:54
It certainly would be nice to see T17 branch out from the worms/lemmings style of gameplay that's dominated in their releases over the past few years. I'm slightly concerned that with their history of mainly 'cartoonish' games, mainly based around humour and mild silliness, they won't be able to pull off a credible and serious FPS. Unless of couse they're mixing the two genres, not an FPS worms, but something similar, using worms style weaponry and humour in an FPS. If that is the case, then either they'll pull it off, or it'll flop terribly.

Alien King
2 Jul 2006, 10:11
Never really got into Deus Ex myself.
FPS can be really good. Especially if they get the multiplayer right (achieved in Quake 3, RTCW, AVP2 (with some slight flaws) and some others).
I tend to get bored of the single player unless the story is really interesting. Otherwise I only complete it out of boredom or not at all.
And I never found the appeal of the Half-Life games.
But anyway, never having played the original AB games, it is a series that should be worth getting into.
I suggest: Alien Breed: Ressurection.
You idiot.
Oh, and if anyone even considers the idea of a Worms FPS, you'll be shot. Really. It's not needed.
Somehow, I just know someone is going to ignore this simple statement of fact.

pilot62
2 Jul 2006, 10:39
What about Call of Duty?
This'll be interesting, as all they've done for a while now is worms and a 2d lemmings game.

bonz
2 Jul 2006, 12:40
You idiot.
That suggestion of mine wasn't really a serious one. :rolleyes:
They'd surely get problems with 20th Century Fox.

Alien King
2 Jul 2006, 13:39
That suggestion of mine wasn't really a serious one. :rolleyes:
They'd surely get problems with 20th Century Fox.
Neither was my statement.

Squirminator2k
2 Jul 2006, 14:27
It certainly would be nice to see T17 branch out from the worms/lemmings style of gameplay that's dominated in their releases over the past few years. I'm slightly concerned that with their history of mainly 'cartoonish' games, mainly based around humour and mild silliness, they won't be able to pull off a credible and serious FPS. Unless of couse they're mixing the two genres, not an FPS worms, but something similar, using worms style weaponry and humour in an FPS. If that is the case, then either they'll pull it off, or it'll flop terribly.
Check out team17's [back-catalogue (http://www.dream17.co.uk/softography.php)] and you'll see that there's a healthy mix of serious games and humorous ones too.
FPS can be really good. Especially if they get the multiplayer right (achieved in Quake 3, RTCW, AVP2 (with some slight flaws) and some others).
TimeSplitters: Future Perfect is the best multiplayer FPS about. But Team17 aren't going to win any prizes by copying others.
I tend to get bored of the single player unless the story is really interesting. Otherwise I only complete it out of boredom or not at all.
The story for Alien Breed may not be original, but in AB3D the narrative, 1st person intro before each level helps keep the story flowing. I genuinely found myself worrying about Captain Reynolds.

SuperBlob
2 Jul 2006, 15:15
You don't consider XIII a good FPS? Or Goldeneye? Meh.
But this sounds like good news, I've got a bit sick of playing Worms games, plus, there'd probably be less people coming along and drawing sausages in the fanart forum :p

SiN
2 Jul 2006, 15:18
They could definitely do something interesting here ...
They're making an FPS, which is great because I imagine it's an easy sell to publishers. However, the FPS genre space is so open that there's tonnes of room for innovation while still appealing to the mass-market "fps player". At the very least, if they manage to do something that doesn't innovate, but has great level design, that would still make a great game. Look at Call of Duty for instance.
SiN

Spadge
4 Jul 2006, 07:12
We aren't building an FPS game, that genre is very congested.
However, I can't say what we are building with it, either.
There's a ton of stuff going on right now although there probably won't be too much in terms of official release information (aside from something for 360 XBLA) in the near future.

KamikazeBananze
4 Jul 2006, 15:04
An RTS? An RPG?
Those have been done with the Unreal engine before. Granted, the first was a mod, but still.

AndrewTaylor
4 Jul 2006, 15:54
We aren't building an FPS game, that genre is very congested.
However, I can't say what we are building with it, either.
Let's keep guessing genres until he refuses to say "no, we're not doing that". That won't get annoying.
Edit: Do not do this.

KamikazeBananze
4 Jul 2006, 17:39
Edit: Do not do this.
Awww...
Well, we know that the Unreal engine is very flexible. That's something, I guess.

Squirminator2k
4 Jul 2006, 18:00
In a perfect world, it's either Alien Breed 2007, or SuperFrog 2. I can't imagine a SuperFrog game being knocked together in an Unreal engine, though. That said, I've heard of weirder uses for game engines.

bonz
4 Jul 2006, 20:03
SuperFrog 2
Hasn't there been somewhere that made a 3D SuperFrog fangame?
And T17 made him stop it after he showed a few screenshots?
:)

AndrewTaylor
4 Jul 2006, 20:32
Hasn't there been somewhere that made a 3D SuperFrog fangame?
And T17 made him stop it after he showed a few screenshots?
:)
Well, the screenshots were clearly just Mario64 with a frog in it, so that game was on thin ice wherever it turned.

bonz
4 Jul 2006, 20:47
the screenshots were clearly just Mario64 with a frog in it
Oh, I didn't know that.
The backgrounds looked very generic for me, AFAIR.

Plasma
4 Jul 2006, 21:59
Hasn't there been somewhere that made a 3D SuperFrog fangame?
And T17 made him stop it after he showed a few screenshots?
:)
IIRC:
That was somewhere between 1 year and 1.5 years ago,
T17 prevented it while saying that it's because they had plans for SuperFrog yet.
He was allowed to continue shortly later, although it was called Super-Lizzy.

Squirminator2k
4 Jul 2006, 22:06
He chose to knock the idea on the head, though. No great loss, really.

MrBunsy
4 Jul 2006, 22:20
Well, we know that the Unreal engine is very flexible. That's something, I guess.Someone's already made an Alien Breed look-alike. A top down shooter (against aliens) called Alien Swarm as a mod for UT2004, so the tech is certainly there.

KamikazeBananze
4 Jul 2006, 22:34
Yeh, that was what I was thinking of.
And then there's Air Buccaneers. I love Air Buccaneers. With a passion.

MrBunsy
5 Jul 2006, 08:20
And then there's Air Buccaneers. I love Air Buccaneers. With a passion.You've played AB! :D I loved that mod! Trying to collect water bombs out the river the other day reminded me so much of that gametype where you had to collect the floating gold. Such a pity I can't find anyone online any more. Ah well, at least Red Orchestra is still going front strength to strength.

KamikazeBananze
5 Jul 2006, 09:27
Oh yeh!
I play it whenever I go with friends to a LAN centre in Dublin. I bring along AB, and we play for ages.

Pooka
5 Jul 2006, 09:30
And there are all those Alien Breed fan-recreation-type games.
So yeah, an FPS, eh? Right. I hate those. With a passion. I really, really do. The only one I've ever played and managed to get to grips with was Doom. Games like Deus Ex are ridiculous with their controls using both the keyboard AND the mouse (whoever thought of that one needs a good re-education), Quake was too dark to see anything, ever, so you died for the most ridiculous reasons, and Metroid Prime would be much better if you could actually SEE Samus - the amount of times I've walked off a platform or something because I haven't been able to position her...
...anyway, they're all not very good. I'd say something worse here, but I'd probably get banned.
So, yeah, don't make an FPS. They're worthless, frustrating, pointless, irritating games that are really difficult to control and have little merit whatsoever. If you can reinvent the genre, fine. But my hopes aren't high.
Oh, and if it turns out to be a Worms one I'm throwing myself off the top of Torchwood Tower.

AndrewTaylor
5 Jul 2006, 09:56
Well since Spadge just said they're not making an FPS I reckon you're safe.
Games like Deus Ex are ridiculous with their controls using both the keyboard AND the mouse (whoever thought of that one needs a good re-education)
Seriously, how many hands have you got?

abdallah
5 Jul 2006, 16:01
Lemmings for Wii. Id love it. Smacking Lemmings around with the motion sensing remote.
On the other hand, if theyre using the new Unreal engine the game theyre making is probably not for Wii. Ah yeah I forgot about Sony.. *******s.

Alien King
5 Jul 2006, 16:19
Games like Deus Ex are ridiculous with their controls using both the keyboard AND the mouse (whoever thought of that one needs a good re-education)
Er... how do you play FPS games then?

SupSuper
5 Jul 2006, 17:35
Er... how do you play FPS games then?Well in old FPS like Doom you wouldn't have much trouble using just the keyboard since there's no 3d view.

KamikazeBananze
5 Jul 2006, 17:40
The latest version of Doom allows mouselook.
Doesn't appear to work though.
EDIT: And by the latest version of Doom, I mean the Doom Collection.

Alien King
5 Jul 2006, 18:49
Well in old FPS like Doom you wouldn't have much trouble using just the keyboard since there's no 3d view.
Yes, but in newer FPS games how would you play it?

KamikazeBananze
5 Jul 2006, 18:54
Huh? If you're asking how to play newer FPSes:
Left hand on keyboard. For me, on the WASD keys, since it means I'm not scrunched up at one end of the desk.
Right hand on mouse.
If you're left-handed, as my brother is, you can do it like that, or use a left-handed mouse and use the cursor keys with your right.

Preasure
5 Jul 2006, 19:59
Hmm, for me it's the arrow keys, with return, shift and ctrl set as the other functions I'll need in a situation where I can't afford to stop moving and reach over. Each to his own though, never really got the hang of WASD.

Alien King
5 Jul 2006, 20:12
Hmm, for me it's the arrow keys, with return, shift and ctrl set as the other functions I'll need in a situation where I can't afford to stop moving and reach over. Each to his own though, never really got the hang of WASD.
When I first played Wolfenstein3D it was the Arrow keys. That has stuck with me since. Ctrl, Shift, (Numpad : )Ins(0), End(1), 4 all serve as the alternate functions. Sometimes I use Pagedown too.
The other side of the keyboard is used for the more trivial commands; Talking, Taunting, Objective viewing, stats view, etc.

Plasma
5 Jul 2006, 22:10
Hmm, for me it's the arrow keys, with return, shift and ctrl set as the other functions I'll need in a situation where I can't afford to stop moving and reach over. Each to his own though, never really got the hang of WASD.
I think most FPS now use WASD it's comfortable in combination with mouse than the arrow keys.

AndrewTaylor
5 Jul 2006, 22:22
WASD still isn't great, though. Why nobody has made a little keypad specifically designed for FPS games is beyond me.

Alien King
5 Jul 2006, 22:26
I think most FPS now use WASD it's comfortable in combination with mouse than the arrow keys.
The WASD keys are too close to the others for me. It's uncomfortable, despite it being in a more comfortable place. I do have to move the keyboard or mouse to either side a bit when playing FPS games.

Cyclaws
5 Jul 2006, 22:37
WASD still isn't great, though. Why nobody has made a little keypad specifically designed for FPS games is beyond me.
They have. (http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/input/7a67/) Doesn't look like anything I'd like to use, though.

Alien King
5 Jul 2006, 22:42
They have. (http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/input/7a67/) Doesn't look like anything I'd like to use, though.
Looks like a strange keyboard to me. All they did was move the arrow buttons and stuff.

Plasma
5 Jul 2006, 22:59
WASD still isn't great, though. Why nobody has made a little keypad specifically designed for FPS games is beyond me.
Actually, quite a number of special keyboards were made for certain games. They're just quite uncommon.

SupSuper
6 Jul 2006, 00:30
I have no problem in using the now common WASD, since all the other also common keys like E (Action), C (Crouch, though now they use Left Ctrl but I prefer C), X (Prone), Space (Jump) and such are easily accessible with just my left hand.

MtlAngelus
6 Jul 2006, 05:20
WASD still isn't great, though. Why nobody has made a little keypad specifically designed for FPS games is beyond me.
Hehe I remember K^2 and his obsession with ESDF.

AndrewTaylor
6 Jul 2006, 11:12
Actually, quite a number of special keyboards were made for certain games. They're just quite uncommon.
That's not what I mean. I mean something generic, for FPS games. Most people have several and it need only cost a few pounds.

KamikazeBananze
6 Jul 2006, 11:50
There's the ZBoard:
http://www.zboard.com/europe/
There's a Logitech board:
http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details/IE/EN,CRID=2288,CONTENTID=10717
There's the Saitek board:
http://www.saitek.com/uk/prod/gamerskey.htm
There's the Saitek sort-of glovey thing:
http://www.saitek.com/uk/prod/progamer.htm
Finally, there's the Belkin Nostromo:
http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=157024
I was going to finish with a controller that you actually wear as a glove, but I forgot what it was called...

AndrewTaylor
6 Jul 2006, 16:15
Finally, there's the Belkin Nostromo:
http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=157024
That's what I mean. The others are just keyboards -- they're designed for typing first and gaming second. This thing is exactly what I meant.
It's something new -- it looks unlike a gamepad, unlike a mouse, unlike a joystick, unlike a keyboard. It's a controller designed for FPS games. Never seen one before in my life, though.
Oh, and nobody will ever get me to control a videogame with a glove. No good will come of that.

bonz
6 Jul 2006, 20:52
I got stuck with the WASD keys in 1998 when Half-Life was released.
In every game that hasn't set the keys to the Half-Life default, I reconfigure the Left-Ctrl key for crouching, F for flashlight, E for use (or Q and E for leaning in games that support it) and Shift for running.
controls using both the keyboard AND the mouse (whoever thought of that one needs a good re-education)
HEHE!
That person was John Romero, who actually played his game Doom with mouse AND keyboard back when it was released. :D

Mr.cosmico
9 Jul 2006, 22:29
I use ZBoard. Really awesome keyboard for gaming.
Though it sucks for writing because it's an english keyboard, and its quite different from a portuguese keyboard. So I switch to my old one whevener I'm writing something.

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