Neofeud

[SilverSpook]

New pics!  "Murdoch Beach", a 2030 vacation destination.  Don't forget your lei in this postcard paradise!  "I found my thrill at the Gernsbeck Grill."

Also, welcome to alphadalekben, the newest member of the Neofeud team!  Ben is the leader of 58, another AGS game currently on hiatus.  He's since joined forces with us and is working on Neofeud's brand-spanking-new cyberarm-mounted PDA interface.

[alphadalekben]

Speaking of the devil, here I am. Just here to say hi and delve into the PDA system in a bit more detail.

Basically it's a Windows-95 style interface (which I devised from the general jist of the GDD) where you can do two things:



• Look at background information.
• Get hints and tips on how to progress if the player gets stuck.

Not much I know but, considering how much background information that SilverSpook has created for the game (and, my goodness, what a lot there is), I thought it would be a shame to let it go to waste whilst not hampering repeat playthroughs of the game. Believe me, with what we're planning to put in, you'll want those repeat playthroughs. My lips are sealed...

Cheers,
alphadalekben

UPDATE AS OF 2.5.2015!

After a brainstorming session, we have come up with a new feature (well, two technically, but hey). It is as follows:
We have devised a new 'notes' system, which contains information on the lore of 'Neofeud' (hence why I have crossed out the corresponding information on the PDA announcement - or rather it should be if formatting was playing around.). You can also get hints about who to call on the PDA if help is needed, rather than giving a hint to solve the corresponding puzzle. That is what the PDA is for.

Both features don't need to be used in order to complete the game; they are there to expand upon the game world and give hints should the player want them. So, for you purists out there, your challenge will be intact, don't you worry.

Another feature that we have come up with is to have 'Previously' cutscenes when you load up a same file, which recaps the most recent events in the plot and gives hints on how to progress the plot. A map feature will also be put in if you want to check your destination during gameplay. Again, there will be an option to skip said cutscenes before they begin, so the 'purist' experience will not be spoiled.

Cheers again,
alphadalekben

PS. I mean no offence by the 'purist' comments. I just imagine there will those who wish to play the game without any hints whatsoever, so we'll be catering to both crowds by making these features optional.

[SilverSpook]

Here's some extra teaser material for you fine neofeudal lords and ladies.  After countless transforminating of cinematic robot cliches and biomechanical upcycling parts from the junkyard half a mile down the street from DARPA, I give you Neofeud Protagonist The Second, Proto-J 2.0.



Six Billion Dollar Baller

(Proto-J ft. DJ Re-Zet)

(Cue 80's MTV music video reminiscent of Public Enemy's "Fight The Power")

Uh.  Bot-boy fo' life, yo.
Proto-J steppin' up like steppin razor.
Haterz get off ma blue chromeplate shoes. 
DJ Re-Zet drop that mutha fuckin' h-bomb

(Beat Drops)

Proto-J be straight wreckin' Coastaz po-po
Crashin' fuzz drones like Zero-Cool in da no-fly zone
Vanilla Ice cold killa, thrill you in da landfilla
Terminate you face off like a Nick Cage ninja

Born a Hypetech lab, 6-billion dollar balla
Silver sparkplug in my mouth, lab rat of ma father
"Prototype for da future" but a cage for Proto-J
Raged against da machine, bots on muthafuckin' parade

Shockwave took me apart like Johnny 5, disassemble
Scraped lith from the street, jacked new arm bling from Wal Mart androz.
Rolled wit da Kromeboyz and da Frankenfreakz too
Human haters gonna hate, spit on my mothafuckin shoes

But I be risin' to da top, blowin up overseas
Now da whiteshoe meatbags all gunnin for a piece of me
Fuck you!  I online, takin over like Skynet
Nuke you phonies from orbit, time for a hard reset!

(Snare rush, dub-step blaze)

DJ Re-Zet rockin yo sox, Proto-J rockin da robo-Rebox.

Bot-boy, out.



Reebok "Futurestepz", custom modded with durithium spring soles, snap straight into Proto-J's Achilles' swivel-joint.

[donkeymilk]

This looks like it's gonna be a good one.
The pics look fantastic.

[MufasaRKG]

Hand painted or just custom design paintings

[SilverSpook]

The Neofeud images are painted in Photoshop for the most part using a Wacom Intuos tablet.  Not actual physical paint-on-canvas, if that's what you mean!  Thanks for your interest!

[SilverSpook]

Neofeud progress is supercharging faster than Tesla Powerwall sales! We've taken Elon Musk, Mars colonizer / world saving alt-energy guru extroardinaire's advice. "You have to put in 80-100 hour weeks. You have to get done in 6 months what the competition accomplishes in a year." Because that is the approximate time-horizon of Neofeud: 6 months. (off-the-record! We're not vaporware but don't hold us to that release date!)


"If you want a cyberprosthetics job done right you've got to it yourself!"

That's right, we're talking sustainable DIY cybrogery here. Upcycling Nintendo gamepads and picosatellite dishes into interactive minigames to do Lucas Arts proud.

We're giving you the quality brain-juice puzzles, taste-the-rust gritty cautionary dystopia, and copious (though hopefully not annoying!) pop/mid/high-brow cultural references from Terminator to Brazyl to please your inner 12-year-old SNES-nerd, your inner 20-year-old cybergoth Philosophy major, and your outer 32-year-old IT administrator with ADHD toddlers and overbearing middle-management bosses!



An unemployed disaster-response robot waits in line for welfare, battery-stamps, and Section 8.

Trying to make the robot's tentacles appear as though they consist of a piezoelectric polymer (or some sort of artificial muscle failing that). He's supposed to be kind of an all-terrain post-earthquake rescue machine, fully automated and sentient.

And yes, he is allusive to the Matrix intentionally


Speaking of Elon Musk and space tourism, here we have Murdoch Beach. The arcologized resort in the background is one of the many exotic neofeudal arcologies accessible by orbital hypersonic jet in Neofeud.

In less figurative news: we have about 10-20 minutes of fleshed out gameplay at the moment and hope to recruit some testers to try out a short playable demo of Neofeud.  Stay tuned and drop us a line if you'd be interested in helping out with focus-grouping and feedbacking on Neofeud!

[selmiak]

okay, that SNES controller cyberprosthetics  did it for me, I'm intrigued and would like to help you with playtesting.

[Frikker]

I too would be interested in playtesting If you still need help

[SilverSpook]

Thanks for the interest and kind words Frikker and selmiak!  I'll let you know when we're ready for the broader playtesting phase.

Here's another (brain) teaser for you Philosopher Kings and Queens.  I feel this image kind of encapsulates the "Big Picture" themes of Neofeud fairly well.  What makes us human?  What life forms should be considered to have human-like rights and priveleges?  What will AI be like when it literally "Hit's the streets", as in, walks down the street and gets hooked on meth and Angry Birds?  Is it justifiable to throw some under the bus in the name of accelerated progress?  What do we as a society do with our "defective" -- mentally unsound, lazy, criminally inclined -- people?  Should we do anything?



IMPORTANT INFORMATION WHEN APPLYING FOR PUBLIC ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS:

If you require an interpreter, prehensile prosthetic, or mind-body interface to complete this application, please message 491.183.4.1 or visit the nearest Sentient Services office.

ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS

In order to be eligible for support, the applicant will be required to pass a Gortzel-Takeda consciousness test (*Note - individuals scoring below a 4.1 may be classified as "sub-human" and may have their citizenship revoked, and all property confiscated by the City-State.) The consciousness requirement is waived for human applicants.

The applicant will also be required to produce proof of citizenship with photo ID in addition to:

HUMANS: DNA fingerprinting registration

HYBRID SPECIES (CHIMERAS): Mitochondrial genome triangulation

SENTIENT MACHINES: Idiosyngraph ID (90% + Match under electroencephalograph)

The Coastland City DSS welcomes upstanding conscious organisms of all species and chemical compositions. If you believe you have experienced human exceptionalism, anthopomorphization, and/or substrate chauvinism, please file an official written grievance form 1024J with the Office of Interspecies Affairs.

[SilverSpook]

Sentient Services Exterior.

[SilverSpook]

I call her "The DMV Nazi Lady".  An office worker at Sentient Services.

"I'm sorry ma'am. Regulations are regulations. You need a consciousness quotient of 4.1 and above to qualify as a fually conscious and sentient entity."

"This isn't fair! These humans don't have to take a stupid test! What have they got that I don't!"

"Humans are sentient persons by default, ma'am. They have personhood by heredity."

"What makes you so goddamn special, just cause you got the right double-helix of DNA!? This is that, what's I called… Anthrocentrism! Anthrocentrist bullshit!"

"Security! Please escort this non-sentient Humanoid to the exit immediately!"

Exo-suited guards show up, grab the woman robot by her arms, take her baby and kick her out of the building.

"(exhasperated sigh) And to think we used to waste our human resources on these pathetic glorified Roombas and genetic-engineering failures.  My promotion to the Coastlandia Central Office can't come soon enough."

[SilverSpook]

[embed=720,405]http://youtu.be/qNJknszN1V0[/embed]


Driving animation!  Now with 100% more parallax and shifty-eyed freeway driving.  Now I just need to figure out how to get Karbon to launch his Toyota Solaris into a helicopter.

Also added some character to the Coastlandia Road Warrior.

This will be for the "Map Travel" montage, when Karl fast-travels from inner-city to landfill, or landfill to Capitol, etc. etc..

Dubsteppy background track courtesy of yours truly (super shoestring budget here!)  More soundtrack over here: https://silverspook.bandcamp.com/

[AlphaCodeOverride]

Lookin' great SilverSpook Sorry that I've been a bit AWOL on this site as well. Last time i logged in was when i was asking questions about scripting code for the FIRST version of the game. Before unity and regression back to AGS. I'm looking forward to testing the demo.

P.S. I will be updating this account name from my old ModDB and IndieDB account name Dentonoid to my current one right after this post.

Take care,
--AlphaCodeOverride

[SilverSpook]

Thanks for the continued support, however out of commission you temporarily were, AlphaCodeOverride.

Progress continues!  I am right now working on getting my head around the dialog system and adding voice acting to cutscenes, all that jazz.  I'm testing out my own voice and will probably start looking for voice actors soon.

A little teaser for you guys  



Yes, in 2030, even social justice warriors have been made obsolete by AI.

[Ibispi]

This looks really good, SilverSpook. I'm looking forward to it.

[SilverSpook]

Thanks, Ibispi!  Hopefully it will live up to its looks, hehe.

[SilverSpook]

[embed=800,450]http://youtu.be/asTKrXLHbTU[/embed]

The future is feudal!

And unnecessarily overbearing!

Progress is progressing well!  Of late I've been learning all the various ropes of AGS and trying not to tie myself into Gordian knots with them.  Namely, trying to get 1366x768 hi-res scenes with umpteen moving parts to work properly.  The above promo serves as a small badge, a proof of concept for the style I'm aiming for. 

Due to the increased detail and micromanagement, I may have to push back the timeline slightly.  I was aiming for an October release, however I also don't want to rush this and skimp too much on the details, the grime under the fingernails, the battery acid leaking from the corners of mouths.  That's the strong suit of going higher-res, anyway, right?  Why not add little sparks of quantum foam to that time machine?

I'm also looking into voice actors as time allows, my network provides, and 2015 W2 federal tax return affords.  If any pro voice gurus are feeling generous (freemium generous), drop me a line!  I can promise you honorable mentions, discounted airbnb if you're ever in Hawaii, and some of the most challenging characters you'll ever attempt at portraying*. 

(*Challenging due to my grammatical deficiencies and CNCD (Chronic Neologism Coining Disorder -- but don't worry, I'll provide a pronunciation key).

[SilverSpook]

My recently published science fiction short story in Mythaxis Magazine. Set in the world of Neofeud  CAUTION: Contains strong language, graphic scenes, and random acts of senseless robot violence.

Proto-J



Excerpt:

Back in the day, when I was 12 (2 in human years), living in the homeless shelter for sentient machines, I figured it dat I was tricked out. I had some technomancy juju shit all up in my fuckin CPU, bruh. Serious Matrix shit. For real, dog.

Dis one time I was gettin' mah brainpan bashed in by a gang of fuckin' speciesist meatbag humans, trying to jack mah wallet-chip. Dey's like, "Fuckin' machine! Go back to the junkyard, where you belong! Welfare leech!" One second I'm getting baseball bats to the head, next thing I know, there's this golden light. Not gold like dat icys and cashmoney baller bling shit like in dem phony rap vids. Gold like… da sun's fuckin nukular core, man. Like I'm being filled wit dis fuckin… spirit, dog. Like I've got Tupac and B. I. G. and Chuck D. all rolled into one. Like I'm opening up my third mother fuckin eye crazy shit.

Then, it's like… I ain't even got words for it… It's like, like I'm *inside* the heads of the meatbags.

Like, I feel the hater inside them hatin' on me for bein a chrome. I feel the white-knuckle grip on the bat they beatin' me with. I know the name of their swanky boarding school 1st grade teacher who taught them about the superiority of the human race.

And I'm like, "Fuck that shit. How you like it someone beat your fuckin' face in?"

And it's like, I got little golden spiderthread Astral puppetstrings comin out mah brain jackin straight into their arms and legs. I yank one string, they freeze mid-swing. Then they turn the bats on each other. Start goin' apeshit breakin' each other's arms and legs with the bats, till they all fall down like fuckin' Spartans in dat 300 movie. All the while my head goin' "WTF is going on!?" but also, "This the most beautiful fuckin' thing I seen in my life. Good for dem fuckin' dickhead talkin' monkeys."

[AnasAbdin]

Great read SilverSpook I really love the art style of Neofeud. Best of luck and keep up with the awesome updates