Neofeud

[SilverSpook]

In capitalist future, power grid uses YOU. 

[Sslaxx]

Someone was a fan of their Megadrive, huh?

[SilverSpook]

I have no idea what you're talking about! 

[SilverSpook]

This is what happens when you're painting while binge-watching Humans, listening to retro-synthwave music, and overhearing Donald Trump ranting on about lazy poor people on CNN in the next room.

[Blondbraid]

This is what happens when you're painting while binge-watching Humans, listening to retro-synthwave music, and overhearing Donald Trump ranting on about lazy poor people on CNN in the next room.

While I haven't seen Humans, I did see the the Swedish series Real Humans (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2180271/?ref_=nv_sr_2) which Humans is a remake of, and I think the series have some pretty great themes and facinating storylines. This game has great potential to broach a lot of real world issues and ask questions about the society we live in, and I can see several parallels between this story and contemporary real life problems, such as the growing numbers of beggars where I live, or all jobs that are either outsourced to cheap labor countries or made redundant by technology. It will be most interesting to see how this game turns out!

[Gurok]

Thanks, SilverSpook! Great recommendation. I'm up to episode 5 now. It's a little tellingly low budget (there's not much in the way of effects), but I don't think there really needs to be. It's good drama with, as Blondbraid mentioned, some great themes. Story started off a little matter-of-factly, "life's hard, going to buy an android". But it really picks up after a few episodes. Not bad!

[SilverSpook]

Thanks Blondbraid and Gurok!

I think Humans is probably the most mature, if not the most expensive, rumination on what the arrival of true AI, androids, might be like that I've seen.  Like Blade Runner, Terminator, and Battlestar Galactica gave up the comic-book action; the blasters, neon-smeared trenchcoats, and hyperspace stuff.  Humans is very non-stylized as Gurok mentioned, so if you like visual spectacle, might want to look elsewhere.  It's 'mundane' low-FX sci fi on the order of Orphan Black.

But sometimes setting things so close to home (literally IN an average home) is the most startling and compelling thing you can do.  I think Humans works precisely because it isn't comfortably 'somewhere out there in The Astounding Future', but right here on our doorstep.  Machines taking over not with Matrix mind control or with armies of heavily armed metal skeletons or even by (merely) taking our jobs.  They take over by being there for our children, for our husbands and wives, when we're not.  The synths become better 'humans' than us humans. 

A major theme I want to explore in Neofeud is in line with this: a world in which machines become deeply human, and humans become cold, calculating tech-addicts and careerists.

But I want to also run around in trenchcoats and hack in my retro phonebooths a bit too.  Which is part of what I like about point-n-click adventure games: you can pare down the man-hours of a live action film or a 3D Skyrim or even a 2D RPG to just a few stylized backgrounds and some sprites and get away with that.

[SilverSpook]

Future machines are not only smart as humans: they're also well-armed and grumpy.

"Warning!  You are illegally tampering with government property."



"Oh shit.  No, no!  I'm, I'm a government employee, officially officiating... official government activities...  Definitely NOT tampering-  I was just testing your, uh, structural integrity, you know, in case of a real energy thief tamperer."

"(Tap tap) Yep!  You're nice and solid and theft deterring, alright!"

"Continued infractions detected.  As a pseudo-sentient Artificial Consciousness I am hereby authorized to neutralize you until arrival of police."

"NO NO NO!  No neutralization necessary!  Emergency Shutdown!  Uh, remember the first rule of robotics, 'I must not allow harm to come to a human-'"



"I'm sorry, there was a slight miscalculation in neutralization measures.  Medical personnel have been alerted, and will be arriving shortly.  Thank you for choosing EnerGenius."

[Creamy]

It wouldn't have happened with a Nintendo
I can't wait to play this.

[Blondbraid]

Future machines are not only smart as humans: they're also well-armed and grumpy.

"I'm sorry, there was a slight miscalculation in neutralization measures.  Medical personnel have been alerted, and will be arriving shortly.  Thank you for choosing EnerGenius."

All good stories are meant to make the audience feel deep and powerful emotions and seeing the protagonist
die in such a way almost made me burst into tears as I felt a very strong sensation of schadenfreude.

[SilverSpook]

@Creamy: Haha, yes, Nintendo is much friendly and G-rated   Thanks!

@Blondbraid: Lol!  Yes I hope you get some serious feels from Neofeud, of all kinds.

[selmiak]

dis da burner!

[SilverSpook]

COP: "Why the hell are you smoking anyway?  You're silicon and chrome -- you ain't got lungs or any meatware to get a buzz."
PROTO-J: "You old whack honky- smoking be straight up about flexin' dat style.  Don't you see how I'm killin dat bad-boy look?"

I've now got over 50% of the backgrounds done, just working on fleshing out the characters, implementing the hundred thousand lines of script, all that fun-sauce.

[AnasAbdin]

I can't wait to see those scenes in action. You're doing an awesome job mister.

[SilverSpook]

Thanks man!  It's been a learning curve doing 2D animation in AGS, but we're getting there!

[SilverSpook]

"Hm, this fluid looks like it could be spilled mythium, a hardcore cyber-narcotic for sentient machines.  If I could find some myth, it'd be useful for planting on robot kids to meet my drug arrest quota..."

[imgzoom]http://i.imgur.com/9q7a0fG.gif[/imgzoom]

"Naw, this ain't myth.  This is just Predator blood.  Nothing useful."

[Fitz]

Have I told you just how much I love the intense, saturated lights? The reds, lime greens -- and, of course, magentas! You could make videos for some horror synth band, like this one.

Also, I just love the tagline: "Smart - so you don't have to be" What I love about dystopias is that they're deeply rooted in todays world, just showing it for what it is rather than what it pretends to be.

[Blondbraid]

"Naw, this ain't myth.  This is just Predator blood.  Nothing useful."

Just read that when they made the movie Predator, they used Vaseline and the stuff inside glow sticks to make the creatures blood.

What I love about dystopias is that they're deeply rooted in todays world, just showing it for what it is rather than what it pretends to be.

I agree 100%, all good fiction deals with reality one way or another. Can't wait to play this game!

[AnasAbdin]

It's amazing how busy your backgrounds can get, yet not too messy to comprehend. I mean I had a little trouble with some older famous adventure games backgrounds having too much elements causing it to hurt my eyes. But with Neofeud, you made it more like the messier the better

[SilverSpook]

@Fitz:  Haha, coincidentally (or perhaps synergistically?) I was in fact listening to some Perturbator while painting some of these backgrounds.    I am a big fan of the 80's colors myself, it's that honeymoon-phase cities had with florescence and electronic/digital tech. 

And I think you're exactly right; to me dystopias take the downplayed and ignored problems in the world and re-mix them at a high volume so they're glaringly obvious.  Science fiction is always about the moment it's written in.   

@Blondbraid: Cool!  That makes perfect sense!  I'll need to get some live action footage of the pred blood cause I'll be using it a lot more in Neofeud. 

@AnasAbdin: Thanks.   In the scene with the tasting of the predator blood, that background is a literal pile of junk, and the one place where you'll have to play a little sandbox-scavenger dig type game.  It's not a pixel hunt though- the objects will be fairly obvious.  More like getting into the teacher's treasure box of stickers and candies, except in this case it's more like getting to rifle through Dr. Parnassus' Wonder Emporium or Ridley Scott's subconscious manifested into physical detritus.  (Or more accurately, my subconscious, hehe.)

It's a good excuse to throw in some worldbuilding backstory in the object descriptions, which doesn't consist of going through an e-newspaper article or reading emails or dossier, because I think that's just a liiiiiittle overdone in games, especially sci-fi / cyberpunk games.