Space Quest: Time is of the essence (Preview Available)

Started by ArmyMage, Mon 09/04/2012 20:33:55

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ArmyMage

Space Quest: Time is of the essence, This is a rebirth off the science fiction comedy adventure game series that sierra games never could finish. The graphics are being designed with several different types of 3d programs / rendering engines, recreating the graphics with a classic but new 2d/3d experience.

The game story will take place in the future, making fun of pretty much everything science fiction, your main character in this adventure game, is a first class janitor, that has fixations to clean things. The beginning sequence of the game, your main character aka the hero of the game's girl friend gets captured, and you set out on a mission to rescue her, from your arch nemesis.

The freelance game development group called "Sludge Entertainment", is hard at work remaking classic point and click adventure games making it available to play adventure games once again with that classic feel that everyone craves, with more modern graphics but not over scaled in development. "Sludge Entertainment" is remaking the classic style graphics with a 3d feel, but not turning the game into a consoled based design, keeping it original to what sierra games have made in past with a facelift.

There will be a playable demo available soon in year 2015.

Space Quest Demo Progress Report: 5/28/15
- graphics 90%
- puzzles 90%
- scripting 90%
- music/sound 90%

here are some concept designs 3d/2d rendered, all images are subject to change, during game development.

Engine Screenshots









"Star base"



"The Bar."



"Alien Planet"



"Aliens"



New Website in the works.
Project: Space Quest

Check us out on facebook
https://www.facebook.com/SludgeEnt

Heres some videos of progression.
The Bimbo
Beatrice
Animation Test
The Hero

Game Engine - Preview

The forums and this thread both can be checked for current development updates... Thanks all :)

DrSlash

#1
Is it and The Stolen Vehicle the same project?

ArmyMage

Negative, two total different projects... The stolen vehicle never would have made it off the ground, recycling the old graphics, from the original game, the graphics in this game design the graphics are being recreated from scratch.. using blender, and a virtual 3d environment, bringing the 2d/3d graphics to life.. this has been a on going project, as far as writing the storyline, and will be a finished project, in the end.., it has always been my dream to play a new sequel to the original series of Space Quest. which is why we are making this development, this adventure will contain, puzzles, death scenes, voice acting, and comical spoofs, just like the originals were made, and the once again the graphics are being done in a 2d / 3d environment. its kinda like Hollywood doing the blue-screen effect, with video, i am doing the same with animating avatars, not to mention custom animating them for death scenes, and responses / actions in the game-play, over all this game will be worth waiting for "mark my words :)"

Sslaxx

Sounds promising! I hope this works out.
Stuart "Sslaxx" Moore.

pcj

Quote from: ArmyMage on Tue 10/04/2012 14:45:11it has always been my dream to play a new sequel to the original series of Space Quest

You are aware of the two original fangames that just came out, right - VSB and Incinerations? Your basic plot sounds a little like VSB so I'm not sure...

Also I would kind of want to suggest you avoid calling it SQ7, but that's just my opinion from being around the block on SQ fangame naming. ;)
Space Quest: Vohaul Strikes Back is now available to download!

mjomble

Heh, this reminds me a lot of the early years of VSB.
In fact, the team even used to be called "SludgeSoft Interactive", but at some point we dropped that.
I hope it takes less than 9-10 years to complete this one, though :)

The idea of making a playable demo first is a good one - it'll give you a good idea of the amount of work needed to produce a fully functional game. One of the reasons VSB took so long was a combination of too much ambition and too little experience in actually completing something. In other words, we bit off more than we could chew (without it taking huge amounts of time, that is).

And I'll second pcj's comment (I'd actually typed out most of this before he posted) - calling it SQ7 may be more trouble than it's worth, as it increases the risk of the project getting shut down.
The main reason many fangames get shut down seems to be that the copyright holders don't want players to mistake fangames for something they're legally responsible for (e.g. "I saw something in a Space Quest game that I didn't like! Let's sue Activision and teach them a lesson!").
So they have two options - either evaluate the fangame, make sure there's no unsuitable content, spend time working together with the team, etc... or just take the simpler, cheaper and safer way of shutting it down.
A good example is The Silver Lining - when it used to be called King's Quest IX, the copyright holder saw it as very easily confusable with their intellectual property and they had it shut down. But eventually they reached a compromise by calling the game "The Silver Lining" and dropping the "King's Quest IX" part.
There was a time we were calling our game "Space Quest 8: Vohaul Strikes Back", but dropped the number (and in many situations, the "Space Quest:" prefix) for the very same reason.

Also, grabbing the exact number and title of a planned official sequel would put a lot of pressure on the game's quality. It may easily turn a numberless game's "It's a good game and a fun adventure for Roger" review to a "It's not bad, but doesn't really live up to the expectations I had for a proper Space Quest 7".
You should play Vohaul Strikes Back and Incinerations (they both happen to be fan made Space Quest sequels made with AGS).
And then tell everybody on the planet about them. And off the planet.

ArmyMage

Quote from: pcj on Wed 11/04/2012 13:19:22
Quote from: ArmyMage on Tue 10/04/2012 14:45:11it has always been my dream to play a new sequel to the original series of Space Quest

You are aware of the two original fangames that just came out, right - VSB and Incinerations? Your basic plot sounds a little like VSB so I'm not sure...

Also I would kind of want to suggest you avoid calling it SQ7, but that's just my opinion from being around the block on SQ fangame naming. ;)

Thanks for the advice, and the suggestions.. i have been working on the story long before those two games were made, and they are not molded around any other space quest game, it is build up from the ground up... we have been working on the story for SQ7 for years, this is not my first time around, on an attempt to make a new adventure of this magnitude, as far as the name, SQ7 is perfectly fine, i am not going to call it space quest, since sierra still hold right to the original name and i could catch flax on that... So the game will be called "SQ7 - this time it's personal" the main character will be named roger instead of roger wilco, i am cutting characters names short, to avoid copy write, honestly i am not afraid of copy write, but you never know, i delt with a emulator for about 6 years called earth & beyond, and let me tell you, game company's can be very mean if they want to be :)

However, on the earth and beyond project, we had claimed it as a public community owned game, and we were able to setup donations for the servers, software and equipment. as long as it proceeds were not being used directly for profiting off of a copy written game, there is not really much that can be done on EA Games end as long as it's profit was claimed as public donations, rather then payments or sales, however that project used its profits from donations to pay for the servers and software.

The truth is if any game company feels that there profit is at threat they will make any attempt into recover or kill the competition before it will get that far, i don't think this fangame we are working on is going to spark one of those issues, but i do thank you for your concern once again, and any kind of advice is welcome to this project :)

I will be perfectly honest with everyone i am not going to try to sell a fanmade / remake of an original series fangame, this game is going to be made using free software that is available to anyone, that has the knowledge to use it, AGS being a big stage point in all this and a big thanks to Chris Jones for making AGS happen..

pcj

That's cool, I of course wish you the best of luck and will try to keep an open mind about you trying to claim SQ7 status in fandom ;)

A few comments on the content now:
Roger looks a bit more muscular than he's usually depicted, is that intended or are you working on that still? He's generally seen as a lanky janitor.
How much of the game is revisiting old locations? All of the location renders shown are from existing SQ work - while that's probably somewhat easier for you, it's potentially less interesting for players. Some of the locations make sense, I guess - but it would be nice to have more variety.
Not a big fan of the logo - not very striking/exciting, etc, but you've got time to work on that.
Space Quest: Vohaul Strikes Back is now available to download!

ArmyMage

Quote from: pcj on Wed 11/04/2012 19:13:08
That's cool, I of course wish you the best of luck and will try to keep an open mind about you trying to claim SQ7 status in fandom ;)

A few comments on the content now:
Roger looks a bit more muscular than he's usually depicted, is that intended or are you working on that still? He's generally seen as a lanky janitor.
How much of the game is revisiting old locations? All of the location renders shown are from existing SQ work - while that's probably somewhat easier for you, it's potentially less interesting for players. Some of the locations make sense, I guess - but it would be nice to have more variety.
Not a big fan of the logo - not very striking/exciting, etc, but you've got time to work on that.

There will be some revisiting of some of the areas from the original series, there will be alot of new alien planets and spaceships along with aliens / characters them selfs. most of the revisited areas are remade in full 3d/2d designs, keeping it original but adding more detail and animation interaction. as far as roger that is a concept render, there will be a few more designs before we set it in stone to what we are going to use for the static choice.

as far as all the locations shown being from the original there is somewhat of a time travel that happens in the storyline, to where he arrives in new areas and meets new characters / aliens.

and the logo and all the images shown are subject for change as i have stated above the image posts.


now for some questions to the fans:

what do you guys think so far?

should we make up a new name / title?

any other input on the current developments shown is welcome.

pcj

Wasn't "This Time It's Personal" the working title for (one of) the planned official SQ7? If so I would say you should definitely change it. I think something more spoofy like other SQ titles would probably fit better.
Space Quest: Vohaul Strikes Back is now available to download!

ArmyMage

The original working titles that were going to be used are listed below.

Space Quest 7
- This time it's Personal
- Show me the Buckazoids
- Return of Roman Numerals

the difference between our title and the original, is we are not using the name space quest 7 in the title, it is going to be merely "SQ7", there wont be any direct reference to the original name / character names, basically spoofing a spoofed :).

ArmyMage

Quote from: pcj on Wed 11/04/2012 19:32:36
Wasn't "This Time It's Personal" the working title for (one of) the planned official SQ7? If so I would say you should definitely change it. I think something more spoofy like other SQ titles would probably fit better.

What do you think about "SQ7 - Time is of the essence", i think it sounds kinda fitting its self, considering there is time travel back to rogers roots in the storyline.

pcj

It's OK, I guess, not really catchy or anything. I don't really know the whole plot you have going either so I can't really gauge the appropriate-ness.
Space Quest: Vohaul Strikes Back is now available to download!

ArmyMage

#13
Quote from: pcj on Wed 11/04/2012 19:55:14
It's OK, I guess, not really catchy or anything. I don't really know the whole plot you have going either so I can't really gauge the appropriate-ness.

well once again thanks for the input, ill stick with this title for now, maybe i will find a perfectly catchy title in the end, there still is a little ways to go before everything is set in static, as far as the progress of development everything is moving along perfectly... i shall release more information on the plot, as production moves foreword... keep updated on this thread for more information and details..

mjomble

#14
Good call on the title change.

I'm a bit confused about the "It's SQ7, but not Space Quest 7" aspect, though. It seems weird to include a specific number that happens to be that of the latest Space Quest game plus one, and at the same time make the Space Quest part less specific.

"Space Quest: Time is of the essence" would be a more logical choice, in my opinion. Or even "SQ: Time is of the essence". But the number is still creating a very strong association with Space Quest 7, even if you say it's not.

As for further feedback, I'm not a big fan of the overall look and feel of the game.
It probably took a lot of time and effort to create these 3D scenes and work out all the details, and it's looking better than anything I could produce, but at the end of the day, many of these screenshots still look a little dull (especially the outside shot of the bar).

I guess the thing is that it's pretty damn tricky to make 3D look good in an adventure game. Incinerations managed to pull it off somehow, but for most games like these, it's far easier to get a natural, fitting look with 2D graphics.

There was a time when VSB had a lot more 3D content in it, and a lot of it had similar quality to these screenshots. Over time, we replaced most of it with 2D graphics and also removed some cutscenes entirely. Most of the 3D content left in VSB was created at a later time by Chris, who used similar techniques as in Incinerations.

I'm not sure how helpful this comment is - it seems you've already created a lot of 3D content and suddenly switching everything to 2D isn't an option. I guess one option is to play Incinerations and study the backgrounds to maybe pick up some rendering techniques that make them look more natural.
You should play Vohaul Strikes Back and Incinerations (they both happen to be fan made Space Quest sequels made with AGS).
And then tell everybody on the planet about them. And off the planet.

ArmyMage

#15
Everything in the beginning can lack detail, all the little details have not been filled in yet in the bar scene, for one there is lack of other space ships, and even the detail on the spaceships or skins have not been added, don't worrie it will all fill in, you will see it in the final release of the demo. everything in the space quest series that was public was crowded with people / aliens and all things in the background that was spoofed from the tv / movies, these images that are in a 2d / 3d form are beginning stages to the developments.. as far as the show of the demo, its just a brief idea on how it all will mesh together into one when they are finished, the scenes in the demo ill even agree to it being dodgy and lack of detail.

I do have another more current video of progress in the works, with the new rendered roger and more filled in animated scenes, which will be release in the very near future.

mjomble

Ah, good to know. Looking forward to the demo :D
You should play Vohaul Strikes Back and Incinerations (they both happen to be fan made Space Quest sequels made with AGS).
And then tell everybody on the planet about them. And off the planet.

Sslaxx

Stuart "Sslaxx" Moore.


Darth Mandarb

WOW!  8-0

I think this just might be a new record! Well over an eight year old necro-post by a member who hasn't logged in for over five years!!

Sledgy - haven't you done this before? Please don't dig up old threads mmmmmkay?

Move along people... nothing to see here!

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