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Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by MisterBister on Sun Apr 9th at 12:29pm 2006

Background:
A few days ago I thought about singleplayer and why people dont want to bother making singleplayer MODs as much as they want to make multiplayer.

My inital thought was that multiplayer is simply more fun. The best experiences ive had has actually been when i played multiplayer with my friends, however i then realized that that wasnt the whole truth.

Playing games like Knights of the old republic and Oblivion really made a deep impression on me, and i really do remember them much better, compared to multiplayer. I also had alot of fun playing them.

The biggest problems with creating single-player adventures
Singleplayer often demand less coding, but demands much more of everything else. The story has to be very good, tons of levels has to be made, lots of voice acting and modelling also has to be made aswell as sounds.

One of the biggest problems is that the creator of the mod actually has to make other guys interested in his single-player adventure and make them want to participate. As a Level-Designer you basicly do what the script tells you to do and, at least for me, that doesnt sound very appealing. In multiplayer-mods
much of the work is left for the leveldesigner to decide.

My mod Concept prosposal
While i was thinking about all of this I came up with a possible solution to this.
Why not splitting up the single-player adventure into lots of small adventures featuring different peoples stories in a universe?
The designers then create their own adventure lasting for about 20-30+ minutes, where the designer decides exactly himself what is suppose to happen. Everything is allowed, as long as it fits within the universe.
This way, anyone could participate and it would give a nice outlet for everyone s creativity.
It would also be alot less demanding to make 30 minutes of gameplay, than making 5 hours of gameplay and good storyline.

Lets take the StarWars-universe as an example. Lucas only came up with some of the stuff around the movies. Other writers then helped adding content to the starwars universe who didnt actually work at lucas arts. Hopefully, the sam e thing would happen with this MOD-concept.

The MOD team could create different templates of places, cities and stuff that frequently was used, to speed up the mapmaking.

Mod prosposal
I also came up with a MOD that would fit very well within this concept.

The story takes place in a universe where two intergalactic empires fight eachother on a multiple of planets. The player shares the fate of different soldiers during this conflict on different planets and conditions.

One adventure may be as a spec op soldier working far behind enemy lines, another may be as a common soldier in a gigantic trenchwar on a desertplanet and his daily struggle for survival. The possibilities are pretty much endless.

The ending of theese stories are entirely up to the designer. Follow-ups may be created for the most popular ones and may be presented in updates, and patches.

What do you think of this concept idea, and the MOD prosposal? Good or anus?



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Stadric on Sun Apr 9th at 3:44pm 2006

It's a good idea, but the story line is destined to be intangible, I'm doing something similar myself, and the story line is relatively tangible(save for the parts I just want to confuse the player with) :P




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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Spartan on Sun Apr 9th at 3:54pm 2006

Sounds a lot like Sven Co-op. Probably one of the greatest and most groundbreaking games in terms of gameplay style IMO. Go for it man.




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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by G.Ballblue on Sun Apr 9th at 4:12pm 2006

Meh, I'm writing a Resident Evil fan fiction then I have every intention of turning it into a single player mod :P





Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by ReNo on Sun Apr 9th at 4:29pm 2006

Ballblue: ANOTHER res evil mod? Sorry to sound so cynical, but I've seen about a dozen of them over the years and I'm not sure if a single one of them has been released.

MB: At the moment it's a nice concept, but you haven't really mentioned gameplay. Is gameplay going to be consistent through the mod? In fact, what is the gameplay? Is it an FPS? Primarily action based or are the other elements to it? Any special features that set it apart? Splitting the game into small, self-contained chunks is a good idea, and also promotes iterative releases (that whole episodic content thing) rather than the need to have everything ready at once, but it also places more demands on resources, given that each chapter will probably require unique textures, props, and characters.



Designer @ Haiku Interactive | ReNo-vation.net



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Andrei on Sun Apr 9th at 6:28pm 2006

I for one think the spacewar theme is a little cliche'.




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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by reaper47 on Sun Apr 9th at 8:23pm 2006

It's more of a mindgame than anything else from what I read. But I like the idea of, well, I don't want to use the painful phrase "episodic content" but it's a new take on it. It's not Valve's way of doing it, it's much freer.

It works like a lot of sci-fi themes. Perhaps like a TV series as opposed to a feature film.

But actually what you described reminds me of the Animatrix. I didn't know what to think about it at first but ultimately I found it a much better experience than the overly lenghty Matrix sequels. Every director brought his unique style to the project, taking the Matrix universe as an idea, a concept rather than a background for a storyline.

Interesting thoughts.



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by G.Ballblue on Sun Apr 9th at 9:42pm 2006

The mod proposal itself I think is a bit... unoriginal (not trying to be an arse, but sorry :/ ). An idea that sort of blooms off of the SecretCity idea would be to create a mod that has close to... no killing in it! Think something like Alice in Wonderland, where you don't have to be restricted to graphics or meaning.

Or, you could place any of the four secretcity maps for Sven-Coop to get an idea of what I'm talking about <img src=" SRC="images/smiles/heee.gif">



Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by MisterBister on Sun Apr 9th at 11:00pm 2006

Yes, i know that my MOD idea is very unoriginal and everything. It has nothing unique. The idea is more of an example of how a MOD could look like that followed this concept.

One of my friends suggested the Half-Life universe.
Let the players play citizens of city 17 during the freedom war, or something like that.

? quote:

but it also places more demands on resources, given that each chapter will probably require unique textures, props, and characters.


The thought was that most of the textures and models would be done in prior to the first release, and then used by designers. Of course you had to add some unique characters and stuff into each "chapter" if you want to be serious. But theese things are pretty much up to every designer. As I said, the MOD team would distribute as many templates as possible to speed up creation process.



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Gwil on Sun Apr 9th at 11:17pm 2006

There's a lot to be said for developing single player addons - not even full mods, just map packs akin to the USS Darkstar or ETC for Half Life 1 (both by DaveJ I think, with minimal alterations).

Just adding a few new sentences or simple reskins can add to a well thought out map pack.




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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by omegaslayer on Mon Apr 10th at 12:23am 2006

So this is kinda like DG's map mosaic? only in single player?



Posting And You



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Gwil on Mon Apr 10th at 2:03am 2006

It sounds a lot like Project Quantum Leap. That was meant to be quite good, and i'm sure one of our members contributed a section to it..




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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Forceflow on Mon Apr 10th at 11:52am 2006

DrGlass did a mosaic map project, too.


:: Forceflow.be :: Nuclear Dawn developer



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by mazemaster on Mon Apr 10th at 11:55am 2006

PQL was really fun. There have actually been a couple sequels to it as well. If only I had more free time, I'd definitely contribute.


http://maze5.net



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by habboi on Mon Apr 10th at 9:36pm 2006

Heh just so you know...DG's Mosaic map idea originated from me.
An interesting mod idea but can you make it if you wanted to?

Sadly people like MP over SP as you can play with friends...
Cheer up because there are a few SP mods which I shant mention.





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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by MisterBister on Mon Apr 10th at 10:01pm 2006

? quote:

An interesting mod idea but can you make it if you wanted to?


Have'nt got a clue. Just wanted to share my thoughts.



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by FatStrings on Tue Apr 11th at 2:57am 2006

it would be cool it you could manage to make it into a co-op thing





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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by rival on Tue Apr 11th at 3:40pm 2006

i think its a brilliant idea, but would have to put a lot of time and effort into creating the universe. the universe would ahve to be well defined so any people making content for the mod would know exactly what to do.
I really like the idea though, might start a universe of my own <img src=" SRC="images/smiles/icon_wink.gif">


Bullet Control: $5000 for a bullet.
&quot;I would blow your f**king head off! ...if I could afford it. I'm gonna get another job, start saving some money... then you a dead man!&quot;



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by Pvt.Scythe on Tue Apr 11th at 8:24pm 2006

[getoffmytopic]Has anyone ever created a truly epic space battle mod with ground fights along with on ship fights and spacefighter dogfights? I think not. If you know one tell me immediately.[/getoffmytopic]
I think this kind of a mod template, a ready world, is a good idea. Giving a base for "freelance" level designers to create in a different environment than just the traditional old HL world.



''Everyone wades in s**t until they're competent enough to walk on it. Jesus style.''
Dystopia - Empires



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 Re: Thoughts about saving Singleplayer
Posted by rival on Tue Apr 11th at 10:41pm 2006

? quoting Pvt.Scythe
[getoffmytopic]Has anyone ever created a truly epic space battle mod with ground fights along with on ship fights and spacefighter dogfights? I think not. If you know one tell me immediately.[/getoffmytopic]
I think this kind of a mod template, a ready world, is a good idea. Giving a base for "freelance" level designers to create in a different environment than just the traditional old HL world.

was bored once and scribbled down ideas for starcraft 2. thought it would be a good idea to have rts land battles with Total War style camera and Homeworld style rts space battles.




Bullet Control: $5000 for a bullet.
&quot;I would blow your f**king head off! ...if I could afford it. I'm gonna get another job, start saving some money... then you a dead man!&quot;




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