We’re quite busy now, and I’m happy to say that we are spending most of the time on warp speed development this week.
We made significant changes to payer physic and are currently working on a few more extra features that are supposed to improve the overall movement quality.
Moreover, we’re preparing to finally set off with the website. The launch was originally scheduled on April 15th, however, there are couple more cool things that we want to get done before we officially say hi. We intend to start releasing alpha versions of Warp Speed and we’re working on the introduction video as well. These two require a few issues to be resolved and that’s what consumes all the time now.
There’s no way for a game to become an AAA+ title if it does not look badass these days. I know you’re all tired with almost monochromatic videos wesz posts from time to time to show off his skillz, therefore I decided to mix a few textures I’ve made in the meantime so you can see how the game’s gonna look like in the future.
Click on the screens to see full size preview. I suggest that for better experience you check them out in fullscreen mode.
The dude as well as the weapons are just placeholders for future ball-breaking artworks.
There’s only a few textures present but obviously there’s a lot more to come. Whereas these here do not have too many details, I’m planning on enriching them later on as currently I’m working on getting a few more base textures that’ll look fine together when you actually texture something with them. This proved to be the hardest part so far. In general designing textures that are supposed to look fine from all four points of view is kind of tricky. I’ll go over this process in a following weeks if I’m lucky. Enjoy and stay tuned by then!
Long time since last post, but warp speed is still under development! Yes, that’s true, I have prepared this short post for all those assholes, that don’t follow the progress. Here is a list of new things:
3d sound engine
weapon and particle system
animations
VFS
new scripting language – game monkey
static lightmaps
dynamic lightning
auto-update feature
improved modding
almost finished network code
I decided to invite several people to test possibilities of warp engine, mainly hardware compatibility issues, speed, quality and modding capabilities. If you’re interested, please mail / twitt me.
Almost forgot to mention that Netsu and Tymek from the Double Dude have joined the inglorious basterds team!
This video shows very basic level editor for warp speed.
It’s speed is like 200% as my hardware is just as lazy as me and wouldn’t record it at normal circumstances unfortunately.
At the moment we can create polygons (triangles and quads) in diffrent type of material, like free, solid, platform, damage etc. You can texture polygons, paint each vertex, put objects, spawn points and do other basic stuff like moving/transforming objects. I did basic layer managment and UV editor, but it isn’t useful for now, needs to be rewritten. In the future you will be able to put many diffrent objects like weapons OR lights, export/import meshes geometry, paint everything with brush like in photoshop, add different effects and customize GUI. Our priority of course is flexibility and usability. Usability, which quite often gets forgotten by indie developers. No, we want to be our level editor to just as friendly as any other software with intuitive and user friendly navigation and stuff.
A statement that can be often heard when speaking of 2d shooters – “It cannot compare to 3D titles gameplay”. For today, we like or not, it’s a pretty much correct. However, can we assume that 2D multiplayer shooter games market is/have ever been at it’s best? NO. A couple of good titles have came out (I say a couple but anything signifcant that I can really think of is soldat) have come out over the years. The titles, that people would play because they are fun to play over the internet with friends AND they do enable people to play at a competitive level.
Since we have desired to fill this gap for a very long time now, we’ve finally found a way. It’s called warp speed, it has no storyline, no tons of gore, and it’s being created for only one reason – to become the greatest and the most playable 2D multiplayer shooter game to have ever been created.
Enough talking, let’s get straight to the point.
Now, if after watching this piece You can FEEL what’s coming, we’re done. Whatever I write here about the process of getting to that concept, and how it’s in very alpha stage and that the video only shows the movement idea, You are our fan already and You are waiting for more. If You don’t, well, then it means that either You are not into 2D shooters/high paced games or… I don’t really know… Perhaps you can share with your thoughts in the comments.
The main goals in short:
fast paced game (no hiding, no sniper rifle, no lying in the bushes, no headshots made with every shitty weapon available)
easy to learn to anybody (you don’t need 10 additional buttons for grenades, prone state, flying, throwing rope and whatever)
enabling competitive playing (the game basics are easy to learn but the gameplay depth will actually make it possible to master it endlessly)
gameplay gameplay gameplay that will make You addicted
visuals that will make You addicted, too
Game features:
around 5-10 different weapons (so far we settled on 7)
elastic physics enabling the player to move around te level faster when he gets the idea of movement mechanics
no elevators, jumppads (at least the traditional ones), ladders and such
platform for the competitive playing
Isn’t it confusing to move around? No. Okay, it is, a little bit, in the begining. Once you get the idea, You can get to every corner of the map easily. What does it mean for a 2D game? It’s not a 2D game anymore. As for the turning control You basically have two additional buttons to manage – bending forward/backward – their idea is really easy to grasp.
It looks pretty ugly for now, I was supposed to write here something about the textures I’ve made so far but I don’t really see the point in making this entry any longer by spamming some screens and writing description of them right now, so I’ll leave it for now and make a separate post later.
What’s the problem behind this great idea? We’re not developing it right now as we were forced to freeze the project in the end of january 2009 for the sake of a few other things. We are doing some webdesign stuff and generally trying to stay above the surface atm, so yeah, it’s hard to develop warpspeed at the same time. On the other hand, it’s a shame to put it away, too. Anyway, we hope to restart the works around june/juli so sit back, relax and be patient just for now.
Any of Your feedback will be greatly appreciated so if You like/dislike anything about this idea, let us know, we’d like to hear from you.
