Yeah, hoping for at least two of the stretch goals.
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Shadowgate Kickstarter
- Thread starter Sir_Crocodile
- Start date
I didn't back this (swore off adventure game Kickstarters after about 5 of them), but I am very glad to see it make it, and will probably pick it up if the reviews are half decent.
It's amazing that Kickstarter has really managed to bring a whole genre back from the dead for at least a year. 2013 will be the biggest year for adventure games since at least the mid-90s. In fact, I can't ever think of a year where there was more adventure games I was excited about.
If a few of them do well, along with the huge success of The Walking Dead, it might actually stick and we can keep our genre around for a while, too.
It's amazing that Kickstarter has really managed to bring a whole genre back from the dead for at least a year. 2013 will be the biggest year for adventure games since at least the mid-90s. In fact, I can't ever think of a year where there was more adventure games I was excited about.
If a few of them do well, along with the huge success of The Walking Dead, it might actually stick and we can keep our genre around for a while, too.
cj_iwakura
Member
The artwork they're doing is incredible.
Really hope the final game lives up to what they've shown.
Really hope the final game lives up to what they've shown.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Hopefully paypal pushes it past 140k if kickstarter misses the mark.
transience
Member
21 minutes for 3000 dollars!
edit: final total is $137,232 through Kickstarter. They were up to 138k until someone pulled back like 1000 dollars in the last minute.
edit: final total is $137,232 through Kickstarter. They were up to 138k until someone pulled back like 1000 dollars in the last minute.
Paypal link is still up. Let's hope they'll get to the 140k stretch goal with paypal.
http://www.zojoi.com/index.htm
http://www.zojoi.com/index.htm
so glad this made it... didn't think I'd get so happy over a remake, but the RE1 GCN is still a favorite, plus the goblin room, and the stretch goal new segments have me interested. Love how it's an adventure game with a few subsystems, like the magic and torches. I guess a lot of the old infocom and other classic text adventures had those, but for graphical adventures, not really, other than maybe Loom's music/spell system.
IrishNinja
Member
crap, meant to get in on this one - oh well, prolly a day 1 but for me when it's out on GOG or whatever
See two posts above for the paypal link! Get in now while it's hot!
There's still time to pledge and get the Catacombs stretch goal. The PayPal option will be open for another three weeks.
http://zojoi.com/shadowgate_campaign.htm
Currently at $135,500. Needs $4,500 more for the expanded Catacombs stretch goal.
http://zojoi.com/shadowgate_campaign.htm
Currently at $135,500. Needs $4,500 more for the expanded Catacombs stretch goal.
exmachina64
Banned
I did not know this. I might pledge; I backed out in the middle of the KS.
As a side note, I love this image from their website:
cj_iwakura
Member
So uh, I know Shadowrun is stealing all the hype, with good reason, but the other other Shadowgame has stuff too!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/423394
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/423394
Well, we've been busy on all fronts of the game so let's get into it, shall we?
Design
We have had many great design meetings on Shadowgate since our last update. Our re-imagining is coming together nicely- certain aspects of the original game are intact while the look and feel is decidedly different. We don't want to go into too much detail as that will give things away. The best way to explain it is that certain puzzles are in familiar places and might even have similar components or solutions but they have just been made to fit within the fiction better than in the original game.
We have increased the size of our game substantially and have added some new elements that really enhance the world (we've also been looking at the Catacombs to see what we can do there. The Wizard Tower Expansion is meshing with the original game nicely and the Goblins and the Black Axe quest have also been designed and should please our fans.
Aaron's UI design is progressing nicely and we're pretty happy with giving it a facelift while still making sure it keeps some of the timeless functionality of the original game. We'll show this more in an upcoming update when we can mesh it properly into some rooms.
Programming
We're really still knee-deep in the boring 'under the hood' stuff within Unity. We've mapped out the high level architecture that runs the game and setup object and gui communication so that doing something as simple as clicking an object can trigger a response in the gui. As we discussed before, our sound management system is complete allowing us to fade and stack a series of tracks to build excitement and is now being used by Rich Douglas (more below). Other bits are done as well like input functionality to ensure both touch and click events work similarly.
Finally, we've been focusing on the data aspect of the game - both how to script the objects that create the rooms and how to save and change the states of those objects. As you probably know, Shadowgate is an object/room-driven game and each object or room has to be checked against dozens of different variables to ensure that you can interact with it on various levels. This includes Object Attributes ( Openable/Closable, Takable, Consumable, Unmoveable, etc.), Room Attributes (Darkness, Water, Heat, Weather, etc.), States ( Burnt, Frozen, Locked, Wet, Empty/Full, etc.), andTypes (Container, book, scroll, spell, exit, etc.). Whew. Lots of stuff to keep us all busy for quite some time!
Rooms
Chris continues to crank on rooms and inventory objects. We've changed the aspect ratio for the rooms to 16:9 and also added something else new to the game - zoomed views. These views are infrequent but very useful, especially when dealing with intricate puzzles or objects that are far away. Here's an example of the zoomed in interaction of the skeleton in the lake.
Audio
Rich has been patient with us as we finish up the design. I mentioned in the last email that he has been working with the programmers to give us separate tracks of instruments to allow us to create dynamic music. He composed a quick tune (based on the tomb room in the NES version) for our sound management system and I've posted an example of this below. These tracks can be mixed/matched, started/muted to change the feeling in the room based on events (in this case, perhaps opening individual tombs). The first track is the full version but the others are individual instruments so feel free to play around with them.
Coffin (full composition)
Track A - PERCUSSION and ORCHESTRAL FX
Track B - LOW STRINGS
Track C - WOODWINDS and ETHNIC
Track D - MEDIUM STRINGS
Track E - BRASS
Yum, that music has nicely translated from the NES version. It still manages to say "You're going to die" in that lovely way the original version did.
This is probably going to be my first Kickstarter game I'm going to actually receive (AS my others were 3 of the "big" projects on the site) and I can't wait to see how it turns out.
This is probably going to be my first Kickstarter game I'm going to actually receive (AS my others were 3 of the "big" projects on the site) and I can't wait to see how it turns out.
Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew
Banned
cj_iwakura
Member
Should we be doing new threads for the new stuff they've been sending?
This may be the first kickstarter I support. I love the Shadowgate games. I need to replay SG64 one of these days. Sadly I can't ever replay the original and get any sense of adventure since I have it completely memorized.
cj_iwakura
Member
It's been over. Maybe we can get an OP update?
Darn, don't know how I missed that. Glad it made it though! I love Shadowgate.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
I updated it at the time to say it was closed, but perhaps it wasn't clear enough; have reworded it.
If you specifically want some of the kickstarter goodies, you can try contacting them directly via the link in the OP. Dunno if they're still excepting paypal donations, but it can't hurt to ask.
cj_iwakura
Member
OST has shipped:
It sounds really good.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/471704
Huge Witcher vibe.
It sounds really good.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/471704
Huge Witcher vibe.
cj_iwakura
Member
That's great. I probably wouldn't spoil it if I had gone for that tier, but I'm sure it's great.
How long until we get some gameplay, I wonder...
(Also, do any of you want to help make nice banners for the OT?)
cj_iwakura
Member
New update:
Heres a quick update on where we are at:
Programming
The programmers have finished up the inventory/spellbook and are knee-deep in a new load/save system and room mapping feature. They have also been modifying the PAC (Point and Click) engine and making it as robust as possible to eliminate hardcoding certain actions or sequences. This will allow Karl to script every possible thing a player can do (or try to do) with the objects in the game. At the same time, weve been placing rooms, objects and audio into Unity and tying them to these scripts.
Artwork
After a lot of conversation, Karl and I decided that were going to add cutscenes to the game something that Shadowgate has never had. To that end, weve hired digital painter Kalen Chock to handle these. We felt that Kalens speedpainting style had good synergy with Chris Colds artwork and were glad to have him on board! Speaking of Chris, hes still cranking away at room art and Aaron Milligan is heads-down, developing the assets for the game map. BTW, here's a cutscene example...
cj_iwakura
Member
New update:
I'm starting to worry about this getting too ambitious, like certain other KS projects.
Sincere apologies for the late update. While weve been very very busy working on the game, I was really holding off on an update since we have made a number of key decisions and personnel changes. So, lets get into it
Features
Our goal has always been to make the best game possible! Plus we want the game to be re-imagined for the next generation of gamer- making it better than the original. To this end, we have decided to add some new and exciting features along with additional content that we think are pivotal to making this the best Shadowgate experience we possibly can.
Cut Scenes - Last month we announced that we will be doing cut scenes. These will be complete with music, sfx and voice over. Since Chris is swamped trying to get rooms finished (hes about 5 rooms from being done with the castle proper), we brought on Kalen Chock to help us with cut scenes. However, while he is awesome, we decided that his style and Chris wasnt meshing as well as we would like so weve contracted with a new artist. He is speedpainter Wang Ling and we think his style is fitting in great!
Achievements Karl has designed an achievement system that adds more replayability to the game. This is something that Shadowgate has never had before. Basically, there are many different ways for you to gain achievements - these range from how quickly you finish the game, to discovering all the rooms, to finding every single object in the game, and many more. Once we are greenlit on Steam, we hope to tie into their achievement system as well!
Hidden Deaths Since Shadowgate is synonymous with dying in multiple ways, Karl has added a feature that we are calling hidden deaths to the game. These deaths have to be unlocked through game play and will require you to think of creative ways in which you, the player, might die. Fun stuff all around!
Localization - Lastly, we are considering localizing our game to other languages. We've designed our engine to handle additional languages and we are currently discussing which ones we might target.
Programming/Scripting
As we have shared in previous updates, we chose Unity because of its flexibility, ability to port code to other platforms and solid code base. Still, it is a new platform for most of us and the learning curve isnt trivial. And while we are thrilled at the results we are seeing, its taking longer than we anticipated. The PAC (Point and Click) engine, and the custom XML scripting that commands and track objects and each interaction is proving to be a huge and intricate task. To help alleviate the development burden (and also to implement new and existing features), we have brought on a few new folks to the team. This includes an additional programmer who will help with engine specific tasks as well as three interns who are helping with object and particle placement, 2D animation, and scripting objects. These guys are fitting in well and providing a huge lift for our development team.
We are doing everything we can to not only finish the game but to make it bigger and better. As you might imagine, hitting out estimated November date will be difficult especially in light of all the additions to the game we shared above (as well as the stretch goal we hit). We feel this is the right direction and we hope you will agree that the Shadowgate universe deserves our very best effort towards this re-imagined game! Well keep you up to date on how things shake out in the next month- especially with the addition of our extra help.
Rewards
We take the tier rewards as seriously as we do the game development. We have been very demanding with our vendors to make sure you get what you pledged for. So
Shirts Weve sent entire batches of t-shirts back for re-prints. We are pleased to say that the last of the changes are in. Woot!
Quests of Shadowgate This 72 card game could have been its own kickstarter considering all the work required (heh). We are in the process of working with the card company to get the colors correct and are very close to finalizing everything.
Staff of Ages Kenny has finished all the 18" staffs. But we decided you should get a base with each staff for proper displaying of this ancient relic! Hes finalizing those now.
Soundtrack CD The CD is finished and will ship with the staffs.
Books We want to let Chris and Wang finish more of the art before we get this rolling.
Boxes and maps I know these rewards dont ship until the game is done but weve identified our box company and our cartographer is working on the map as we speak. Its very cool!
So, were working on the rewards on all fronts and will bundle and ship as they are completed.
Thats it for now. Again, sorry about the late update but as you can see, theres just been a lot going on and we wanted to share everything that we are doing. I'll also be uploading more screenshots to the Zojoi website over the next week so be sure to check them out!
I'm starting to worry about this getting too ambitious, like certain other KS projects.
cj_iwakura
Member
I love the UI and aesthetics. Hopefully we aren't waiting too long.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Latest update:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/611762?ref=activity
Like the idea of "locking" a command.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/611762?ref=activity
Like the idea of "locking" a command.
cj_iwakura
Member
Still sounds like they have quite a bit of work ahead of them. Hopefully it all goes well. I'm so far 1 for 1 in Kickstarters that I've backed turning out good.
(Shadowrun)
(Shadowrun)
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Hopefully they can reuse the engine they're building for a sequel.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Great video.
Hope the greenlight goes well for them, they've been great with updates on KS, and the game looks great.
Hope the greenlight goes well for them, they've been great with updates on KS, and the game looks great.
I agree. I've loved everything I've seen of this game so far. Can't wait to play it.
cj_iwakura
Member
Wonderful. I assume we'll get Steam codes too?
cj_iwakura
Member
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/728413?ref=email
Game is nearing Alpha. Can't wait.
Game is nearing Alpha. Can't wait.
cj_iwakura
Member
Alpha is done! Beta soon.
Huzzah! Can't wait for this game.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
March update posted
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/789467
Collectors boxes look great
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zojoi/shadowgate/posts/789467
Collectors boxes look great
Sir_Crocodile
Member
If it does well enough to greenlight Beyond Shadowgate, I hope they compose a chiptune track for it