Establishing a Fictional Universe

[Basil102]

Lately, I've been thinking it might be a good idea to give Red Eclipse it's own fictional universe. We could all offer and discuss our ideas and suggestions, and decide on the answers to basic questions like "When and where does the game take place?" and "What exactly is happening in the game and why?".

This would primarily help with the 'map direction' issue that was brought up a little while back. By deciding on when and where the game should take place, we can more easily determine what kind of maps we should be designing, and our decision on what's happening in the game and why could also help us determine how we should design our maps.

Also, adding lots of detail in the world that we create for the game could help a bit with getting more positive attention, bringing in more Red Eclipse players as a result. I don't think it would help too much in that regard, but in the minds of people who would otherwise see Red Eclipse as just another Quake clone that isn't worth their time, a detailed fictional universe -- along with a set map direction and great attention to detail in the maps -- might show that we are serious about this game and are putting genuine care and effort into it's development.

Let me know what you guys think.

[molexted]

(Un)fortunately, there's only two of us mappers, Acerspyro and I, so our map works are easy to coordinate. My ultimate goal is a coherent theme and universe that connects all the maps; however, given the resources we possess and the limitations of the Cube 2 engine, it would take in inordinate amount of time to create new content for every map to fit the new theme.

Currently we're moving toward maps that look like Cutec or Decay depending on the layout of the map: see Toxic Abuse and Panic for examples. If there's something else that people want, let us know.

[Basil102]

I don't think we'd need any new content at all for it. We've already got a lot of textures and models at our disposal in the map editor. Even if some mappers felt like they needed new stuff for their map, at this point I could really only see it being a few textures for signs, banners and/or billboards, which it seems to me like we could create and have ready for implementation on our own with relative ease. But maybe I'm underestimating the difficulty of actually implementing new textures into the game. And if that is the case, you have my sincere apologies.

And thanks for giving us those maps to refer to, by the way. It really helps a lot.

[molexted]

Textures are easy to implement but are limited by Cube2's garbage collection; mapmodels are limited by Cube2's model lighting implementation.

When you refer to mappers you are literally refering to me and Acerspyro: it's not some abstract group of people like would exist in a larger game project. It takes a long time to make high quality maps within the limitations of the Cube 2 engine and there is a very limited amount of resources to accomplish it with. Acer and I are doing the best we can to get RE more coherent but it's going to be slow and imperfect.

We need asset help in pretty much every respect: textures, mapmodels, weapon models, promotional art, and mapmaking and any help you or anyone else may have is welcome.

[Basil102]

I see. Well unfortunately, I know almost nothing about making models and I'm not that good with art either, so I can't offer you any help there.

But, I'll be more than happy to make some new maps for you guys, and maybe a couple of new textures.

[qreeves]

I've always been hesitant to establish a story beyond the basics as there isn't really that much to a deathmatch style game to begin with. If you can come up with something interesting based on the work molexted and acerspyro are doing then feel free to do so, but there's no guarantees it will be adopted. I'll try my best to give helpful feedback anyway.

[Basil102]

I wasn't talking about giving the game a story, except for maybe an explanation of what events led to what we see in the game. Personally, I think anything more than that probably wouldn't be a good idea.

I was talking more about just a fictional world and an explanation of what we're seeing. Like whether (after we establish a Red Eclipse universe, if we establish one) what we're seeing is a war or some sort of blood-sport.

[qreeves]

[SniperGoth]

I was gonna post what @qreeves said, but he was faster
Making an excuse for a deathmatch focused game (Quake 3 Arena, Unreal Tournament etc) happens, is more than enough to me, but for other people, mostly not.
Personally i'd want to see who the big one overseer is, the reason why the drones were created, the place where people go to sign for the deathmatches.
Maybe someday i will try to come up with a concept model for the overseer (computer voice man) to be added somewhere on the game.

[Basil102]