In fact, there are already three promising Unreal Tournament 3 mods that have not only made the jump over to the UDK but also gone commercial, and curiously, UDK is not the only factor that binds all these three projects together. Each these teams also took part in the Make Something Unreal 2010 contest arranged by Intel and Epic Games. (In fact, two out of three of the above projects are included in the UDK showcase.)

It’s only fair to begin this showcase with Swedish Toltec Studios’ The Ball, given the game is to be released in a matter of days on October 26th. The game can already be preordered from Steam at 10% off the normal price of 17.99 €/£14.99, and is actually published by Tripwire Interactive, who have delightfully chosen not to remain complacent with simply developing more Red Orchestra, but are also taking other teams under their wings. The first of their, uh, protégés was Unreal 2004 mod Killing Floor. Quoth Tripwire president John Gibson, not at all missing the uniqueness of the first MSU winner publishing a second wave participant:

“When we first tried The Ball we knew this was exactly the type of game we would like to publish – fun, creative and a blast to play. … This is all the more exciting for us as the winner of the previous ‘Make Something Unreal’ contest to have the opportunity to help a winner from the latest MSU contest take their game commercial.”

In The Ball, players helm an archaeologist trapped within a cavern that turns out to be the entrance to massive ancient ruins. Shortly afterwards, the player discovers, wait for it… wait for it… the ball – “a mysterious artifact … gold and metal shelled” and the game’s primary gameplay twist becomes apparent: Instead of being “The Ball,” the player controls it to solve puzzles and vanquish various enemies. This distinction can be very much attributed to the runaway successes of Portal and perhaps more importantly still, Half-Life 2‘s gravity gun. Unlike Half-Life 2, where the puzzles exist to pace the action, in The Ball, the puzzles play a much larger role.  These comparisons aside, its gameplay remains unique enough to be best explained in Toltec’s pictures:

Though now soon to be released in retail, The Ball is also available for download in demo form. The original version of the game came in second just behind The Haunted (see below), and while the game has already been receiving some excellent scores in the press, I nevertheless recommend taking a look at the demo as the game is already extremely playable and polished in its demo form and gives you an idea of the game’s style.

I might be in the minority – there are “mummies and exploding monkeys” in the game after all – but I personally did find the demo to be a little on the boring side. Steam aside, The Ball can also be found on GamersGate, Impulse and Direct2Drive, and is even going to be available as a boxed copy in Europe!

The Haunted: Hells Reach, the 1st Place Grand Prize Winner in MSU 2010, is a third-person co-op shooter that pits human players against hordes of shambling demons and as such will most probably remind most players of Left 4 Dead; the twist here, though, is that instead of allowing – or even favouring – holing up in a corner to find the best defensive spot, The Haunted demands players to adopt a vastly more aggressive playing style from the get-go. This is achieved with non-linear, scenario-based level design, and the gameplay is decidedly arcadey thanks to its high pace.

As a mod, The Haunted managed to find its own space sandwiched somewhere in-between Killing Floor and Left 4 Dead. Some of this can be attributed to its western-tinged look, but perhaps better still helped by the fact that there are many weapons, secrets and upgrades to be found and unlike the other two, the game actually rewards more adventurous players instead of punishing them. As with the other two games of this post, a downloadable version of the mod is still available at Moddb, and is very much worth the price of admission.

Being this year’s top MSU team, The Haunted was awarded a full free commercial license of the UE3 engine, something that should bode well for the future of the project and hopefully ensure a smooth transition over to the retail space. Below, you will find the latest trailer for the game, fresh from the oven:

Last but not least, I would like to mention Sanctum, a first-person tower defence game with a clean and shiny ultra-futuristic sci-fi look that contrasts interestingly with the jungle that swallows the playing field. The game was assembled at the University of Skövde, also in Sweden(!), and took home the 4th place in the educational category of the Make Something Unreal competition. In the game, players control an elite female soldier who is tasked to protect her home-town from swarms of incoming hostile aliens.

Although the original alpha version of Sanctum dates back to September 2009, Coffee Stain Studios have just released an updated demo in preparation of their participation in the forthcoming Indie Game Challenge. In terms of their commercial release, the team aims to finish the game “Q1 2011 and release it on ESD channels.” Below, you can see a quick glimpse of the game’s action:

P.S.S.T.

In addition to the aforementioned, you could also take a look at Prometheus, which can be acquired free from Impulse.

TL;DR

Download The Ball: Cahua, The Haunted 3.0 and Sanctum Demo.

Though the original never saw its promised sequel after the Belgian company went out of business (you can see existing screenshots of the project at Unseen64), the ageless gem is now fortunately available at GOG.com, in full working order – if you’re interested in running your old mothballed copy, the OpenOutcast team have a good tutorial.

The original remains utterly beautiful to this day mostly thanks to its stronger-than-most audiovisual direction and rare feeling of “being there.” The same, however, can also be said of the new fan version:

A February 2010 downloadable test, Oasis 1.0, already exists for sampling; a revised and polished version is promised to follow shortly. While its gameplay currently consists rather exclusively of menial back-and-forth and carrying missions, and although the dialogue from Cutter Slade (perhaps in an attempt to better synch the dialogue with the protagonist’s name?) remains littered with off-kilter enunciations and uncharacteristic, fourth-wall breaking quips, the wealth of work and craftsmanship already present in the project makes what little game there is to be experienced ultimately quite pleasurable and a joy to look at.

While the current 1.0 version is still clumsy and admittedly bug-riddled, its team is publishing a flow of updates at a development blog that illustrates many of the tasks that go into developing such a large-scale hobby project.

A potential point of contention for Outcast fans might nevertheless be the game’s narrative: as detailed in a blog entry, the team have chosen not to emulate the storyline of the original game, instead brainstorming an all-new narrative. Another bump in the road for the project might also be the questionable popularity of Crysis Wars; while Crysis Warhead certainly sold well, not too many mod projects have been released on the platform to date. Perhaps the forthcoming “Wars” version of Mechwarrior: Living Legends will change the landscape to the better?

Luckily, as the game is single player, it can be tested out with the Crysis Wars trial, as detailed on the project’s Moddb page.

Halt. Enter The Metastreumonic Anarchist Conspiracy Movement website.

Confused yet? I know I am. The only thing that’s absolutely clear is that E.Y.E., by all means, is a labour of love (do check out the fantastic concept art above). In the game, players become a planted spy seeking to discover a traitor in E.Y.E., a twofold group of Secreta Secretorum monks fighting against the Federation:

The story takes place in a dark future that has seen unending wars between the Federation – a several worlds union, and the Metastreumonic Force – an ancient and mysterious power.

The player embodies an infiltrated spy in E.Y.E – a group of elite monk warriors – made up of two rival factions in constant internal power struggles, themselves serving the Secreta Secretorum you work for: a multi-thousand-years-old secret organization desirous to steal power from the Federation. The organization ordered your infiltration to control and survey E.Y.E actions, as well to unmask a traitor to the cause.

Metastr…? Secretoru…? (Scivela…?) Though there exists a wealth of background information on the game’s website, the more I learn about the game, the more confusing it gets, as much of the material available is multifaceted and obscure.

One simple explanation for the lack of en clair is simply that the team is all-French (a forum Q&A thread in French is available to those more fluent in the language).  Je ne parle pas français, alright, and therefore rendered unable to accurately present to you the game’s more elaborate fictions and features.

That being said, I can tell you what the core game is about: Futuristic monks, manipulation, secret organizations, strife, conspiracy, and Frenchness: In fact, the game aesthetically and thematically resembles the output of another French studio, Arkane Studios, including Arx Fatalis, Dark Messiah and The Crossing, the latter two even more so due to its use of the Source engine:

The beginnings of the E.Y.E. project in fact date back to the year 2006, with the studio itself subsequently founded in 2007. To give you a better idea of the last four years of game development, an August 2007 launch trailer details some rather confusing and Half-Life 2 –textured action that is delightfully inferior to the team’s most recent 2009 trailer:

A visual layer of polish has been applied, and Streum On Studios have additionally chosen to delay the game’s original 2009 release in exchange for additional content. The curiously pitch-shifted voice acting present in the trailer above remains a curious discordant note in an otherwise polished trailer, but the controls and the HUD no longer display mod-ness, neatly illustrating the difference between a modification and a full-blown game.

Another reason for the complexity present in the documentation for E.Y.E. is that in all actuality, its origins trace into the late 1990s: In 1998, project lead Jonathan Cacherat designed a role-playing board game, AVA, that subsequently united the current Streum On Studios team. Their first finished project, also based on AVA, was the Half-Life 1 co-op multiplayer modification Syndicate Black Ops, released in 1999 and finished in 2001.

The game is still available for download and fully Steam-compatible, and positions players in the shoes of Syndicate assassins who are contracted for delicate cleaning missions and assassinations. The game displays a strange flair of humour (see weapon selection images below), a deviously high level of difficulty and, notably, vast, vast amounts of playable content. I found the game to be surprisingly fun to play with your friends, and it seems as though some of the ideas and content present in SBO will also been seen in the forthcoming game.

The developers have cited Warhammer 40K, Deus Ex and BioShock, (as well as Blade Runner and Ghost in the Shell) as influences for SBO and E.Y.E., and the latter promises to contain a whopping 25 weapons, ten PSI/physical powers, 14 cybernetic implants, a separate hacking mode, and most curiously, “psychological and mental traumas [sic] management”. Also to come with the game are selectable classes and occupations. Like Syndicate Black Ops, E.Y.E. comes bundled with a co-operate campaign designed for 2-4 players, and additional missions for 4-8 players. The team also promises that single player, multiplayer and co-op are all interrelated in some way. Death, too, has no penalty; whether this means Vita chambers, regeneration, instant respawns or immortality remains to be seen.

Streum On Studios’ press kit optimistically targets the following platforms for release: “PC, XBOX360 (potentially) & PS3 (potentially)”. E.Y.E. was originally slated for a 1st quarter 2009 release, but is now delayed infinitely for an extra layer of polish.

The sequel, System Shock 2 by Irrational Games, improved the control scheme by allowing mouse look when shooting, and then detaching the cursor when using the inventory. Malba has recreated that scheme in SS1 by making mouselook available at the touch of a key, which, as you can see in the brief demonstration I put together below, makes the game appear much more like a typical FPS.

The game feels completely new, more of a twitch shooter now than a thinking man’s shooter. While some purists will argue the game never needed this kind of change, I think it makes the game feel new enough for long-time fans and more accessible for people previously unable to take to it. The mod apparently works with the original CD version of the game; I have tested it with Kolya’s System Shock Portable and while it initially took some time to configure it correctly, it works like a charm.

You can get the mod here. Note that I was only able to get the first version of the files to work, not the newer ones provided further down in the thread. For those of you planning to try it with System Shock Portable, Kolya has provided step-by-step instructions on how to apply the mod:

- Extract SYSTEMSHOCK-Portable-v0.9.exe
- Extract Malba Tahan’s mod into SHOCK/RES
- Rename the original cdshock.exe -> cdshock.exe.BAK
- Rename XCDSHOCK.EXE -> CDSHOCK.EXE
(leave XCYB.CFG and cyb.cfg alone)
+ For DGVESA mode: Start SSP.exe, from the START-MENU select “Start SSP with DGVESA”.
+ For DOSbox mode: Make sure to get the latest SSP09-DOSbox-Update.7z. Extract it into SHOCK/RES. Start DOSbox.exe.
- Change the resolution in game. E toggles mouselook.

Okay, I admit, it’s probably just me and my fear of the final frontier: I was scared to death even with No One Lives Forever’s sharks. Luckily, there is a quantum of solace to be found in the game – I can always play as sharks only! That shouldn’t be so bad, right? …right?

That being said, the project looks fantastic and deviously simple. It is also being worked on by former Killing Floor lead, Alex Quick. Check out this new, awful, awful UDK game at Mod DB!

I cannot recall any such high-quality work exhibited on the Half-Life 1 engine since Paranoia, the suspenseful Russian shooter that went so far as to incorporate low-level enhancements to the very engine.

The developers are indeed very keen to highlight the fact that Cry of Fear is a total conversion and as such contains zero unoriginal content. Here’s the delightfully vague lowdown, something that has never prevented horror games from maximizing their potential:

You wake up in a dark alley, not knowing anything. What has happened anyway? You struggle after the truth and answers. Answers you want to know in the darkness and fear, which makes your heartbeat race like violent blows against your head. Where do “they” come from? What has happened? Are you just turning insane?

Based on earlier gameplay video (see above) and the aforementioned holiday trailer, Cry of Fear looks to feature well-acted cutscenes, creepalicious animations, an inventory system for panic-juggling items and weapons and above all a fantastic-looking sprint function that propels the character to real running speeds. The game also looks to improve on the rather excellent production values of the previous game, of which an improved, multi-ending Director’s Cut version exists.

Finally, it does bear noting that both Paranoia and Afraid of Monsters made Richard’s end of the decade list. Paranoia can be downloaded here, and Afraid of Monsters DC is available here.

Half-Life 1, for instance, had an excellent breadth of the aforementioned – The Specialists, Action Half-Life and The Opera to name a few. The sequel, nevertheless, has seen far fewer successful applications of the topos: The Specialists swear never to do a Source update, The Opera is long since dead. Therefore, it’s more than topical to mention two fresh Half-Life 2 –based projects that could help alleviate the situation on the platform.

First, Distraction was just released on the 24th and promises to be in the vein of The Specialists: 3rd person camera, slow motion, akimbos, bleeding and stunting. It’s always delightful to see a new team push out a playable release, and I would like to congratulate the team for the achievement. Nevertheless, the beta remains just that, with omitted levels, crashing bugs, missing animations, textures and sounds, and as such recommended for those who are willing to put the work in.

The team have quickly jumped in to patching the project, though, and a 1.1 update was released on the 30th, considerably improving on the weapon balance and playability. At the moment, Distraction comes with six reality-based levels that do contribute to the overall feeling, with dhl_escobar being the current highlight.

Second, Action Half-Life 2 was also surprisingly released for the EP1 version of the Source engine back in May of 2009, though with no original levels and little fanfare. Level-less and rather obscure, the modification has thus been quite the challenge for potential players to engage in. Therefore, the developers have recently chosen to open up development to all in the form of their latest Source 2007-based version of the modification. This can be acquired with the team’s “KetchUpdater,” which requires .NET 2.0. There even exists a fan-made tool for checking for currently available players.

The Orange Box builds come packaged, at the moment, with four levels (two of which are shared with Distraction; I fully expect to see more content developed simultaneously for both and shared between the two). Ministry of Action also host a directory for various levels that you can try – many Half-Life 2 Deathmatch maps are perfectly suited for a game of AHL2, and threads discussing suitable levels can be found in the game’s forums; In my mind, dm_stad_final and dm_tower_b42 are most excellent.

However, much like Distraction, both versions of AHL2 are still relatively unpolished; where the OB builds look and feel vastly better already, the EP1 version remains slightly more playable. To cite the developers, “It’s by no means done, polished or complete. It’s rough around the edges and in various other places, but so far we’ve been having a massive blast playing it, and we hope you will too.” These two projects may not have yet reached Steamworks-level professional quality, but after having played Action Half-Life 2 for quite a while now, I often find myself missing the stunt functionality in other similar games, testament to the concrete playability of both projects.

Finally, having two modifications that look, feel and play so much like each other is a very intriguing situation and very much a question of audience: Years before, players would often choose between AHL and The Specialists. Hopefully both these projects will be allowed to bloom – no easy task in a saturated marketplace!

First off, we would start with installing the official v1.1 patch. This is not required for 2CD versions of the game, though I’ve never come across those. After that, the smartest choice is bigg’s unambiguous Widescreen Mod, currently sitting at v2.2 – as an added plus, it works for other games built on the Infinity engine, too. To get more bang for you buck with the bigger resolution you just got, you should also install GhostDog’s PS:T UI mod for the aforementioned. According to the site, it makes “1280×800, 1280×720, 1280×768 and 1280×1024 resolutions viable for Planescape: Torment by changing a number of things in the UI.”

Here are a few examples of the improvements (via The Codex Forums):

Finally, there is an unofficial Fix Pack available (v1.37) that attempts to rectify some issues not already solved by the official 1.1 patch.

Now, if you want to go the extra mile, you could also install the “Planescape: Torment Ultimate WeiDU Fixpack“, which promises to fix “hundreds of bugs and thousands of typos” (and additionally comes with the fixes contained in the Fix Pack above plus more). The most experimental of personalities can also proceed with the “Planescape: Torment Unfinished Business” and “Qwinn’s Planescape: Torment Tweaks” patches, all three of which were released by Qwinn.

Here’s each of the aforementioned steps:

1. Official patch v1.1
2. bigg’s Widescreen Mod v2.2
3. GhostDog’s PS:T UI mod v1.21
4. Fix Pack v1.37

1. Planescape: Torment Ultimate WeiDU Fixpack
2. Planescape: Torment Unfinished Business
3. Qwinn’s Planescape: Torment Tweaks

Any other mods and/or patches you would recommend?

“After 7 years of work, Out Of Hell has finally been released upon the masses! What can I say? I feel…weird!…and floaty! I always thought about this day, but now that it’s here, it feels as though I’ve been sleepwalking for the last 7 years and am now just waking up!”

We can only imagine how Mr. Long feels about having worked on the project for so… long. One thing is for sure, however: There are few things more fulfilling than being able to assign to your project both a beginning and an end. Out of Hell, due to Long’s admirable persistence and perseverance, now has both. Not one to be discouraged by long developmental arcs, either, he has already promised to take a good look at the forthcoming reception to the game:

“If Out Of Hell does well and there is a demand for it, I will work on the official expansion. I have story (takes place right after the ending) and more game ideas (co-op mp, offline npc co-op) to expand upon the Out Of Hell universe but it’s all dependent on whether people like it.”

For those not yet familiar with the game, here’s the official line:

Out of Hell is a single-player total conversion for Unreal Tournament 2004. It is a horror themed first-person adventure that takes place within the industrial town of Grinwood which has been overrun by a sea of blood-thirsty zombies. Players assume the role of Donovan Ling, a young police officer and possibly the last remaining human alive.

And here be a bullet point list of its features:

• Bludgeon your way through 15+ grimy and blood-soaked maps using over 10 brutal weapons!
• Highly detailed and atmospheric environments, creepy locales, immersive ambient sound effects and a spine-tingling soundtrack.
• Uncover a deep and disturbing storyline as you make your way through the decimated town.
• 100% custom created content including textures, models, animations and more!

Since Nguyen has chosen to revert back to his original plan of releasing the total conversion completely free, all that’s left to do is download the fantastic-looking UT2k4 project and give it a go. The download weighs in at 1gb.

The seeds were sown last week, when it came to our attention that Valve had flown the Left 4 Dead 2 boycott group leaders over to their headquarters for a tour of the forthcoming game – something only the Valve masterminds, wearing their best pair of silk gloves and armed with a jar of lube, would have been able to think up; To add insult to the injury, the boycotters came out of the experience feeling positive.

Meanwhile, a relatively unknown Left 4 Dead modder, Joe W-A, jokingly sends an e-mail to Gabe Newell, asking:

Why the hell haven’t I been flown to Valve?
I mean, you guys need to preview my campaign.

Gabe, jovial as always, retorts:

We are boycotting your campaign.

Not one to shy away from a verbal fracas, ripostes Joe, “Does that mean I have to fly you here?”, to which Gabe counter-ripostes, “Me and Erik [Wolpaw]”. Only moments later, a blog collecting donations for flying the Valve duo over to Australia, Brisbane appears, and a mere few days’ worth of gathering, the undertaking has already broken the rather amazing 3000 dollar barrier required for the plane tickets. Joe additionally promises the surplus will go to the Penny Arcade charity venture, Child’s Play.

The hilarity of this inconceivable succession of events aside, I’m not sure what it will mean for the overall complexion of interaction between Valve and its fans, but as far as the actual realities of this meeting go, it is either going to be an awkward trainwreck or a fantastic fête of funk: Plans are being made for capturing the occasion on video, too, so we’ll be privy to the plot! Either way, I do commend both parties for their geniality and their willingness to engage, something which Valve has built their reputation on from the very beginning.

Lastly, Rock, Paper, Shotgun make a great point in their latest coverage on the story:

If we were a multi-million dollar company who could afford a billion plane flights, we’d certainly make sure most of the money raised went in that direction and still go on the trip.

I second this notion! Don’t forget to take your sleeping bags, Gabe and Erik!

Edwards, fresh off releasing a custom survival map, Dead Meat (his portfolio additionally includes a contest-winning level for the Steamworked Zombie Panic: Source) is no stranger to gaming horror, and while we explicitly wanted to hear his feelings on the more technical intricacies and design-related dilemmas present in developing Left 4 Dead content, Edwards also touches on broader conceptual decisions, issues and themes that are present in the horror genre, relating his vision to titles such as Silent Hill and Siren: Blood Curse.

We would like to thank Edwards for answering our questions, and for those with a keen eye, there are Yama and Dead Meat screenshots sprinkled amidst the answers after the jump! Dead Meat can be acquired from http://www.scorchingcraniums.com/portfolio/abattoir.html.

How different would you consider the requirements, design-wise, for working on a L4D level compared to your earlier projects for, say, Zombie Panic: Source?

Design-wise it’s not that different, you block out the map, test with a small group of people and keep going until the gameplay works. The obvious difference is that L4D relies on AI, so you need to design the map with that in mind, and also remember that replayability is probably the most important thing in this game, so you need to give the player enough options to keep them interested time after time, or let them try a different tactic if they die and have to keep playing the same part over and over. It might need a bit more thought than a map for a game like CSS, but with enough beta testing you can solve all those problems.

There is, in my own experience, considerable variation with the difficulty level of Valve’s own survival maps. How importantly did playtesting figure for Dead Meat?

I’m registered on a couple of forums full of other talented mappers so I never have a problem getting feedback. With Dead Meat, I released a couple of beta versions on those forums to get feedback on how it played out before releasing a public version. I’ve also got a few friends who play the game so I test with them.

The good thing about Left 4 Dead is that it is very AI-centric: Although it doesn’t tell you everything about the map, I can just create a nav mesh and run through it with bots on my own. So usually I get to test the map in all the different ways it can be played. Once the level is public, and everyone has a chance to play, you’re bound to find the last few bugs that were missed.

Different people told me it was either too easy or too hard, but playing and testing I think I found a good balance. While some locations might be easy to defend, the layout usually forces you to move and whenever I play it I end up moving from room to room so the difficulty changes in a single playthrough.

Dead Meat is a professional entry to mapping for Left 4 Dead. What was your primary motivation for approaching the admittedly arduous and intimidating task of developing a full campaign in the form of Yama, instead of, say, another survival-based level?

I actually started Yama in 2006 when Turtle Rock announced the game. They ended up delaying it until 2008 but I worked on it over that time, mostly just making prefabs, textures, models etc, and getting more and more references. The setting and map order has actually changed since then, and I don’t think I knew as much back then how much work a 5-map campaign would actually be.

Dead Meat started out from some photos in my Yama references folder of an abandoned abattoir which I knew wouldn’t make the campaign, and that map was more or less a test to get used to working with the L4D content and the director, I think it only took about 6 weeks from start to finish. One of the problems with making a campaign is coming up with a consistent, realistic theme that can span 5 maps and anything up to 90 minutes of gameplay.

I don’t have any concrete ideas for another campaign mostly because of that. I do have another survival map planned, and even though a lot of people don’t like survival, the maps are far easier and quicker to make. Since I enjoy mapping even if no one plays them, that’s what I’ll be doing next.

The choice of utilizing Japan as a setting seems enviably obvious in retrospect, with a thriving tradition of survival horror in Japanese popular cinema and gaming. Would you say such geography is underutilized in game design overall?

I’m not sure if the setting itself is that important; Silent Hill is one of my favourite games series but that was more for the style of horror they used. There were a lot of unique things in that game but as it was set in the United States, I think that’s an unique trait of Japanese developers.

I prefer horror in games like in Siren or in movies like Audition but I think that’s more to do with the creators than the setting. When it comes to films I think that’s down to studio pressure and appealing to the lowest denominator in Hollywood, so I don’t think it’s the setting really, it’s just that the developers that tend to set their games in Japan are Japanese, and they happen to be better at creating horror.

The attention to minute detail, already visible in screenshots of Yama, is terrific. How much of your actual “mapping time” goes into researching textures and props?

Far more time than I should spend. When I get references I usually go overboard and find too many things I want to include. The first map in the campaign was going to be the same mountain setting as the others, but somehow I ended up switching it to Tokyo itself which means I now need dozens more textures and models. I’ve got photos of places I want to include and I sometimes change the map to work them in, but having so many photos means I get a good idea of the setting and as you mentioned, the kind of textures or models I could use elsewhere in the map.

Originally I had some photos of a cable car station, and looking for more photos of that place led me to other places that became maps in the campaign, like a hotel in the 5th level of the campaign. Even if I don’t end up using all my references, they give me a good idea of the look of a particular place and its architecture.

For me, the photographic hues together with the decay do vividly recall Japanese war photography from before and after World War II. Is this a source of inspiration for you?

That wasn’t a direct inspiration. I do think that like in a lot of other horror games, taking a recognisable environment and twisting it is a really good way of making a player feel uneasy. This is something that will work on every playthrough unlike, say, a tank bursting through a wall.

Siren: Blood Curse was a big inspiration for the village level and maybe Japan Studio (SCEJ) were inspired by war photography, but I thought the sepia tint works well for this map because after playing through the more colourful Tokyo and temple levels and then riding the cable car into a brown, desaturated, almost silent village, it gives that feeling of something not being right.

In relation to my previous question, I do feel that we are all accustomed (and even programmed) to seeing something inherently fearful and horrific about the destruction of Japan, with Hiroshima and Nagasaki still in recent memory. I’m definitely chilled by the screenshots, and the location seems ideal for survival horror. Dead Meat, however, does contain overtones of macabre humour as well. Do you think humour is essential for survival horror?

Going back to Silent Hill, I think Silent Hill 3 did this well with some of its characters and dialogue. I don’t think it’s essential but done in the right way it can be effective. Like how the horror itself is often subtle in those games, then subtle humour can work in the same way.

Many download mirrors are up now, as well as an active torrent; you can browse the manual or the noob guide while you wait for the 850MB download.

There is, however, a perfectly understandable explanation for the lengthy development arc: The mod is the work of one single man, Long “Chicken+Ribs Combo” Nguyen, with additional music from Justin Lassen. It’s very refreshing to still see one-man army -style modding: Where today’s game engines may already be too complex and unmanageable, UT2k4 is still workable enough for one single man.

More information, screenshots and a new preview trailer after the jump!

The official blurb off the game’s website:

Out of Hell is a single-player total conversion for Unreal Tournament 2004. It is a horror themed first-person adventure that takes place within the industrial town of Grinwood which has been overrun by a sea of blood-thirsty zombies. Players assume the role of Donovan Ling, a young police officer and possibly the last remaining human alive.

We’ve been following the project for years, and the developer, Nguyen, has had the very dangerous tendency of constantly promising ultimately unattainable, unrealistic release dates. For instance, in a 2003 interview, Nguyen estimates a release in October 2003! In a fine 2007 story available at The Escapist, he explains this tendency:

…I began to develop better techniques for doing things and my art improved, I couldn’t help but go back and overhaul what I had done previously, a habit that eventually attributed to the delays.

All things said, it really, really is looking like the project is right about done. It also looks like it’s benefited immensely from its long development process. The most tangible sign of looming release includes this new beautiful, atmospheric trailer for the mod:

In addition to the game’s official website and the Escapist feature, there’s also a ModDB feature on the game for those interested. We’ll keep you posted!

Even before its release, Neotokyo already has one distinct advantage over some of its other Source mod peers: We already know that it works. While the original proof-of-concept version of the game, on the UT2k4 platform, may have lacked some content and ultimately a player-base, it also played extremely well and succeeded in illustrating its polished, balanced gameplay.

The all-new Source version, then, is bound to play just as smoothly, but also be a tangible upgrade in other aspects of the game. For me, the most exhilarating facet of the game is the team’s utter attention to detail, with years of work poured into prefabs, signs, posters, textures, maps and models: A look and feel in complete accord with its given name. Also worth mentioning, and another illustration of the team’s dedication to their craft: A 27-track digipak double CD soundtrack by Ed Harrison. (I can personally vouch for its quality).

In preparation of the release, Studio Radi-8 have already published examples of their in-game hint system. The team is currently fine-tuning the game, and while we wait for more information and release dates, you should check the project’s official YouTube channel. Finally, I’ve included their pre-release trailer after the break.

Dear Esther,
the gulls do not land here anymore. I’ve noticed that this year they seem to shun the place. Maybe it’s the depletion of the fishing stock driving them away. Perhaps it’s me.

Dear Esther is an interactive first-person adventure. Based on the Source engine popularised by Half-Life 2, it is a free mod that requires the game to run. Created by British games researcher Dan Pinchbeck under the development moniker thechineseroom, the mod is described as an interactive narrative that “puts traditional game technologies to new use”. Essentially the player has one action available to them, and that is to move around and explore the island. The narrative arrives in the form of the atmospheric visuals and sound, and short spoken fragments of story that are triggered at various spots on your journey. The narrator reads out extracts from a letter addressed to someone called Esther, and relates his attempts to follow in the footsteps of a man arriving to the island before him. Throughout his monologue he alludes to his experiences as well as those of other characters, all seemingly related in some way. The accounts sometimes appear literal but at other times feel more metaphorical and nebulous in their meaning.

The mod notes mention that the narrative triggers littered throughout the map have an element of randomness applied to them – each one selects one of three fragments, so revisiting the experience will produce different combinations of story fragments. This inventive story device ensures that any particular playthrough will be unique and that replaying will allow you more avenues of interpretation. Indeed, the pieces on their own have no context and are sometimes seemingly unrelated to the bigger story, and it is entirely up to the player to make connections betweeen them and meanings out of them.

It is required of the player to not play the mod like he would a regular first-person game. The controls have been stripped away of everything save for basic manoeuvring, the movement speed reduced to a patient walk. If you start bunny-hopping to move faster you may cause the triggered sound clips to overlap each other, if you try and overthink the path ahead and go exploring in areas you aren’t meant to you’ll find yourself seeing behind geometry and getting stuck in tight spots. Dear Esther demands that you settle into the relaxed pacing and trust the design of the environment to lead you forwards. In that respect the map flow is directed and fluid, there is always a way forward and it is never too obscure. At a few points there are alternate places to explore but these tend to just add more narrative fragments; ultimately the route is a linear journey from the pier to the centre of the island.

The extremely desolate surroundings and minimal aural ambience create a heavy melancholy that reflects the loneliness of the protagonist and the island. Most of the time all you can hear is the wind, but occasionally a soft piano melody floats in at appropriate moments. The island is a deserted place, there are only hints of previous inhabitants and the visuals are sublimely tuned to convey this. A thin mist lies over everything, the palette consists of muddy hues and the clues left behind by the man you are pursuing are the only signs of life – bright and in stark contrast to the greyness. There are moments where you may think you see something but a closer look brings uncertainty – little glimpses of things that you’ll miss if you blink. All these elements result in an ethereal quality that pervades the entire experience, and leaves you questioning the reality of even the island itself let alone the fragmented recollections.

Dear Esther,
I find myself to be as featureless as this ocean, as shallow and unoccupied as this bay, a listless wreck without identification. My rocks are these bones, and a careful fence to keep the precipice at bay.

Dear Esther is not a game. It is not something that you can derive fun or challenge from. It is a passive experience of the likes of games like The Path, the extent of interaction distilled to mere movement and observation. Pinchbeck argues that the active interpretation of the ambiguous story provides the drive for the player to ‘play’ the mod, however this still is an interaction not unique to games but common to all forms of art. Consequently Dear Esther is a melancholic, brooding story of a man discovering himself, told to you through the mechanics of first-person narrative. And all the better for it: this is a ghostly tale well worth experiencing.