After many setbacks, the fangame Indiana Jones and the Fountain of Youth has just released its first playable demo. Ten locations chock full of old-style "Fate of Atlantis" inspired 2D point-and-click goodness.
If you're not sure if fangames are for you, first check out the screenshots to see just how much work has gone into this game so far, then get the 5Mb demo!
Source: Barnett College
DO WE HAVE TO WAIT 5 YEARS FOR THE FULL GAME? Chirstmas 2006 maybe?
But it will take awhile. Quality takes time, and (from the writing side of things) scripting a computer game is completely different than scripting a linear story. It presents a number of challenges, not least of which is trying to get important information across without being too "wordy." (Something that still could've used some work in the demo)
And that's just from the writing side of things...programming the sucker I imagine to be a nightmare!
I'm always most inspired after seeing the artwork Misjaa creates. It's something else to see words that are written take form in his storyboards.
If you guys liked what you saw in the demo, wait till you see what'll be in store for the introduction to the full game!
Lorn
Like most of you, we felt that FOA was as close to an addition to the movie franchise as could be achieved on the computer screen.
We're aiming for this experience to be the same...we want this to feel just as legitimate as the big screen adventures!
Lorn
I'd even pay for a completed cut. Which, for a cynical cheapass like myself, is one heck of an admission.
Keep up the excellent work, all.
http://dsgames.guerrestellari.net/index.html#notizie
I mean, the video of the plane moving plane over the map cutscene... NONE of the Indy games have got that right! They just have the map and a red line!
Keep up the good work, but KEEP US UPDATED ON IT! I will be watching with bated breath! Oh, and any help you might need (beta testing, whatever) - just ask! I'm sure any of us will be glad to!
Are there any plans for voice assets?
Keep up the good work. Hopefully projects like these will convince Jim Ward how wrong he is about us.
Pays to actually read the site.
"There are future plans to release both TALKIE versions of the DEMO and FULL-GAME, and also include an MP3 score."
We've been in contact with Doug Lee, who provided the voice of Indy in Fate of Atlantis and Infernal Machine, and he quoted us a rate.
I think it will probably be cost-prohibitive to produce a talkie for the full game, particularly if you want professional quality voice acting for all of the characters.
However, a talkie for the demo might not be out of the realm of possibility, and would probably be a lot of fun.
Here's hoping!
Lorn
I'd possibly be interested in contributing. I wouldn't say I'm the most talented voice actor in the world though (I do have an Audigy 2 and a decent mic, which is a plug).
lol
How big is Indy's part (according to the site that's the only part you're accepting auditions for at the moment - which is understandable)?
We can assume he probably has more than double the lines of everyone else. I get the impression that this is going to be a fairly large game.
Knowing the amount of dialogue involved might help potential Indys decide whether they're in a position to contribute.
All that said, Doug Lee would be pretty cool.
I presume you guys have seen the Kings Quest 1 & 2 remakes? They both have full talkie versions that are excellent.
Granted KQ1 is very short with a limited cast, and 2 is fairly short also, I dont think that the idea should be dismissed at all. I'm sure if you posted around the forums, held auditions of people sending in recordings of themselves reading from sample scripts for the characters, you could find people that would be willing to do it for nothing more than their name in the credits.
I'm fairly talented at voice work myself, no expert by any means, but I would contribute voice talents to the game for any characters you felt me worthy of, and I would do it for nothing.
Plus I have a pretty good mic, so, Id say get started on casting!!
The audition listing that you found is well over a year old, if it's the one I'm thinking of.
At one point, we solicited submissions from our fanbase for potential Indys - but this was before we began discussing the possibility of working with Doug Lee.
You're correct in that Indy will certainly have the most dialogue in whatever we do.
The potential challenges are in raising enough money to cover the costs of Mr. Lees services, and then in also attracting enough quality voice talent which can also match the recording level "sound field" that will be created by Mr. Lee's audio mix.
Our project leader doesn't feel this will be a problem...I have a few more reservations.
One benefit to the discussion is that Mr. Lee has offered to record two sample lines of our choosing which will enable us to determine what the sound field sounds like - from that we could determine if we can record other voices so that it sounds like it's in the same space.
After that, we just have to find voice quality work of the same level as Mr. Lees so everything flows together well.
Lorn
You should be able to compensate a little with post processing (depending upon what software you're using - I use Audacity. It's free and can use Cubase (vsd?) plugins).
You might want to look towards some guidelines for recording to help try to standardise the general feel of the sound (eg: room size, acceptable level of background noise, target voice volume, pop shield, etc.).
That might not guarantee voice talent, but it'd make what you end up with a lot easier to manage.
I'd say about 50% of speeceh is inflection...trying to paste together words that weren't originally spoken that way in context would probably sound just as bad as a text-to-speech reader would.
Potentially a good idea to cut down recording times though.
(Unfortunately, I've got a hunch that it'd end up sounding like those computerised phone menus that just don't have the timing or inflection or volume right - plus with the extra time and takes needed to get that perfect "Hey look", you may as well record the extra lines)
Keep it up.
If you go to your game directory and start the game by double clicking the .exe, you may find that the savegames reappear.
Probably here;
C:\Program Files\Screen 7\Fountain of Youth\Demo\
Double click foydemo.exe
DOn't use the desktop shortcut!
They do appreciate the report, though.
I'm the writer on this project, and want to thank everybody for all of the kind words on the project. I almost posted the announcment here last night, but wanted to see if it would find its way here on its own.
Shmargin> We've had trouble nailing down the stuck symbols panel bug, but believe we may have identified the cause - an alert player figured out that if he right-clicked on the symbols, the panel would get stuck. Try looking at the symbols without right-clicking, and see if that gets you past.
We dont' currently have a mac port, I'm afraid..not sure what it would take it get it running in the macOS.
Glad you're also enjoying the in-jokes - we were definitely gunning for old-style Lucasarts humor.
The team has been working hard on this project for several years now, and we'll continue to press ahead for the full game.
I'm definitely aiming for a cinematic feel while scripting the adventure - I want this game to feel worthy as an additional to the silver screen mythos.
If you liked the demo...wait till you see the intro of the full game!
Lorn
But the jokes, especially the LucasArts in-jokes are top notch.
One in-joke oppeortunity missed though is having a LucasArts or SW character (eg. Laverne or Max) as the semaphore flag bearing emblem on the side of Lando's plane (though that's not your dept, obviously).
(Couldn't have a Lucasarts adventure game without them popping in there *somewhere*.)
http://www.bigbluecup.com/yabb/index.php?topic=21531.0
Unfortunately, I cannot tell if it works with this game, as I cannot run the installer under Mac OS X.
Now if someone would put together a ZIP-download...
I have nothing to do with the programming, artwork, animation, or music at all.
My job primarily concerns developing the plot and dialogue for the game.
The most interesting thing about being involved with the project is in coordinating everything internationally.
We're spread all across the globe.
The project leader (Mark Lovegrove) is from the UK, our background artist (Misja Van Latuum) is from the Netherlands, I'm from the United States, I'm not entirely sure where our programmer, dkh, is from...
Our puzzle designer and my story assistant is from South America...
Basically, we're all spread out, which makes development interesting.
Wherever possible, we're stealing development models from George Lucas himself, taking advantage of the fact that we operate in seperate time zones.
Lorn
One odd thing is that if I run from a shortcut, the savegames don't work (I think they save to the desktop), but if I run from the actual game folder, the game does pick up the savegames that are saved in that game folder.
So if you're launching from desktop icon, instead find the directory it's installed to and run from there by launching the .exe file directly.
It's only 5MB, so give it a try!
So, I hope the story and puzzles in the full game come up to the high standard of the demo so far!
Congratulations to the team, so far the whole experience has taken me back 15 or so years to the first time I played FOA.
So, full release in 2007? Maybe?
And I wonder if this will spur on the Fate of Atlantis 2 team?
AND GOD DAMN YOU LUCAS YOU STAY AWAY FROM THIS FAN GAME, STAY AWAY YOU HEAR ME, YOUVE RUINED MY COMPUTER GAMING LIFE ENOUGH AS IT IS!!!