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Old 27-09-18, 01:52   #32
New Dwight
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Originally Posted by TombRaiderTim View Post
I decided to watch the walkthrough instead after giving the game itself a go but I have to be honest to give a good opinion so I want to say that the game itself is near enough impossible to progress without getting agitated due to there not being any clear hints or tutorials on where to proceed or what things are used for certain parts of the game itself. It may have potential if these kinds of things are included into it but the fact you have to explore massive open areas which could take up to an hour before you come across anything is quite annoying, especially when you have no indication of what the item is used for or where you are supposed to use it so i'm sorry I am sounding quite harsh but its difficult to play when you have crazy quality sound effects going on at once though it may not seem hard to you as you built the game and know where to go yourself but you really need to give clues and directions to players who want to try out your game as I tried to play it but was full on stuck during the first and second level and gave up due to the reasons I stated.

I think some people may agree although everyone has their own opinion but it would attract more attention if it was a little more polished, not to mention try getting it uploaded to trle.net as its a more common place for levels to be shown to other people.
I know it's like that. Replaying the game after these years, I seen that immediately in areas like the manor, Cargo Crypt and so on. Thing is, the game was originally "Arch Raider" which actually had clear, concise hints and a more linear path to follow based on the character's given hints (and stronger use of survival instincts) but for some reason I have yet to comprehend completely why I changed the character. IIRC, it was to have a more relatable character to my main game, which in result left The Mist: Resurrection scarce and scattered and I removed most of the dialogue voices and hints. At that point I didn't care and released it as is. Missed a couple game breaking bugs like, the infamous glass-window-pistols in the manor, the key in the gate in the Cistern Waterway (where going in there without the key meant you'd be locked away forever), and many more. Aside those gameplay affects (I should've kept it as Arch Raider, I wanted to release, but I had already removed all the sources except for the meta2tr objects, so that's not possible).
The environments are what mostly jarred me while replaying the game. Some levels were good, but a lot of them had so much more potential had I spent more time on them and touched it up with meta2tr as I initially planned. Levels like the third level (the Cargo Crypt) was short, and was going to be longer, but I lacked the motivation to ever make it that way.

Some environments though had really good sounds this time around. (The Desert Westersand, Sochen Cave Palace and Cistern Waterway are my favorite. Desert Westersand was my favorite in terms of environmental sounds to be honest, the level was actually a retextured Sacred Lake level.

(Times from the video included "00:00") My personal favorites where:

The Prologue (Ruins of Mountain Makalu) - The environment turned out nice, but the story behind it was invisible to the player as it was built when the game was still Arch Raider, and without that, the level had no context and was just a map worth exploring. All in all, not very interesting, hence why I didn't bother playing it in the video.

The Manor (Outside levels) - room for improvement within the interior.

Sochen Cave Palace (Some objects still lacked proper lighting) 16:08 - Room for improvement in a overall scene. (Wanted it to be more linear to ffxii's Sochen Cave Palace but not entirely).

Cistern Waterway 41:16 - Map was designed well, the scene with the Cleaner robot was done well, but lighting could've used some work based on the concept setting of the scene (old, dingy). The three cages' blocking the sequence switches collision needed to be fixed, or one large cage blocking the switches should've been made instead.

Desert Palace 1:01:16 - Map, in for improvements, as some rooms' lighting where too dark compared to the target map I had in mind - from FF9. Better texture use to fit Desert Palace FF9. I could do with the references from extracted battle maps of FF9, using those textures and the ones I used ~similar to the recent Lindblum/Hideout render.

Raithwall's Tomb 1:17:20 - (The actual map portion near the end of the level) the beginning is a edited Tutorial level map with some extra rooms).
The actual map of the level was absolutely ginormous - similar to the size in FFXII, but still lacked correct lightning and object placement I had in mind.

The Lost Island 1:44:25 - Map is small and for areas like the ocean, has room for improvement. (Currently I did not know how make a proper ocean in the room editor, so the character could swim to the end of the map still).

Esto Gaza 1:45:00 - Really one of my ultimate favorite levels, as it's the one I spent the most time on, but still never touched it up with meta2tr. I remember working with Titak on this level with color ambiences and tone to fit the Cold/Snowy environment. Using various subtle colors.

Mount Gulug 1:54:02 - A good try aiming for the volcanic type scenery, but compared to FF9 (as my main goal for the level) it sees for more improvement. Mount Gulug in FF9, the environment is less of lava fields across the scene and more of an old abandoned dig site nearly (hence the Bishop in Esto Gaza mentions the "Moles" used to live there. e.g. - 'Une- the Mole' etc.). The term "Mount" - 'referencing, 'mountain~volcanic' due to the foundation built on/around a volcano. In FF9, you never see any Lava.

Ipsen's Castle 2:01:53 - The outside scene is okay but needed improvements undoubtedly. Beyond the magic objects, in the front, the player can reach the end of the map, and there's no 'real' way of accessing the interior of the castle as it should be. The interior, is better, has a believable ambience and lighting, but some of the geometry mainly doesn't match with the intended result I was aiming for. In FF9, the interior, and lighting is a bit (a bit) brighter than what I had, the texture usage being the main issue, and the geometry, shows the map at an upright angle and an upside down angle - hence the effect of Ipsen's Castle being reversed, aka "Ipsen's Curse".

The Manor - Under Siege 2:27:00 - Apart from the original manor level where the main interior was widely empty and huge (due to the storyline - manor resident had just moved in and not finished unpacking - I don't believe that, tbh). The Under Siege part of the manor brought a destroyed/wrecked look to the environment caused by Eidolon Atomos (as it once did to Lindblum), but still needed improvements as with the already huge empty areas, there weren't much debris to show off in all the wreckage as intended.

The Alchemilla Tower 2:32:52 - Another one of my favorites, the initial concept of this area was a gigantic tower built on the clouds above, similar to the concept of Bhujerba from ffxii, but in more dark tone. Problem with this is, the tower itself shows no signs of clouds beneath it, but rather in front and at the top. The Tower itself was designed to my target, but certainly could be increased and improved in UE4.

Island, Mahikea 4:12:41 - (Last level seen in the above video https://youtu.be/aPzIMP7LsBU?t=4h12m41s) My feelings with this level are mixed because:
A. The level turned out too short.
B. This level was supposed to be ported from what I had in UE4 on my main game.
It turned out short because I wasn't looking to redesign the whole map in trle and couldn't find a way to achieve that similar quality in trle anyway.
The area with the Iifa Tree (another disappointment - hence why I stopped the video here) looked nice, but could be improved - immensely.

The levels I didn't fancy:

The Manor (Interior) - The huge emptiness and repetitive textures I lazily used was an eye sore while replaying.

The Cargo Crypt 8:05 - Level was extremely small, and nearly bland from the lack of connection to the story.

The Ogir Yensa Sandsea 12:00 - While building the level I initially planned for this to be adjacent to the Sandsea in FFXII, and initially be split into two, but didn't turn out that way as I didn't bother to try tot he fullest.

Desert Westersand 31:47 - Level was nothing but a retextured Scared Lake from TR4, what more could I say.

The Feywood 1:39:11 - Level turned out a disteraster while I replayed it. While my main goal was deliver a similar feeling to the Feywood in FFXII, it just didn't turn out that way, stemming from the lack of patience and precision from myself alone, and was left the way it was, which is a disappoint as it had potential, I just refused to find it.
There also a extremely complicated scales puzzles that I did anew using the Scales object. The way to solve it was to listen to the audio that played of various 'ticks' heard and matched the number of chops to be placed in each. Thankfully, the version downloadable has been patched with the easier, original scales puzzle.

The Lunar Surface 2:17:07 - The purpose of this outer space level was explained in an removed cutscene before the level. The outfit was suited for this level, was only there when the game was Arch Raider, and was removed as well as the cutscene when it changed, resulting in this level without a real purpose. The design is most disappointing as it's really only a retextured Feywood level, as the same small environment and path takes place. Overall, improvements are shouting from this level, or remove it entirely.

Pandemonium 2:48:48 - This level's design isn't great as it is a retextured Temple of Puna TR3 level, with the exception of the boss fight, which was nicely done given the limits of meta2tr.

Royal Capital Ramseur 3:00:11 - This level was planned to be similarly designed to Rabanastre from ffxii, but as the same reasons as the feywood, it turned out to be the worse it could, a retextured Alexandria TR4.

Ramseur 2/the snow level 3:09:53 - is the meta2tr demo level, I need not say anything else.

Ramseur Lowtown 3:13:00- With the initial plans as Capital Ramsuer, and turned out not, and become a textured Guardian of Semerkhet TR4.

The Feymarch 3:20:48 - Because I failed to use my creativity and remake the feymarch from ff4 as 3D similar to Desert Palace, I instead took the level - Castle of Anxiety by QRS and used it as the Feymarch (permission granted prior to release).

Penelo's last levels:

Fossil Roo part 1 3:25:20 - Parts of the area are bland, and should've been done as the initial plan of ff9 fossil roo, but I was somehow satisfied with the current design.

Fossil Roo part 2 3:47:00 is a textured Lost library TR4.

The Memoria Part 1 4:07:25 - Just too tiny.

Abstract Manor 4:09:14 - same reasons as the first level manor.

The Memoria & Crystal World (not shown in the video) - While this had a completely new design for TRLE - using pre-rendered backgrounds to capture that FF9 originality, some of the fields like Memoria/Time Interval etc. where not setup correctly, and the walk mesh/walk path and camera angles were off. The battle scenes with the four guardians where on point though.

All the retextured TR4 levels made the game unexceptionally long. It certainly would've been different had it been designed the way intended. Overall, The Mist: Resurrection has a lot of improvements needed to be done, and would've been a better trle game had it been kept as Arch Raider.

I've added remaking The Mist: Resurrection to my queue of projects in UE4, and I'll likely keep the title the same, but bring the main character back from Arch Raider.
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