How can they "fix" AOD?

Shadd21 · 14-10-24, 22:57

I've never played Andel of Darkness, but what i've heard, the game will need more than just fixing the all the bugs, and removing the level up system. With this not being a full blown remake, and instead being a remaster with probably only a year's worth of development, how can Aspyr realistic improve AOD to elevate it to being a "good" game.

charmedangelin · 14-10-24, 23:14

Just fix the bugs and glitches, restore cut content, and improve the controls.

That's basically it tbh.

JaguarXJ8 · 14-10-24, 23:21

What I'm wondering about is the story. AOD was written originally to be made into 3 games, so the game itself only shows the tip of the iceberg of the whole storyline. Karel was supposed to survive according to the original documents released by lead writer Murti Schofield, so I don’t know how they will handle the end of the game. They might actually have to change the story for that. Maybe they'll have Lara kill him in an epic way or something..

Quote:

Originally Posted by charmedangelin

Just fix the bugs and glitches, restore cut content, and improve the controls.

That's basically it tbh.

Agree with this, if they manage to do these things for AOD it's more than we can ask for

Mr Od · 14-10-24, 23:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by JaguarXJ8

... AOD was written originally to be made into 3 games, so the game itself only shows the tip of the iceberg of the whole storyline. Karel was supposed to survive according to the original documents released by lead writer Murti Schofield, so I don’t know how they will handle the end of the game. They might actually have to change the story for that. ...

The big storyline written by Schofield was indeed splitten into three parts. However, it was clear from a very early development stage that it would have been impossible to build Germany and Turkey for AoD within the deadlines, and so AoD was further cut down. AoD was ultimately refined in such a way that it ended up being self-contained: aside from the oversight of the fact that Lara already knew Karel, in fact Karel dies at the end, pierced by an energy beam and caught up in the explosion of the Sleeper Nephilim.

omerocoti · 14-10-24, 23:41

Implement the same modern controls as TR1-3.

Fix BUGS.

Modify Lara's movement to run, climb stairs, climb after grabbing a wall. Make overall movement faster for all actions.

PLEASE improve the enemy AI, it's horrible.

Redesign Lara's entire movement as she runs and shoots while holding a gun.

redfox45 · 14-10-24, 23:45

I don't know but earlier I was yearning to hear Joss Ackland's godlike voice as Eckhardt so I rewatched the boss fight at the end with him for what feels like the first time since playing it on the PS2 back then. And this horrible memory awakened.
I suddenly vividly remembered standing in that final area ...Standing in place, just ducking these dumb lasers over and over and feeling like the biggest idiot in the world for actually thinking this game would have a final boss that would make all that suffering worth it somehow.
Then the final final boss is literally just "climb up and jump in the general direction of the guy in the middle"

My whole memory of playing AoD is just vague, depressing memories like that of wondering why the hell i'm even playing this still. And reliving that kinda scared me as it made me realize that there's a very good reason why i've not touched that game since the mid 00's and it's only partially to do with bugs and control issues.

Mr Od · 14-10-24, 23:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by omerocoti

Redesign Lara's entire movement as she runs and shoots while holding a gun.

This is a step in the right direction:

But the system should be made even more similar to that of TR1-5, and they should also introduce the mid-air somersaults when jumping forwards and backwards.

Pietras · 14-10-24, 23:58

Controls, camera, combat. If they fix that then at least the game will be sorta-decent enough with all its remaining good aspects finally coming into focus without the players having to constantly fight with the character's movement within the game's world

And it has to be redone the modern way, full analog (or mouse-rotating) fluid controls. No half-assed tank setups to make it similar to 4-5 as some people are inexplicably suggesting. It would actively go against the core philosophy of the game's structure and further downgrade and demake the experience. AOD was never a block-assembled sequel to the classics of 1-5 using their engine. Melee and stealth would need extensive improvement just as much as disastrous basic gun combat, targeting, movement during combat etc. All of that was some of the worst examples of such systems ever done in any video game.

Other than that? Not much else can be done (or should be done before the basic controls and combat are massively improved first). They're not gonna add anything extensive like Germany/Turkey levels. Maybe the pyramid escape could be added as a self-contained flashback bonus level with TLR remaster textures/assets but nothing bigger than that. Some cut sections in Paris could be brought back and some dialogues. Any extensive rewrites are outta the question and there's no guarantee they would even be better than what's already in the game.

No clue what to even do with Kurtis. He's a playable character almost at the end of the game who was suppoused to somehow have... a completly unique new moveset and combat skills for 1,5 levels? Yeah that would never work even if they finished it. They should just work on fixing Lara's controls and combat capabilites and then copy+pasta it onto Kurtis. Lazy design, but what else can be done. There's no room or time to add tutorials for his new unique abilities anyway even if they got restored

Straight-out deleting I Feel Stronger nonsense upgrades would be fast and improve the game instantly. This is a case where "remastering" a feature faithfully would do more harm than good, it was THAT bad and idiotic. Remaking the system into anything functional would be a massive undertaking, it was the most undercooked new feature and straight out useless in any aspect other than needlessly roadblocking the players from performing absolutely basic platforming and traversal tasks on the game's critical path lol. Hard to believe it even made it in originally.

Economy stats could be improved a bit. But then again, there's barely 2 shops in the game so... yeah.... a major fix would require adding brand new vendors with new characters and VAs. Not happening. Maybe they could add some vending machines with chocolate bars/herbs/outfits (especially to Prague) to work around the characters issue but that's it, they won't add vending machines with guns/ammo lol

JaguarXJ8 · 15-10-24, 00:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr Od

The big storyline written by Schofield was indeed splitten into three parts. However, it was clear from a very early development stage that it would have been impossible to build Germany and Turkey for AoD within the deadlines, and so AoD was further cut down. AoD was ultimately refined in such a way that it ended up being self-contained: aside from the oversight of the fact that Lara already knew Karel, in fact Karel dies at the end, pierced by an energy beam and caught up in the explosion of the Sleeper Nephilim.

That's true, but it leaves a bigger underlining problem with the storyline to deal with. What was the purpose of the Sanglyph? In the story, it was created by Eckhardt and later hidden in secret Obscura Paintings. More than half the game is about retrieving the paintings. It was Eckhardt's plan to fuse the Sanglyph with his special glove to revive the Sleeper. Yet in the end… the Sleeper is destroyed by the Sanglyph? How does that make sense? The whole purpose of the Sanglyph was to awaken it. Karel wanted to revive the Sleeper to rebreed the Nephelim race, why would he allow Lara to get near the Sleeper with the Sanglyph, or allow himself to be caught in the energy beam that could harm him? It's something I never understood.

The story makes more sense if Karel does survive in the end (as is the case in the original documents), although it still leaves unexplained how and why the Sleeper was destroyed

RAID · 15-10-24, 00:00

There's tons of opportunities for improvement, some of which have been mentioned.

Controls
Lara's responsiveness
Cut content
Etc

I am hoping they restore some of the story content as well, even the tiniest details. For instance, in Prague, after entering the strahov fortress plant room, Lara magically changes to shorts instead of long pants. That needs to change through a cutscene.

Lara knew Karel as she called him by name, moments before he executes Eckhart, yet there was never any interaction between them prior to that moment. This needs an explanation.

Additionally, areas such as Parisian Ghetto could use some tweaks and add NPC's. In the OG, Lara just ran around the empty streets of Paris and it felt weird. I get it's early in the morning when she gets there, but as the levels progress, time moves along. If memory serves me, she wakes up in an abandoned train wreck at 6am. By the time she climbs, meets Janice, speaks to Bernard, Pierre, the bodyguard, the herbalist, goes to the Serpent Rouge, finds the graveyard, etc, I'm positive it would be at the very least noon by that time. People would come out of their homes by then.

14-10-24, 22:57	#1
Shadd21 Member Joined: Oct 2024 Posts: 2	How can they "fix" AOD? I've never played Andel of Darkness, but what i've heard, the game will need more than just fixing the all the bugs, and removing the level up system. With this not being a full blown remake, and instead being a remaster with probably only a year's worth of development, how can Aspyr realistic improve AOD to elevate it to being a "good" game.

14-10-24, 23:45	#6
redfox45 Member Joined: Jan 2007 Posts: 3,981	I don't know but earlier I was yearning to hear Joss Ackland's godlike voice as Eckhardt so I rewatched the boss fight at the end with him for what feels like the first time since playing it on the PS2 back then. And this horrible memory awakened. I suddenly vividly remembered standing in that final area ...Standing in place, just ducking these dumb lasers over and over and feeling like the biggest idiot in the world for actually thinking this game would have a final boss that would make all that suffering worth it somehow. Then the final final boss is literally just "climb up and jump in the general direction of the guy in the middle" My whole memory of playing AoD is just vague, depressing memories like that of wondering why the hell i'm even playing this still. And reliving that kinda scared me as it made me realize that there's a very good reason why i've not touched that game since the mid 00's and it's only partially to do with bugs and control issues. Last edited by redfox45; 14-10-24 at 23:48.

14-10-24, 23:14	#2
charmedangelin Member Joined: Jan 2016 Posts: 24,632	Just fix the bugs and glitches, restore cut content, and improve the controls. That's basically it tbh.

14-10-24, 23:41	#5
omerocoti Member Joined: Nov 2014 Posts: 1,768	Implement the same modern controls as TR1-3. Fix BUGS. Modify Lara's movement to run, climb stairs, climb after grabbing a wall. Make overall movement faster for all actions. PLEASE improve the enemy AI, it's horrible. Redesign Lara's entire movement as she runs and shoots while holding a gun.

14-10-24, 23:58	#8
Pietras Member Joined: Apr 2005 Posts: 8,639	Controls, camera, combat. If they fix that then at least the game will be sorta-decent enough with all its remaining good aspects finally coming into focus without the players having to constantly fight with the character's movement within the game's world And it has to be redone the modern way, full analog (or mouse-rotating) fluid controls. No half-assed tank setups to make it similar to 4-5 as some people are inexplicably suggesting. It would actively go against the core philosophy of the game's structure and further downgrade and demake the experience. AOD was never a block-assembled sequel to the classics of 1-5 using their engine. Melee and stealth would need extensive improvement just as much as disastrous basic gun combat, targeting, movement during combat etc. All of that was some of the worst examples of such systems ever done in any video game. Other than that? Not much else can be done (or should be done before the basic controls and combat are massively improved first). They're not gonna add anything extensive like Germany/Turkey levels. Maybe the pyramid escape could be added as a self-contained flashback bonus level with TLR remaster textures/assets but nothing bigger than that. Some cut sections in Paris could be brought back and some dialogues. Any extensive rewrites are outta the question and there's no guarantee they would even be better than what's already in the game. No clue what to even do with Kurtis. He's a playable character almost at the end of the game who was suppoused to somehow have... a completly unique new moveset and combat skills for 1,5 levels? Yeah that would never work even if they finished it. They should just work on fixing Lara's controls and combat capabilites and then copy+pasta it onto Kurtis. Lazy design, but what else can be done. There's no room or time to add tutorials for his new unique abilities anyway even if they got restored Straight-out deleting I Feel Stronger nonsense upgrades would be fast and improve the game instantly. This is a case where "remastering" a feature faithfully would do more harm than good, it was THAT bad and idiotic. Remaking the system into anything functional would be a massive undertaking, it was the most undercooked new feature and straight out useless in any aspect other than needlessly roadblocking the players from performing absolutely basic platforming and traversal tasks on the game's critical path lol. Hard to believe it even made it in originally. Economy stats could be improved a bit. But then again, there's barely 2 shops in the game so... yeah.... a major fix would require adding brand new vendors with new characters and VAs. Not happening. Maybe they could add some vending machines with chocolate bars/herbs/outfits (especially to Prague) to work around the characters issue but that's it, they won't add vending machines with guns/ammo lol

15-10-24, 00:00	#10
RAID Member Joined: May 2005 Posts: 20,943	There's tons of opportunities for improvement, some of which have been mentioned. Controls Lara's responsiveness Cut content Etc I am hoping they restore some of the story content as well, even the tiniest details. For instance, in Prague, after entering the strahov fortress plant room, Lara magically changes to shorts instead of long pants. That needs to change through a cutscene. Lara knew Karel as she called him by name, moments before he executes Eckhart, yet there was never any interaction between them prior to that moment. This needs an explanation. Additionally, areas such as Parisian Ghetto could use some tweaks and add NPC's. In the OG, Lara just ran around the empty streets of Paris and it felt weird. I get it's early in the morning when she gets there, but as the levels progress, time moves along. If memory serves me, she wakes up in an abandoned train wreck at 6am. By the time she climbs, meets Janice, speaks to Bernard, Pierre, the bodyguard, the herbalist, goes to the Serpent Rouge, finds the graveyard, etc, I'm positive it would be at the very least noon by that time. People would come out of their homes by then.