Ok, this thread is where we are at, which I will update as it progresses so we know what we need. At the moment we're currently doing this:
What to do:
1. Mod ideas. Currently defining classes, gameplay specifics, implementing some basic features.
2. Sumea modeller challenge #7, challenge to model and texture characters.
3. Level designers to start creating levels to work with. This can be done now!!!
What's been done:
1. Mcdrewski has created the Sumea mod repository. You can download all the updates on how the mod is progressing there.
2. Kezza has been looking into Unreal Tournament 2004 and scripting. He's done character classes, radar, and other things.
Who's currently doing what:
Azmodai, Souri, Nibbles, Killa Dee - working on a map each
Mcdrewski - running the repository, and overviewing project, GUI
Kezza - overviewing scripting and modifications, if you want to help out here, ask him what needs to be done!
This is a summary of the ideas going on in the [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2681"]Sumea Mod Ideas thread[/url]. I'll keep updating it as we go so there's one clear spot to look for the summary. Please post comments to [url="http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2681"]the other thread[/url], or PM me directly.
Summary
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts
As You Like It - William Shakespeare
"The Sumea Mod" is a futuristic class-based, team co-operative play mod for Unreal Tournament 2004. The gameplay is focussed on team co-operation over annihilation, and the levels are designed so that objectives can only be completed by different classes working together.
Some might see this as an almost pathalogical attempt to mimic the co-operation between developers, artists, modellers and so on in the Australian/New Zealand Game Development Industry ([url="http://www.sumea.com.au"]the industry that Sumea supports[/url]). Actually, we assure you that most of us keep our heavy rocket launchers and fusion jumppacks purely for weekends, and hardly ever take them to work.
...one man in his time plays many parts... Character Classes
To try and keep this thing to a managable size, we've pretty much settled on three character classes. However we haven't really made too many decisions on what abilities those characters will have.
We're looking for concept artists at the moment to give inspiration for these very generic descriptions, so get out those tablets, pencils and markers! What we know, and what we think about them, though, is as follows:
The "heavy"
Heavily armoured and carrying a huge load of firepower, these slow moving characters are the mainstay of the infantry. They can launch rockets or mortars to targets which have been marked for them by another class.
The "support"
Moderately armoured and much quicker movers, these characters are demolitions specialists first, and soldiers second. They can resupply the heavies with ammunition, and can drive vehicles and operate machinery that's crucial to meeting the team's objectives. They're no slouches in the firepower department though, carrying a flamethrower (or something) to take the fight to the enemy.
The "covert"
Lightly armoured, the coverts are fast when required, and meticulous and silent when they choose. From afar, their sniper scope can help them take out unsuspecting targets, while at close quarters they carry a weapon that brings silent death to those not paying attention. However, we think that they'll also be healers somehow, perhaps using a weapon or vehicle to restore health to their teammates. We're not quite sure if they will be able to 'cloak' themselves, or simply disguise themselves as the opposition. Perhaps they can mark targets for their heavily armoured brethren.
Ideas for character designers
We've collected a smattering of fleshed-out, (and some with no flesh at all) ideas on character 'styles' and abilities below. For some of them , it's obvious which class should get them, but the rest will probably be shuffled around to balance out the classes if they're used at all. If something in here strikes a chord, then why not post your flash of inspiration in the ideas threads, or knock up a concept piece for the concept thread?
- "Red barbarian needs grenades badly!"
- "Where are my newts?! I need them to heal Uglak!"
- I really should have thought of a good way to summarise this better
...all the men and women merely players... Player abilities, weapons etc.
Here's the rest of the ideas we've got about abilities, weapons and vehicles. As before, some of them are obviously designed for certain classes, but the rest will be shuffled or kept for use in Sumea Mod 2.0.
Abilities
Weaponry
Vehicles
All the world's a stage... Maps and Levels
Style
So we've decided that the mod will be futuristic. Other than that we're kind of leaving it up to the concept artists and level designers to create the world. Completely different map styles and worlds are fine, so long as they foster co-operation in order to satify the map's objectives. The current setting ideas and elements that we're working with are:
- Lots of close quarters firefights
- Choke points
- Sniping from afar
- Painting targets for artillery strikes
- Vehicles to move slower units around
Most ideas at the moment seem to be more focussed on the urban jungle feeling, but don't let that stop you from making your detailed replica of the craters and canyons of Mars if that's what you want!
...have their exits and their entrances... Objectives, Death and Respawning
Generic Mission Objective Ideas
One thing that this mod won't focus on is the deathmatch/fragcount sort of objective. Sure, you could choose to play the maps that way, but only by ignoring the actual mission objectives - and why would you do that? After all, in most cases there will be multiple objectives per map, so there's a lot to do...
Our current list of generic objective types are:
Ideas for level designers
We've had a lot of great ideas for things and gameplay rules to put in our levels and maps. Here are as many as we can tell you about without succumbing to madness:
- For example, zombies turn humans into other zombies...
- Would probably require large numbers of small teams
- Heavy Weapons fire,
- Demolition or
- 'Hacking' power supply
- Perhaps the thing is a Godzilla-like creature?
- Perhaps the thing is a plasma-ball-shooting energy being?
- Perhaps also has mutually exclusive objectives (collect energy balls/destroy energy balls)
- Could be an escort type mission
- Could be a tug-of-war type mission
Respawning
We haven't discussed this yet, since we're such L337 gamers that we never actually suffer the indignity of being killed. Or perhaps we're just too ashamed to be the first to ask the question.
Maybe we'll spawn immediately,come in as reinforcements every minute, or only respawn when raised by a medic. We'll work it out as we go along...