Hey all! Long time no see! Sorry about the username change, but my Korrupt username seems to be in limbo. Just wanted to offer some thoughts about this new Descent game being made.
Like you, when they announced it, and I saw the graphics, models, gameplay, etc... I admit, that I was not happy at all with that. But it got me thinking about a few things.
This game is still in development and there are many opportunities to change due to community feedback
As much as it doesn't remind us of our original Descent, it's still an officially licensed Descent game, which until now, have not existed. There have been some great community projects though, but not with official backing.
As a community, we have fallen into a niche of what we like about Descent, and anything that differs from that has been greeted with negativity. I remember the same thing happening to the game where you rode on hoverbikes. I forgot the name of it though. We've fallen in love with the idea of this banging body beauty of a blonde that is classic Descent, and that's causing us to ignore a beautiful brunette with a lot of potential, who ACTUALLY wants the love of this community.
This is a team that is closely associated with the creators of Star Citizen, which has been making waves in the pc gaming community.
It's only the beginning of the game, and as backers and veterans, we have plenty of time to help mold the game into something that is both appealing to the Descent community and to a wider market of gamers that are new to six degrees of movement.
Descent underground may not be perfect, but I realized it's my best chance at another officially license Descent game anytime soon by a development studio that has the ability to pull it off on a top notch game engine. So, reluctantly, I became a backer. Yea, I miss the Pyro GX, and I don't know if they will be able to get it in due to licensing assets, but hell, we might get something even better if enough thought was put into it.
Korrupt^Bots^ wrote:Descent underground may not be perfect, but I realized it's my best chance at another officially license Descent game anytime soon by a development studio that has the ability to pull it off on a top notch game engine.
Just being official isn't enough for me, especially when there are more interesting Descent variants out there in development, especially Sol Contingency and Talon. I'm currently not supporting D:U because they haven't convinced me. I'm a single-player campaign guy. I like to shoot robots with lasers. Show me that footage and I'll show you the money.
you're not going to see that footage this early in the project.
Izchak says: 'slow down. Think clearly.' April Fools Day is the one day of the year that people critically evaluate news articles before accepting them as true.
We should have seen it, because they should have known they needed to show it, regardless of their development path, but I believe Lothar is right (he would be one of the ones that would know)--you're not going to see that at this point.
But here's what we know: we know that Descendent Studios is made up of people with a background in single-player campaign-driven games, and we know that their goal is actually the growth of Descent as a title into something very elaborate, and you'd better believe a very involved single-player campaign will be a large part of that.
I'm going to pose a question here and elsewhere: I appreciate everyone's criticism of Descent: Underground, and I have plenty of my own, but it seems that a lot of the critics I've heard have a notion that there is something to gain by holding back from supporting it. That part I can't relate to. I've had to ask myself the same question. What do you/we gain from Descent: Underground failing to launch through KS?
My answer is that there is only one thing to be gained, unless we believe that D:U is standing in the way of a better "Descent" title being released, and that is maintaining the strict integrity of the Descent experience as far as our consent is concerned. As a perfectionist I can absolutely appreciate this, but as a student of reality I'm convinced this course will only end two ways, if we have our way, since the companies which created Descent are split and gone--first we can go on to enjoy Sol Contingency, which will not be "Descent", but remember this option is not dependent on D:U's success or failure, and it could rather be argued that a successful D:U will create fans of the genre which will then find Sol Contingency; second, we can play Descent 1, Descent 2, and to a lesser degree Descent 3 'till the end of time as the only true Descents.
I think that a galvanized and involved Descent Community could help steer D:U into something we will all enjoy for years to come, in addition to Sol Contingency, GeoCore, and any other viable 6-DOF offerings as they come. The guys at DS aren't bad guys, and they want to do right by a "Descent" game. Maybe that means a little less of an outright Descent port than some shortsightedly desire, and maybe it means a little more influence from the open-space community than Descent should have, but I feel the talent and stakes involved suggest a payoff in the long-run that Descent pilots wouldn't be terribly unhappy with in trade for some compromise from the classic title.
In the end I think it boils down to dealing with what we have to work with, and not just what we wish we had. Personally I think I would very much regret failing to support a "Descent", given all of the above, even one with this kind of launch. I think this is a chance for Descenters to seize the day. What has Descent, and the community built around it been worth to you over the years? I've played some pretty fun games over the years, but Descent has been a ride like no other, and to me the $300 that I've scraped together to back D:U so far is still an insignificant price to pay in the grand scheme of things. I'm willing to bet that for a lot of us D1, D2, D3, or all of the above have been the best investments entertainment-wise we've ever made, not to mention the ways it may have enhanced our personal lives (modding as an outlet and development for creativity, friendships, hand-eye coordination, strategy, ...). Granted a lot of us have probably lost a little too much real life time to the mines at one time or another, but I can say that I've also gotten things from it that I value in life beyond the mines. As with anything, you get out what you put in.
Yea, I was with the Bots when they first formed, along with Warpig and the others. It was good fun, and I miss the community that I had in Descent, even meeting people in real life.
Korrupt^Bots^ wrote:Descent underground may not be perfect, but I realized it's my best chance at another officially license Descent game anytime soon by a development studio that has the ability to pull it off on a top notch game engine.
Just being official isn't enough for me, especially when there are more interesting Descent variants out there in development, especially Sol Contingency and Talon. I'm currently not supporting D:U because they haven't convinced me. I'm a single-player campaign guy. I like to shoot robots with lasers. Show me that footage and I'll show you the money.
Wingman actually explained the single-player problem at one point.
Modern single-player campaigns are actually much more expensive than multiplayer. Since they knew they were going to have to Kickstart, they chose to build the least expensive part first and use that to balance the game mechanics and fund the single-player.
It's not a question of ignoring single-player, it was purely a question of having to face the reality that Kickstartering a single-player game was going to be even harder than multiplayer.
The goal is to bring back Descent, all of it. But because of the barriers that have been erected (including legal hurdles, angry communities, and just play time) it's going to be a long, hard fight and they picked the best target to establish a beachhead with limited resources.
Personally, I think that if this very limited scale reboot doesn't get Kickstarted, there is a very good chance that the various intellectual property holders will be even more likely to bury the rights and sue the pants off of anyone they think is remotely trying to bring back Descent. Descent: Underground is the last, best hope for the Descent franchise.
Descent: Underground is the last, best hope for the Descent franchise.
For the name, maybe. Between Freespace and D3, I think most of us are long past caring whether something has the name. If Sol Contingency has the magic, we'll play that. DU and SC both have the magic, we'll play both.
I'm not too worried about the future of Descent, one way or the other. Too many people love this game too much for the magic to stay dead. Whatever legal lines they have to skirt to do it . . . they will. That's why trying to reboot Descent is an evergreen hobby, why everyone who loved the game and can so much as shake a stick at a compiler takes their shot at it, why there have been so many bazillion attempts at it to compare DU to.
If DU fails, there will be more.
My enthusiasm for DU doesn't spring from the name, but from the fact that it represents the most promising attempt I've ever seen. Still gotta make good on it, but if you guys can't do it, it's a harder problem than even I think it is, and I don't know who could.
What is it that puts DS so far in the lead, by the way? It isn't the name. It isn't really the professional team, though that certainly helps. It isn't the physics or faithful design or anything, SC beats the pants off of 'em there. Their vision aligns pretty well with mine, and that certainly helps. But the real factor is listening to pilots. If they keep doing that as well as they have been, it should be impossible to fail.
