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[Araph]

A few of you were kind enough to suffer alongside me through the development process of an indie survival-horror game called Warden some time ago. For those of you who don't frequent the Creative Projects board, I started working on a new game (also survival-horror) called Barricade.

The basic idea is that a group of players have to hole up in an abandoned building and survive being hunted by a monster for a set amount of time (until dawn arrives in-game). The players have to set up traps and obstructions with items found in-game to stall the monster long enough to win. However, the person playing as the monster can basically one-shot the other players and the others don't have any direct defenses against it.

The game is, of course, still very early in development, but I'd like to have people mess around in the map I'm working on, toss around ideas for traps and stuff, and basically see what people think before committing to any other mechanics. I've taken what I've learned from Warden to try and work more efficiently on this, so it should progress significantly faster than Warden did.

Spoiler: Early, early, screenshots from the dev thread (click to show/hide)

If you're interested derping around with the game as it is or you have any ideas you'd like to see in it, let me know.

[Fikes]

Hurray! He's back!

I never played warden but it was fun reading the After Action Reports and the like. It is fun to watch people create things.

[Araph]

Hurray! He's back!

I never played warden but it was fun reading the After Action Reports and the like. It is fun to watch people create things.

I'm glad you enjoyed watching Warden develop!

The basic idea sounds like the sort of thing that'd be more effective as a retro-style top-down affair, as opposed to a first-person persperctive. Given that it's not just an indie game, but one treading on the ground of things like the old Friday the 13th game, it seems like it'd be that sort of thing. I think people tend to associate first-person with a more immersive (and therefore, by necessity, more polished) experience.

Still, sounds very interesting, will be keeping an eye on this.

Thing is, as a horror game it's supposed to be immersive, or at least as immersive as possible. When I get the chance, graphics will get more attention, though I do feel that as long as the level of detail is clean and consistent you can get away a surprising amount.

Also, it's partly personal preference. I love me some first-person survival-horror games and tend to shy away from retro indie games. Just my own opinions; doesn't mean retro games are bad by any means.

[Facekillz058]

Oh, it's YOU again.
Couldn't stop making me poop myself with one game, could you?
Looking forward to how this works out.

[Farce]

Thing is, as a horror game it's supposed to be immersive, or at least as immersive as possible. When I get the chance, graphics will get more attention, though I do feel that as long as the level of detail is clean and consistent you can get away a surprising amount.

Uhhh.  I have veeeery little experience with horror and horror games - not my bag, 2spooky4me - but you don't mean the game should look all clean and consistent, right?  I like to watch Extra Credits on youtube, and one episode they did on designing horror games was like, "old horror games were better because the graphics sucked".

[Araph]

Oh, it's YOU again.
Couldn't stop making me poop myself with one game, could you?
Looking forward to how this works out.

Hopefully it'll work out to be more poop-worthy than Warden!

...In retrospect, that's a really weird sentence.

...don't mean the game should look all clean and consistent, right?

That's what I'm saying. No unusually high-poly models, no vastly different amounts of detail in textures, and no sudden changes in color palettes.

Going back and looking that Extra Credits video, it seems to be very similar to Plague of Gripes' Let's Gripe About Horror series. I watched through Plague's videos on the subject, and the only real thing I'm keying off of those is that the players are actually helpless (once the monster is right there), playing off of the fear of complete helplessness, where literally the only thing you can do is try to stay away from an implacable entity that is constantly searching for you.

[Araph]

Just a heads up, today I got Barricade to run on a remote server and successfully connected and started a game, so whenever people are available and want to check it out, it's technically ready. Continuously being improved, but technically ready.

To clarify, it's not particularly scary or anything yet, and there are a lot of holes and rough patches, but you can join a server, spawn a character, walk around, and interact with the environment in a basic manner.

[Fniff]

Hm. What kind of abandoned house is it? Standard horror movie mansion?
Could be interesting if there was multiple maps, or maybe a map editor, but both of those seem fairly down the road. Still, keeping my eye on this.
If you want a good recommendation on a horror game that's rather under appreciated, check out Knock Knock. It's a very good experience and it's a good study on the feeling of helplessness. Plus, it's art style is very unique, being simplified and almost cartoonish yet still being eerie when it wants to be.

[Araph]

Hm. What kind of abandoned house is it? Standard horror movie mansion?

Abandoned cathedral, actually!

Could be interesting if there was multiple maps, or maybe a map editor, but both of those seem fairly down the road. Still, keeping my eye on this.

Probably won't be a map editor, but there will definitely be multiple maps. Eventually.

If you want a good recommendation on a horror game that's rather under appreciated, check out Knock Knock. It's a very good experience and it's a good study on the feeling of helplessness. Plus, it's art style is very unique, being simplified and almost cartoonish yet still being eerie when it wants to be.

Checking it out right now!

[GentlemanRaptor]

This makes me a happy man. Warden was great fun to test, and I'm looking forward to this.

[Criptfeind]

This sounds like a interesting idea, and it will be cool to see how it devloups. Count me in for any play testing that I can make it too, as Raptor said, fucking around in warden was fun, and this sounds like it might be similarly so.

[Flying Dice]

So sort of like Counterstrike zmod, but with no guns and one zombie? Sounds like fun to me. PTW.

[Sensei]

Warden was kinda neat. Count me interested on this one.

[Araph]

Warden was great fun to test, and I'm looking forward to this.

Sounds like fun to me. PTW.

Warden was kinda neat. Count me interested on this one.

Thanks!

Turns out sounds make everything scary. I think the game is pretty much playable now! Not polished at all, but playable. If there was tentatively a testing session on Saturday, would anybody be able to make it?

[Criptfeind]

I could probably make it this saturday.