Jaesun
Fabulous Ex-Moderator
That looked really good.
That's very pretty.
To a very casual observer this looks like vaporware though. Is that an unfair analysis?
Making it in Unreal: the walking simulator comes home in Myst successor Obduction
Myst was perhaps the first PC game to truly crossover to the study shelves of the mainstream - and though some of its strengths have aged monstrously, others are eternal. In Cyan World’s upcoming Obduction - Kickstarted to the tune of $1,321,306 - players don’t take on a role. They play themselves, whisked away to an impossible world.
“I think there’s some real power in that,” muses ‘90s gaming figurehead Rand Miller. “If what we’re trying to do is help a player suspend their disbelief, then one of the first steps that can help that is not to try and convince you that you’re somebody else.”
It’s the escapist fantasy of falling out of the everyday - common in Narnia and Spirited Away, Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.
“What would you do if this happened to you?,” asks Miller. “It’s worked for us in the past, and we’d kind of like to embrace that.”
There’s more of Myst and its sequel, Riven, that still works than you’d probably imagine. While Cyan games once stood alone in their lonely environments and pedestrian pacing, a whole genre has grown up around them: walking simulators - a derogatory term reclaimed by the developers of some unusually creative contemporary games.
For Obduction, Cyan have pulled from the design of Gone Home, the beauty of Dear Esther, and the tactile manipulation of The Room. Art director Eric Anderson’s last project was The Witness - whose Jonathan Blow often cites Myst as an influence - and the tools he used there have inspired those he’s built at Cyan.
“We wear the walking simulator badge proudly,” says Miller. “We pick little seeds from things that really motivate us.”
While the Spokane studio have worked with Unity and proprietary engines in the past, they’ve picked Unreal Engine 4 for Obduction. There’s a sense that Cyan, who once proved the untested CD-ROM, like to pick apart new tech.
“It’s this odd balance where if you get too far ahead of the curve, it gets difficult to actually ship the product,” explains Miller. “You’ve got to try and hit it just at the right time.
“I think we all felt that UE4 was good timing for us. It was out ahead enough, but not too much that we couldn’t ship or have bugs that were unresolved.”
Cyan were particularly keen on being able to dig into the engine’s source code - not least because their needs are somewhat different to those of the games Unreal traditionally propped up.
“We’re using an engine that was primarily used for first-person shooters,” points out programmer Jason Calvert. “Our user interaction is quite a bit different.”
Obduction needed a cursor, for starters - and the ability not only to click and release, but also to drag objects. Cyan have put a lot of work, too, into collisions clean enough to support plenty of player meandering. But there’s still some way to go. Stand in the sunlight in their prototype build, and you’ll see the shadow of a holstered mercenary.
“He looks really buff,” laughs Miller. “Like he always want to carry a gun and beat the crap out of people”.
As in Myst and Riven, environments run the gamut from the familiar to the alien. Cyan reckon Obduction’s palette is a little brighter and more saturated than that of its relations - since they can do more in the way of illumination and luminosity. But at least one element will grant Obduction a “reach-back feel” - its FMV personalities.
“There’s definitely been a trend away from putting live action characters in a game - it’s mostly CG,” says Miller. “But we felt because we had a legacy of live action we could, if we felt it was best, reach back to that. And after much gnashing of teeth and examining all the options, we decided that was the best way to do it.”
The technical challenge has lay in slotting 2D images into a fully-explorable 3D world. Cyan have embedded their FMV in sci-fi ‘imagers’, and picked other “controlled circumstances” for conversation - think BioShock’s tendency to stick plot-critical characters behind glass.
These are hardly flat images, though - Cyan have filmed their actors in stereo, so if you’re playing in VR it “looks pretty convincing”. A meeting of classic and contemporary PC gaming.
“I think a lot of the design process is based on what we’ve done in the past, either consciously or subconsciously.” admits Miller. “It’s interesting to see those parallels and how they sneak in and surprise us on occasion. In Myst it was a linking book, but really it’s just a portal - a portal that takes you to another place.”
Obduction is expected on PC later this year. Unreal Engine 4 development is now free.
I'm okay with them riding the walking simulator hype; I just hope the game will be properly challenging and not, well, a walking simulator.
I always wanted a 1.3 million dollar walking simulator!
I always wanted a 1.3 million dollar walking simulator! Thanks, Cyan!
Irony? Sarcasm? Why? I mean ok, it's a gaming forum, hell, it's the Codex in specific, so while you may be within your rights..you make games, you do not just play them. So why the tone?
Make one yourself, or keep making your own kind, and best of luck
It is really tiring watching tiny (in budget comparison alone, no offense meant) devs come here and criticise their more successful counterparts. This double standards' type of attitude, (professional when need be/i'm Indie, i'm your average Joe, i'm your bro against decline when it suits me) is rather tiring..you use the same tools at hand THEY do..hyping, advertising, fucking funding platform for fuck's sake. Tools'-wise, the difference is only the scale.
Is this what bothers you Blackthorne? The difference in scale? Work harder and spare us.
Is it the content? Because this is Cyan. They made a 'Myst' of their own. Among others. Fuck have you made that has even neared it? hmm?
Don't forget yourself, this is public. If in private you find yourself justified by elevating yourself in a higher standards position? Go nuts. Just recall that you have yet to reach it, and as such, prior to proving it..?...
We have (the gamers) double standards too. And wrongly. Ok. Now be the mature, grown up individual and rise above them please. You see things your way. I show you mine. How many people like you come here and use these forums for hyping? How many? It's a double benefit, both the site and people like you benefit from it. Ok. Just keep in mind how it appears to third parties. The non-invested ones. You need to come here, in person, due to lacking the funds or alternative venues, and goddam hype your product. They (Cyan) in particular, have not. So while you take advantage of this, stick to it. And mind the derogative comments for other people's work. The success levels of which you have yet to emulate.
Peace, and again. Best of luck. Just your average lurker's thoughts on "indy developers and their forum comments"
and go about my business
I actually respect Blackthorne's honesty regarding his opinion about other developments: he's also an adventure gamer, not just a developer, and it shows. There are people in the industry who always lick other developers' butts in order to appear respectful (for example, Tim Cain being a "huge fan" of Fallout 3 ), and I find that behavior a bit ridiculous and fake, so Bt making fun of Cyan in this very moment is perfectly fine with me.
Good god, shut the fuck up. This is a forum where people are encouraged to speak their mind, positive or negative. Whether or not they are a developer should have no bearing. I'm sure there are many here who would disagree with some of the stuff Blackthorne says, and that's good, but your BS concern trolling can go take a hike.Then do. Go about it.
Unless "your" business is selling YOUR product, while simultaneously shitting on that of others. Criticising may be a prerogative of any a one of us (non financially motivated to post [ie that excludes you] ), but should never, ever, have been yours. Selling yours in one forum thread while loloposting on that of another's appears to me a bit..off..?
And for the record, i'm not a Cyan 'fan'. Never managed to finished Mysts, Rivens and their like. Ever. Just in case your prism is that warped that you'd resort to this next.
The amount of shit i give about your products also amounts to zero btw. The difference is i can say it, because i am not selling mine HERE as well, in a different thread. This has nothing to do with your personal traits. Rather with the fact that you are immature and/or incapable of managing them when and if appliccable. Now i know you already got what i meant the first time of course. I know this is merely your tactless way of glossing over it and moving on. To actually defending your original postion. Well done.
I like your moxy kid, but you're still an asshole.
Hey Obduction Backers,
Well this letter was finally supposed to be some very exciting news, but that’s not how it turned out. We feel like we’ve been sucker punched. Let me explain exactly what happened and why we’ve been quiet for the last few months.
First, Obduction is amazing. We couldn’t be happier with how it’s progressing.
About six months ago we realized that Obduction had evolved with enough content to be a bit larger than the Kickstarter-sized experience we had planned. With that in mind we decided to see if we could raise some small additional funding to move Obduction to that larger vision - instead of moving the scope back down.
We had serious interest from several sources including a small publisher. After several meetings and reviews the small publisher said yes, and we proceeded to negotiate a formal contract that was ready to sign two months ago. They assured us that this was a done deal, and so, with their very specific recommendation we moved forward with the larger Obduction production — leaving the option to reduce behind us.
So, two months ago we were on the cusp of signing the contract and making the exciting announcement to our backers and the public. We waited a few days… then a few days more. A week passed, then another. The signing of the contract was lagging. It was a red flag, but there was always a reason — vacation, holidays, travel, out of the office. They assured us that things were fine - it was just a matter of timing for the executives.
You see where this is going.
Long story short, we were expecting yesterday we would finally sign and move forward, but instead we found out that, in spite of all the good faith negotiating, early assurances (that we based some rather important production decisions on), and even gestures on our part to sweeten the terms of the contract (if that was the problem) — the publisher did a 180 and reneged for what were apparently financial reasons.
Now this leaves us in an extremely tenuous position. Because this publisher tied things up for so many months, we have very little time to try to round up additional funding.
So, here is what we’re doing…
Obduction production continues at full speed while we reassess. We will determine the adjustments required to move Obduction back to the original plan — reducing the scope in an intelligent way, so we can complete it, polish it, and test it.
In the meantime we’re also looking for any partners who would like to be part of making the bolder Obduction for a sweetheart of a deal. We’ve got plenty of the game complete to prove what Obduction is, the investment amount is relatively small at this point, and (because of our situation) the terms (and royalties) are generous. Maybe we’ll still get a chance to build a larger Obduction experience.
Here’s what that means for you…
We’ve used a few months of our schedule for work on the larger vision, so we’re a few months behind. We’ll be reworking our production schedule based on what we figure out in the next week. Obduction is definitely still coming, and it will amaze you, but it will be delayed by a few months.
It’s always awkward to have to hang out your dirty laundry. Last week we were so excited that we would finally be able to tell you about a publishing deal that would enable a larger Obduction experience, and this week we’re scrambling to adjust. But our team is small, nimble, and amazingly talented.
It’s ironic and sad that every time that Cyan has been pushed to the brink, it has been related to some unexpected move by a publisher. I suppose we were hoping for something better this time — shame on us.
Thank you again for your support and understanding. Now that we don’t have to keep mum, we look forward to once again keeping you informed of everything that’s happening.
Rand