Project Warlock - retro inspired FPS, but expanded with character progression and upgrades

[Great Deceiver]

this vomit-inducing faux 'retro' thing reminds me of what goes on in horror movies these days - you have endless waves of zero effort shlock that is allegedly trying to 'capture' that 80's slasher flick feel, but what you actually get is soulless, ambitionless tripe that has zero justification for existing.

These insipid things don't ape the games that supposedly 'inspired' them, they're just testaments to how utterly inept the people making them are - they really have no clue. This misplaced sense of fake nostalgia really fucking bugs me. How old were these hacks when Hexen came out, 2?

 

[Mynon]

I'm surprised by how many of you failed to pick up that they're trying to go for that "Amiga Look", as that is painfully evident from the color scheme and HUD design...

For the purely old-school PC-style FPS, this is closer to the mark:

The last images Voidpoint released look great but we still don't know what the game's going to be called.

They're now calling it Ion Maiden and plan to release it this year.

 

[Durandal]

Ion Maiden sure is a cool name
A minor peeve I have with these kind of retro-looking games is that when you start making them more detailed than they originally were they kind of end up looking like Minecraft because of the geometry, like Arcane Dimensions for Quake

 

[soulburner]

Any more info on Ion Maiden? I keep finding the same few screenshots everywhere...

 

[Ezekiel]

Of course it has character progression and upgrades. They're all like that now. I liked shooters more when they weren't about that. When I didn't have to go into a menu every few minutes or think about stats.

 

[Mynon]

Examples of new enemy spritework.

 

[Durandal]

That's pretty good, I just wish the color palette wasn't so muted.

 

[Nekot-The-Brave]

You could say it looks like quake.

 

[Mynon]

It's basically "Amiga look", with ramped up contrast. It's a conscious choice and most folks seem to like it, so I doubt that it is going anywhere.

 

[Excidium II]

Looks cool 2 me.

 

[Ash]

Can't stand the art style. Mostly everything else looks fine though. We'll see how it turns out.

 

[David_Kay]

Hi everyone. I'm the graphic guy of this game. The game is in very early alpha but we do appreciate feedback. Regarding some of the concerns about this game: This is a small game with a lot of limitations. We do not aspire to make another Quake or Blood. Such games are beyond our current capacity and experience. This is why the levels are flat and we use sprites instead of 3d models. We know our limits so we're making a game that we are actually able to finish. It's possible that with the experience we gain from this project we will be able to create something more ambitious next time. Looking back I guess that saying this game is inspired by Quake and Blood was a poor choice of words, as it implied we are making a game of a similar caliber. That's on us.

As for the art style, it had to be both simple and time efficient to produce. And since it's a simple game, simple pixel art was the perfect choice. Altough I do my best to make it look decent. It's the first pixel art project I took, so I had to learn many things on the fly. It was not my goal to mimick any existing game or style. This is why this game does look different than other doom clones. We never wanted to recreate a game from the past. We are making our own game using some of the design templates and inspirations from existing games. We have specifically chosen the comodore palette so this game would look different. And because it fits the dark and gloomy themes that we want to convey. And I always wanted to use this color set for a game. I agree that it's a very specific art style. You have to be into that sort of thing to enjoy it.

Oh and I was 10 when Hexen came out

 

[LESS T_T]

Some Facebook updates:

Egyptian episode is now almost done. That will be more than half of the total game content so far. While we're getting closer to reaching beta stage, be sure to check out Dusk. The word is out that it's actually pretty good. Among so many failed attempts to recreate the retro shooter experience it's good to see a game that does it right. It's something we also want to achieve, albeit with very different approach.

Sneak peek on some ingame art

Stay Tuned!

And things are getting blurry:

 

[Lyric Suite]

That blur crap better be toggable.

 

[Zed]

"you opened a door"

thank you for the information

 

[Fedora Master]

"you opened a door"

thank you for the information

YOU OPENED A DOOR


​

Picked up some health(10)

 

[Zed]

You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You reloaded
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You opened a door
You shot an enemy​

 

[PrettyDeadman]

You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You reloaded
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You opened a door
You shot an enemy​

you died.

 

[Lyric Suite]

You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You reloaded
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You shot an enemy
You opened a door
You shot an enemy​

you died.

Another gay Dark Souls clone then.

 

[Zed]

you died.

You pressed Alt
You pressed Alt
You pressed Q
You pressed W
You pressed T
You pressed Alt and F3
You pressed Alt and F3
You pressed Alt and F4​

 

[LESS T_T]

Some of recent updates:

Judging by the progress we make in development we estimate that the game will be finished somewhere around early Q1 2018. We can't give you an exact date yet as we want to take the time to really make sure everything is up to snuff on release. It will take a bit longer than we previously expected but the game will also be bigger and include more advanced features. The development process is going well and we wish to deliver a game that will be worth your time.

Many of you wondered if the game is going to have any post effects, or whether we wanted to go full retro. Well, here is the answer. You can fully customize the graphical options.

If you have any suggestions or requests for additional settings - go ahead

First Industrial preview

WORK IN PROGRESS, it is just a PREVIEW!

 

[LESS T_T]

Can you believe that the game's content is almost 70% done? As of now we are finishing Industrial up and oh boy, it looks fantastic! Here's another sneak preview of one of upcoming environments

 

[ArchAngel]

So it is safe to say they missed their October 2017 release date :D

 

[LESS T_T]

We finally got enough sound effects to record some rough gameplay. A lot of stuff is still missing but you can get a general idea of the combat. We'll hopefully be able to start refining the levels and visuals when we have all core assets in place.

Game is currently in late alpha so it should look and feel significantly better after few more months of development.

Project Warlock is being made by Buckshot Software. ETA is somewhere around spring 2018.

 

[Ash]

That's pretty badass. Still not sure if I could withstand that artstyle for more than 10 mins though, IDK. I guess I will, as it's not that bad, just depends how the gmeplay turns out. Looks OK in that regard, just not sure about the level design.