Wintermute Engine Forum

Game development => Game announcements => Topic started by: Johny1300 on April 24, 2005, 09:54:14 AM

Title: DREAMS WALKER - behind the curtain of the Dreams walker project
Post by: Johny1300 on April 24, 2005, 09:54:14 AM
BEHIND THE CURTAIN OF THE DREAMS WALKER PROJECT

WHAT YOU DON'T KNOW YET


INFORMATION ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Since everyone says I'm hiding behind the nick Johny1300 I'll tell you something about myself, in case anyone's interested.

The internet knows me under this nick and I won't reveal my real name for now, it's unimportant. I'm 15 years old and I'm still attending the primary school, unfortunately...
I started making graphics when I was 13, now I concentrate mostly on music creation and web design. Many of my works will be displayed at www.johny1300.com when it's finished. After finishing my studies I want to start a career in music, if possible. And if not music, then graphics, even though I'm not convinced I'd be able to do it.
I created several commerical web designs and a few banners.


HOW I SEE THIS PROJECT
It's a test project. I'm simply trying to find out what am I capable of (it was about time). I don't know if I'll be able to finish it successfuly, but so far it works well. I prefer to do all the work myself. It's more complicated but one doesn't have to argue with anyone.
I know it's a needle in a haystack but I do it just for the fun of it.


HOW THE GAME'S BEING MADE
I'm trying to keep my goals simple but the game creation is complex nevertheless. I do most of the work at the weekends, I can usually create 2 locations per day, which is really extreme for me. And how do I do it? It's simple. The game's gonna use 3D rendered art. The main role is played by the 3D modelling software (I prefer not to name it). To give you an idea, something like Blender. After rendering the image travels to a 2D bitmap editor, where the colors, lighting and shadows are edited, something like Gimp. After that VFX are added. I'm using mostly professional filmmaking tools, something like combustion and after effects. Then comes the music and sounds. Some music will be original, some will not. Music making is harder to explain, let's say some program like reason, fl studio, cubase + some hardware device such as master keyboard and midi controller..for example.
I'm planning ambient music, depending on situation the music will be either relaxed or it should evoke fear.
I intend to use sound effects from film sound banks. So there will be only minor modifications using software such as goldwave, sound forge. The most complicated part of the project for me will be the programming. The game will run on wme engine, so far I have done the menu, the intro video and a beta location with items. The intro video will be probably reworked later.


WHAT CAN YOU EXPECT FROM THE GAME
To differ a little, I came with several specialties to make the game more interesting. The game is based on so-called "astral projection and oobe". Some stories I plan to put into the game will be based on experiences of people who survived their clinical death. So you'll fly through the white tunnel and meet people who are no longer among the living and you'll see things descibed in the book by Robert Monroe, who's been researching the human psyche and clinical death. You should also encounter the rules of the astral spheres, time and space, based on the scientifical research of these things. I recommend visiting marlitan's page about these things so that you know what to expect. People ask me how is it possible for the main hero to talk with people and pick up items if he's not alive. It's simple. People won't see or hear him, but he'll be able to enter their dreams and communicate through there.
As for the items, they will be mostly imaginary, created by the human mind, see marlitan's page.

Some examples from the land of the dead
The ability to walk through the mirror = you will enter another dimension
The ability to enter a painting = in astral it's called a virtual world, you'll appear inside the painting as if you were really in there
The ability to enter people's dreams = there will be several scenes where you'll have to solve puzzles in dreams of various characteristics
The ability to travel in time
And mainly the ability to see what living persons don't see...


PROMISES, PROMISES...A PERFECT STYLE
The game's supposed to be huge, but I'm not promising anything!! What I descibed above is likely to appear in the game, but nothing is guaranteed.
I'll try to make as few modifications to the original concept as possible. I can't even estimate the release date, but I hope it's gonna be this year. But for now all this is just useless babbling.


THE STORY AND SCRIPT EXCERPTS
Every person has some wishes, dreams, hopes. If you can dream, anything can happen, you can fly, enter the unknown, create your fantasies, you are actually modifying the dream to your liking. In other words, a lucid dream. Some creatures are trapped in their dreams, they cannot get out, they don't know how to. Their mind surrounded them and trapped them in their thoughts. Although they can create whatever they want, fulfill their wishes and fantasies, they'll never see the real word again. And even if they do, it will be only from a limited point of view. These people are called Dreams walkers.

The game will be divided into two episodes. The first one is called Dreams Walker: Lost in moonshine. That's the one I'm working on right now. The second one is called Astral projection. I'll make it if the first episode is successful.

The game tells a story of a man who survived his clinical death which lasted for several weeks. On his way to work he's hit by a car and he appears in the world of non-living. He doesn't understand where he is. He'll appear on a ship sailing to the river Styx (the river of the dead). He will encounter some strange happenings on the ship, such as seeing himself in the parallel world. When he reaches the shore of the river, the ferryman demands a scroll of biblical words from him so that he can ferry him across the river. Our hero doesn't have the scroll so the ferryman returns him to the world of the living. He has to find the scroll there. After he appears back in his home he thinks it was all just a dream. He goes to work but he sees things on the streets which were never there, things that only left their trails in the time. He tries to contact other people but they don't reply, they can't see or hear him. He realizes he's dead. Later he discovers the only way to communicate with other people is through their dreams.
Your goal in the game is to find the reason behind this imaginary world and to solve several puzzles. You have to get to the world of the dead and not to get lost in the world of the living.
I don't want to say anything else, because I don't want to spoil the game for you.


CLOSING WORDS
I hope I'll be able to finish the game and that you're gonna ilike it. It will be very time consuming and unfortunately I'm not a professional...


REGARDS: JOHNY1300 "DJ ASTRAL"


Screenshots

http://www.johny1300.com/projects/1.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/2.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/3.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/4.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/5.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/6.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/7.jpg
http://www.johny1300.com/projects/8.jpg
Title: Re: DREAMS WALKER SCREENSHOTS
Post by: Nihil on April 24, 2005, 04:56:09 PM
As I already said on IRC, very nice and surrealistic!

Can you already reveal a bit about the story?
Title: Re: DREAMS WALKER SCREENSHOTS
Post by: odnorf on April 25, 2005, 10:38:43 AM
I love the colors you are using. Is the game going to have a female main character?
Title: Re: DREAMS WALKER SCREENSHOTS
Post by: Johny1300 on April 25, 2005, 06:46:03 PM
Main character is male :-) And story ? is very original. Unfortunately my english speak is very badly, so that you much about story wont say. Game be enacted in dead world, very similar astral projection or oobe, game would had be very psychology and horror styl.
Title: Re: DREAMS WALKER - behind the curtain of the Dreams walker project
Post by: PrestonD on April 28, 2005, 07:39:35 PM
Very cool and interesting concept of game scenario, I will play it when you are finished.  Seems like for a young man in his teens you are already learning tools of the trade to eventually become employed by a game development company (or roll your own like Johnathon Boakes).  If you can knock out 2 scenes a day on a weekend you are doing pretty darn good.

How are you doing your character art generation? 

Also can I make a suggestion?... on the title screenshot the artwork is beautiful, but to be able to get past censors and software game ratings you might want to be careful on the nudity as some community standards may not accept that...its fine with me and as I said its beautiful work, but if you want to have good volume of sales you may want to be able to market your finished game to a larger audience.

Keep up the good work and I look forward to the finished product!

Regards,

Preston D