[s87]

Check out the the current news post!

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As everyone knows Crysis has a feature rich Dialogue System including support for all kinds of facial expressions and lipsync. The trouble starts though as soon as you try to make dialogues nonlinear: the integrated system only allows Dialogues which run straight from top to bottom.

Since interactive dialogues will play an important role in open Outcast we had to find a better solution. Together with our Game Designers we set up following feature list for our own implementation:

• Dialogue flow is nonlinear (influenced by chosen options and logic / Lua scripts)
• Dialogues are defined in XML files
• Translation support
• Different camera modes that are configured over a config file
• Triggering actions that can be defined using the Flow Graph System of Crysis
• Starting sequences and optionally resuming the Dialogue again after they finished
• Support for Lipsync and facial expressions
• Providing simple Flow Nodes so Leveldesigners can integrate Dialogues easily
• Skipping lines of the dialogue

Now all of these features have been implemented, but see for yourself:

Dialogue Demonstration @ YouTube

If you are interested in the technical details or ask yourself how your mod could benefit from our system, read along in the corresponding feature on ModDB.

Successfully adding a modification of this magnitude to Crysis Wars confirmed us that we chose the right platform for our project.

A Highlight of the system are the camera modes you can see in the video below.

Camera mode Demonstration @ YouTube

The next challenge is the extension of the Quest system and support for persistence - you heard right - that would enable travelling between different regions (levels) freely without losing quest progress!

More on this to come after we implemented it.

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And another thing: We're looking for Flash Artists, GFX Programmers, Conceptual Artists, 3D Artists and, most importantly, Level Designers at the moment.
It's not like we have none (as you can see in our Screenshots) but we have not enough yet
If you're interested, take a look at the job descriptions @ ModDB and write a mail with 3-4 samples of your work to application@openoutcast.org (if you have further questions write me a PM).

[xxxgamer]

Woah guys that is awesome :O Very very nice.

If I may ask how are ye planning on travelling between levels without loosing your items etc..I remember a year back there was a discussion here about that because that would again enable a much bigger scale for making projects.

Gonna put ye on frontpage. Keep it up guys.

[NL--banneboy--NL]

Awesome, i also played the open beta/demo and loved the type of gameplay

@xxx gamer: There is a simple flowgraph for that actually ^^

[xxxgamer]

And how does it save the info? in a text file or something? Like how does the flowgraph exist after the next map has loaded?

[NL--banneboy--NL]

OOh like that, im sorry i totaly misunderstoond, i guess the onliest way is to make multiple levels for different endings

[s87]

Quote:

i guess the onliest way is to make multiple levels for different endings

Well the problem is that we had in mind that you can freely travel between the different regions ... we aim to get a pretty nonlinear gameplay

Quote:

And how does it save the info? in a text file or something? Like how does the flowgraph exist after the next map has loaded?

We're planning to use the persistence/savegame system to store that data.

[xxxgamer]

That is awesome. Nice work lads if ya have any updates let me know so I can throw it onto the frontpage for ye.

[s87]

A feature that no game calling itself sequel to Outcast should be missing is the ability to travel between different regions freely (the game world Adelpha was connected through portals - the so called Daokas).

Is it possible to transform a merely linear First-Person-Shooter like Crysis Wars into an adventure game that supports this kind of free travelling?

See for yourself:

NOTE: The morph targets for the Cutter model weren't finished, so his lines aren't lipsynched. What do you think about his voice? Should it be changed - maybe YOU can do it better?

When introducing free travelling we also had to think about following issues:

• Will the inventory/questlog of the player be kept when travelling to another level?
• Will modifications performed to the current level be remembered when travelling elsewhere?

Our solution for both of them was the development of a persistence system (check the corresponding feature on ModDB for more). We were pretty much relieved when it worked out the way we imagined, since it wasn't clear whether the Crysis Wars SDK would permit such sort of modification altogether.

This and the dialogue system (presented in an earlier news post) were features not clear to be doable with the SDK - so we decided to implement them first to make sure we chose the right engine for our project.

Again we were confirmed in our choice ... while it is still a long way to go until we’ve finished the programming work (not to mention asset creation) we are at least certain now that the remaining things we want to alter are definetly possible.

You also may have noticed that some custom UI elements for the questlog were added. Under the hood we further created a Lua-driven quest system that fits our needs better than the stock mission system of Crysis Wars.

And finally we added some screenshots of the new marketplace, city walls and the tweaked Cutter model with the incredible Backpack 3000:

The next step in terms of programming will be the implementation of an improved 3rd person camera with support for proper aiming (in combat mode) and collision detection (everyone who tried Oasis surely noticed that navigating in buildings was pretty annoying).

More on that soon...

And finally some advertisment for vacant jobs:

We are always searching for motivated and talented people who want to help us release open Outcast some day and improve their portfolio along with getting experience working in a team with a professional claim at the same time. Currently we have a considerable shortage of 3D artists (modelers and the like) and besides we could need some tool programmers (C# knowledge required) and community managers (who can translate news postings and "spread the word").

Take a look at the official job announcement on ModDB to learn how to apply and what the detailed requirements are.

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[xxxgamer]

Oh wow 0_o reading through this now.