The Possibility Of A SR Video Game?, An in-depth discussion/theory of a next-gen Shadowrun video game, etc. Options

[EchoFiction84]

Ok, I'll begin with this.

I've been playing Shadowrun since 1997 and it has been a wonderful game to see grow. I've been around the net as a young kid - I'm 25 right now - reading sites like Blackjacks SR Page when it used to get regular updates, haha! Just have had some wonderful experiences with the Shadowrun universe in general, namely, the RPG and video games.

Which brings me to my next point, after a little bit of background on my Shadowrun experience.

A video game.

I'm new to this actual board but have been following dumpshock for as long as I can remember so if it's taboo to talk about the possibility of a new game, then I am sorry, but here I go.

I believe that a proper Shadowrun RPG with on-line capacity would kill the markets.

Plain and simple...so...why hasn't any game developer noticed this yet?

Perhaps they haven't had much attention to it, seeing as how the latest Shadowrun installment tanked worse than Project: Hope did back in the day. FPS games like this latest Shadowrun with a somewhat banal storyline/system just don't work and it was evident. Good concept, bad delivery.

But what about a Shadowrun RPG that focuses on all the aspects of the RPG that we have grown to love. You start out, create a character and bam, away you go. With the scales of GTA and Fallout 3, it is evident that one developer should be able to crank out a high-scale Shadowrun game.

Or here is another great idea like I had witness develop over at fireproclub.com...how about this idea.

We start an on-line revolution and WE be the ones responsible for a new game.

I firmly believe that this is possible.

Do you?

[Thanee]

Yes, it is possible. It also takes A LOT of time and money for development to do right.

We'll see eventually, hopefully, what Smith & Tinker will do with the license (at least, I think they still have it).

Bye
Thanee

[Karoline]

I don't know, I'm not overly optimistic, especially after the butchery that was the Shadowrun FPS. But it isn't just that, but often companies get ahold of something that has support behind it, and just push out crap because they know they'll get decent sales from the fanbase, regardless of the game quality. Movie based games for instance almost invariably suck, but still sell reasonably well compared to the minimal amount of work the company has to put into it. In other words, a quick buck.

Now, that said, good games can come out of a license. DDO for example is a great game, they actually put alot of effort into it and remained fairly true to the rules, changing them just enough to make them playable in an MMO.

I think the problem with getting a good SR video game, is that the fanbase is smaller than D&D (to my knowledge) and so there is less incentive to make a game for it, particularly a really good one. The last SRVG relied on 'Hey look, magic and high tech and coolness' and flash and glam to get people to buy it, as opposed to making a good game (by all accounts it was absolutely horrid, even ignoring how it basically ignored SR entirely).

Okay, I'm just rambling now, it's late and I'm watching a movie while typing this.

[Kagetenshi]

I believe that a proper Shadowrun RPG with on-line capacity would kill the markets.

Plain and simple...so...why hasn't any game developer noticed this yet?

I would hazard that it's because you're incorrect (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

But what about a Shadowrun RPG that focuses on all the aspects of the RPG that we have grown to love. You start out, create a character and bam, away you go. With the scales of GTA and Fallout 3, it is evident that one developer should be able to crank out a high-scale Shadowrun game.

Not really, not at all; Shadowrun in a form that resembles the RPG is very much a team game. Without the Rigger, Decker, Mage, Face roles all filled, it's very difficult to get anything done without serious contrivance, and it's difficult to get those in fewer than three characters while still being reasonably effective.

So right from the get-go you're looking at either playing a game that needs to be played in small groups (good luck) or taking on the very hard problem of creating a teammate AI that doesn't make you want to shoot it.

Then there's role. The difficulty of allowing the player to do anything but shoot stuff. A whole lot of other problems that I don't have time to devote analysis to.

Or here is another great idea like I had witness develop over at fireproclub.com...how about this idea.

We start an on-line revolution and WE be the ones responsible for a new game.

Better start your revolution somewhere where the cease-and-desist orders don't reach. I'd also suggest having a pretty big gameplay-design document before you start asking for code donations.

~J

[Caine Hazen]

Kage is correct, there were at least 2 previous efforts to do Srun MMO-style games that have been shut down by Microsoft. They currently hold the vijeogame licenses and don't much feel like sharing. After the abysmal FPS sales and reviews, I think they'll just sit on it all a while longer before giving anyone any rights to doing Srun on the computer (which is also one of the driving forces that keeps us from having offical software chara gens)

[Wounded Ronin]

It would be a lot of fun if they made a SR FPS similar to Deus Ex. You could incorporate a lot of fun shlock into it. You'd only get on-screen HUD information if you had a Smartlink, and otherwise you wouldn't even get a reticle unless you toggled Aim Down Sights. Wired Reflexes would let you turn bullet time on and off. Astral projection would let you float around in noclip spectator mode but your vision would be all jacked up. SR2 style decking would be like a FPS mini-game that looked like Tron. Hell yeah!

[Stahlseele]

i still have screenshots of the loading screen and log in screen of the shasowrun online MMORPG that microsuck killed to guard their shooty piece of trash from quality competition . .

[TomDowd]

Even before I left FASA I was involved with two SR multiplayer online games. The first effort was intended to be either on one of the early enhanced BBS systems, either America Online (shortly after it changed from Q-Link) or GEnie. A decent amount of design work was done before everyone realized that to do the core ideas right it was just too damn big. A few years later, Jordan Weisman, myself, Sam Lewis and a few others locked ourselves in the FASA conference room for three days and whiteboarded out everything that an online multiplayer SR game would need, and again it was decided that it was just simply too big. (One of the cooler ideas we had for the earlier project was that we were going to recruit some of the various SR writers, like Charrette, Hume, Stackpole, Findley, etc. and have them act as the "CEO"s of the various megacorps and ask them to provide a couple hours a week time to providing overall corporate guidance and direction to their Johnsons. "This week is "Bend over Fuchi week". Have at'em boys!" The actions of the player-characters would affect a "corporate stock market" and so on...)

Shadowrun to be done right, needs multiple worlds: a physical world, an astral world, and the Matrix. The first two have related, but still different, graphics requirements, and the third is off on its own*. And the three need to be synchronized, and you have to be able to swap between any of the three relatively easily. Layer on that the multiple game systems you'd need, and the backstage infrastructure for generating and managing "runs" and so on... The scope is enormous and significantly larger than anything out there, when all is said and done.

Will it ever be done? I don't know. Do I wish that someone with a skilled team and the funding would take a crack at it? Hell yes. Would I want to be involved? You're damn right I would.

TomD

*Now, understanding that this was probably 1993 or 1994, we even went so far as to bring in some computer graphic specialists and run some numbers as to whether or not it would be feasible to have the physical world and the astral world share the same geometry but have different texture sets. The question was whether or not both texture sets could be stored simultaneously in video RAM so that the magician characters could swap between astral and physical perception at will with minimal lag. The answer was it could be done, but the amount of available texture space for each "world" would be insufficient for creating a cool world. Certainly today video cards have far more VRAM available, but the expectation is proportionally higher as well. I suspect the same problem would persist even today.

[Stahlseele]

See WOW, the dead world after you have been killed.
Also, the Matrix needs to be made to look like Tron to be successfull *nods*

[Caine Hazen]

funny you mention that Mr Dowd... I used to bug Sam Lewis when we were playing Star Wars Galaxiesb about that sort of thing. He mentioned it had been thought about some, but not that you had all meet about it

I do love Sam's take on video game economics, so it doesn't surprise me at all to hear about using the writers as a Corp CEO of sorts. He seems like he'd be into a Srun world with someone actively in charge of the economic situation.

Maybe we just need to get you guys locked back in a room with a whiteboard (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[tete]

I think if the World of Darkness MMO actually comes out and is even 1/2 as successful as EVE is for CCP, Shadowrun may get an MMO. The problem is everyone wants then next WOW and WOW had a certain right place at the right time factor on top of being a solid game.

[Tanegar]

See WOW, the dead world after you have been killed.
Also, the Matrix needs to be made to look like Tron to be successfull *nods*

WoW's spirit world isn't really comparable to Shadowrun's astral space. It's the same geometry and the same textures, just rendered in monochrome. The only thing that changes is the sky.

Also, see Tron 2.0 for Tron in videogame form. Yes, Shadowrun's Matrix needs to look exactly like that. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[Stahlseele]

I liked the game Tron2.0.
It was hellishly hard, especially the boss fights, and the ending sucked, but else it was pro ^^
Also:
It could have been!
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4048/459634...7aa92579d_o.jpg
It should have been!
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3284/459696...07ec0f837_b.jpg
But alas, poor yorrick, it wasn't meant to be . .
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1365/459696...f278600d8_b.jpg

[EchoFiction84]

I agree with a lot of people, good ideas.

I read that Mr. Dowd had commented on size limitations and what Shadowrun could conceivably require in terms of disk space...I'm no gaming designer but I'm pretty sure that with it being 2010, it shouldn't be a problem.

If I am guessing correctly, it would require more space to say, present a game like Grand Theft Auto where there are constant changes and a seemless and endless game play, i.e, no "scenes" like in the old Genesis version when you'd taxi between districts/cities. I would think that a Shadowrun game with that "cut play" style where it's basically just a bunch of scenes that you can go through would be pretty interesting, however, allow enough time for free form in the play but have the majority of it isolated places, buildings, arcades, blah blah blah. Anyone remember that Westwood Games version of Blade Runner?

With regards to the astral/physical/matrix aspect, it would be tricky, yes, but not impossible. I am sure that the various "other" planes of astral and matrix would suffer in the long run in order to dedicate more effort and interest in the real world, that doesn't mean those avenues wouldn't have an entertaining aspect of two to them. For instance, again, the Shadowrun on Genesis...for that time, the matrix game play was amazing, IIRC. There were rave GamePro reviews for it, I had that issue. I think with some re-working, a matrix would be greatly possible, not to mention an astral...

However...for some reason, I find the astral aspect of the game seeming to be a lot more difficult to represent. That whole "monochrome" comment up above sorta crushed my idea, lol! Remember on [insert old Nintendo game here] when you'd encounter endless bad guys, all the same, just a different color swatch. Exactly. Just cast a few new colors over the world, teak some aspects of technology and what possesses how much essence, throw in some baddies and bam, astral!

I'd like to see the real world detailed, however, and I believe that is where a lot of the gamer attention would be focused on. Games like Second Life give us a great psychological profile of what people seem to like in video games and it just proves that people, evidently, don't mind or might enjoy to various extents, that of living a second life inside a virtual world.

With that said, I will leave the conversation at that. Just think of the possibilities that one marketing team could come up with, things to entice players to the game. Just think...in the Shadowrun MMO, you could garner tons of consumer attention by having them do menial things but its fuuuun...I have friends who play The Sims, don't you? Including that aspect in it would bring a whole new level to MMO, in my opinion.

Whereas WoW is more of a dungeon crawl, there aren't many options like their used to be with say, Ultima Online. No more puchasing small hamlets and setting up shop.

...Just imagine...

...You log onto the Shadowrun MMO website, checking out the updates...You read that in 8 days, 925 various rooms will go on sale at the newly-opened Renraku Arcology. You buy your stuff, you hold something rare, it creates and demands respect in an on-line world.

If the Shadowrun MMO was to be a modern-day frankenstein, all of the parts needed exist in various games today.

[Kagetenshi]

I read that Mr. Dowd had commented on size limitations and what Shadowrun could conceivably require in terms of disk space...I'm no gaming designer but I'm pretty sure that with it being 2010, it shouldn't be a problem.

I'm not seeing the comment you refer to. He refers to the scope of the nature of Shadowrun as vast, which it is (as mentioned, three and a half worlds of varying separation), and the scope of the resulting plumbing as being similarly vast, but I don't see any mention of asset size. Or did you mean the comment about textures in VRAM?

If I am guessing correctly, it would require more space to say, present a game like Grand Theft Auto where there are constant changes and a seemless and endless game play, i.e, no "scenes" like in the old Genesis version when you'd taxi between districts/cities.

Nope. The trouble with seamless is that you need to load it while the player is still running around doing stuff (and maintaining acceptable performance for the stuff they're doing), rather than being able to stop everything until your assets are loaded/processed. There's no inherent space increase, although you're probably going to get some extra padding springing from the fact that you now have not just point A and point B but also the route between them, plus you might not be able to use some aggressive compression anymore. Anyway, that's not a significant factor.

With regards to the astral/physical/matrix aspect, it would be tricky, yes, but not impossible.

So is getting a medal in the Olympics. We're not looking for "possible", we're looking for "achievable" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I am sure that the various "other" planes of astral and matrix would suffer in the long run in order to dedicate more effort and interest in the real world

This right here is part of the big problem: Shadowrun is so huge, conceptually speaking, that things need to be sacrificed to bring it down to a reasonable scope, but by the time you've done that you don't have Shadowrun anymore.

I'd like to see the real world detailed, however, and I believe that is where a lot of the gamer attention would be focused on.

I thought you wanted a Shadowrun game, though?

~J

[TomDowd]

I read that Mr. Dowd had commented on size limitations and what Shadowrun could conceivably require in terms of disk space...I'm no gaming designer but I'm pretty sure that with it being 2010, it shouldn't be a problem.

I wasn't referring to disk space, which would still be significant, but rather the amount of character and object textures needed to be kept in a video card's dedicated memory at one time. Going by the current (April 2010) user statistics for the Steam service (found here) about 36% of all systems profiled had 512 Mb of available video memory, which while significant can get chewed up rather quickly.

Streaming has pretty much replaced the old pause-and-load technology these days, so that would not be an issue for loading large worlds. It requires careful level design and implementation to ensure that old areas aren't being swapped for new while other things (like say, physical/astral/matrix/vehicle combat) is going on.

With enough players attracted to all of the aspects of Shadowrun you pretty much have to committ to delivering on all fronts if you want to do something that is actually Shadowrun.

TomD

[EchoFiction84]

....Shadowrun you pretty much have to committ to delivering on all fronts if you want to do something that is actually Shadowrun.

TomD

So would you say that the Genesis version wasn't real Shadowrun because it lacked an astral plane?

You as well as I know that you have to make sacrifices at times in life and not putting as much work into the astral plane as say the alleys and club scenes in a Shadowrun game isn't gonna cause waves.

At least, not too big of them.

I agree with the saying that Shadowrun is a vast and open concept, which is why this hypothetical game would require such as vast and revolutionary game play in order to capitalize on the whole stop and pause game style.

[TomDowd]

So would you say that the Genesis version wasn't real Shadowrun because it lacked an astral plane?

A fair point. I think there are some different expectations today, however, but it is still a fair point.

TomD

[tweak]

I thought the Shadowrun Sega Genesis game did a good enough job of getting Shadowrun right. I'd love to see an upgraded version of this game on the DS.

[KarmaInferno]

The irony is that there is a Shadowrun-ish MMO out there, but it'd probaby be considered to be firmly on the Pink Mohawk side.

Anarchy Online.

It has cyberpunk. It has magic. It has the matrix. Its even got the whole megacorp-vs-gutterscum-vs-megacorp conflict.

But most folks don't think of Shadowrun when they look at AO.

BTW, isn't Sam working on that Cartoon Network MMO these days?



-karma

[Karoline]

I remember Anarchy Online. I used to play that year and years ago. Didn't realize it was even still alive. I hadn't really discovered SR by that point, so I never thought about it, but yeah, it is fairly SR like, and was a good game.

[Teknobabel]

I felt I had to log in to post in this thread (it's been a while, although the system still has some pm's in it from 03).

Designing a game for shadowrun comes down to one thing: How many features can you pull out and yet still have a game that resembles Shadowrun.

You can either go for the 100% experience (open world mmo) or you could go for a limited subset (fps, urban brawl, combat biker game, anything that implements a unique aspect of shadowrun in a game with nothing else).

The 100% experience will never occur other than in a subscription based stream of content releases mmo, where the content that everyone wants will be steadily released over time after the engine got developed. The odds of this happening are slim to none, because WoW pretty much has the mmo market cornered (cept in places where the fanbase is loyal to the point of insanity, see CoX). And the expectations placed on every new mmo that has a great license (take Vanguard, Age of Conan and Warhammer Online) these days means it'll invariably be labelled a WoW Killer before anyone has even seen a screenshot.

The limited subset has great promise, but you have to start the game from the position of the IP first and then engine, not the other way around (which I still reckon is how the Shadowrun FPS got made). As a matter of fact there already exists a game with hacking, cyber implants and classes (read species), it's called Dystopia and is pretty much a 2/3rds shadowrun game as it has no magic or astral. Could the shadowrun dev's do what Games Workshop did with Chaos League? Would be a smart thing to do, but I'm dreaming if it'll ever happen. Not to mention that you can continually expand the game to add extra game modes like combat biking (add vehicles) or urban brawl (as already done in UT).

Few screenies to get the idea of cyberspace in Dystopia

http://www.dystopia-game.com/media/v/scree...etic11.jpg.html

http://www.dystopia-game.com/media/v/scree...etic12.jpg.html

I'll take a game like Dystopia until a Shadowrun game comes along, the cyberspace element of dystopia is what sets it apart from other fps'es out there right now. Having an astral mode wouldn't really improve it as you'd be stretching the players on each server even thinner. If you can't find the action as everyone is in the physical while you are zipping through the astral all alone, it won't enhance the gameplay, and gameplay is what you want.

[Thanee]

The MMO that came closest to the feel of Shadowrun was Neocron. It was quite buggy, and set in a more advanced future, but nonetheless it had many, many great ideas (some of which even current games struggle with) and was a lot of fun. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bye
Thanee

[Dumori]

*Now, understanding that this was probably 1993 or 1994, we even went so far as to bring in some computer graphic specialists and run some numbers as to whether or not it would be feasible to have the physical world and the astral world share the same geometry but have different texture sets. The question was whether or not both texture sets could be stored simultaneously in video RAM so that the magician characters could swap between astral and physical perception at will with minimal lag. The answer was it could be done, but the amount of available texture space for each "world" would be insufficient for creating a cool world. Certainly today video cards have far more VRAM available, but the expectation is proportionally higher as well. I suspect the same problem would persist even today.

Ive seen similar things done shaders can be used as well as a full texture swap.

[Starmage21]

Iono about you guys, but for me, grand theft auto games ARE shadowrun, just without magic.