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[Star Control] Origins is out NOW. Be sure to enjoy the sauce.
Quiotu
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http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/126206-Star-Control-Reboot-Emerges-From-the-Wreckage-of-Atari
Dear god I can't get this smile off of my face. I can't WAIT to see what these guys can to do reboot this series.
Dear god I can't get this smile off of my face. I can't WAIT to see what these guys can to do reboot this series.
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Star Control was one of my favorites, and GalCiv's also one of my favorites, so I've got good feelings here.
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Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
As do I. I don't think we'll see something like the Elemental debacle again, as they appear to have taken the lumps from that one to heart.
The only bad thing about this announcement is what about Galactic Civilizations 3? I know it hasn't been announced yet, but I'd love a sequel.
Oh the dreams I will dream right now.
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Considering Toys for Bob is in Skylanders purgatory until probably the apocalypse, likely not happening.
What's eyebrow raising is that Stardock got Star Control and NOT Master of Orion, which went to frigging Wargaming.net along with Total Annihilation.
This won't affect the currently-available free release of Star Control II The Ur-Quan Masters from Toys for Bob, right?
My Backloggery
It shouldn't that code was OSS'd legally. No way to really turn that around.
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So basically download it while it's hot.
Judging by what Stardock is saying, it doesn't seem like a sequel is something they're really wanting to make, but rather a prequel. They want to make a game before SC2, one before the shield wall was implemented. Now, this will probably require them to use assets from SC1 and 2 for it to feel right, assets that are still owned by Toys for Bob and Paul Reiche. So I have a feeling this is the first step, and will be in talks with the creators of the first two games soon.
I think the problem with this is that at the beginning of SC2 all the good guys are thralls or slave-shielded, and most of the ancient races are extinct. Most of the prehistory is periods of varying awfulness, there's some fighting represented abstractedly in SC1, and then it ends on a downer. The prequel space is kind of already written into corners.
In any case, the article says reboot over and over:
Again, I feel like SC2 was what happened when Ford and Reiche went with an XCom-like reboot using Starflight 1 as a major source of inspiration, but they didn't need the Starflight IP to do that. It seems like it might have been more productive for Stardock to take their own GalCiv property and try to make an action adventure game out of that.
Stay losing Youtube.
It conveyed that their major source of inspiration was 2, not 1 or 3 which is pretty important. Given their strategy background, some were worried they'd hew closer to 1 than 2. 3 is just downright odd.
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Holy shit, I come back from work to see that my abandoned 3-year-old thread LIVES!!
I'll change the thread title to verify new life.
I wasn't even sure if Stardock got access to Star Control 3, or just the previous 2. Actually, I think rumors were that Atari only had rights to SC3, and they had to get permission from the Toys for Bob guys to use the previous games. Seems like they're on board though, hopefully.
My only worry is they speak of a 'procedurally generated world', which is kind of a taboo thing since No Man's Sky. I do hope it's generated like that to a point. What made SC2 so awesome for me was that the universe was static, actions had consequences, and you had a time limit before shit started to happen without you. I don't mind using procedural generation to make the spaces in between more dynamic, but I want good plot and characters in my Star Control, and procedural generation doesn't do that well.
Mind if I ask what past history of Stardock's rubbed you the wrong way? To date, I've thoroughly enjoyed what they've put out...but if something was particularly heinous, I may have blocked out the offending game from memory.
Stardock does have some experience with the randomly generated universe due to their strategy games plus there's a different scale involved so I don't think it'll be quite the same as NMS.
As for the rights, Ars Technica went into it on their writeup of the reveal: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/10/a-first-look-at-star-control-origins-gameplay-prequel-due-for-release-in-2h17/
The short version is that the Toys For Bob guys have IP rights to the setting and aliens used in 1 and 2 but not the Star Control name hence why they could release The Ur-Quan Masters. Stardock bought the Star Control name and the IP for the aliens and setting in SC3 but don't get any IP for 1 and 2 hence why they can make a new Star Control game but are setting it before any of the aliens from 1 and 2 are in play since they have limited rights and 3 was just weird and silly.
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It was honestly awhile ago with Elemental: War of Magic. As released it was a very bug ridden game with poorly designed interface and gameplay. Though they did, if I recall correctly, profusely apologized for it and I think provided the remake/sequel for free which I also didn't find terribly compelling gameplay wise.
That said and to be fair, I don't recall any major issues with the more recent Galactic Civ, but my experience with Elemental just essentially burned into me to be wary of them.
So it's more that combined with the lack of access to the original game lore rights that has me wary of this game.
Heh...I knew I was forgetting one of their games. I have GalCiv 2 and 3 (as well as all the expansions for 2, and most of the expansions for 3 (leaving out the more micro of the microtransaction packs)), and skipped the Political/Corporate Machine series, and I completely forgot about Elemental and how disappointing and broken it was (that said, I did hear that the expansion was pretty decent).
Okay, so yeah...they've been kind of hit or miss.
The IP was available for sale and grabbing it would give both brand name recognition and prevent someone else from picking up the license and litigating a release that was "too similar" to Star Control. It makes sense given the more sue-happy climate software exists in now. And the name recognition helps given that it's been a long time since something with the same style of play and atmosphere came out. Sunless Sea has a number of similarities but is still quite different/prone to kicking the player in the genitals repeatedly early on so having it as the closest comparison in recent memory may not be so great.
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A lot of people like Fallen Enchantress and Legendary Heroes quite a bit. However it wasn't a Master of Magic or Age of Wonders successor like a lot of people had hoped for.
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Huh...now this is weird: I guess sometime in one of the many holiday sales or humble bundles or bundle all-stars packs, I've ended up with Fallen Enchantress in my Steam library. Maybe I should actually install it one of these days.
As for the new StarCon having all new aliens...my response is a pretty hearty "meh." While I love the Yehat music, the entire concept of the Shofixti, and the iconic Ur-Quan Kzer-Za ships, I don't completely mind them introducing a new set of aliens and ship designs. What really set Star Control apart, for me, was the uniqueness of the ships during HSM (and cheesing the Thraddash Torch's secondary attack to kill every AI felt soooooo good to my teenage brain and ego).
Sue-happy or not, it's been made pretty clear over the years that you have to make something pretty amazingly egregious to get sued for a game that's merely similar. If Stardock were that gun-shy about lawsuits I'd think they'd have bought the rights to Master of Orion before putting the Galactic News Network directly in GalCiv.
It just seems so bizarre to me. If I were really in love with the Aliens universe and wanted to make sure I was making a game worthy of the franchise, but then the lawyers told me I couldn't use the xenomorphs, the characters, the Colonial Marines or Weyland-Yutani, I'd probably go, "Huh," and make a sandwich instead. What exactly does Stardock have, aside from the name? No one cares about any IP from SC3.
So none of the aliens from 1 or 2? That's a damn shame, though admittedly a lot of them were total super-cliches. And some of them like the Syreen would be hard to pull off without serious retcon'ing. I liked the humor of the first two games, but an all female race of green psionic humanoids compatible with humans flying in giant red rockets called Penetrators... yeah, kinda awkward nowadays.
Hey now! I liked some of the new alien ships introduced in SC3 and wouldn't mind seeing them again!
GNN is a common enough name for sci-fi news networks that it may be a safer thing to do especially since it's clearly a parody of CNN and multiple parodies are allowed to coexist.
I think there's a bit of a difference given how Aliens has 4 movies in the main franchise, 2 AvP movies, comic books, multiple action figure lines, novels, multiple video games, oh God I was such a consumer whore for the franchise when I was a teenager, references and parodies in other media works, etc. to all focus on one distinctive and iconic alien species whereas Star Control had a lot of alien species that only appeared in one game or only got any real fleshing out in one game and if a developer wants to create that feeling of interacting with an alien species in 2 for the first time having all new ones isn't the worst idea.
But I also wouldn't downplay the ability for fanboyism to influence developer decisions. It's pretty clear from interviews that Bard Wardell idolizes the old games and it's hardly the only instance of unusual decisions made with regards to franchises by independent makers. Age of Wonders 3 basically exists because Notch was a big enough fan of AoW 1 and 2 to throw enough money at Triumph to get them to stop making Overlord and Majesty/Arkania setting games. Bethesda's Fallout titles barely feel connected to non-Bethesda Fallout games in tone and setting.
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I feel Bethesda had significantly more to work with than this project. They had the Vaults, the Brotherhood of Steel, the Vaults, the basic conceit of a post-nuclear wasteland. If I understand correctly, the long and short of it is that Stardock has bought the license and are immediately rebooting it, and they don't get to use anything identifiable from SC1 or 2 aside from the name, "Star Control." So what do they have? Earth? How is this a Star Control game and not any other space based trading/exploration/combat game?
I think you might be reducing down a bit too much of what makes Star Control Star Control. At its core, Star Control is unique ships from unique alien species duking it out on a 2D battle-grid (i.e. Hyperspace Melee). I mean, shoot...Star Control 1 didn't have anything to pull from, so they didn't have anything "identifiable" either. So this Star Control reboot...without the aliens and ships of SC1 and SC2, they still have the gameplay elements and the common use themes (such as space, hyperspace, planets, resource gathering, etc...)
Ford and Reiche have announced an upcoming, technically unofficial sequel to Star Control 2, titled Ghosts of the Precursors.
https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/307443/Star_Control_II_devs_unite_for_a_passion_project_sequel.php
It is kinda odd that we have two teams now, one which has the rights to the name Star Control but not to the content of SC1 and 2, and another that has access to all SC1 and 2 content but no right to the Star Control name. And it's honestly incredible that we have this situation at all where two devs are pretty much okay with it. It could've been a lot like Harvest Moon and Story of Seasons.