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| TKO Software will invest $7 million in developing a 3D action adventure game to launch with the film in late 2004. |
| QUOTE (Kellym @ Nov 23 2004, 02:58 PM) |
| Let us know if they reply R ;) |
| QUOTE (Outback Brock @ Nov 26 2004, 04:58 AM) |
Would be good to jump into the shoes of Dirk!!!!!!! |
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Sahara is a movie you'll be hearing a lot about in the coming months. The big-budget motion picture features Matthew McConaughey as a sort of James Bond meets Indiana Jones action star named Dirk Pitt (any relation to Brad?). His adventures take place at various points of interest in the versatile continent of Africa. TKO is working on the game adaptation, and showed it from their secret stronghold deep in the bowels of E3's Kentia Hall. Don't let the meager setting fool you; this title has some cool things going for it. The game's major hook so far is what the developers call "improvisational combat." This allows you to take nearly any object in the environment and use it for violent purposes. When we say nearly any we mean it. If it's not glued down, you can throw it; if it is glued down, you can toss someone into or through. One a table is blasted to sticks, for example, you can hurl those sticks like projectiles. The control is extremely easy, so you don't have to aim your toss at all; just hit the corresponding button and let Dirk do the rest. Dirk can do a few other cool things in hand-to-hand battles. When an enemy is down, it's possible to get on top of them and pound their faces in further. Also, Dirk can get in the zone, which allows you to pull off some impressive one-hit kills. New moves and combos get unlocked. All these things are in place to keep the combat from being too button-mashy -- which every action game should strive for. There are also plenty of gun fights in Sahara, and the developers seem to be striving to usurp the gunplay in the last EA Bond title. I'm not sure how successful they'll be, but now seems like a good time to point out that the game is very early right now, and won't release until next spring. One cool things we saw in the demo are plenty of scripted events where you interact with the environment. For example, Dirk shot up a water tower, which then fell down in a massive heap. TKO is breaking new ground in terms of graphics. Matthew McConaughey and other actors -- like his movie sidekick, Steve Zahn -- were cyber-scanned for authenticity, and their voices are used in the game as well. Shadows are a major focus, and we're told the PS2 version of Sahara will mark the first time a title on the platform has ever used "stencil buffer" shadows before. We'll take their word for it, but our own eyes told us the lighting is pretty impressive. Gamers have learned to be wary of movie-based games, especially those done by smaller companies. However, Sahara is already appearing quite promising, and the movie will likely draw a lot of attention later this year, as well. Let's just hope the video game/movie combo will fare better than McConaughey's last action effort, Reign of Fire |
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Sahara Game Interview - 01 September 2004 - John [JCal] Callaham Author Clive Cussler's best selling series of novels featuring adventurer Dirk Pitt is going to get a one-two punch in other media via an upcoming movie based on the novel Sahara (starring Matthew McConaughey as Pitt) and as an upcoming action-adventure game from developer TKO Software. HomeLAN got a chance to chat with TKO Software CEO Jacob Hawley and design team member David Howe to find out more about their plans for the Sahara game. HomeLAN - First, how did TKO Software get the licence for the Sahara game? Jacob Hawley - Funny story ... probably confidential so I can't give you the full details. Anyhow, we were pitching another Paramount property at the time and were invited to take a look at the pitch booklet. After having a look and bringing it back to the studio, the guys here were pretty excited so we started to negotiate for the license. Shortly there after about October of 2003 we were able to sign a deal and start development. HomeLAN - How closely is the development team working with the filmmakers on the making of the game? Jacob Hawley - From what I have seen, we have gotten some support from the film crew but they have been pretty busy with the movie. We have gotten some special clips of the combat training, wardrobe, and a great deal of the concept art. David Howe - We were also able to meet with Matthew McConaughey in order to do body scans of him for our character model. Paramount has also provided us shots from the sets sent back to the states by the film crew. HomeLAN - What can you tell us about the storyline for the game? Does it follow the plot of the movie or go in a new direction? Jacob Hawley - We try and follow Cussler's vision from the book, while dealing with the approval process from Paramount. We deviate from the movie back towards the original text of the book where we can. David Howe - We will definitely attempt to capture key moments, locales and events from the film however. HomeLAN - What can you tell us about the type of gameplay that Sahara will have? David Howe - The game play is centered around brawling and improvisational combat. Dirk will use whatever is handy to beat up enemies, from clay bricks and wooden boards to explosives and machine guns. In the game, the player will be able to pick up items around them at will, use them, and discard them. A key element in the game play will be picking up objects nearby and using them against your attackers as weapons. There is no inventory for the player to manage, so items in the world will be plentiful of many shapes and sizes all with disposable flair to them. The player will go through hundreds of real world objects, guns and makeshift weapons on their way to victory. The player will also be able to utilize stealth coupled with unique stealth moves in certain areas of the game as well. We also plan to have a robust spline based vehicle/turret system. HomeLAN - What playable characters will be in the game and what types of other characters and enemies will be encountered? David Howe - Playable characters will be Dirk Pitt and his sidekick Al Giordino. Dirk and Al are a modern day Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Many missions will include a switch between these two playable characters. These transitions will occur at key locations within a mission that makes sense for the game play at hand, and will be predetermined in our design. When these character transitions occur, the idle character will have an activity that makes sense, such as ducking and reloading, driving whatever vehicle they are on, or blasting away from an upper balcony. A majority of our transitions occur when Al and Dirk are not in proximity, so this presents us with an opportunity to change the primary game play theme to keep the game feeling fresh and the player drawn into the excitement. Dirk and Al are each unique characters with different personalities and specialties. Dirk will tend to be in situations that involve elaborate hand-to-hand combat and improvising weapons, while Al will tend to end up in situations that encourage guns, rockets and explosives. HomeLAN - What kinds of locations and settings will Sahara have? David Howe - The game takes place in Africa in the countries of Nigeria, Mali, and the surrounding desert regions. Aside from the desert regions there are also plans for an elaborate industrial site called “Energie Solaire” which represents the “evil lair” so to speak. Every environment in the game is designed to take the player deeper into the world of the film, the book, and Dirk Pitt. HomeLAN - What other unique gameplay elements will Sahara have? David Howe - The current incarnation of Sahara was done using TKO’s proprietary LiquidFX engine which is still in development. LiquidFX is TKO's cross-platform game engine packed with cutting-edge technology, and has been in development by a team of dedicated engineers for over a year. The engine features DOOM 3-style lighting and shadows, sophisticated real world physics, and an intuitive build interface co-developed by leading engineers and designers. With LiquidFX, TKO has complete control over the presentation of the game world, and can create graphics that support dynamic, fun game play. Features include: normal mapping, per-pixel lighting, and other advanced lighting features, including patent-pending optimizations that will make the engine blaze HomeLAN - What is the current status of the game’s progress and when will it be released? Jacob Hawley - The current state of the game is that we have a reduced staff on the production team until we can finalize a deal. We have recently had a lot of interest in the game after having a fairly quiet summer. We anticipate that we will have a game next year based on a signed deal with a publisher and are a really only waiting on that to kick this back into a 60 man production team. HomeLAN - Finally is there anything else you wish to say about Sahara? David Howe - We hope the movie rocks… |
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| HomeLAN - What can you tell us about the storyline for the game? Does it follow the plot of the movie or go in a new direction? Jacob Hawley - We try and follow Cussler's vision from the book, while dealing with the approval process from Paramount. We deviate from the movie back towards the original text of the book where we can. |
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I was the Senior Game Designer on this project untuil they laid us all off in march of 2004 and the company TKO went bankrupt. >From: "Rickard Widell" <rickard@missionsos.org> >To: <myscha_sleddog@hotmail.com> >Subject: Sahara Game >Date: Sun, 20 Feb 2005 15:32:48 +0100 > >Hi! > >I understand you are the Senior Game Designer of the upcoming SAHARA game. >As the movie is soon to be released, I wonder if you have anything to say >about >he game. Is it still in production, and when will it be released? I saw a >short >interview with a screenshot at Game Spot once, but that's all. > >Any response would be very appreciated! Thank you. > >Rickard Widell |