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UndyingNephalim — Reboot
#norin #sigma #realtimestrategy
Published: 2015-02-23 08:40:35 +0000 UTC; Views: 2414; Favourites: 49; Downloads: 5
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Description
Hey look, Norin got rebooted!While I've had moderate success with both Hyrule: Total War and Star Fox: Event Horizon, pushing my original IP's such as Sigma has been, quite simply, a nightmare.
Sigma was picked up by three different publishers over the course of two years, being dropped by each of them only shortly after alpha stages of their involvement. The killing blow for Sigma came about in December of 2013, where support for the Fleet Ops engine that was being used was abandoned by their team in favor of starting a completely new RTS engine with no release date or rough estimation of its availability. After desperately struggling to find a suitable engine for some time, I eventually put Sigma to rest and released a final version on Fleet Ops, opting to focus on my other work. Pretty much no one noticed and it seemed everyone was happy with my other games. I've not touched my magnum opus strategy game ever since.
Recently I was talking with morphiul and the idea of just completely rebooting Sigma from scratch with a different 80's sci-fi tone and more surreal Brazil like premise was brought up. I thought the idea sounded like fun, so despite the complete lack of a suitable engine or resources I decide to start rethinking Sigma from the ground up: everything from gameplay mechanics to aesthetic. Hopefully one day I'll find a suitable engine, maybe even finally a stable team of individuals who won't bail out to bring this strategy game that's been stuck in my head for well over a decade to life. Because I certainly am not venturing into the video game industry again. It's a complete nightmare: the developers, the journalists, and the consumers have somehow turned what is supposed to be the coolest entertainment industry into a veteran's only club, a gamers are wild animals hunting ground, a social justice warzone, and a minimal effort tragedy. I guess reality is the ultimate reaper of dreams. Oh well, alternative time!
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Comments: 35
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I honestly have to say my favorite part is her face. It is foreign but it's also unique. Like I want to place a bit more of a human face on there but I can't. Almost as though she has a strange mask XD It just fits very well I think (if it is the morphing thing). Also love the curl she has in her hair~ It is an adorable little addition.
I know it's a simple pose but she still shows a lot of innocence still which I think is a great carry over. I hope that you get to work with her a lot more and I look forward to what you do with Sigma \o\
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Bahhh I love the curls, they were a complete accident too.
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With your work I've always been stuck rooting from the sidelines because RTS games just aren't really fun for me. I've never enjoyed playing them. 
As for the pic itself, I love Norin's new look! She definitely looks mysterious, yet still has appeal and I actually think she still looks kinda cute like this. XD The fingers seem a little odd to me, but that's just me. I absolutely adore her head design. I can't wait to see what other new changes you're gonna bring!
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I don't blame anyone for not liking RTS games, there are a lot of weaknesses in the genre no one has been able to overcome yet and it's probably why strategy games are all but dead outside of small groups on the internet anymore. Unless multitasking is fun for a person then it's hard to get past that sense of detachment from what's going on I guess.
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Yeah, I've just always liked the perspective of playing as one character in the middle of the action rather than directing lots of characters while watching everything from on high. XD
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It's not as cute but I love it and mostly prefer it over the old design as it creates a rather unsettling impression on the character. Also I love Brazil so this is just music to my ears.
I'm really sorry about the difficulty of getting your New IP to work, a lot of people are just really afraid/unwilling to try out something new.
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I love the new look! Is she representative of the morphing idea you told me about? Because I definitely get that vibe from her now. Is her skin semi-transparent? Because at least in her arms it kind of looks that way. Love how her face and head look overall. Creepy, very foreign, and mysterious all in one. Ngh, I really look forward to seeing you work with her more. <3
As I've said before: sometimes rebooting old stories leads to even better results. From what I've seen and heard, Sigma's reboot sounds like it'll be amazing. Good luck with it! I'm definitely going to keep up to date with it. :>
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Yeah I went with the morphing idea, though I think for different reasons then I mentioned the other day. Her skin is semi transparent in some spots but not overall I think.
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Honestly, I think this extra bit of polish is what Sigma really needs. I loved your ideas and drawings, but you're still only a 1 man team using an old and limited engine. To be honest, I really didn't think it did your concept justice. I would have suggested maybe starting a Kickstarter or Indiegogo drive, but lots of disappointment and broken promises have really turned people off to that sort of thing.
Along with the fact that it's a PC only indie sci-fi RTS game... you really hit what the video game industry has become on the head. It's not the 90's anymore. People aren't interested in things that aren't hipster visual novels, COD, or League of Legends.
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I think people are interested in a lot of different types of games, just not the massive numbers that a lot of the dominant companies want (and kind of need) to purchase their games that they spend so much money making. There's been a pretty big resurgence of point and click adventure games, a genre that's been literally dead in the industry for over a decade. Even RTS games made a random comeback this year, and not just tiny indie ones. We had huge RTS's with AAA production values like Planetary Annihilation, Meridian, and Grey Goo. There are audiences for these long dead genres, just not in the high millions that corporations want.
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Hey, do you mind if I ask a few questions? I am a little concerned.
I always thought Sigma looked good, I want to see it be a playable game one day.
What is this reboot going to be? Is it still an RTS? How has it changed?
Because I don't want Sigma to turn into something it's not.
It is so lame that the publisher's bailed out on you. Shit like that is so stupid.
And to be fair I wouldn't say the video game industry has become a veteran's only club. Indie games are massively successful today.
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Yes it would remain an RTS, the changes would most likely be the aesthetics and visuals. I want the game to look more surreal and strange, I really want to break away from the Halo/Mass Effect super-army-militarized look that pretty much all sci fi has fallen too in the last decade.
I think indie game developers have appeared in droves and have become massively popular for that "veteran's only club" reason honestly, a bunch of newcomers being rejected and turned away from larger companies or they just don't want to deal with the corporate garbage.
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Ah, I see. I trust your judgment, but I hope that the visuals will still be recognizable as Sigma, you know?
If I could make a suggestion, I think that you should take the Star Wars route and take time to flesh out many colorful and interesting words. There are some good ones on the old Sigma wiki (great job thinking of planets that have more than one biome by the way), but not a lot, and as far as I know the home planets have no information on them, and they all look like deserts.
I think that every home planet should be unique and diverse, rather than a desert with a few military bases and a green sky, make Horivine a planet with many deserts, forest, snow caps, oceans, and lot's of diverse terrain and wildlife. Just like Earth! You could even probably just use plants and animals from earth, it is a human home world after all. Do the same to the Zestian, Jeveron, and Sov homeworlds, but make them more alien in nature, and more personal to their species, perhaps the Sov world could be heavily polluted due to unchecked industrial development? Really, the only planet that should be a featureless rock is the Ekoset world.
I hope you will respond, I want to know what you think about developing the planets better.
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I am considering moving Sigma to the ground, I guess in that case I'd have no choice but the flesh out as many planets as I can.
I should probably point out that Horovine isn't a desert and is pretty similar to earth in its environments. The Zevestivan himeworld does also have multiple biomes, just a very large tropical band. The Sov homeworld was actually very aquatic, with the little bits of land mostly being swamps or glaciers near the poles.
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See, that's cool!
Unfortunately, it doesn't come off that way in the old cinematics you made, all we see of the planets make them look like they are pretty barran, but I can't really blame you for old cinamatics when you can do much better now days.
Another thing: The place Sigma takes place in honestly feels like a crapsack world, and I don't know if that was what you were aiming for or not. the Ekoset are planet looters who perform mass genocide and natural destruction on a regular basis, the VRA is run under a military dictatorship who suppress any ideas they don't want and encourage people to be emotionless drones for the military, the Sov have an extremely corrupt government and anyone who can't make it in their aggressive society is left to rot, the Zestians are way to caught up in their religion, and the Jeverons, a society that actually came across as pretty decent to me, was destroyed.
Was it you're intent for this world to be a really crappy place or did it just come out that way? (at least it isn't as bad as Warhammer 40k)
Also, what about pop culture? Do the alien species have any pop culture, music, litature, video games, movie industry, propaganda filled political/religious cartoons, ect? Sci fi writer's usually seem to overlook that fact that most industrial societies would have some sort of pop culture.
Also, considering the VRA is a suppressive Dictatorship... do you think there would ever be a rebellion among the people it suppresses? Or are their any atheist Zestians?
I do like the idea of Sigma having land battles, I wish more Sci fi games had both space and land. Though I don't want you to get rid of space either, as I think it seems more important in this setting, I understand if you switch to land if you have to in order to get a good engine for the game.
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I don't know if I would call the setting of Sigma intentionally crapsack, at least it doesn't seem that way to each civilization initially. The game was more so about very closed off societies coming into contact with each other and having what they understand of the universe and their cultures put into question. For instance the VRA never really had any concept of art or even God before encountering the Zevestivan, likewise the Sov had no basis for societies that existed with non profit empathy. The story usually revolved around characters in each respective society realizing something was wrong or missing from their own culture: Hawksin realizes his people have suppressed emotion, Broker realizes her society is a self serving and shallow, Kydora sees her people as intolerant zealots that could learn so much more from different ideologies regardless if their faith was right or wrong. If anything the civilizations are intentionally missing certain aspects that you bring up to show what it would be like to miss them: broken and flawed. Each race sort of has a feature the others are all missing and without each other they are in a way incomplete. I've always liked the idea of the same situation being told from multiple viewpoints for that reason: after getting something from all angles and people involved you sort of realize the story is broken from only one point of view.
People in modern societies on earth tend to take extremist points of view on everything from government to religion to even entertainment and video games, if anything Sigma is sort of a commentary on that. You're either Conservative or Liberal, Christian or Buddhist, Realistic Zelda or Toon Zelda: there's no room for conditionals or in between anymore. A person can be liberal for human rights, but conservative on abortion. A person can believe in Jesus Christ but practice Buddhist methods of mediation and finding self peace without violating the ten commandments. People can prefer the darker art styles of some Zelda games and still have fun with the others. Likewise a lot of the races in Sigma are "This and not that," and coming into contact with each other pulls the curtain off the whole thing.
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I see what you mean. Somehow I don't think that a society could go to space without developing some sort of art, I would rather say that the Horovine used to have art, but suppressed it as they became militaristic.
Very interesting concept though. I really like that idea, multiple civilizations discovering a better way to live from interacting with each other.
And it seems the Ekoset take this to a logic extreme, they barely have any culture at all!
Just one more question: What are the Mylock and Jeverons missing in their societies?
I still stand that the Jeveron society seems like it is the least flawed one though.
And it seems like every faction to me has an individual who is caught up in his or her species ideology way to much, and one who is trying to learn about other cultures, if you look at the characters.
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The Jevorons were extreme isolationists, not even willing to leave their homeworld and explore the cosmos. They basically fell under the label of "we've learned all we need to learn." They are basically the stubborn old grandpa afraid of new things.
The Mylocks were almost in the opposite position, they were on an endless quest for knowledge and were overreaching themselves. They were like children wanting to learn about fire, only to reach out and burn themselves in the process. They represent mindless scientific progress without any concern for ethics or the negative consequences of their actions.
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That's cool Undyingnephalim. I like it a lot. You are probably one of the only sci fi writers who intentionally invokes 'planet of the hats' rather then have it happen because there isn't enough detail. That is cool.
And I think I figured out what the Ekoset represent: mindlessly consuming natural resources and polluting the environment without any regard for the future or the creatures you might be harming. Alternatively, they might be people who just mindlessly work and live in self gratification with no personal ambition or goals; like animals, but with the ability to be more. I think you were probably going for the former though.
I hope you post anymore artwork you make. 
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What about the Ekosets?
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I don't think Neph was going for cute with the new rendition of her.
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mmm so you ditched her original kinda starfox style in pro of a more alien looking visage...interesting
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I've got to say I really like this redesign for Norin. The last one looked too "bunnylike", if you ask me.
I'll be frank with you, man. I learned about you through HTW, and I really wish you can carry it forth to the end; but I would love to try Sigma and find out about the world you're developing. As for the games and possible engines, I personally think RTS is in a bit of a dire situation lately. I would suggest trying a more "grand strategy" or 4X approach, considering that your idea is set on deep space.
I'd suggest the engine of the game Darkest Hour. Strictly speaking, it's a WW2 grand strategy game, with a large world map divided in thousands of provinces that the different countries have to fight for, but the modding possibilities are immense and the community is mature enough to work with. It has tech trees, army development, trade, resource management, intel, diplomacy... it's a quite complete and complex game, but frankly, I can see the chances of turning the Earth map into that of a different planet, or even a space sector. It's real time too, so it might fit your purposes.
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That Darkest Hour game does look pretty fun, though I'm not sure if that's the style of game I'm going for. For one I would like a full 3D engine, and two it doesnt seem like that game allows for much in the way of cinematics. Then there's also publishing rights, I can't seem to find anything about publishing games commercially with that engine. Sigma is something I'd really like to see on Steam.
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You know, I always wanted to see your interpretation of Hyrule ported into a tabletop perspective such as the one in Darkest Hour, and I believe Sigma could fit as well. Indeed, there is little to do in cinematics, but I guess you could use a lot of concept art to illustrate unit pictures, technology descriptions, unit sprites, leader and minister faces and all overall fluff. It's not 3D, but it might be a stepping stone to draw attention towards Sigma! (I'm already imagining a "tactical" Sigma in a full 3D engine and a "grand strategy" Sigma in a tabletop perspective)
As for publishing and so on, Darkest Hour is actually a fanmade game that got supported by Paradox Interactive and got actually sold as a standalone game! The Europa engine is rather old now, so it's probably free to tinker with and I guess that publishing matters can be discussed. As far as I know too, Darkest Hour is on Steam.
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I'm not entirely opposed to the gameplay of Sigma being more like Darkest Hour, I just don't know if I want my game to be mostly static icons and still portraits on a flat map. I have some really surreal ideas for environments that I feel like would need a full 3D space to pull off I think. I'll still consider using the engine though since you mention that games can be published on it. That's the biggest bullet point for me right now.
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I see what you mean with that. To be honest, I know that the 2D limitation leaves little room for large breakthroughs, I believe in your capabilities to push the boundaries as you did with the Medieval 2 engine.
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It's a shame that your original creations have been so neglected. To be honest, I found you through H:TW, but definitely stayed for Sigma. It looked like it had a lot of potential, had ideas and themes I've rarely seen in modern fiction, intriguing lore and characters, and most importantly, it's YOUR brainchild - if I want another Zelda, I honestly could just wait for Nintendo to inevitably release yet another one. It made me a little sad to see Sigma constantly ignored in favour of your other projects (not that they're bad, of course). I very much enjoyed Sigma in its past incarnation.
That being said, I'm liking this reboot a lot. Maybe this will get a little more attention out there, or might appeal to more people...or....something. While I will miss old designs'n'such, some fresh blood could never go wrong (....right?). Just out of curiosity, would I be wrong in assuming a more aquatic, almost amorphous design? That's the impression I'm getting, and if so I'm curious to see where this ends up going.
Keep up the good work, and I hope you have more success with your original IP's in the future~
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I guess it also didn't help Sigma that my Patreon support was mostly given for my Zelda and Starfox games, money sadly was a driving factor several months ago. Now that I'm much more financially stable I've been able to ease off of focusing on things that bring in money.
Aquatic was not the attempt here, though amorphous body shifting does come into play. My intent was an extra dimensional creature trying to configure and get itself to work in a three dimensional space by mimicking other creatures it encountered. I guess think of the Bulk Beings from Interstellar trying to fit into one less dimension, or in case you've not seen that film imagine a three dimensional creature trying to fit in a two dimensional world.
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Aha, that does make sense. Extra-dimensional beings have always intrigued me, and it certainly makes me more curious to this strange new Sigma being worked on. I'm glad to hear that things are more stable now, and I hope that this will allow you to work on the things you truly enjoy with tender loving care (unlike some other financial driven endeavors I can think of...)
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And there I was thinking you were just ore interested in the other stuff at the time. Good luck with it
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