Vapour: Free Local Experimental Indie Horror Game
Hi guys,
We are Skobbejak Games (Tiaan Gerber & Alexander Ehlers, literally just the two of us) and we have come up with the prototype for an experimental horror combining the gameplay mechanics and design of oldschool and modern horror titles (such as Silent Hill and Slender) with the frantic and exciting gameplay of 90's First Person Run and Gunners (such as Doom, Duke Nukem 3D, Blood etc.)
We hope that you enjoy the prototype and that you can support us in producing a really awesome and special full paid version.
Gameplay Trailer + Free Download:
We are Skobbejak Games (Tiaan Gerber & Alexander Ehlers, literally just the two of us) and we have come up with the prototype for an experimental horror combining the gameplay mechanics and design of oldschool and modern horror titles (such as Silent Hill and Slender) with the frantic and exciting gameplay of 90's First Person Run and Gunners (such as Doom, Duke Nukem 3D, Blood etc.)
We hope that you enjoy the prototype and that you can support us in producing a really awesome and special full paid version.
Gameplay Trailer + Free Download:
Thanked by 1hanli
Comments
Welcome to the forums!! Not sure if I'm missing something but I don't think you provided a download link?
I don't know too much about horror games. I experience them mostly vicariously through Let's Plays, and that one other cool horror game on the forums: http://makegamessa.com/discussion/161
I have some compliments and constructive criticism (I hope it is constructive).
The game looks pretty. I like the idea of the glowing objects in the mist (I thought it was the sun shining through at first). I think you've done a good job for a two man team. The trees look like baobabs, which I thought was a nice touch. Not sure if the mist is something that comes free with Unity or UDK, but it looks good.
Is the mist a reference to Silent Hill? i.e. Ash from a catastrophic fire. If you are trying to get that feeling them maybe some falling ash particles could convey it better.
I don't know how far you intend taking it, I felt the environments could use some more variations, but limiting the player's sight with mist helps reduce the feeling of repetition (and increases the claustrophobia).
I felt the sound design evoked the right atmosphere.
Although the sound effects for the enemy attacks didn't sound very intense. It's sort of a whipping sound, but it doesn't sound like it's damaging a human.
I didn't really like the monster greeting sound. It's obviously right out of Doom, and although the reference is cool, the reference itself overshadows the effect it is meant to have (i.e. it's meant to scare me but I think of Doom instead).
Some heavy breathing after getting hurt or after running might be a nice touch.
The thing that I worry about with this design is that the feeling of power that a game like Doom evokes, the ability to kill your opponents, is in direct opposition to the feeling of powerlessness that accompanies being lost in a dark forest with a monster. It appears like you are trying to go in both directions at once.
I'm honestly not sure how to solve this, or whether it even is a problem. I enjoy oldschool FPS shooters (like Doom) and I understand the appeal of modern horror games (I think). I'm just not sure what the effect would be of making players feel kind of badass and kind of hunted at the same time.
I guess that's why you termed it an "Experimental Horror Game" : )
I had an idea that might be kind of scary/claustrophobic.
It seems like there are pickups on the map... I'm not too sure what they do though. What if the mist was slowly closing in and blinding the player more and more... but the pickups pushed back the mist a bit. So if players don't pick anything up they eventually become blind except for the glowing markers in the mist... and when blind players would kind of be at the mercy of the monsters hunting them, but when the mist is clear the player can kill the monsters and feel badass for a bit.
(This might actually be something you are already doing, but I couldn't tell from the video)
The fighting itself, the throwing the green balls at enemies, isn't all that juicy at the moment. I don't know if this is something you want to improve. I would probably suggest having a shotgun instead, which I think might tie it to the real world a bit better and help players get immersed more. I think getting immersed in the fantasy of the situation helps modern horror games.
But like I said, I haven't made a horror game myself.
I hope that this comes across as constructive. I'm excited that you guys are attempting this and I'll be following your progress!
At the moment your various pickups seem a little disjointed from the world - there's little in the environment around them that shows players where they are or that they could even pick them up. You guys know they're there, so you head straight for them, but I'd probably walk right past and not even notice ;) Giving them some sort of outlining or grounding in the world would make sense, L4D's health packs always being on walls or shelves and in cupboards means you develop an expectation as a player of where you might look for specific items.
I think you could up the creepiness of the enemies you have right now by grounding them in the world a bit more too: That second lit area (Consume, I think?) with the sacrifice/effigy/totem thing is creepy as fuck. If that was the first thing you saw it would really ram home the horror element if that skullspine on the stake jiggled at you when you got too close for the first time. Then having another one come at you would be much scarier :)
And finally - don't assume you need combat. 1 single enemy can be scary enough, especially early on, compared to spawning multiple enemies because you want the fighting to last longer.
Looking good though, I think BSFtS's fog particle advice would make it even better. Your environment sort of reminds me of Sir, You Are Being Hunted, give us more :D
To shine some more info on the project, what we wanted was pretty much a fusion of the oldschool and modern horror genres with the frantic action gameplay of 90's First Person Run and Gunners. Also the game is meant to be insanely difficult so that it acts as a better survival experience. We also just want you to keep in mind we are going for a very unrealistic approach as it is Purgatory and we dont want it to be too realistic.
We don't want the player to be guided by the pinky the whole time. Also keep in mind guys we are only 2 guys and we did this in less than a year on ZERO budget, there are so many sweet upgrades and addition that we want to put in the full paid version (hopefully, if we can get the support that we need).
@FanieG: Thanks for the compliment on the name man, we took exactly 7 months.
Sorry, I think we didn't really check what it is you're after. My bad.
Video looks great, will try not to repeat some of the sames things already said.
Mist, trees and glowing lights look great, not sure I can work out the different functions by color in the video. The combat and fighting definitely remind me of Hexen not sure if you ever played that.
Two points I would propose that might make the game better.
Footfalls and breathing for your character. If possible different sounds for locations/terrain.
The mobs all seams to hone in on you in a straight line. If some spread out trying to circle you that might make bring on slight panic in the player. Of course you might have other mobs that already do that and they not in the video.
Look forward to giving it a spin.
I'll forbear on further comment until you've returned and answered Dislekcia's question regarding what sort of feedback you're looking for.
Good luck with the game! ^_^
@dislekcia: In regards to what kind of support we are looking for: We want the game to be spread to as many places and people as possible so that enough people will like it and that we can hopefully launch a indiegogo camapign end of the year that actually stands a chance at being successful. That is basically the point of this prototype game, to show people that we mean business and that we know what kind of game we want to create. We know the thing isnt currently fit for sale, but come on its two guys, 7 months and NO BUDGET, so we need to start somewhere and gain traction, otherwise no one will be interested/buy it.
Also forgot in reply to BlackShips: sorry if the download link was a bit elusive, you can go directly to www.skobbejakgames.com and download either the PC, Mac or Linux version directly from there.
@Thaumaturge: Haha, Skull Spine I like that, our little nick name for it during devlopment was SpineHorse, cause it kinda looks like a Sea Horse. Hehe, anyway thanks for the support man, really makes your effort feel that much more appreciated.
By the way, if I may, I'd like to clarify please: are you looking for constructive criticism at all?
If we had the money the game would have better content and much cooler visual effects but we are very limited at the moment.
That's why we are hoping to raise enough funds so that we can ultimately get more people to work on it and make a decent game but thanks for the help and feedback so far, we'll definitely keep all of it in mind while developing.
Here's a speed play through of the entire game if anyone is interested or too lazy to play it:
So you keep talking about raising funds. How do you expect to raise them? I think what's happening here is there's some sort of disconnect between what you're expecting to happen and what people are trying to help you with. Generally, making a game better and communicating what that game is about in stronger ways will help create opportunities to talk to press and thus drive visibility and eventually, allow for funding options from a larger fan base - be that crowdsourcing or Greenlight or whatever.
That's the type of model people are giving you advice under, but it seems like you want something different? I think you're running the risk of people going "Well, I can't give them feedback because they'll just tell me that they're 2 people with no budget again". I'd love to see you develop this more, all I'd like is a couple of pointers on how to actually structure said help in ways that you'll appreciate ;)
What we intended with this prototype is just to get the general idea out there and to start get people interested and build a fanbase. While we appreciate any and all constructive criticism and we always way the options, you have to take into account that the final decision is ours and that we are also trying to start creating the full paid version now to at least have something decent by the time we want to start our crowdfunding.
Remember as well that weve worked with this project for quite a while now, so we already know most of the stuff where it is lacking or where potential needs to be pushed more and we are working on it for the full paid version.
Perhaps the problem is one of expectations: looking again at your first post, my guess is that you were expecting a response similar to what you might expect on a general gaming or fan forum, while this is, I think, essentially a creator community, and so the default here is "comment and critique".
As to knowing what's lacking, why not mention at least some of it: discussion of such improvements might help to build interest (by giving us a better impression of the final game)
But fair enough -- as I said, your game looks cool. Come to think of it, I'm glad to see the mention above of Hexen (although I think that I'd likely prefer Heretic, myself :P): I seem to recall thinking recently that I'd like to see something new in that vein. ^_^
By the way, when you do start your crowdfunding campaign, please post the link here, and good luck with it! ^_^
Nobody's suggestions or feedback is about forcing you to do anything. Of course that's always up to you, it's just that if you put something in front of some of us, you're going to get the sorts of feedback we've found useful in the past. Stuff like "I didn't know what I should be doing there" or "How do I know when I've picked up a gun?" - theoretically stuff like that might be useful when working on the game further.
I think what I'm trying to do is echo back to you guys that you're coming across as a little prickly. Nobody is denigrating how much work you've done, nobody is attacking your effort! We're all just very used to pushing each other to do better. We're also used to how powerful constructive criticism that comes from an outside viewpoint can be. For instance, I'm certain that while you guys may believe you already know everything you need to do to the game, there are some parts of how others see it that you simply can't grasp on your own because you're too close to it.
Look, if all you want is some encouragement and the odd pat on the back, that's cool :) I'm sorry if we've been somehow offensive.
I think the disconnect between your (you guys') expectations and what we normally do in our forums is quite a big thing here. From your initial post, it seems like you guys were expecting the people here's reactions to be:
1) That's an awesome game! Good luck!
2) I want to give you money!
3) I want to join your team!
(Now of course I'm only guessing from what I'm reading, so if I'm wrong please don't take offence. Noone here is trying to offend nor would anyone intend to!)
1) 2) and 3) almost NEVER happens around here. 1) isn't constructive, 2) just about never happens cos we're not investors, 3) happens usually only when the stars align and the universe is in perfect harmony. Nor will they in most game dev community, because everyone has limited time and everyone is chasing their own dreams!! This is very much a thing of passion, as I'm sure you know - and it's usually one's own passion :)
And instead what you got was
1) Constructive criticism
It's actually the norm here - this is a community of developers, who make games, discuss games, dissect everything to little pieces... And people who hang around are people who've all had their (hard and often excellent) work torn to shreds by each other. Trust me, I'm a single person, working full time not on game dev, working on my own project in my own time, and I thoroughly enjoy any critique and ideas I get on my prototype(s), especially mechanically (I usually say "meh" to graphics cos I don't care about them because I'm prototyping not polishing).
And like @dislekcia said, nobody is suggesting that you MUST heed what everyone else has said. It's up to you to take in what's being said about your game, and see whether what they said is valid or not, and implement what you want in the end. And in the end, it is other people who will play your game - not you - so other people's input are super valuable - because, for most people, working on a project for a long time can make you ignorant of mistakes you're making.
And it's ok to make mistakes! There's nothing wrong at all with mistakes - rather make it and understand why, and learn something from it, than to think "this is the way" and never listen to valuable input.
And trust me, these guys have some super valuable input, but don't take my word for it, judge for yourselves :)
1) 2) and 3) almost NEVER happens around here. 1) isn't constructive, 2) just about never happens cos we're not investors, 3) happens usually only when the stars align and the universe is in perfect harmony.
And the first step towards getting 1), 2) or 3) to happen is to engage and listen to constructive criticism and the voices that are willing to speak, right? :)
I'd personally have avoided making any game that even hinted at needing shadows, which has limited me in the past to 2D games or games with flat colours. I'd pretty much refuse to work on 3D environments without real-time shadows or lightmaps. Unless I could unwrap everything uniquely and memory wasn't an issue. :P
I enjoyed the sound design, and liked the 'flashes' that popped up every now and then-although they got WAY too frequent as you played. Keep those as more of a 'shock' during the quiet moments.
I liked the grabby hand things in the beginning, would have been nice to see more of those. Something to think about would perhaps have them rooted to the ground (ie-unable to move), but MUCH more of them, so you are almost surrounded by these writing hands shooting up from the ground.
The floating skulls I feel would have been less 'comical' if they were ghostly...I kept wondering how they were flying. Adding in movement of the spines akin to a snake moving through water could be interesting...
I didn't really understand how the light sources worked in the game...as in, why are they there? Are you following the path of a previous traveller? Are they luring you into traps? etc.
But overall, a good prototype to build on! Looking forward to seeing more! :)
Sorry for the late reply, we're extremely busy doing some upgrades to the Vapour prototype as well as setting up our Indiegogo campaign.
First of all thanks to all the support and critique a lot of it is quite insightful.
In reply to why we have made this post, it wasnt really about gaining a larger audience or being in need of specific critique. We just wanted to share it with South Africa's leading game development community and like-minded individuals, it just felt like the natural thing to do.
Most of the suggestions that people mention are stuff we wanted to put in the game from the beginning but we are strapped for time, we cant wait too long the indie gaming scene (even the local one) is filling up like crazy at a fast rate. We want to get something out and build up from that rather than spend so much time and effort to make a long, detailed and complicated game and end up being late to the party.
Dont get us wrong we want to make a long, detailed and complicated game (well as long, detailed and complicated as we can make it with the indiegogo funds we receive).
For instance Chriss_Bischoff mentioned: "shorter linear, varied environments" That is definitely something that we want to incorporate in the full version, its that kind of level design that made us fall in love with 90's FPS titles. There's multiple other suggestions that everyone mentioned that we've also had in mind from start or we realized during devlopment. We dont want to mention too much cause we dont want to spoil all the surprises, but some of them can be obviously expected:
better visuals,
shorter, linear, diverse levels with indoor and out door segments
An FPS hand (different spells as well)
Character Voicing (with some creepy one liners)
New and improved enemies
Inventory items as well as instant Powerups
The list goes on.
Hope this answers some of your questions.
P.S. It's not like there's really much "local" weight to game purchasing, so you're competing with every single internationally produced game already. The only place where this isn't the case is on platforms that don't have much on them yet, which is coincidentally where every other random indie is trying to rush something out to as well, so you end up not gaining much unless you're unfathomably lucky.