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Anachronox Preview
Gamecenter has posted a new preview on Ion Storm's upcoming Quake 2 engine game Anachronox[BLOCK]
Blow it up!
Anachronox
Eidos
By Bill McClendon
(12/18/00)
What do you get when you use a heavily modified Quake engine to create a game inspired and influenced by Japanese console RPGs such as Chrono Cross and the Zelda series? You'd probably get something that looks a whole lot like the upcoming Anachronox. Designer Tom Hall and his 15-member crew have been hard at work on Anachronox for a while now, and we got a chance to put a section of the game through its paces.
The first thing gamers will notice about Anachronox is how good it looks. The Quake engine--first introduced in 1996--has been significantly overhauled and seriously improved. Environmental mapping and 32-bit color are only two of the more visible improvements. What impressed us most was a feature that had been introduced at this year's E3: Anachronox's characters sport facial deformations that are among the most lifelike we've seen for the PC yet. Each character has a distinctive personality in his or her facial expressions and body movements. Watching Sly Boots slip furtive glances at one of his party members--that he has the hots for, incidentally--and getting caught at it from time to time gave both characters a touch of life and style...but when Sly turned to face forward, he actually assumed an innocent expression, complete with raised eyebrows and widened eyes. We half expected him to start whistling tunelessly like nothing at all was going on. Characters will have dialogue synced to their mouth and other facial movements as well, and the execution of this feature thus far is impressive.
The gameplay itself will be strikingly similar to that of console RPGs. Movement will be handled by the keyboard, and it will be similar to that in console RPGs, in that the arrow keys will move the party in relation to the player, not the characters. For instance, the up arrow will move the party away from the player, instead of moving the party forward in whichever direction they're facing. The mouse will be used to move the camera viewpoint around as well as to spin the camera RTS-style; at first it's a bit awkward, but it becomes natural very quickly.
In the various types of "minigames," again, Anachronox shows its console RPG influence. The section we played through began as a straight-up rail shooter, with our ship traversing the inside of a mazelike asteroid. However, from time to time, we had to select the next path forward when presented with options, so thinking and problem solving accompanied the flying and shooting. The "boss" at the end was taken out by shooting him only at certain times, all the while popping free-flying assistants and incoming missiles.
After finding our way through, we explored part of an alien hive. When we were exploring the base, we found a number of humans encased in cocoon-like apertures in the walls, and took the time to chat them up in adventure-game fashion. Of course, since they were trapped in the walls, and we couldn't free them, we could only talk to them--but the game showed its personality here as well in the conversations we had with these NPCs. From there, we encountered some enemies and discovered a third type of gameplay. Anyone familiar with Final Fantasy or Chrono Cross will know the drill here; players and enemies have reflexes and attack speeds, and can only act when it's their turn. Your party members will have access to what Hall called bouga, roughly defined as their ability to focus and find the "sweet spot" when they attack. The higher the meter, the more options they'll have and the more powerful the attack. Sly had our favorite attack--when his bouga meter reached full, he had a Cap attack option. Think "sniper rifle meets quad damage," complete with a bullet cam. Other types of special attacks included a Plasma Wall (area damage on all enemies) and Grumpos' Yammer attack--which has the most hilarious effect we've seen in a while. In one other type of minigame we saw, one of the characters had to hack into an alien computer; to do so, the player had to solve a straightforward symbol-based logic puzzle.
One aspect of the combat that impressed us was the camera work and the wide variety of spell effects. For the graphical part of the equation, it's clear that the Anachronox artists have been hard at work making them visually striking, distinctive, and appropriate. The camera work has been done extremely well; even though it may move around more than console RPGers might be used to, it does lend a certain dynamism to the action. Hall indicated that the final game will have around 100 levels, with 30 to 40 hours of gameplay, and if what we've seen is any indication, that's probably a low estimate[/BLOCK]
Blow it up!
Anachronox
Eidos
By Bill McClendon
(12/18/00)
What do you get when you use a heavily modified Quake engine to create a game inspired and influenced by Japanese console RPGs such as Chrono Cross and the Zelda series? You'd probably get something that looks a whole lot like the upcoming Anachronox. Designer Tom Hall and his 15-member crew have been hard at work on Anachronox for a while now, and we got a chance to put a section of the game through its paces.
The first thing gamers will notice about Anachronox is how good it looks. The Quake engine--first introduced in 1996--has been significantly overhauled and seriously improved. Environmental mapping and 32-bit color are only two of the more visible improvements. What impressed us most was a feature that had been introduced at this year's E3: Anachronox's characters sport facial deformations that are among the most lifelike we've seen for the PC yet. Each character has a distinctive personality in his or her facial expressions and body movements. Watching Sly Boots slip furtive glances at one of his party members--that he has the hots for, incidentally--and getting caught at it from time to time gave both characters a touch of life and style...but when Sly turned to face forward, he actually assumed an innocent expression, complete with raised eyebrows and widened eyes. We half expected him to start whistling tunelessly like nothing at all was going on. Characters will have dialogue synced to their mouth and other facial movements as well, and the execution of this feature thus far is impressive.
The gameplay itself will be strikingly similar to that of console RPGs. Movement will be handled by the keyboard, and it will be similar to that in console RPGs, in that the arrow keys will move the party in relation to the player, not the characters. For instance, the up arrow will move the party away from the player, instead of moving the party forward in whichever direction they're facing. The mouse will be used to move the camera viewpoint around as well as to spin the camera RTS-style; at first it's a bit awkward, but it becomes natural very quickly.
In the various types of "minigames," again, Anachronox shows its console RPG influence. The section we played through began as a straight-up rail shooter, with our ship traversing the inside of a mazelike asteroid. However, from time to time, we had to select the next path forward when presented with options, so thinking and problem solving accompanied the flying and shooting. The "boss" at the end was taken out by shooting him only at certain times, all the while popping free-flying assistants and incoming missiles.
After finding our way through, we explored part of an alien hive. When we were exploring the base, we found a number of humans encased in cocoon-like apertures in the walls, and took the time to chat them up in adventure-game fashion. Of course, since they were trapped in the walls, and we couldn't free them, we could only talk to them--but the game showed its personality here as well in the conversations we had with these NPCs. From there, we encountered some enemies and discovered a third type of gameplay. Anyone familiar with Final Fantasy or Chrono Cross will know the drill here; players and enemies have reflexes and attack speeds, and can only act when it's their turn. Your party members will have access to what Hall called bouga, roughly defined as their ability to focus and find the "sweet spot" when they attack. The higher the meter, the more options they'll have and the more powerful the attack. Sly had our favorite attack--when his bouga meter reached full, he had a Cap attack option. Think "sniper rifle meets quad damage," complete with a bullet cam. Other types of special attacks included a Plasma Wall (area damage on all enemies) and Grumpos' Yammer attack--which has the most hilarious effect we've seen in a while. In one other type of minigame we saw, one of the characters had to hack into an alien computer; to do so, the player had to solve a straightforward symbol-based logic puzzle.
One aspect of the combat that impressed us was the camera work and the wide variety of spell effects. For the graphical part of the equation, it's clear that the Anachronox artists have been hard at work making them visually striking, distinctive, and appropriate. The camera work has been done extremely well; even though it may move around more than console RPGers might be used to, it does lend a certain dynamism to the action. Hall indicated that the final game will have around 100 levels, with 30 to 40 hours of gameplay, and if what we've seen is any indication, that's probably a low estimate[/BLOCK]
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