Iron Curtain

[Archangel]

Name: Archangel

Age: 26

Direction: This is something of an old book brought back off my dusty shelves, an idea I wanted to explore in high school but was lost through the serendipity of adulthood. What better time than now to bring about old fantasies?

The campaign will span roughly 7 or 8 Terran missions, utilizing multiple objectives, mini games and some good ol’ fashioned army building. Though I have to be honest, ultimately I have no idea how I’m going to pull this off. I just know how it begins, how it gets interesting, and how it ends.

It won’t be hard, so much as fun. You CAN lose, but the objective is to give the player an enjoyable ride through the lives of a centralized cast of characters, allowing them to connect through their journey, laugh with them and cry with them, and occasionally – kick some badguy ass. All the while NOT taxing the player with a strenuous time-eating monstrosity. Get in. Have fun. Get out.

Plot and Stuff: The story begins after the massacre of the UED fleet and follows a lone, surviving Battlecruiser and its distraught-but-stalwart crew trying to get back, to a home too far away, from a cause so lost their admiral ate his own bullet, to an Earth so oblivious “the Yuks wouldn’t waste an empty bottle of Vodka on an S.O.S..”

The Slavic-borne Iron Curtain faces troubles inside and out as, from the outset, a mutiny breaks loose and a security chief, believed to have gone post-trauma, overthrows the captain and his loyal officers.

Other complications include pursuing forces, technical breakdowns and an all-around strange vibe from a crew with little to go on besides the hope and dedication their Captain commands.

Summary: Iron Curtain aims to be fresh and fun, with a hearty mix of story and adventure. Characters will be introduced to fervent commandos, bravado captains, calculating villains, and a snarky battleship AI babe, N.A.T.A.S.H.A.

Cherry-topping the campaign includes subtle, cultural and geopolitical commentary blended with (my personal favorite) classic hokey sci-fi clichés and stereotypes. Did I mention a full Voice Over produced in-house by yours truly? Oh, and I’ll probably make an mpq to run the whole beast, just to handle the little nuances like profile portraits and unit responses.

Updates: I am publishing this while actively working on Sandrima and other film-related projects, so already I am at a severe disadvantage for updates. Presently I’m shooting pick-ups in Tampa (we even built a whole new set! Psssst! It’s the inside of a hover tank) so I was even late on posting this. But I will update as I see fit to release, and that probably means never.

Hahah! Nah, I’ll put something up in this thread here when I have something pretty to show you or if you have any questions.

Assistance: Right now I’m looking for play-testers (if that’s allowed). Anyone willing to run a trial of a mission or two would be great. I’m also looking for people willing to do minor unit/building modeling for some of my aesthetics, one-two frames, nothing big, as well as anyone interested in building the MPQ since I’m really friggin’ lazy. Of course I’ll split the winnings with you. So, like, yeah. If you like what you see, shoot me a message and climb aboard!

[Maglok]

You are voicing it all? And there is a N.A.T.A.S.H.A? This I gotta hear. Sounds promising.

[Archangel]

Har har har. I have female voice actresses as well, now. I'm a big, important person, you know!

Now where's that van full of security-hacking shades-wearing cigarette-smoking zerglings I miss so very much?

[Sodon]

I'm already intrigued.

[Campaign Creations]

Approved.

[Lavarinth]

Now where's that van full of security-hacking shades-wearing cigarette-smoking zerglings I miss so very much?

They're coming.

[Marco]

Good luck Archangel.  Your approach on the story certainly seems solid - you seem to have - on paper anyway - a lot of solid concepts which have potential.  I certainly hope your execution is equally solid.  One of the main things that has plagued me when writing my newest creations (for this contest and for SC2) is that you always have to have long moments of gameplay.  The story is always going to fluctuate toward some new problem which will usually require violence to solve.  It's somewhat constricting at times having to always think about game play. 

I'd love to write a few long episodes where there isn't any action at all.  I didn't work up the courage to do it for the initial slew of episodes I'm going to be releasing for my SC2 campaign, but I may try my hand at it depending on how well the in-game engine can handle this.  Watching one long cutscene, like 20 minute long, without any action whatsoever, wouldn't be very exciting in StarCraft.  I certainly hope SC2 proves to be as cinematically interactive as it appears.

Sorry, got off topic a bit, just ranting.  Good luck.

[Maglok]

Don't worry AA, I already wrote them in.

[Lavarinth]

Good luck Archangel.  Your approach on the story certainly seems solid - you seem to have - on paper anyway - a lot of solid concepts which have potential.  I certainly hope your execution is equally solid.  One of the main things that has plagued me when writing my newest creations (for this contest and for SC2) is that you always have to have long moments of gameplay.  The story is always going to fluctuate toward some new problem which will usually require violence to solve.  It's somewhat constricting at times having to always think about game play. 

I'd love to write a few long episodes where there isn't any action at all.  I didn't work up the courage to do it for the initial slew of episodes I'm going to be releasing for my SC2 campaign, but I may try my hand at it depending on how well the in-game engine can handle this.  Watching one long cutscene, like 20 minute long, without any action whatsoever, wouldn't be very exciting in StarCraft.  I certainly hope SC2 proves to be as cinematically interactive as it appears.

Sorry, got off topic a bit, just ranting.  Good luck.

Metal Gear Solid 4. Great reviews, at times over an hour's with of cutscenes.

Simply a great story, and great gameplay made it receive great reviews.

[Archangel]

I'd love to write a few long episodes where there isn't any action at all.  I didn't work up the courage to do it for the initial slew of episodes I'm going to be releasing for my SC2 campaign, but I may try my hand at it depending on how well the in-game engine can handle this.  Watching one long cutscene, like 20 minute long, without any action whatsoever, wouldn't be very exciting in StarCraft.  I certainly hope SC2 proves to be as cinematically interactive as it appears.

Most of the longer cutscenes actually occur in the Mission Briefings and the player may skip them entirely and still know what's going on in the game. It's an experiment I'm trying out, we'll see if it works.

You know, Des, I seem to remember a wonderful little sequence you did, I think at the end of the Fenix with the dramatic music scoring an emotional murder of a character and it was pretty long to build up I enjoyed it so much it got me into the whole cut-scene business to begin with.

So, really Desler, THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT.

[Marco]

I'd love to write a few long episodes where there isn't any action at all.  I didn't work up the courage to do it for the initial slew of episodes I'm going to be releasing for my SC2 campaign, but I may try my hand at it depending on how well the in-game engine can handle this.  Watching one long cutscene, like 20 minute long, without any action whatsoever, wouldn't be very exciting in StarCraft.  I certainly hope SC2 proves to be as cinematically interactive as it appears.

Most of the longer cutscenes actually occur in the Mission Briefings and the player may skip them entirely and still know what's going on in the game. It's an experiment I'm trying out, we'll see if it works.

You know, Des, I seem to remember a wonderful little sequence you did, I think at the end of the Fenix with the dramatic music scoring an emotional murder of a character and it was pretty long to build up I enjoyed it so much it got me into the whole cut-scene business to begin with. 
So, really Desler, THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT.

Be careful Archangel, there are hard limits in the mission briefings, I think anyway.  You run out of space eventually, and I'm uncertain if it can easily be circumvented or not.  The Oracle was really upset one day when he ran into the many hard limits of StarCraft while working on his Fallen Angel campaign.  It's probably safe to say that he had to cut a lot out to cram everything into those 4 little missions.

That cutscene...  well I guess it was okay in its day.  But really, it was just kind of a reused concept.  Looking back, there wasn't anything really innovating, and the death wasn't really tragic or anything, I really hated Devreaux.  Although all my characters from 'The Fenix' probably all acted alike.  I guess at the time, there weren't a lot of cutscenes back then.  But since that time, many people have done many things.  I personally like the ending to Fall from Grace over that in terms of emotional impact, if it happened to make any.

[Archangel]

Don't be hard on yourself. You can't look back at something that was good for its time and rag on it now because it's well below par on anything current. That's not constructive and it doesn't give credit to the whole concept behind progress. You have to start from somewhere and you've always been a great innovator in the realm of campaign creating. Heck, this was your site once upon a time, right? Or maybe I'm smoking crack. In which case, don't do drugs.

I'll show you the first mission briefing so you get an idea of what I'm talking about. Later

[Lavarinth]

I remember Desler once saying something about cutscenes being a pain to do back in the old days since there was move order command, only a move command, which teleported the unit to a location. So you had to teleport the unit in a "walking" direction.

[Dem0nS1ayer]

Oh my god, that's so ghetto!

[Archangel]

OK folks, it's time for a little UPDATE TIME! Yaaaay!

First mission's done. Mapping, triggers, voices, scoring, the whole nine widths. I uploaded some photos of in game excitement, so let's have a looksee.

First, some intellectual dialogue and compelling visuals!

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen00.jpg[/imgwh]
Hah! I kid, I kid. OK, So here's the compelling visuals:

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen01.jpg[/imgwh]
Hah! I kid some more! OK, ok ok ok ok...

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen02.jpg[/imgwh]
Yay! MISSION OBJECTIVES! Hurray! Wait, why does the SCV have to survive? They never survive. Not even ever.

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen04.jpg[/imgwh]
A group of mean mutineers are getting ready to have their way with a couple of damsels. Luckily, the captain has arrived! And always ready is he with the witty retorts!

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen05.jpg[/imgwh]
Oh, captain Dominic. Everything is a game to you, isn't it.

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen07.jpg[/imgwh]
After freeing a couple of prisoners, Dominic thinks all he needs to give these guys is a gun and a helmet and a fresh pair of socks and they'll just up and join his posse...You know, Dom, charisma isn't everything.

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen08.jpg[/imgwh]
Oooooooo THAT'S why the SCV has to stick around...

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen09.jpg[/imgwh]
Well hot damn, I guess charisma is everything.

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen10.jpg[/imgwh]
Natasha being all welcomey and such.

[imgwh 640x480]http://archangel.rooms.cwal.net/SCcontest/screen11.jpg[/imgwh]
Captain Dom being all descriptivey...and...such.

That's all for now folks. Gonna try and get a video up in the next couple of days or so. Ciao!