Hi to all MB Players,
Well - hard to believe, but it's been 10 years since I issued the first release of MB I!
On the 15th May 2003 I released v1.0 of Movie Battles for Jedi Outcast:
(Lucas Forums archive - original )
It's amazing to see it still going after 10 years...!
Many thanks to all of you who have kept it going after all this time.
I remember first playing Jedi Outcast, and being SO impressed by the single player experience. Engaging, immersive and exciting. I'm pretty sure I played it almost non-stop for several days...
Having loved the first Jedi Knight, I was expecting a lot from this sequel - and the single player game certainly didn't disappoint.
However, the multiplayer mode left me distinctly cold. Especially such after such a fantastic single-player experience. Why was I running around as a stormtrooper with a light saber?! Why was Luke Skywalker strafe-jumping while firing a machine gun?! Why did all the saber battles involve jumping around madly like bunnies?
Around this same time also came Counter Strike - which redefined for me just how immersive an online shooter could be. I was insanely addicted to the game for a long time, and every time I played it I was impressed by almost all the decisions made by the game designers - everything was tweaked and streamlined...
And then the thought fairly quickly came to me... "What would it be like to combine the two? Counter-strike style gameplay in the Star Wars universe?!"
I realised that THAT was the Multi-player experience that I had really expected - and that I wanted...
I hadn't done any modding before, but this was the kick in the arse I needed to get into it.
First of all, I tried to get a fully-fleshed out team together right from the start - before I'd really had a chance to code anything. (Mainly because I assumed this is how any mod team got started...) I'd named the project 'Team Assault' and I did manage to get about 6-7 members 'on the books' for a short while.
But this approach didn't end up working - it's hard to keep everyone motivated when all you have bought to the table (thus far) is a gameplay design document!
...pretty soon that original team disappeared into the ether.
So... I gave up on it for a while. But, still, the idea kept nagging at me. I was convinced it would work really well. For a while, I kept my eye out for any other developers that were maybe thinking along the same lines - maybe I could join their team and help them out instead?
But none emerged...
So eventually, I just decided to see how far I could get on my own. With only code changes...
So I worked on MB I as a solo project for a couple of months. I built the classes around a pre-set model list, including many community-made models that players had to download individually. That way, I managed to (just about) get my first beta version out.
From there, I started to get interest in the mod - and help.
I think the first direct, solid help I got from another modder in the community was BloodRiot - a modeler who had made one of the first sets of mandalorian models. He loved the mod - and we found a way to adjust his models so that the rocket component of the Mand model would disappear when the rocket was fired.
...and then from there, help and support kept flowing in... and now here we are ;)
I want to say a big thanks to the many team leaders and hardworking developers who have sacrificed so much of their time and effort to the game. It has truly surpassed even my most ambitious ideas on how the game would ever have looked like 10 years ago...
I think only a few of us truly understand how much free time can get sucked away moving a project like this forward. My hats off to you all...
And many, many thanks to the many, many players who have continually enjoyed and supported this mod over the years. To all the clans who organise communities and battles. For all the spirited and enthused feedback you leave on the forums. (As frustrating as the negative and non-constructive comments can be, the truth is that many of the best features and changes have been directly shaped by the community.)
I'm still very proud when I (still, now and again) go onto a random server and play the mod a bit.
It's still a game I love to play - the game I wanted to play back then in 2003...
Cheers - and long live MBII ;)
Ren
