While the team are beavering away on the
campaign we thought we would post a series of regular updates to show
the community what we have been doing over the last 12 months.
Enjoy!
What we have here is a melting pot of Hungarian heritage, Gothic &
Romanesque styles that result in a cohesive and believable steam-punk
universe that the player can immerse themselves in like a warm blanket
on a cold winter nigh
multiple ways to plan your route through the byways of Bridgeport:
In this shot we spent quite a bit of time getting the performance to acceptable
levels without sacrificing artistic vision and intent. Its a mixture
of imposing framework of the city, and dark nooks and crannies.
The city looks alive and believably organic in a pre-contemporary vision.
This is tempered by the need for consistent performance so that even
players with low end hardware will have a rewarding experience.
Other TDM updates:
**********
Community "Beginner" Contest
In a effort to encourage more participation from new mappers (who may have been intimidated by the veteran crew) The Dark Mod community (with help from Taffersparadise.com and TTLG.com ) have organized a contest for "beginners only".
In Remembrance of Him
by RPGista
(UPDATE) The final mission released for the Community Beginner Contest, this mission is a tour de force in artistry for both lighting and architecture. A third mission that defies the concept of a "beginner" and shows unexpected maturity.
Sneak and Destroy
by SeriousToni
Weighing in at over 150MB (!) with custom sounds, models and textures. This is a remarkable "first try" and is already well received by the community regulars.
Rightful Property
by Jysk
While this file is a smaller download, the mission itself is one of the most expansive city maps yet released. Another surprisingly mature (and well received) release from a new TDM mapper!
********************
Halloween Contest Results:
**********************
Amidst the celebration of the TDM v1.07 release and The Crucible of Omens campaign, the results from the Community Halloween Contest were postponed to make room for these important announcements. Here are the (belated) results:
WINNER:
"The Creeps" by Mortem Desino
Rankings:
1) The Creeps (Mortem Desino) 83.98%
2) A Night to Remember (Fieldmedic) 82.95%
3) House in Blackbog Hollow (Stumpy) 75.78%
4) Dragon's Claw (Bikerdude) 70.10%
5) Samhain Night on Bone Hill (Pranqster) 67.70%
***********
House of Theo
Finally, one of the original "Beta Mappers" Theothesnopp returned to The Dark Mod forums and released his first mission "House of Theo" an excellent castle heist.
Doom III engine is not that impressive like it was 10 years ago. But still good luck with your game. I will call it game because it is total conversion. There is a lot examples how company makes total conversation and releases it as a new game for full price.
So good luck again!
Folks are still playing missions for the original Thief games so being "behind the times" is kinda relative to the audience expectations.
That said, the Doom 3 engine is Open Source now so (provided the coding skills) the sky is the limit for what modern features you wish to add.
The TDM team have made some nice (conservative) improvements to the engine in the upcoming version (which is now a consolidated executable), and (hopefully) as future iterations evolve, more engine-side fixes or enhancements will arrive from within or outside the team.
(If anyone has rendering code knowledge and would like to contribute, please stop by the forums and and create a thread in the "I want to Help" section.)
Yeah this mod has gained huge potential... and considering how relevant Thief is to this day I won't be surprised to see great things come from here.