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[1:10:53 PM] Will: so I built Arno from Assassin's Creed Unity [1:13:14 PM | Edited 1:13:33 PM] Hugh Wotmeigh: If you finish it, I'll send it to my boss [1:13:23 PM] Will: what are you talking about [1:13:27 PM] Will: that is finished [1:13:35 PM] Hugh Wotmeigh: OH YOU MOTHER f****ER

Uh I guess I should introduce myself after being a lurker here for some time. Finally thought I should create an account. This forum has helped me get a lot of old Lego games working and I can't thank everyone who has contributed patches and launchers enough. Anyway, thank you all and I hope I get to know you all a bit more!

High Level Overview Welcome! Over the coming months in my spare time, I will be developing a new LEGO fan-game called LEGO Investigations. Before I can build the full title, I need to make a vertical slice that demonstrates the full thing is feasible and will be worth the effort it will take. In this High Level Overview, I will be going over some generalities. In my next blog, I will upload a golden path chart, beat sheet, level design plan as well as an asset list and potentially a script sample, which should give more specific detail into how the Vertical Slice will work. Section 1: The Jist What is this game? LEGO Investigations is a first-person adventure game where players are a detective and must investigate accidents and emergencies to determine what has occurred. Made in Unity for the PC, this game focuses on the player narrative rather than the story, and makes use of interesting mechanics such as simulation and seeking. Why is anybody going to care? The big goal for this project is to be a successful LEGO fan-game, and to do this there will be intense focus on meeting the core LEGO brand values, including imagination, creativity, fun, learning, caring and quality. The game will use LEGO in a way that makes it core to the mechanics, and will give the players a chance to try new and rewarding gameplay that tests a player on their logical reasoning. Who is the game for? LEGO Investigations is primarily for boys and girls between the ages of 12 - 24. This game is very specifically aiming towards fans of the LEGO brand, especially its video gaming merchandise. This game will favour more inquisitive, logical and careful players rather than fast-paced action-orientated players. There is no client for this game, and the game will not be sold for profit (per licensing reasons). Section 2a: The Vertical Slice - Summary Title LEGO Investigations: The First Case Genre First-Person, Adventure Platforms Windows PC via Unity3D 5.1.4 The Big Idea It's your first day on the job, and you've been called to the scene of a major accident; a double-decker bus has come off the road and crashed into a local shop, leaving dozens hurt or disassembled. While the ambulance crews scurry to help the injured, you'll need to figure out who the correct culprit was; mechanical failure, driver error, weather or foul play? Don't mess this up; the Government is already under suspicion of muddling the truth of its investigations, and another wrong case could put us in the pits! Play Mechanic As a highly trained detective, you have the uncanny ability to sniff out relevant parts and people to the investigation. Combine that with a brilliant mind which can simulate all kinds of possible scenarios that involve the evidence you locate and a knack for conversing and getting the truth out of potential suspect, and then it only becomes a matter of correctly piecing together the chain of events in the right order. License The First Case is a standalone level which will not be a part of the final product, should plans go ahead to turn this vertical slice into a full game. It will represent the majority of the mechanics of the full game and give a fairly accurate view of the game experience. The average playtime should be in the ball-park of 10 minutes to 2 hours, depending on how many events and how many pieces are in the final build and how good the player is. Since the LEGO Brick/Brand is owned by The LEGO Group, the results of this project cannot be sold for profit. Target Audience The First Case is intended to generate some kind of reaction that can be used to gauge if pursuing the full product is a good idea; it must, therefore, be enticing to journalists and YouTube Let's Players, as well as figureheads in the AFOL community, as opposed to the final product which would be directed more towards the children. The development of this project should be public, and therefore needs to be fairly flexible to allow for constructive criticism to guide how the product turns out. Section 2b: The Vertical Slice - Mechanics Seeking One of the most core aspects of the game is the ability to find relevant evidence to the case. The evidence the player needs can be scattered all over the level, and so it will take an inquisitive eye to find whichever pieces are most important to solving the mystery. Not even piece will help, and some may even be red herrings... Movement Mechanics: The first-person player can move forward, backward, left and right (strafing). The levels are not designed to require jumping or crouching, but may require the player to look up or down. LEGO/Item Collection: Items that can be interacted with are made of LEGO. Items that shine can be collected as "potential evidence" and are what the player needs to focus on. Collected items go into the player's backpack and will determine what events they can use during Simulation/Piecing. All evidence will leave notes and clues inside the player's notebook. Detail Investigation: In some instances, the player can "zoom-in" on certain parts of the world; for example, the player can get a view up-close of a desk and everything on the desk to see if there might be something useful there. Red Herrings: Many items in the world will outright be used to confuse or distract the player. Some items are from the investigation but did not play an active role in what happened, while other items may have been left-overs from the past before the accident. The player must simulate or collect additional evidence to determine if items had any relevance to the scene. Item Cancelling: Collecting some items may ultimately cancel out the existence of others (collecting a photo of a character without a moustache may mean they never had need for a moustache brush). This will help eliminate possible events for Simulation/Piecing, and cross off irrelevant/confusing notes inside the notebook. Dialogue It's important to listen to key witnesses and suspects when trying to evaluate what happened. While not everything they say will be true (by accident or intentionally), some evidence can be very helpful or even crucial to figuring out what happened. The key to the dialogue system is to try and get information, and that sometimes means challenging the character on what they've said. Conversation Options: When you initiate a dialogue with a character, you will have a Mass-Effect-style wheel of conversation topics to choose from. The main character's dialogue is never explicitly read out; you only witness the other character's side of the conversation. The conversation options on the left side are used to challenge what the character just said or their appearance/way of talking (when appropriate), while the right side allows you to ask more questions. The bottom allows you to leave the conversation at any point (you will resume from the same place when you return). Intelligence: If you have learned evidence from the items you've collected/investigated or from other characters which conflicts with what the person you're talking to has said, appropriate dialogue options to call out/challenge the character with your evidence will be highlighted, and will allow you to get more accurate information. This can be disabled in the menu to increase game difficulty. Notes: Any information you discover will be added to the notepad, and if that information is contradicted by correct information it will be crossed off. Simulation A fast player may wish to simply rush through; collect the minimum-necessary evidence and submit their findings. In order to get an accurate sequence of events and rank high, a smart player will want to make use of the simulation system which allows them to mix-and-match possible events in a chosen order to see if everything leads to how the crime scene looks when you arrive. Event Collection: An "event" is a thumbnail that sits in your backpack and represents a small snippet of time, usually a couple seconds, where a key part of the story happened (such as a part coming off a vehicle or a person getting out of a car). In order to use events in the simulation, you must have either collected enough evidence and/or notes for the simulation to appear in the browser. When you collect a piece of evidence, any events that require that evidence to be shown will be unhidden but locked; collecting all the required evidence items/notes will unlock the event for use. If you've unlocked evidence that makes an event contradictory, it will be locked and crossed-off. Notepad: The notepad can be accessed inside the simulator, and allows you to go over information you've collected. Not all note-evidence can be used to unlock events; some of the notes you collect will be general knowledge for your benefit (such as the speed of bullet in the air or how glass shatters when it breaks in different ways). These notes are in a separate section of the notepad, and should be used to compare similar events to see which one is more plausible. Event Chains: In order to use the Simulation aspect, the player must drag and drop events into a timeline. The start and end events are already given to the player, and the exact amount of "slots" will always be given, so the player knows exactly how many events took place. Each event has "handles" (different coloured/shaped edges on the left and right sides of the thumbnail); you can only put the correct-shapes and colours together in the chain. This prevents the player creating an order of events that is completely incompatible. Event Simulation: The real meat of the Simulator is to put events in a chain and see how they work together. Once the player has dragged and dropped events into the chain they can then begin "Simulator Mode". In Simulator Mode, the player becomes a flying camera which can watch, pause, play, fast-forward or reverse the events. Simulator Mode takes place inside the same scene as where the detective is, but anything that is changed from the scene will be a transparent "ghost", which allows the player to determine if elements ended up in the correct positions in their sequence of events. Piecing The ultimate goal of each scenario is to correctly identify what has happened. When you choose to finish your investigation, you must present your findings, and then you will be ranked on how close your were. Level End: You can choose to finish the level at any point by talking to the Boss. Doing so will bring you to a screen where you can input your findings, or back-out if you don't feel you have enough correct information. Notes: You can bring up your notebook or your bag of evidence at any point in this screen if you need to double-check what you have. Event Ordering: The first piece of info you will need to add is the correct order of events. This is exactly the same as the Simulator Mode, except you cannot simulate the events from this part of the game; this is to prevent players trying to rush through and dump evidence in that "looks" correct. Questions: After that, you will then need to provide answers to ~5 questions about the scene, including who/what was most guilty and some of the things that happened. For each "question", there will be a blank spot with a drop-down selection that will allow you to pick out an applicable item/note that correctly fills out the sentence. Submission: When you are confident you got everything right, you will be asked one final time if you're ready to submit; you will then be shown the sequence of events you chose in a cinematic order, and brought to a ranking page. The chain-of-events counts for 50% of the mark, and the 5 questions are each worth 10%. If the player does not get 100%, they will be shown some hints to consider for the next time if they want to replay the level. 50% is the minimum requirement for completion. Considerations These are miscellaneous mechanics that may not be applicable to the vertical slice, but could improve the experience. Randomisation: The correct chain-of-events and the position of elements in the world could be randomised on each play-through. Episodes: As well as having individual, "one-off" cases, it might also be good to have linked-sets of cases called "Episodes" where the player is trying to solve a big mystery by visiting different crime scenes. Timed/Speed-Run Mode: A mode that tests how fast you can collect the evidence and solve the case. Collectibles/100%: Getting the perfect ranking in each level (as well as the timed run) should give the player some unique items/abilities/additional cases. It might also be good to let players collect special items in the game world. Rewards could also include things like story/audio logs. Hub World: To launch different cases, rather than use a menu, the player should be inside a hub world (like the Tt Games) where they can launch each case. If the player completes all the cases, they can then complete a special case in the hub world itself. Hint System: It might be handy for less-experience players to have some kind of light hint system that guides them in the right direction, but does not solve the puzzles for them.

mistakes were made:

[12:41:53 AM] Terrev: reminder that wes jenkins, designer dude behind lego island, joined rru and said he was "too f****ing techno-amish" to figure out how to use it [12:42:37 AM] Hugh Wotmeigh: At least he and his team were more techno-competent than the team who made the sequel

This topic should be renamed to "RIP BIONICLE RETURNING 2015-2016" now.

i'm glad dash finally closed his mouth, all that grinding was bad for his teeth.

http://www.lego.com/en-us/bionicle/newsboard Official announcement. No Makuta set or Mask of Ultimate Power! Too bad. I have a lot of thoughts in my head, so I'm gonna try writing them down. I've had my qualms with Journey to One. Goodness knows I have - I'm sure most of you reading this know that well enough. Coming into these new episodes, though, I kind of knew what to expect as far as production value went. I think that went a long way to making the whole thing a less disappointing experience. And even though, if I cared to dig, I'm sure I could find just as many issues with the script this time around. And the animation, and the staging, and the shot-to-shot pacing, what absolutely overwhelmed me by the end was how much they just wanted to give Bionicle a good sendoff. My idea of a sendoff probably would have been different. But what they did is, on an elemental level, so much more Bionicle than anything past 2005 ever was, up to and including G1's conclusion. They did the thing! The thing the Toa always did where they all shot their power at once to trap Makuta (and the Bahrag that one time). Let me tell you a secret: planet-sized robots fighting is okay, but it's not very Bionicle. This was, after a fashion. And they didn't hold back on the parallels to the original films, either. The Shadow Realm Makuta is trapped in is represented by a rock that looks just like the shard Roodaka claws from Makuta's rock prision in Web of Shadows. It even has a propensity for shooting out a shadowy hand to suck people in with - just like old Makuta did (he used the ability through the rock in Web of Shadows, but I couldn't get a screenshot that shows it well). Visually, the Toa sealing Makuta back away is just like Legends of Metru Nui, too. And in both productions, the shot is closely followed by the Toa's spirits in the stars (literally, and metaphorically). And then we end on "For that is the Legend of BIONICLE," which doesn't only carry on the tradition of how the original films concluded, but actually acknowledges the original in-universe meaning of "Bionicle" - the legend of the Toa who will arrive to save the island. That's something that hasn't been touched since 2001. It's not perfect. But goddamn, they really gave it their all, and I can't help but really, deeply admire that. As far as ways to say goodbye to Bionicle go, its a hell of a lot better than any other option that's come up since Mask of Light. And I think I'm okay with leaving it at that. Goodbye again, Bionicle. And thanks for everything.

The rock that's upside down there actually spins around. Yeah. I dunno what's up with any of this.

Why hello there, welcome to the members side of things! We hope you enjoy your stay and will stick around a while.

Hai, and welcome to RRU! And remember to not be a idiot to the Rock Monsters, believe me, that wasn't funny. Anyways, enjoy your stay!

Bionicle is dead. Long live hordes of fanfiction.

I came back to pay my respects. Oh G2, I hardly knew ye.

The goal of the Vertical Slice and this blog will to be prove that I'm actually working on the project so when I ask for help, I can show them that I do mean business. So, for the first part I'll work solo, but eventually I'll need to bring in reinforcements, especially for the art stuff.

Just when I thought there was no easy solution to the problem of lack of variety in Minecraft player minifigs... huh. Neat, but I would have never seen this coming.

It seems the prophecies have changed. Shame about that. My feelings are well and truly mixed. I am by turns darkly amused, morbidly curious, sad, and rather relieved. Let's start with that ending. Hmmm.... Not my piece of cake. I had already given up on Journey to One being even passable fare, so I only watched the finale to see what all the fuss was about, but still, it's hilariously rushed. "Makuta is coming through the Black Gate Shadow Portal. It's a good thing that we're actually stars! All we need is to believe in ourselves! Bye-bye!" I am genuinely curious as to how much of this they planned from the start. It looks to me like they made it up on the spot, but I know from experience that this is a tremendously unfair assumption. If nothing else, it does parallel the climax of LoMN. Then there's the loose ends... The Mask of Time's the biggie, but I don't doubt there were many other stillborn concepts. Let's hope they all see the light of day. I'm quite curious as to how Gen2 bombed so badly. Hero Factory sold well enough to run for five years (though it was playing the porter for BIONICLE on both ends, to be fair,) and yet BIONICLE didn't last three. What changed? I almost wonder, absurd as this may sound, if the target audience at large mistook it for a licensed IP, and were turned off by knowing nothing about it. It's a shame it had to end on this note. A death at three years would have been natural. Sure, we'd have been disappointed at not seeing the Once and Future Theme return to take its rightful place in the Immortal Pantheon of Break Out Themes (for now occupied only by magical assassins with a penchant for outrageous vehicles,) but hey, there's no shame in doing well enough. It's also rather sad, IMO, to see the decline in set quality. Winter 2015? Awesome. Summer 2015? Not quite as cool, but still pretty good, not to mention novel and with some fantastic pieces. Winter 2016? Disappointing, overly-greebled Toa (Onua being a major exception,) but at least Umarak and the creatures were lovely. Summer 2016? Blargh, meh, humbug. Winter 2017? Well, hopefully they'll have learned from the reaction to the 2015 sets and they'll make a- Oh. But in a strange way, it's a relief to know that Gen2 is dead. Gone is the oppressive uncertainty and fear born of hearing whispered reports of the theme's ill-health. It failed, yes, but we are at the wake, and the funeral is not long in coming. It will not bring joy, but it will bring closure, and that can not be undervalued. On the bright side, provided LEGO doesn't decide to jump the in-house contstaction ship all together, Gen2's successor must be more than just a cut-price BIONICLE. Perhaps we'll get something new and wonderful. Perhaps out of this tragedy, much good will come. Regardless, I would like to thank the Gen2 team for their efforts. It's clear they put their hearts and souls into this, and for that I commend them. Thank you all. Thank you for helping to recapture some of the magic of my childhood. Y'all rock! RRU Bonus:

http://bricksfans.com/lego-bionicle-is-set-to-be-discontinued-this-year/ bonkles is dead confirmed confirmed

I had an odd number of tracks. Now I have an even number of tracks. Fortunately, the post editor allows me to shrink images - very good! Boasting two twin lasers and one small artillery cannon, this vehicle can [rest of spouting stuff about it] I had one spare track... and I decided to build around it in the MM colourscheme... and this came out. The cockpit opens and the laser tilts to a maximum of 45o. Vehicle II: I had white skis. I built around them in the MM colourscheme. I thought it looked vaguely like some small, not-very-well-armed scout, so I thought of scout-ish things while building it (which saved me the trouble of scavenging for a decent glass cockpit ) Those blue 1x1 studs are supposed to be lasers, okay? It's rather cramped in there, but he fits. That's the safe at the back for small crystal storage and movement. === A Strange Bit Of Gingerbread === Every year, our family makes gingerbread castles on a rainy-ish day - remember, for us in the Southern Hemisphere it's winter. I couldn't decide what to make and in a spur of either blind stupidity or great ingenuity I made the Mars Mission Defense Station. I think the image speaks for itself there. Full of sugar. That said, building with gingerbread is extremely difficult - high towers are almost impossible. Almost, and I managed to squeeze the turret into a reasonable width by using non-orthodox building conventions (which weren't SNOT ) I traced the outline of the defense station and the pipe, but not the power plant. Partly because I was wondering how to build it. On the left is also our brutally deformed mining platform (see first picture - it's missing the drill). Sugar!

what the f****.

Terrev Today 2:08 PM *squints at chat and throws phone out window of van* Ringtail Today 2:08 PM get out of here while you can

Yeah. What sort of devs would just leave random crap sitting where the player isn't likely to-

There is now no doubt in my mind that LI2 is a lovingly-made, completely finished game, created by absolutely sane, well-adjusted individuals.

Also, there's several places where weird textures are applied to things. Here's a few of them: Another example is the boat in the parachute training minigame, which has a ring UI texture applied, much like in that screenshot from the other parachuting game.

Seriously! No bull! it's the bulls castle

Okay....? The lack of explanation of this scene leaves me with no words. Nick's surprised face as the bot bumps him from behind, Rob's slightly creepy face. Pepper tanning on the crosswalk. Everything.

DO YOU SEE A BOWL OF RIGHT ARROWS HERE CAUSE I SURE DON'T THANKS GAME