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One thing I forgot to cover in detail in my previous blog entry was regarding how my game fits into the 6m core values of the LEGO company. Once again, this is all just generalisation at this stage, but since it's part of the reason I'm making this game (to make a LEGO game which actually matches all the values), I need to address them in some capacity. The 6 Core Values: Imagination: It's important that kids can have enough freedom to express their ideas and develop their understanding of the world through the power of clever thinking and imagination. In my game, since there's no "action" mechanics that force kids into a fast-paced, deconstructive mindset, I can have the players invest a lot of the game time in their own minds, thinking about the way the world works and possible solutions to the problems they will encounter. The game very much is about asking the player to imagine what happened, and the simulation mode lets players play with their imagination based on what they find. Creativity: While Imagination focuses on the player bringing their unique view of the world to the game, Creativity is more about how the player can express their ideas and make impactful choices. In this game, every choice (such as collection items or playing a chain-of-events in simulator mode) has clear feedback on if it will help, hinder or distract towards your end goal. While there will always be one right/best solution, it's going to be key to still reward the player for any successful progress they did make and inspire them, rather than scold them, into trying out new ideas. The end ranking system will need to take this into account. Fun: LEGO nailed it when they stated that Fun comes through Mastery; that is, we enjoy when we learn and feel the rush of progression and succession. I feel as though the mechanics lend themselves to a very clear teaching experience about consequences and understanding the butterfly effect. With a strong feedback loop in place, players should always feel as though their actions inside the game are getting them somewhere, whether that be closer or further away from discovering what exactly happened at each scene. Learning: While this could practically be the same thing as Fun, I instead wish to treat this more towards the actual tutorial/skill-building process. Not everybody will understand how cars falls apart when hit at certain angles when they first start out, which is why my game will need to incorporate some native, subtle hints within the mechanics and design of each scene. As a simple example, the simple use of lighting and colour can make more important items stand-out, guiding newer players towards the key evidence they may not be aware they need. Caring: This value isn't going to be present so much inside the mechanics of the game itself as just the overall design goals of the game. By listening very carefully to Jon Blow's message about the human condition and the ethics of game design, I will be ensuring that players of this game aren't wasting their time on crap, but will actually have a deep and meaningful game experience with substance to enjoy. Quality: Ultimately, this will be the biggest challenge. By setting minimum technical and design standards and keeping myself hostage to this blog, I can overcome some of the typical problems in keeping consistent, high quality throughout a project, but it's going to take a lot of organisation and effort to really make it sink in, especially if others come on-board for this project. It's all very vague and mysterious at this point, but as I carve a clearer picture of this game in the coming weeks, these values will start to be nailed down to very specific elements of the game design.

So I came across the unused edition of Pepper's House today.... I'm not sure what the deal is, the lighting was better before the island was put in the background, Sorry about this. Alternate color version of shot above can be found here. have some more sub-par screenshots of the place. As a note: I didn't venture far out of the pepper house folder for textures so I got a bit creative on what it would look like, the only one I did was the yellow wall, I'll speak more on the walls in a bit. Ground floor: Alternate wall colour: The alternate wall color came from the fact that it is the color of the walls when you look inside from the outside. As well, on the model itself UV maps didn't originally exist meaning something simpler had to have been there before the wallpaper existed, so I honestly wasn't really sure what to put there prior to mapping, so I chose one of the simplest solutions. Bonus Pic (sorry I didn't get around to HDing it):

Might as well post the skin pack I worked on last month: http://oresome.rockraidersunited.com/download/377 This should help:

woah pepper you're getting awful friendly with me

I think a lot of the problem probably stems less from Tt Games and more from The LEGO Group. Think of it this way; at the beginning you had LEGO Media, that were know were NOTORIOUSLY controlling. The colour selections, the views on violence, the "no turning in Stunt Rally" thing...then you get into some of the online games, which are extremely basic. Some decently challenging ones, but still very "controlled" and locked-down. You can then look at their ever-failing MMOs; LEGO Minifigures Online was nothing more than a game about clicking on everything and hoping that a random generator would favour you, Chima Online was just completely bizarre, and while I don't have any directly experience, it seems like LEGO Universe was gimped by comparison to NetDevil's other MMOs, but not in ways that make complete sense. I get the feeling TLG don't place as much trust or confidence into the video gaming realm as the products, and probably think that kids are incapable of dealing with deeper gameplay than what a linear action game offers. Now it's compounded by years and years of financial success and record-breaking by Tt, and Dimensions is their current cash-cow. Businesses only really play up their values into their products when it makes financial sense to do so. It's easy for marketing teams to write bulls*** that heals over any critique. At the end of the day, LEGO are a business, and the only form of critique they'll truly listen to is one that either threatens their wallet or tickles their interest. I highly doubt my game, if it ever gets finish, will do that, but I'll be damned if I don't give it a shot.

guys come on don't scare the new guy off with all your dank memery

cheers

All he wants is some nice company up in there. Won't you join him?

Wow, reading through all of these really hits home how many of those points the TT Games (with the exception of Worlds) don't follow in the slightest: IMAGINATION: Nope, not in the slightest. As you sorta stated near the beginning, players are forced down a singular path towards the end of the level, and there's pretty much no leeway around that. No interesting ways to approach a situation besides what the devs are telling you to do, and nothing to really broaden your thoughts on the game's world. CREATIVITY: Again, nope. As I said in the previous point, there's no real leeway around the game path already chosen for you by the devs. No, the character customiser doesn't sodding count. FUN: By McJob's definition of feeling that you're actually getting somewhere through mastery... no, not really. Other than the faint feeling of achievement when you 100% a level, you never really feel like you're getting anywhere (which is why the game tries to throw completion percentages at you all the bloody time), especially game mechanic-wise. Chances are you'll be doing exactly the same things near the end of the game that you were at the start, and that gets boring pretty quickly. LEARNING: Definitely, definitely not. Anyone who's ever touched TLMVG knows about how bad it dealt with teaching mechanics (it spent so much time barking orders at me that I thought I was in the army for a sec), and although the more recent games have tried to reduce this it's still present in a lotta places. CARING: From a gameplay point of view, there really isn't that much care in-between titles. Strip away everything and all you have is a barebones set of mechanics strapped together to make a very samey game. However, literally every other area of TT shows tons and TONS of care, and it really comes across in the final product. Cutscenes? Still the greatest bit out of all the Lego games. Character dialogue? Apart from a few exceptions (TLMVG, looking at you), well-written and occasionally really bloody entertaining. Obscure references? Always the best. So yeah, everyone expect the gameplay guys are fuelling these games with pure love. QUALITY: Definitely the one thing that TT is best at. Although I have many, many issues with the TT games, bad performance and crashing isn't one of them. In summary, the TT games are like the videogame equivalent of a dumb action film: although they may not win awards for being the smartest or most revolutionary things out there, if you turn your brain off after a long day at work and switch one of 'em on, you'll be able to enjoy the dumb fun that they can provide if you don't think about them for too long. From a gameplay analysis point of view they're rubbish, but from a 'dumb fun' point of view they're inoffensive, occasionally neat and qualifies as entertainment... unless you think about it too much. Thoughts?

wow so I've been here three years huh Exactly one year ago I told you all how I ended up here in the first place, but this year... I haven't really got much to say actually. We've had some good times and some bad times in the last year, but the one thing that definitely hasn't changed is my relationship with this forum and how much I love it so. Everyone here is nice and for once on the internet it feels like I belong somewhere, and that sense of belonging is hella neat. Even through the spambots and the forum downtimes and the jhucycle incidents, we've always managed to stay together and that's super-neato. Td;lr, you people are great and I like you. But for this particular post, I'm not exactly sure what to say that hasn't been said before. It's really difficult to say unique things innit? As for how my life's been going since the last time I did one of these yearly blogposts, I'm... doing pretty well, actually. The minifigure photography I've been posting on Flickr is getting a ton o' views, that worst of lego ideas blog is starting to get some traction (posted an undertale project, got over 20 notes overnight), I got a PS4 (look ma, I'm up-to-date with technology now!), I've finished with Sixth Form and I've been offered a conditional offer for a media course at a nearby college. Life's not too bad at the mo. Sure I'm not the richest bloke in the world, but I'm happy and that's what counts. I'm a teensy bit miffed at the death of Bonkles, but I'm not letting that bother me too much ( I did buy myself a Protector of Ice though, and I love 'im to bits awwwww he's so cute). And the future? Well, I'll get to that when I get to that. Here's to that future though, and to many more years on this highly-obscure vintage lego games forum which I love so much. Here's to it I guess. -Ayliffe

I'd like to propose a toast to this wonderful occasion... *stuffs bread into the toaster* ...in all seriousness, it is a great thing that you have been around all these years. One less member account ontop of the mountain of dead member accou-- [POSITIVE THINGS]. If you ever leave, we'll miss you, but we hope you'll be back a while after. As a community, we (maybe-not-all-the-time) care for each other and-- [TOUCHY FEELY STUFF]. Cheers! --Ben24x7--

i'm a jhu alt I'm glad you enjoy the forum. I enjoy your news posts, and your sense of humour, and I know Quis will be gladdened if I tell him I learnt about Ashens off you. A forum's only as good as the people in it *raises glass to toast* *smashes glass because me + wineglass = a large increase in entropy and Mad Pain Points*

Dude, you are getting me all up in my feels.

All aboard the feels train.

A while back I came across this: This is from somebody did art stuff for LEGO Battles and the sequel LEGO Battles: Ninjago. About 22 seconds in you can see a clip of two knights fighting that doesn't seem to belong to either game - it's not Ninjago, but the art's definitely ahead of that in the original LEGO Battles. So I emailed him a while back and asked him about it. Turns out it was actually an art test for a LEGO Battles 2 before it became mostly Ninjago themed. Also, the switch to the isometric perspective was part of the game even in those early LEGO Battles 2 days. Also, LEGO Battles: Ninjago was going to have its cutscenes rendered in a cel shaded style (3D made to look 2D), and while it was cool, it was made to look more like the TV show for consistency. He was also the resident LEGO expert in the dev team, and was glad we'd picked up on all the references to old LEGO stuff. I also showed him Aaronburner05's Gemma mod for LEGO Racers - he liked it, said he loved LEGO Racers. One more thing - we've found more info on that 2009 LEGO Racers game mentioned in the OP since that post was written, you can read about that here if you haven't already:

Nonsense. We use only the freshest malarkey in our memes, and our purveyors are never less than impeccable; s̞̣̝͖̰ụ̘̼̜̟ͅc̶̘̜͚̝̦ͅḩ̺̗̪ ì͇͉̩̮̜̱͚s ̢̣ṱ͙̲̪ẖ̗̲͈e̩͇͉̺̮̣ͅi̬̳̜̦̣̘͡r̘͙̙ ҉̗̜̮d͖̯̘ȩv̯͖̜̥͙̲o̳̳̳͙ti̯̣̯̝͚͕̥͠o̯̙̦͈͕̳ͅṋ̷̞ .̞͍͈̹̳̖ And we have PUPPIES!

"Oh no." OOoohh yes, darling.

This topic has been dead for almost a year - how about I revive it? My sigfig. Since there isn't a generic helmet piece aside from the diver, I wore the fisherman's cap. Unfortunately, I can't give myself a hook hand or epaulets either. I also made a classic pirate skin. Wouldn't you love to see what I had to re-texture? Anyway, I found a new use for my decal remakes!

The body and helmet go over Veronica Voltage, while the pink ponytail replaces the default white one. http://oresome.rockraidersunited.com/download/342