KickStarter Underworld Ascendant is a disaster

[Zep Zepo]

Quit equating Warren Spector to UUW 1 or 2 and System Shock.

He was nothing but an enforcer for EA at the time.

Honestly, nothing twists my titty nips like you guys not knowing your gaming history.

Zep--

 

[Gord]

I guess go back and look at the original KS and ask yourself if that all sounds realistic (especially the release date; Nov 2016).

The real question is, why did I back something that was basically a bunch of crazy promises? I guess I just really wanted a new Underworld game.

Anyone following pre-release dev chatter knows not to heed the overpromising too much. I was pretty certain that we wouldn't see half the stuff they kept talking about. But given the team, the chance to see a proper UU successor seemed tangible enough to back it. It was a gamble, we lost. Such is life.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

I undersrand Otherside owns the source to the originals. Releasing it would be the best recompense they could give to their fans and the now confirmed, utterly lost LGS legacy.

 

[Curratum]

I could really use an UU 1/2 sourceport...

 

[Glic2000]

I guess go back and look at the original KS and ask yourself if that all sounds realistic (especially the release date; Nov 2016).

The real question is, why did I back something that was basically a bunch of crazy promises? I guess I just really wanted a new Underworld game.

Anyone following pre-release dev chatter knows not to heed the overpromising too much. I was pretty certain that we wouldn't see half the stuff they kept talking about. But given the team, the chance to see a proper UU successor seemed tangible enough to back it. It was a gamble, we lost. Such is life.

Definitely. I guess I thought they would piss around with their "innovative" new ideas for a while and then just dial it back to basically do a re-make of the original game. But instead they stuck with their stupid new ideas and made something much worse than the original game.

 

[BEvers]

 

[Atlantico]

Release it from its mortal coil

 

[BEvers]

 

[Max Heap]

Jesus christ, you can see the sheer despair in their eyes and hear the sadness in their voices.
This isn't even funny anymore.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

 

[BEvers]

 

[Old Hans]

So what happened to this game? I thought it had the original UU devs, Warren Spector, a successful kickstarter, etc.? The usual over-promise and under-deliver?

When they kept talking about all the physics and complex Eco systems, I knew everyone was in big trouble. The danger signs were all there early on. Their heads were so far up their own asses with the eco system shit

 

[Nyast]

I have the feeling that a lot of this is down to the decision to go with "fancy" graphics.
If they had settled for lesser details, more abstraction, etc - a style more similar to earlier 3D games - they would have been able to get a lot more done.

We really need more games that use simpler graphics, to have more free resources for actually important content.
After all, that's how game devs did it before.
Oh, well...

If I had to pinpoint the one big mistake they made with UA, I think it was the decision to try and make everything physics-based. That's why the game feels so clunky and janky and it seemed to take up most of their development time early on.

For example, they had these bulbs you could throw and they acted like an adhesive to stick objects together. The devs were VERY proud of those stupid sticky bulbs, and I don't think they even made it into the final game. Probably because they were pretty useless and just caused a bunch of technical issues.

Pretty sure they're still here. The sticking tree fruits, right ? I have a bunch in my inventory. Never used them. Never seen anybody else use them.

 

[Latelistener]

Reading the comments it actually start to be interesting... if you are interested in surrealism. It is the first immersive surrealism sim.

The whole situation is surrealistic. They're releasing version 0.3 after 4+ years of development, claiming that it wasn't inspired by UU (and they don't even know how's that even happened that you expected a UU successor) and acting like nothing happened.

Was there even a roadmap? Or their plan was simply to toying with Unity and physics for 4 years straight and then release what they managed to make? Where was the project director? The studio head?

 

[Zep Zepo]

So, I just read (over on Steam , I think), that the "Powered By Unity" thing is the first thing you see when you start the game.

So, they didn't even buy a Unity license? The "Powered By Unity" at start thing indicates they used the free version (I believe).

I could be wrong, but I don't care.

I continue to get my LOLs.

Zep--

 

[Viata]

So, they didn't even buy a Unity license? The "Powered By Unity" at start thing indicates they used the free version (I believe).

They could remove it if they bought a license, but perhaps not even that they knew how to do it.

 

[Curratum]

You're not wrong. Powered by Unity logos show up on unpaid licenses of the engine.

 

[Viata]

Powered by Unity logos show up on unpaid licenses of the engine

It also shows up on paid licenses, it just that people have the option to remove it in this case.

 

[Curratum]

This is just the best. One of their biggest lapdog fanboys re-registered on the official forums to post some very mild criticism and mostly to beg them to fix the game, maybe, pretty please, and the entire dev team is taking turns thanking him personally for it and having a bit of an idle chat with him.

 

[Zep Zepo]

I have a full pro license for Unity (4 or 5?). I don't recall how I got it, but I didn't have to pay for it, I know that. I messed around with it for about a year on and off.

Don't recall ever seeing the powered by unity thing, and I made stand alone and web apps to test shit.

I also don't remember if there was a toggle to turn that message off in a pro version, I guess it's possible, but I don't recall ever doing that.

The only "Unity" thing I ever remember seeing was on my web apps while they were loading the files and whatnot, and then I think it was only a Unity logo like the stylized "U" or whatever it was they used.

Zep--

 

[Nyast]

Yeah, they're using the free version of Unity.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

Irrelevant. They mentioned working with Unity on various elementas of the engine. They may have had agreement to leave the logo in.

 

[Zep Zepo]

Irrelevant

Except that it's not irrelevant. It goes to show how much faith they had in what they were doing.

Buy a full license with Unity support and less commissions to pay, or use the free shit for the % of profit off the sales scheme Unity has.

Zep--

 

[Zep Zepo]

And I think programmer boy mentioned surfing Unity boards for answers, not getting support directly from Unity itself.

Zep--

 

[Zep Zepo]

I have a full pro license for Unity (4 or 5?). I don't recall how I got it, but I didn't have to pay for it, I know that.

Oh, and my license is legit. I didn't mean I pirated it. Just can't remember why they offered it to me for free.

Zep--