Hello everyone,
My name is Talal, I am currently undergoing a masters program in Interactive Application Design in Spain.
For my final year project I am creating an MMO strategy game much like tribalwars or CIV5 (more details in the 2nd part of the thread). I am familiarizing myself with C# in Unity with great success so far and I will be handling most of the coding myself (with some help from the community). My biggest setback so far is learning how to create the MVC for which I am aiming to use Photon, Postgres and Cassandra. I understand the concept of how everything should come together but no idea how to implement it.
Anyway!
What I am looking for is people to help me with my project. Outsourcing is part of the program I am in.
Some would say that since I am just starting out you won't need graphical of audio assets, but if I am aiming to make this game a reality then I need to seduce people with pictures and animations and so on so as to get bigger and better following. I have big plans for this project.
What's in it for you? You get to grow your portfolio, gain experience working on a video game, whether it is creating artistic assets, helping with code. And the best part is that, there are NO STRINGS ATTACHED. You can drop me a half completed project and I would be more than happy for your effort and contribution.
So, what I need is: (more detail later)
- Several 3D character models + Animation (if possible)
- UI Assets: Window based unit, settlement, city and hex detail. Main menu(and subcategories). Overall design. Maybe name suggestions in logo format.
+ Banner art presets.
- Concept art
- Environment models preferably for a proceduraly generated hexagon based map (top down @ 45 degrees [3D imgs])
- Music and sound
- Some C#, CQL/ SQL coding help (Photon + Postgresql + Unity, game balancing, multiplayer networking etc..)
If you are interested in helping out - no string attatched - please read on. Alternatively, you can reach me here
[email protected]The Story, Setting and player role:
The game is an MMO Strategy multiplayer game set in a fictional earth-like world (similar to LOTR and GOT [swords, bows and magic]) where there lives Men, Elves, Spectrals (elite being made of pure life force and believe men should die) who although fewer in numbers rely on necromancy and deception, and Primals (rock and tree constituted beings who have been around since the beginning) who believe balance must be brought to the world both socially and industrially.
All races are locked in a constantly shifting tug of war for dominion over the world.
The players (after picking a side), will take control of a city that they will build up to train units, dragons etc, forming alliances with other players to battle other player formed alliances. Players can conquer other players' cities, engage in diplomacy and also battle NPC creatures, barbarians and mercenaries. PvP, PvE.
Artistic direction:
Starting note: The game will be mainly a bird's eye view of a map (parallax movement) separated with hexagons that restrict (or better define) player unit movement. The game happens in real time (rather than turn based). The elements viewable on the map will be cities, camps, npc characters and players units (commanders/soldiers/dragons)
You can find references for this section here (will be updated constantly): Pinterest
Overall Style:
arthas menethil wallpaper 1920x1
The primary direction I am trying to take here is solid yet open to interpretation.
I want to go for a world of warcraft cinematics art style. Not realistic yet not cartoonish. Character movements are dramatic yet not cliché. Colors are subtly vibrant with a clear contrast in the color palette. (clearly need a set of color palettes system)
Garrosh 610
Armor designs that are taken from historical references, yet not too similar to a point where you can identify it clearly (similar to lotr). Nothing too out of the box sci-fi, nor armor that is 'slim-fit'; they need to look realistic and give some reference or credit to the underlying storyline.
3D character models:
curro rodriguez durnobasic frontvladimir buchyk 0185e1f6df7cf066253c27581d8b31013d
Armor: Armor is Race specific so you can play around with the concept. I'm looking for something that people can relate to so the use of historically accurate armor designs is a good place to start. Nothing too anime or japanese or over the top experimental. Simple, powerful, dramatic and visually pleasing.
Character: character has powerful idle stance, whether standing or kneeling. Holding sword and shield. And he also has to be carrying a banner, whether on his back or in his hand (banner art is player created)
Animation: If you are animating, then they need to have 'walking, attacking, defending with shield, death animation and maybe a salute too'. (similarly to WoW the salute is race based so show me what you can come up with)
Units: Wizard, Diplomat, Merchant, Mercenary, Dragons, NPC creatures
The player will enter a different scene when he goes into his city where he will be able to build and train troops.
NPC creatures and Dragons: you can go all out, as long as the model fits with the overall theme, and color palette I am sold. The final model will be animated so if you want to give it a go, go ahead.
UI - User Interface: (not properly explored yet, on the sidelines for now)
UI: UI has to follow a physical design style similar to that of hearthstone. While hearthstone is themed to be happening within an inn, this game will be happening within an military operations room similar to that within the world of warcraft movie. (I know... Blizzard fanboy alert, but these guys are doing it right!)
Map HUD: Players will be presented with a mini-map of the entire world, quick options and other elements. (this part will be updated soon)
City HUD: Different from the map hud as the player will be given a button that alows him to build or another to train. (this part will be updated soon)
Windows: Unit, cities, buildings and commander stats, upgrades and perks will be placed in card like windows similar to Hearthstone in terms of dimensions and art style (%) and Europa Universalis in terms of information provided relatively to what you are clicking. (this part will be updated soon)
Other elements: Forum, chat, leaderboard(or power). (this part will be updated soon)
Stats of:
Regular unit: Attack (relative to weapon equipped stats, upgradeable + changeable), Defense (armor and shield, upgradeable + changeable), Experience (+experience bar), Stamina (can be increased), Moral (based on situational factors), Rank (ranks up when filling the experience bar), weather resistance.
Commander: His stats are similar to that of regular units only he has an avatar can be seen within the window, the outline of the window similar to hearthstone is relative to how experienced or rare he is. A percentage of his stats are granted as a bonus to the armies he is controlling. Regular units placed under his command are either within the same window or within a tab in the card.
if animating: The cards fly out on click and turns from upside down to face the player.
The player will enter a different scene when he goes into his city where he will be able to build and train troops.
Banner art presets:
Players will be able to customize the banner of their kingdom and units. take references from Diablo 3 and go crazeh. Keep the current storyline in the back of your mind (which is not fully fledged yet) so your take the designs will be really valuable but also subject to feedback and reiteration. This thread contains solid references for art style if you need it. Again, the banners will be carried by units and commanders.
maxresdefault
Concept art:
Draw ANYTHING. Characters, NPCs, Cities, Props, Units, Scenes, Story takes and Unit Types! Show me how you think this game should look like. I want your take on it!
Environment/ Map model(s):
battle for middle earth map
I would like everyone that is willing to help to take a good look at this, the colors and contrast that is happening here are a good example for what I envision the game to look like. Since it will be a top down game.
Art/ design style: This is ALMOST exactly what I want the map environment models but with a bit more elaborate accentuation of colors. Moreover, this reference's zoom level is quite far, i want to put more emphasis on where the player is moving, so if he's in the mountains, his relative size would be as big as the 'O' in GondOr.
Note: The hexagons are not necessarily part of the map itself rather coded over it as part of the game mechanics, so feel free to elaborate. (a decent reference for this is Tribalwars2.com 's map)
Map assets: Mountains, hills, rivers, marshes, planes, valleys, volcanoes etc. Preferably, they would be made in a way that would make them compatible with procedural map generation algorithms.
if animating: Trees moving, wind blowing, smoke rising from the volcano or cities that have been recently attacked.
Music and sound:
Music:
I used to compose music myself using ableton so I have a very good understanding of music albeit unprofessional execution.
For music, I am looking for something that translates the overall mood and feel of the game, and player emotions. What I mean by that is that The underlying player emotion when he is playing the game is nothing that translates into Moonlight Sonata or the theme song from friends. Blizzard has a good grasp of this concept and is quite apparent in all their works, from cinematics to the hearthstone soundtrack; or the WoW starting areas (mystery and exploration).
My take on the mood of our game would be mixture between layed-back and intense, minimalistic war drums, strings, wind instruments etc. Think of a Viking town hall, intermittent shouts, claps, screams(maybe). Here is an interesting reference: Viking clap. I'm interested to see if you can pull something off with modular music design, so the player would be presented with a different music if he is in a battle or just chilling in his city.
Don't want to give you a reference of other artists because I want to stick to an original style.
Sound:
In terms of sound design, again I'm looking for raw sounds and subtle ambient sounds. Wood on wood, wood on metal, metal on metal, tree sounds, wind, smoke, furnaces, creature sounds. Most importantly, war sounds, havoc cries, charge cry, commander screaming his ass off etc. You can get creative with this.
What I am aiming for is having recursive (or loopable) sounds that would keep the game audio full.
There has to be a good balance between highs and lows, the low frequency sounds wont blow up your speakers and the high frequency ones won't tear through your eardrum.
Coding help:
Brothers, any coding help I can get with this game is greatly appreciated. This is where I will be spending the bulk of my time.
If you have experience in Multiplayer networking through Postgres, Cassandra and photon.
If you have strategy game algorithm experience.
If you have game balance experience.
Or a solid general C# coding knowledge; again your help would be greatly appreciated.
Final Words:
I am very open to experimental works, so don't be afraid to tap into your fountain of creativity.
I will be updating this thread for critical information new people joining need to know about such as the decided upon color palette and such.
Everyone that contributes will be sent a playable version of the game once it reaches Beta status. AND their names will be included in the game credits, and wherever else the people who have worked or contributed to the game will be announced.
I am passionate about this game like fire and will be working on it everyday whether it be coding or game design.
Thanks for reading this far.
If you are interested in talking about this further or helping me out by collaborating with anything, leave me a reply or email me at:
[email protected]Alternatively you can add me on skype:
talal.h_jk88
or twitter
@t_harmouch
Hope to hear from you guys!
You beautiful person you
Jobs
