#gamestalgia

[saturnw0lf]

What happened to Juvi Adventure 2?

Well, buckle in, because this is a long story.

This is something that’s still a bit of a sore spot for me. It’s at the point where I’ve written and re-written what I’ve wanted to say a few times because I’m not quite sure how I want to approach this. What you also need to understand is that my memory in general is also pretty bad, so I can only tell you what I remember, as much of this was years ago. I’m sure other people who were involved with this project can pick up the torch from where I’m leaving off if they so choose. I should also note that I’ll include a tl;dr at the end of this if you don’t care for the preamble. With that disclosure out of the way, I suppose I should begin answering this question with the story of what was going on behind the scenes:

Our story begins in 2014. Or at the very least, that’s when my involvement in the project began. Juvi Adventure 2 was a large group effort comprised of different artists, writers, etc. Put a pin in that, that’ll be important later.

I was much more of a writer back then, I dabbled in GameMaker since about 2007 but I wouldn’t by any stretch call myself a game developer just yet. So I saw the head of the project post in some Sonic groups that he was looking for people to help, and feeling self-conscious and insecure as ever, I saw an opportunity to make a name for myself.

So I pitched some of my ideas for the project. I don’t even remember any of them fully, something about Eggman aiming to conquer the multiverse or whatever. I can say now that seems silly, even by Sonic story standards, but we were all teenagers, kids. That kind of thing was just the coolest thing ever to us. So he liked it! I was brought on board thinking I would hit the ground running.

It didn’t quite work out like that. I wasn’t the only writer involved on the project, there was one in a sort of higher position than me, if that’s what you want to call it. The general outline for the plot was written ahead of time, and at that point I was only allowed to fill in the blanks. (Which, I should note that I’m not bitter about. That’s a pretty standard practice, even if irksome back then). And over the months, I did. It took a lot longer than it should have, but I was being hit with several technical and personal setbacks at that time, and we still didn’t have a game developer, despite all the people we were bringing on board. You can see how this is coming up and becoming more of a problem.

So, we brought more and more people on board, and most of them were artists and people whose roles I don’t quite remember. But they definitely weren’t game developers. We had some voice actors, musicians, almost the whole nine yards. It wasn’t until later that we finally, finally got ourselves a real developer. And for a while, all seemed swell. Things were finally moving. But of course, all is never as it seems.

(NOTE: Things are good between they and I now. This was years ago and we’ve put it behind us. I’m not upset about it anymore.)

Our programmer, to put it bluntly, tended to flake on us a lot, but in a lot of the scenarios they gave us, it was hard to blame him. They listed things like depression and anxiety, which I know all too well and have compromised my workflow an innumerable number of times. So, we obviously missed our SAGE 2015 deadline. Okay, no big deal things like that happen all the time, right?

Well, then we missed the deadline after that. And the one after that. And the one after that. And the one…you see where this is going.

We hadn’t updated any of our pages in months because we simply had nothing to show beyond the screenshots we already had. Things were beginning to look dire. Then, the critical blow, and where things all went downhill.

They quit. The demo would never come to be. They gave me the source code, and left. I tried to fix it up, but it was incredibly broken with several things not working. This point around 2016 is what I would call the beginning of the end. Subconsciously, I think, we were all tired and ready to give up, we just needed a reason. That would come soon enough.

The head would leave after several attempts to revive the project went nowhere. At this point, we were all fully ready to give up and dropped the project completely. We lost members before, but none as critical as those two. Slowly but surely the rest of us, including myself, started leaving, and to my knowledge, that team chat has been inactive for months now. At the risk of burning bridges and ruining future business opportunities, I would say it’s safe to call it dead.

tl;dr: We tried to do too much and didn’t know what we were doing. We had a whole bunch of playable characters planned, DLC, Online playability, things that just aren’t realistic to expect out of a group of teenagers making a Sonic the Hedgehog fangame for he first time, let alone as their first project. When we finally actually had a programmer, the project collapsed under its own weight.

It’s not all bad news, though! Another former Gamestalgia member and myself split off to form our own group, and we have something I’m really excited to show off in the hopefully not too distant future.

#fangame #sonic the hedgehog #sonic fangame #juvi adventure 2 #gamestalgia #what happened to

[har0ld]

90s gamestalgia real quick

First, [games should be] fun, with no excuses about how the game simulates the agony and dreariness of the real world (as though this was somehow good for you). Second, they [should] be challenging over a long period of time, preferably with a few ability “plateaus” that let me feel in control for a period of time, then blow me out of the water. Third, they [should] be attractive. I am a sucker for a nice illustration or a funky riff. Finally, I want my games to be conceptually interesting and thought-provoking, so one can discuss the game with an adult and not feel silly.

Star Controll II designer talking about how games should be via Filfre.net on Star Control II.

It’s really something I miss from the early 90s gamedev culture: do something dope, challenging but not brutal. Serious, but not that serious either. Teams were striving for balance to serve an unknown, yet big market.

These days we have optimized our production to cater to very specific demographics so much that, if you like one thing from a game, you have to eat so much of other things that you might not like. We specialized gameplay and wrapped it in some aesthetic and no other. Say I enjoy FPS. I have to deal with ultra-heavy military settings and themes because that’s what FPS players enjoy. But I don’t. I just enjoy the shooting/hide and seek mechanic.

I don’t miss the 90s ruthlessness of how game developers didn’t care so much about you having a great time. A bit too much of “I make the game I want to play” type of process.

But when said developers had an entirely new game, interesting gameplay, universe, story, characters and so forth, like Star Control II or Day of the Tentacle? Man, it was the best times ever. Like, life-altering.

from h. Play http://bit.ly/2Gj1tPB via IFTTT

#h. Play

[game-memories]

Missile Command(Atari 2600)

Talk about an addictive game. Missile Command was both frustrating and fun. The game puts the player in the role of a missile commander(?) whose responsibility is to shoot down invading missiles that threaten to destroy cities.

At first, the game starts you off easy. The missiles are very slow and it's relatively easy to knock them down. But, as you progress through the subsequent levels, the missiles gets faster and there are more of them to destroy at one time. I can remember not making it very far at all. Many times I would become frustrated and quit playing. But, as is the mark of a fun game, I always came back to it.

#video games #gamestalgia #missile command #atari 2600

[game-memories]

Pitfall!(Atari 2600)

Pitfall introduced a game mechanic that is now used in countless contemporary action/adventure video games: rope swinging. Beside jumping, this was the only other function of the game. And, to my young adolescent mind, it was the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. It allowed me, a young kid who was in love with films like Indiana Jones(yes, we'll get to that game as well), to fulfill those dreams interactively through video games. I eagerly anticipated swinging over a pit so I could hear the sound byte that would play each time. I tensed up when I encountered alligators or giant scorpions.

Humorously, I had no idea what the goal of the game was until I just read it on Wikipedia. I don't recall gathering any treasures even though I'm sure I did. And, even so, I didn't realize that was the main objective.

#video games #gamestalgia #pitfall #atari 2600 #indiana jones

[game-memories]

Moon Patrol(Atari 2600)

Moon Patrol is probably one of my favorite games on the Atari. It was challenging but not as complex or as broken as other games(E.T. I'm looking at you). I was actually able to make progress in the game even at my young age.

A 2D side scroller, the player took control of a moon buggy. The buggy was equipped with guns that shot forward and straight up. While the player was occupied with shooting the enemies(and what looked to be large mounds of poo) on the screen, there were also big pits in the ground that had to be jumped. Luckily, the moon buggy was equipped with a jumping module of some sort. So, the formula was shoot/jump/shoot/jump. Just like Defender, the goal was just to rack up as many points as possible.

There was no end game to speak of. This was a good thing, since my young attention span didn't last too long. Usually after thirty minutes to an hour, I was either done playing altogether or on to the next game.

#atari 2600 #gamestalgia #moon patrol #video games

[game-memories]

Defender(Atari 2600)

Many eons ago, I was a country boy. I liked fishing, hunting and general outdoors-y stuff. One day, my cousins came for a visit. They brought their Atari 2600 along with several games. They let me have a go at it. That was the day I fell in love with video games. The first ever video game I can remember playing(which could be incorrect, since it was about 23 years ago) was Defender.

Defender was a relatively simple game by today's standards. The player would control a ship from left to right, stopping along the way to rescue survivors and also blasting ships from the sky. I remember being enthralled by this simple game play mechanic. Back in those days, graphics were nothing more than a few lines made from very few colors on a 2D plane. But my imagination ran wild. I took on the role of the Defender pilot, making sure to save as many people as I could, all the while racking up points. It was an eye opening experience, and one I will never forget.

Later in that same month, my generous cousins decided to give me their Atari along with their collection of games which included such games as: Missile Command, Q-Bert, Tank, Moon Patrol and E.T. just to name a few. I will be discussing these games in the near future.

Subsequent posts from me will not be as dramatic, but I hope they resonate with some other video game lover.

#video games #defender #atari 2600 #nostalgia #gamestalgia