Please, please, please, please, please, have Penumbra converted into a Novel/Book. Theres already a lot of written lore/story in the game but I think it could do really well in a book and would reach to a demographic that aren't into videogames
That's actually a good idea. The game has a great story !
Sadly, the potential audience is probably around 12 people, so short of selling each copy for £50 there's not much of a profit margin!
Yeah, it's been discussed before I think.
It would be nice, but noone would do it. It would be cool if someone wrote just a small side-story story though, written from the perspective of one of the workers at the time of the outbreak or something like that. With there working like 60 people (I can't remember, was it more?) I'm sure a lot of stuff happened at the outbreak. I think one of the first notes in Black Plague say something about a bunch of survivors gathering up and trying to escape, then splitting up and stuff.
I guess someone could write a fanfiction but since we have no map over anything not visited in the games (the actual size of the Shelter, where the "endless" mining tunnels someone wandered off into are or where the old ruins-place is) the writer would have to make a few places up or set it all in places Philip visited. We do know a bit about the different characters though and there are plenty of names in the game, plus making character's names up isn't as bad as adding a whole new section to the Shelter if the devs just had planned it to be the two corridors areas we saw in Black Plague (that and the outdoor area is pretty much all there is in Black Plague, or is it?).
We also know very little about the outbreak, but I guess people started going nuts and that's it.
To write a good fanfiction the devs would have to spill some sort of neat "extra" to work into the story, like a map or exactly how something happened, how Tuurngait transformation works etc.
Would be fun to flesh out Penumbra some more, but as Tom says, there is probably not a very large audience for it. What could be possible, is that if we ever release Penumbra HD, or what ever weird thing might happen in the future, a shorter story could be included in the pack. Penumbra has quite a lot of text, so there will probably be enough people who buy the game that will find it interesting. Not sure if anyone would buy a 300+ page book based around it though. Also, there are certain legal issues surrounded with releasing Penumbra material, so it is nothing we at Frictional Games can do whatever we please with (it's pretty "slack" legal stuff, but still, we do not have 100% freedom).
As for fan fiction, I do not think the releasing maps and such is needed and I think that would restrict people too much. It is more fun if people imagine themselves what might lurk in other parts of the base or what other weird things the Archaic have been up to. The places that we have left unknown are meant to be filled up by the players themselves, so they can fill them with their personal fears
As closing note, I just wanna say that I would LOVE to read some fan fiction!
Speaking of a sort of fan fiction, would it maybe be possible to include some resources of Penumbra such as the enemies and props and stuff in Amnesia or an SDK for HPL2 so people can make fan maps and such?
I will be possible to make user created maps for Amnesia and we are working to have some nice ingame system for this, so one can just click "Play custom map" and then select a downloaded user selected map.
We are also putting effort into making the game customizable so user will be able to change a lot of stuff to make a total-conversion like stuff. We are not aiming for some super generic thingie like hl2, where one can make just about any type of game. The game as to have basic Amnesia elements in it.
As for Penumbra resources, these should be easily convertible into Amensia as they are all collada files. Actually, it should be possible to use the maps too and just important the entire map as a static objects (which is sort of a basic component when editing maps, see
this blog post). However, there are legal issues connected to this so user can't just as the Penumbra assets are under copyright. But since it would be fun with some kinda Penumbra mod for Amnesia if any one feels motivated to do one, it might be possible to solve. Have to think about it.
Awesome!
But let's say you (normal user) are making a map in game, do you need to know basics of coding or is it as easy as map editor, let's say, in Age of Empires, etc.?
(11-14-2009, 10:26 PM)Thomas Wrote: [ -> ]Would be fun to flesh out Penumbra some more, but as Tom says, there is probably not a very large audience for it. What could be possible, is that if we ever release Penumbra HD, or what ever weird thing might happen in the future, a shorter story could be included in the pack. Penumbra has quite a lot of text, so there will probably be enough people who buy the game that will find it interesting. Not sure if anyone would buy a 300+ page book based around it though. Also, there are certain legal issues surrounded with releasing Penumbra material, so it is nothing we at Frictional Games can do whatever we please with (it's pretty "slack" legal stuff, but still, we do not have 100% freedom).
Making a 300 page story for Penumbra would indeed not be interesting for very many, but some sort of shorter story or perhaps a flash game to add a bit to the story? If you happen to have an abandoned mine and a rock worm costume at hand you could make it a Youtube short like they did with Lost
(11-14-2009, 10:26 PM)Thomas Wrote: [ -> ]As for fan fiction, I do not think the releasing maps and such is needed and I think that would restrict people too much. It is more fun if people imagine themselves what might lurk in other parts of the base or what other weird things the Archaic have been up to. The places that we have left unknown are meant to be filled up by the players themselves, so they can fill them with their personal fears
I guess I can agree with that, I've just always been into making stories as realistic as possible and as faithful to original stories as possible. Particularly the last part of that sentance was interesting though: "fill them with their own personal fears"... that's brilliant.
Anyhow I hate to see it when fanfictions take off in completely unbelievable (even if possible) directions such as the Archaic being aliens, the Shelter having some sort of weapons laboratory and stuff like that where you end up reading it just thinking "this is dumb".
(11-14-2009, 10:26 PM)Thomas Wrote: [ -> ]As closing note, I just wanna say that I would LOVE to read some fan fiction!
So make it a contest
Winner gets a wagonload of sloppy artwork sketches.
Anyhow I do think there are people that would be interested in writing fanfiction for Penumbra. It was a while since Black Plague was released now though so the forums aren't quite as bursting with activity as they once were and the next game won't be Penumbra related, but someone might still have the energy and inspiration to do it.
(11-15-2009, 12:54 AM)Thomas Wrote: [ -> ]I will be possible to make user created maps for Amnesia and we are working to have some nice ingame system for this, so one can just click "Play custom map" and then select a downloaded user selected map.
Being able to make your own maps would be nice. I've only tried mapping for Doom a bit, plus GarrysMod and Forge which isn't actually making the maps. Could be fun though, if it isn't all too hard and plenty of tutorials are uploaded.
(11-15-2009, 02:33 PM)Scraper Wrote: [ -> ]Awesome!
But let's say you (normal user) are making a map in game, do you need to know basics of coding or is it as easy as map editor, let's say, in Age of Empires, etc.?
Probably more like the Doom 3 Editor than the Age of Empires Editor
Here's a video showing pretty much how to make a room (there are probably better ones), it's not hard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvd85DZnVt0
So it won't be "easy", but you won't need coding skills for the mapping at least.
Well, the editor they've shown is much easier looking than a Radiant from id, slapping on prefabs and such in order to make a simple room.