Click here to view the embedded video.

Anyways, I really like the campaign so far.  The previous iterations of Archon that I’ve played, the only way of playing was only the board and all the pieces arranged on opposite sides like a chess board.  The difficult could be adjusted or two people can play against each other.  The Conquest campaign in Archon Classic was originally on the iPhone and I think it make a good transition over to PC.  It is compatible with the Xbox 360 controller which works well.  However, I am usually playing this on different PCs, so I usually use the keyboard so I’m not moving the controller around every time.

I haven’t honed my Archon skills yet and these campaign missions are giving me an opportunity to get used to various strengths and weaknesses.  I still need to get used to light and dark squares and how they alternate over time.

So much has changed in a single year.  For one thing, we have info about Toys for Bob’s super secret game.  Paul Reiche shared with Lukipela that they were given more time to polish their project and do more work with it.  He even mentioned that there were some potential info leaks which were quickly plugged.  It was also confirmed that “Above and Beyond” is not their current game.  This rumor started from a blog called Superannuation who discovered the title and referenced Star Control with a link to Star Controller.  Superannuation is an information-sleuthing site that collects information related to video games.  Some of the posts include interesting domain name registrations from publishers.

It’s only a few more months until the Holiday season when more games will emerge.  This is when we will start hearing about TFB’s game.  In other words, the waiting game continues.

There are some indie sci-fi and fantasy games that have caught my interest.  In addition, I know I haven’t mentioned Archon Classic in a while and I’ll start recording some gameplay footage.  There’s a lot of stuff I haven’t delved into yet.  I know it’s been released on Steam as well.

A very interesting post showed up on the UQM forums about something I wanted to write about here:  People were selling The Ur-Quan Masters on eBay.  I do not like or support this since it does not benefit the UQM team.  I have nothing against Ubuntu or Mozilla selling their own products since they benefit from sales.  To keep it simple, there are a bunch of legalities that can make selling free software for profit legal.

Personally, I have a small grudge towards eBay.  I tried to sell an Action Replay for GameCube.  It was taken down in less than a day because it was an unlicensed product which can make the console do things it is not supposed to do.  However, I see hundreds of these products like this on sale that make it to the end of the time limit.  In addition, it is acceptable to sell unlicensed NES games (e.g. Tengen Tetris, Hot Slots, Shinobi, etc.)  However, if I sell a reproduction cartridge of an unlicensed game that is clearly labeled as such, it will be taken down; an unlicensed game can still have copyrights.  I have seen auctions for illegal items which were not taken down after I flag them.  In summary, I continue to use eBay to buy and sell things occasionally and I wish they would enforce their rules more fairly and give users a chance to justify themselves and get a clear answer as to why their particular auction was removed.

In conclusion, it’s been 2 years and it makes me think of how much as changed in that time.  I remember last year, I mistakenly thought they may have been working on Madagascar Kartz.  One thing that caught my attention was a racer called BOB in one of the trailers.  I thought it was a nod to TFB.  It turns out it was B.O.B. from the Monsters vs. Aliens movie which was included in this game.  And don’t worry, I’m still here.  For those who use Twitter, I can be followed through @starcontroller.

Links
Someone going insane trying to discover the meaning behind Toys for Bob
Superannuation
AHH! Madagascar Kartz
@starcontroller
@paulreiche3
EDIT: Added Paul Reiche’s Twitter.

Note: These lyrics are not guaranteed to be accurate as I had a very difficult time understanding the words.  If you can provide a more accurate interpretation, please post a comment.

Floating here so long
Solar sensors are all gone
Drifting aimlessly in outer space

All the multi-colored stars
Shining brightly near and far
They head fast and fade without a trace

With our telescoping eyes
Looking upward to the skies
And see the things that we can see
Are you reading me?

The streams are too long
The coordinates are wrong
And we can’t remember why we’re here
Abandoned here alone
We don’t know which way is home
And communication is unclear

Were suspended up in space
Disappeared without a trace
And we don’t know if it’s night or day
But you know we’re lightyears away

Star Control
We’re 10 million miles from home
Where do we go from here
A light in confusion
We’ve run out of options
Tell us where do we go from here
We need to be told
Star Control

Our creation was your dream
We were more than just machines
When you programmed us to think like men
Your ambitions ruled your mind
And you’ve perfectly designed
All communications have all reached the end

Were suspended up in space
Disappeared without a trace
And we don’t know if it’s night or day
But you know we’re lightyears away

Star Control
We’re 10 million miles from home
Where do we go from here
A light in confusion
We’re out of the box
So tell us where do we go from here?
We need to be told
Star Control

Star Control
We’re 10 million miles from home
Where do we go from here
A light in confusion
We’re out of the box
So tell us where do we go from here?
Nowhere to go

Star Control

We’d love to be told

Star Control

Star Control

10 million miles from home

Waiting here all alone

Star Control

I subscribed to Google Alerts for “Star Control” a few years ago.  From these alerts, I can find new articles related to Star Control.  In addition, there can be spam and even eBay auctions selling a Star Control game.  Throughout the years, I have noticed that I occasionally see an eBay auction of an album from a band called Dollar, containing a song called “Star Control”, which caught my attention.

When I first discovered this, I naturally became curious and tried to find the song.  It wasn’t on YouTube, MySpace or any of those sites. It was quite hard to find. I just never thought much of it. Anyways, I finally found the track and it was something completely unexpected.

I admit I’m not a music expert and that I know very little about the 70s and 80s.

Dollar's first album, Shooting Stars (1979) From right to left: David Van Day, Thereza Bazar

From what I’ve read, this song appeared in Dollar’s first album, Shooting Stars, released September of 1979. This is 11 years before Star Control 1 was released and 4 years before Archon. It was 4 years after Queen released Bohemian Rhapsody.  It was before I was even born!  So this song has nothing to do with the Star Control we all know and love.  Dollar also covered The Beatles song “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”.

The Very Best of Dollar (1982) - A quick cash-in for WEA records. It contained the same songs as the first album including Star Control, with "I wanna hold your hand" added. Star Control is on 7 of Dollar's albums, most of them compilations.

The vocals in this song are heavily distorted to sound more robotic. I’m a fan of electronic artists such as Daft Punk and MSTRKRFT who have used robotic voices in their music.  However, I had a very difficult time understanding the words to this song because of the heavy distortion.  Based on the other songs I have heard from Dollar, this is the only they have which uses this type of distortion.  It does not seem to be a very popular song because it’s hard to find and the lyrics are not listed on Dollar’s website despite their other songs.  I was lucky enough to find a forum thread where people have discussed finding the correct lyrics to this song and it was very helpful in my own attempt.

This song tells the story of either a robot ship or crew member who is stranded in space and contacting Star Control to be rescued.  It has an overall sad expression and maintains a science fiction style to its composition.  It made me think of the Mmrnmhrm because of their robotic nature, not that it it was related.  I thought of “robots” and “Star Control” and Mmrnmhrm popped up in my mind.

I’d like to thank those who posted in the forum about finding the lyrics to this song; without it, this would have been more difficult than it already was.  If there’s anyone out there who was curious about this song, I hope this answers your question about what this song sounds like.  In summary, I think it was an interesting coincidence.  Speaking of coincidences, while Nintendo was designing controllers for the Wii, they had a prototype with a star button on it, dubbed the “Star Controller”.  It was quickly scrapped in favor of the Wii remote, nunchuk and classic controller.

Links
Official Dollar Website
Star Control Lyrics Discussion
Dollar – Shooting Stars
Mystery of the Nintendo Star Controller Revealed

Latest Project

It’s been a while! We’re still working on a game that we think is really awesome and fun, but we can’t talk about it just yet. We would, however, like to clear-up some rumors that have been circulating about a new Star Control game we’re supposedly making called “Above and Beyond”: they aren’t true! The game we’re currently developing has nothing to do with Star Control, but it’s still really exciting and we can’t wait until we can talk about it officially. Stay tuned!

I can’t wait to see what kind of awesome and fun things they have put together in their new video game. Glad to see that it’s not Above and Beyond. I always assumed it was a rumor and at least it threw TFB in the spotlight for a brief moment.  We still have another TFB mystery in our hands and it’s great to hear TFB reiterate that it is awesome, fun and exciting.  It’s so awesome, fun and exciting, that they were given extra time to polish it and make more changes.

I know a few weeks ago, Lukipela wrote about his face-to-face conversation with Paul Reiche over a cup of coffee about what he can tell us about his super secret project.  Some of the many talents of TFB include keeping secrets and plugging leaks:

“…we were so close to announcing that word did break accidentally on a few sites. We yanked the news as fast as we could, but then it started to spread (seemingly automatically) like the zombie virus. It took us a number of days to stamp it out and I still have a number of Google Alerts set-up in case we missed its brain admit comes back to life.”

“I can’t say anything concrete and I must mix in some outright lies. While not in any universe we’ve worked within, the new game is perhaps exactly what one would expect from our studio. If you like Melee or Mayhem, there will definitely be a part of the new game you enjoy.”

- Paul Reiche

Needless to say, Lukipela wrote a very engaging article about his chat with Paul. It’s a must-read for everyone! Nicely done, Lukipela.

With regards to the RSS parser I made, I’ll have to add some extra exception handling to deal with some things I didn’t expect.

Whatever they are working on, I hope it leads them on a path to creating more awesome, exciting and fun games that they have control over.

Links
Toys for Bob
Coffee with Paul Reiche

“Give fans things they had never seen or experienced before. Space combat is one of those things.”
- Lars Bakken, Multiplayer Design Lead at Bungie

Halo: Reach will be Bungie’s last game with Microsoft before they join Activision on a 10-year contract.  Although this is Bungie’s last Halo game, this is not necessarily the last Halo game in the series.  Any future Halo games will be made by an internal team at Microsoft called 343 Industries.

Lars Bakken from Bungie plays through the single-player campaign and reveals the one and only space combat mission that will be in the final game.  Lars has stated that space combat has been considered in previous Halo games.  In addition, there will be other surprises that haven’t been done in previous games.  Needless to say, they want to end with a bang.

The saber ship has energy shields, machine guns and missiles.  It also has afterburners and capable of performing barrel rolls.

Not only did it remind me of Star Control, it also reminded me of Nintendo’s Star Fox series.  Nintendo will be recreating Star Fox 64 for their new handheld console, dubbed the “3DS”.

From what I’ve seen in the above video, it feels like an entirely different game.  My prediction is that this mission will be well-received.  They haven’t stated whether or not multiplayer space combat will be included in the final release.  I’m sure there will be split-screen local multiplayer.

I highly doubt it will feel close to what we have experienced from Star Control.  For example, if the player dies, I highly doubt that he or she will be able to choose another ship with different strengths and weaknesses and try another strategy.  Star Control also contains more races, not all of them wanting to wage war.  This part of the game will at least show that space combat is something that is worth exploring, even for big-budget titles that haven’t done it before.

I hope that players and reviewers enjoy the space combat mission in Halo: Reach and show desire for more diverse ships and deeper combat in future games.  It can become a positive point towards future space combat games and even become leverage for the creation of a new Star Control game.

Above and Beyond's rating on Australian Classification Board

There has been some news that has popped up today regarding an unannounced game from Activision-Blizzard.  It is called “Above and Beyond”.  As of this writing, the only information about this game is from an Australian classification board.  The information given is that it has been given a mature rating and listed as “computer games (multi-platform)”.  Superannuation was the first site to post this discovery.

Please keep in mind that the ESRB does not have “Above and Beyond” listed as of this writing.  The criteria between Australia and North America ratings can be different.  The words “mature” and “violence” does not necessarily mean it will be a bloody game with excessive profanity.  The Australian Classification board has a separate MA 15+ rating for “Strong coarse language”, “strong violence”, “blood and gore” and “strong horror violence”.

Some blogs have even linked back to an article I wrote back in October about Shaba Games closing down.  I wrote to Alex Ness about it because a few years ago, he told me that some employees at Shaba supported the idea of a new Star Control game.  With the announcement of Shaba closing, Alex said that some of the people they hired previously worked at Shaba and their team is starting to grow.  Alex also gave another small hint that their unannounced game will “feel more classic Toys for Bob”.

I have no idea if Above and Beyond is TFB’s new game.  There really isn’t much information given other than the Australian Classification board rated it “mature”, author and publisher is Activision-Blizzard and it wasn’t in this year’s E3 convention.   If more details emerge about this game, I’m not quite sure how the ESRB will evaluate it.  From the above image alone, there is nothing to suggest that it has ties to Star Control or Toys for Bob.  It’s a game title nobody knows about from a giant third-party publisher.  Overall, I’m glad that speculation towards TFB’s secret project and Star Control is spreading quickly through different video game sites.  Sooner or later, there will be more news about this game and hopefully things will be clearer.  After seeing so many E3 videos, it’s obvious this year will be another interesting one for video games.  Just because it wasn’t in E3, doesn’t mean that we won’t hear more about this game in the future.

Links
Farewell Shaba Games
Above and Beyond – Australian Classification Board
1UP.com’s article about Above and Beyond
Superannuation’s article about Above and Beyond
ComputerAndVideoGames.com’s article about Death Ride and Above and Beyond

It’s that time again.  E3 is coming up in less than a week and all of the sources of video game news and media will be there to see what developers and publishers have planned in the future.  Some websites have early access to E3 and are already uploading E3 videos.

I haven’t seen every single E3 video out there.  So far, the only E3 video that reminded me about Star Control is a game called Jumpgate Evolution which is a sequel to their first game, Jumpgate.  It is being developed by NetDevil.  The have plenty of experience with MMOs prior to Jumpgate Evolution.  I looked at some older gameplay footage, which showed a player controlling a ship directly in 3D space and firing lasers at various targets.  The E3 trailers also reminded me of EVE Online.

I e-mailed Alex asking if there were any plans for Toys for Bob to attend E3.  He replied that they “probably won’t be attending E3 or showing anything.  Probably next year’s E3 though.”  Darn!  I was hoping that we could see a glimpse of what the are working on.  We’ll just have to wait a little bit longer.

I started to wonder.  Are there any developers who will be at E3 that have some kind of connection to TFB?  After skimming my Google Reader I realized that React! Games will be attending E3.

We’re getting ready for E3 now…we’ll be going and showing our latest version of the game to press and portals…so hopefully we’ll have many more sites that will distribute our little game.
- React! Games DEVblog

They have finished Archon Classic for the PC a long time ago.  I’ve been meaning to write about it for some time and I’ve just been occupied with other stuff.  I recorded myself playing the first level in the campaign.  I used  a keyboard and mouse to play and it is also compatible with the Xbox 360 controller.  They have recently added their game to Impulse, a digital distribution service made by Stardock.

I still notice the same trend many of us have been talking about for years: old games are coming back in a new shape or form.  2K Games is working on a FPS version of XCOM and it interests me.  I’m curious to see how they will translate the turn-based strategy to a first-person perspective.  They previously worked on both BioShock games and I have faith that they can pull it off.  3D Realms has announced that Duke Nukem Manhattan Project will be coming to Xbox Live Arcade.  A new 2D Sonic the Hedgehog game is also being made.  Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge will have a high-definition remake.  With this growing trend, it should be easy to add Star Control to the list of HD remakes.

In summary, there is a very incredible amount of trailers and articles available for an event that is officially starting in a few days.  Even though TFB is not on the list, we may see something that may have a striking similarity to Star Control or anything else related to TFB.  React! Games will be there to show off their new Archon game and I hope they get a fair share of the spotlight.  With Microsoft and Sony showing off their new motion controls, the video game industry is starting to change in many ways.

Links
Jumpgate Evolution – PAX 2008 Gameplay
Archon Classic – Finally on Impulse
List of Exhibitors in E3

Wenlock and Mandeville

Do you see it?  They resemble the Spathi.  Although one could argue that any alien with a giant eye can look like the Spathi.  In fact, the player doesn’t see much of them in the game, other than an eye and purple arms:

From what I’ve read about previous mascots, these mascots seem to be designed with a family friendly image and usually ignored and criticized for their quirky appearance.  Their names are based on the town and village Much Wenlock and Stoke Mandeville.  Each character has their own Facebook and Twitter page.  There is even a background story claiming that they have been formed from the last 2 drops of steel used for building the Olympic stadium in London.  It even goes as far to say that their shiny metal surfaces is a metaphor that they reflect the people.

To be honest, I don’t pay much attention to the Olympics.  I think it’s a very epic international event and it’s amazing to see how far fans will go to support their favorite countries.

It’s interesting that there are people who notice the similarity and are willing to tweet about it.  I’m not exactly sure if this can be used to promote a new Star Control game.  It does show that the Spathi are highly memorable, just like the Prinny (Diagaea), Chocobo (Final Fantasy) and even the Companion Cube (Portal).  I’m still dreaming of the mass-production of a Spathi plushy.

I remember a long time ago, there was an announcement that Pluto is no longer considered a planet.   A thread on the UQM forums called “Pluto is no longer a planet.  Poor Fwiffo” was made.  Fwiffo represented the humorous side of Star Control and was more complicated than just plain “comic relief”.  I remember when I first encountered Fwiffo, I felt a bit of tension while convincing him to join my side.  He didn’t simply switch sides; I had to convince him that he was alone and that I was powerful; I felt unsure that I would be successful and felt a sense of joy when I finally succeeded.  He even gave a clue about the location of the Syreen that some people may have missed.

In conclusion, I do see a similarity between the Spathi and 2012 Olympic mascots.  Maybe this is a sign that we’ll start seeing more things that remind us of Star Control.  If it is, I wonder what could happen next.

Links
London 2012 Mascots
A Tweet about the Mascots and Spathi

There is a key that can be mapped to have the player’s ship instantly upgraded, cargo filled and ships added.  The main purpose isn’t for cheating through the campaign.  It is for traversing through specific areas and testing code updates and modifications without limitations from the game itself.

I remember a few years ago when 0.5.0 was the latest version, I discovered a mod that allows players to view the spinning ship videos that were in the original 3DO version of Star Control II. The original UQM builds do not support these ship spin videos due to additional legal issues.  This modification allows a key to be designated as the info button which plays a video of the ship in the Super Melee and Shipyard screens.  The mod even allowed the Crystal Dynamics promo to be played at the menu.

It was around this time I discovered the debug key.  All I had to do was press a key and my ship would be instantly upgraded with a full crew complement and cargo.  The escape pod isn’t instantly added and is given to the player at the beginning of the game anyways.

The captain’s ship has numerous upgrades and includes cargo such as the Talking Pet and Utwig Bomb.  It has powerful blasters but no point defense laser.

I did have some fun cheating through the beginning of the game.  I left space and was attacked by various Slylandro.  I blasted each of them effortlessly.  I even took on the Thraddash and the Ur-Quan and Kohr-Ah surrounding the Sa-Matra.  Unfortunately, it was surrounded by infinite Ur-Quan.  Since I didn’t have the escape pod first time around, I was stuck at this point.  I still had to free the Chmmr, enhance the bomb and tell the Talking Pet to get rid of most of the Ur-Quan and Kohr-Ah surrounding the Sa-Matra.

Another perk from the debug key is that any star selected in the starmap on Auto-Pilot, the flagship instantly teleport to that location.

This is a good place to mention that the starmap is searchable; in the starmap, press the / key, and type the first few letters of the star name; it will try to find a match and tab can be pressed to scroll through different names with the same starting letters.  It’s an amazing convenience to remember the names and not the numbers.  Unfortunately, I discovered this fact after I finished the game; I used to write down coordinates and refer to the UQM Wiki frequently.

So, how can this debug key be enabled?  Here’s what I did, thanks to the advice from the UQM forums.  Keep in mind that this is geared towards the Windows version of UQM.

1. Go to http://uqm.stack.nl/files/snapshots/ and download the latest content update.  Do not extract the file!  Simply place the zip file in the content/packages directory where UQM is installed.
2. Download the latest Windows release binary.  Extract uqm.exe to the installation directory and overwrite the original uqm.exe.
3. Download the latest Windows debug binary.  Extract uqm-debug.exe to the installation directory and overwrite the original uqm-debug.exe.
4. Create a file called override.cfg in the config directory containing the line: debug.1 = STRING:key F4. On my Windows XP laptop, it was located in C:\Documents and Settings\anthony\Application Data\uqm.  It should be the same directory as keys.cfg
5. Launch uqm-debug.exe and either start a new game or load a saved game.  Press F4 and the ship will be instantly upgraded.

So, that’s some info about what can be done with uqm-debugging.  I wouldn’t recommend using it to play through the entire campaign; there’s a lot to experience and the game has a great design with great dialog to experience.  It’s better to consult a walkthrough to know more about what to do next in the game; it helped me progress through the game more smoothly and I still experienced the entire adventure without feeling too confused.

I’d like to thank everyone on the UQM forums and everyone else who helped me out with getting the debug key working.

I wonder what else UQM-Debug can do…

Links
UQM Forum: Debug Key in UQM
UQM Subversion Snapshots

Many of us remember Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam.  It is a launch title developed by Toys for Bob for the Nintendo Wii.  This is the game TFB was working on when Alex Ness announced they would like to make a Star Control game someday.

The idea for this game came from a discussion from Activision from a list of gameplay styles fans would like to see from the Tony Hawk franchise.  The idea of a racing game was one of the most popular and Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam was born.

While the game was in development, one of the things that TFB tried was gluing a Wii remote to the bottom of a skateboard to see what leaning on it would be like as a controller.  This is interesting because Nintendo eventually released the balance board a few years later.  A game called Skate It used this peripheral in a similar manner that TFB experimented with.

Originally, there were plans for online multiplayer for THDJ.  Unfortunately, due to a tight schedule for getting the game out on the Wii’s launch date, it was removed and only local multiplayer was removed.  It would have been the Wii’s first Nintendo Wi-Fi game.  Pokémon Battle Revolution was released a few months later and became the first Wi-Fi game.

The DS version of THDJ had online multiplayer.  However, it is no longer functioning since it was hosted by a third-party who is no longer supporting it.

THDJ was advertised as having much longer and faster levels than in other Tony Hawk games.  The level design is amazing; there were multiple paths, shortcuts and plenty of obstacles that can help or hinder certain characters based on their stats.  I never once felt like I was moving in a straight line and the closer I get to the last level, I feel more tense that at any second I could lose my position.  It’s very entertaining to watch a pro move through the tough levels.  This could be an example of creative control that TFB had over a project overseen by Activision.

Did you know that this isn’t the first time they have used the Tony Hawk engine?  The other game they used it in was Disney’s Extreme Skate Adventure. *shudder*  This is actually the first game TFB made with Activision after signing their contract.  This game shares the same engine as Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4.

DESA is geared towards a younger audience.  The balance meter is more lenient and the tricks available depend on the character chosen.  There is also an option to create a custom skater.  I first played DESA when I played a demo of it from a demo disc that came with an issue of Official Xbox Magazine.  The only playable level is “Andy’s Room” from Toy Story.  It is a fun game which made me immediately think of Tony Hawk.  Unfortunately, the demo disc is not compatible with the Xbox 360.  Despite the child demographic, it is fun to play.  I feel the same Tony Hawk experience when I played it.

Speaking of Tony Hawk, Neversoft is no longer working on it.  The video game rights have been passed on to Robomodo who has recently made Tony Hawk: Ride.  EA’s Skate franchise is still in the competition.  I’m not sure how the Tony Hawk franchise will evolve in the future.  I haven’t played many of the new Tony Hawk or Skate games; mostly demos.  I remember spending a lot of time playing Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater on the Game Boy Advance and N64 back in the day.

I remember playing a game on the old Xbox called Toxic Grind; it has nothing to do with Tony Hawk.  It’s a BMX game that takes place in the future, where the player is a contestant in a reality TV show on a stage is filled with death traps and must compete with other players to stay alive.  It is one of the most bizarre extreme sports games I have ever played.

In any case, I hope this post about TFB’s experience with the Tony Hawk engine has been informative.  No matter what they have on their plate, TFB can make it fun and get it finished, even if it’s from a licensed IP.

What do you think about the Tony Hawk franchise?

Links
GameTrailers: THDJ Interview with Paul Reiche
GameSpot: THDJ Interview with Alex Ness