Could WC1 be made better?

climber

Spaceman
I was thinking, maybe this has been banded around and given up as a bad game but I think a WC1 remake in the style of UE would be awesome. The guys already have some of the ships and obviosuly the carrier. I think far from being crap it would compliment the original. I know that coming up against the sivar to scale or having to pick off a Fralthi's turrets before blowing it up would make for a much better game.

It could also include the missions from SM1.5 in SWC that us meer mortals have never and probably would never get to play. Just thinking this as I am playing the game right now and am on the kurasawa missions blowing up transports, it would be amazing.
 
You not really making it "better" just putting the already great product into a new visual light. Would be interesting if there was a way to keep the original conversation parts so as to not totally lose its identity
 
I think most people prefer seeing all that effort invested into something new and unique like UE2 or Standoff, rather than a rehash of an existing game.
 
maybe so but I would love to play the bits in SWC that we can't play cos the game is rare as rocking horse pooh and I am not clever enough to get it work even if I could get hold of it.

Perhaps something that plays up until the claw is destroyed as well, make it good and long
 
Yeah, I think a remake would be a bad idea (and also, I don't think there's any modders interested in doing it :p ). Remakes are funny beasts... there's always the temptation of trying to make the game better than the original, and the result tends to be the exact opposite, because the better it gets, the less of the original remains.
 
climber said:
maybe so but I would love to play the bits in SWC that we can't play cos the game is rare as rocking horse pooh and I am not clever enough to get it work even if I could get hold of it.

Perhaps something that plays up until the claw is destroyed as well, make it good and long

I think that's a good Idean, imagin playing in 3d all the SWC ships, well maybe not the entire SWC mapaing, but Secret Mission 1.5 will be cool to play as a WCSO mod

some ppl can't get his hand over SWC needer mac nor 3do
 
Then maybe someone can make a video of it or something. There's too many differences in the engine for a remake to pan out like this. Look at the fuel problems the Standoff team faced. They had to more than double the afterburner supply, because of the nature of combat in the Vision engine. But the limited fuel in WC1 was important. I don't think the Vision engine supports blowing off guns and missiles. Just last night I was assaulting a Star Post in a Scimitar and had all my missiles and mass drivers blown off. They'd have to build in a mechanism for medals and ranks, as well as a more complex mission tree. WC1 success/failure depends on aggregate system success, not simple individual mission wins and losses. It would be a huge amount of work, and there are just too many differences for it to be very accurate. Individual people would have to make decisions on what to change, and nobody could agree on the best way to change things, so some people would end up hating the changes and calling it a poor remake. And for what? I play the original WC1 in DOSBox all the time and it's already great. There's no need to expend all this energy for a poor copy. Actual original and creative mods that respect the originals, like UE and Standoff, are the way to go.

People just need to go in and document SM1.5. Take pictures, note the script, like Wedge and Shades have done for other WC games.
 
I did know it was so complicated, but I least a version of SM 1.5 will be cool to play, at least for me
 
thats a fair point chris, I take it. I know it would be too hard. I too love the original WC1 but there are gaps that I would love to see filled to bring it all together.

I just find it hard to understand how a company trying to make money can let games out that are amazing but are full of glitches that make them annoying in a way. I mostly mean KS where the annoying music in WC1 and the inability to play with keyboard in 2 kind of spoil the experience.

I know a remake would be a marmite experience but hey, it was worth a thought I think. Still, I maintain something up until the claw is blown up would be great
 
climber said:
I know a remake would be a marmite experience but hey, it was worth a thought I think. Still, I maintain something up until the claw is blown up would be great

ans using SWC Ships, thay will be cool :p
 
KS came out at a very odd time -- Windows 95 wasn't quite ready for gaming when Kilrathi Saga was developed.
 
climber said:
I just find it hard to understand how a company trying to make money can let games out that are amazing but are full of glitches that make them annoying in a way. I mostly mean KS where the annoying music in WC1 and the inability to play with keyboard in 2 kind of spoil the experience.

I actually didn't notice any of these glitches when I first played through KS, but it does add in a few bugs that the originals didn't have. On the other hand, it adds in new music, some clearer video, advanced joystick support and a few other nice perks. Now that I can DOSBox in a Window, I just prefer to play the originals. There's something magic about putting in the copy protection numbers each time I want to play WC1.

LOAF's point about the timing is also correct. At a few points in WC's history, the series' nature of being ahead of its time backfires a tiny bit. The biggest example might be all the great multiplayer features in Armada, but a bunch of KS' bugs are due to the immaturity of Directx (2.0) that was just being worked out for the first time.
 
The only way I'd like to see a remake done would be to run the original at a higher resolution and colours. This would allow much higher quality sprites. If it was a modification of the original rather than a complete remake it would work, as the engine would function the same.
 
As far as i would care, the original missions in a modern engine that runs on modern hardware, the chatter and video's can remain thesame..

it's the missions you want to play, as for the stories you want the real deal, if you alter the dialogs and storylines, it's your idea, not that of the original author.
 
Mace said:
As far as i would care, the original missions in a modern engine that runs on modern hardware, the chatter and video's can remain thesame..

it's the missions you want to play, as for the stories you want the real deal, if you alter the dialogs and storylines, it's your idea, not that of the original author.


That's just the thing. Until sm2, wc1 was the gameplay. Even in wc2 the storyline is entirely parallel to the gameplay. By which I mean that none of the story stuff takes place within the gameplay engine. When any story-relevant bits pop up in the middle of a mission, you're sent to a cut scene. So for all intents and purposes, wc2 was the gameplay as well. Especially when you could skip the storyline all together if you wanted (but why would you want to?).
 
I've spent some time reading up on remakes the first time we had this topic around (cf. "proper remake" debate), and the idea of remakes has taken up some more of my time out of pure curiosity. So let me ramble a bit:

Why do people want remakes?
Mostly, to re-live something they've experienced in the past - the old movie you watched as a kid, the "classic" car you drove as a teen, the music you listened to in clubs. All those can be still experienced in their original form, but the frame of reference has changed, so you want the remake to fit in the frame of reference you've gotten used to: Movies have color and better F/X now, cars go faster, recording quality and sound engineering is better. So instead of cruising with that '62 Beetle convertible with the 8-track on full blast down the lane of a drive-in cinema, you'll take the 12-cylinder New Beetle, CD-changers pre-programmed, into a multiplex.

So it's about nostalgia?
Originally, yes. But the buzzword for today's remakes is immersion. Remember Elite? That 80s space sim without dialogue, decent sound, or even much of a story? Remember how you were glued to the screen, thinking up dialogued while shooting at pirates, fleeing police, or picking up the rescue capsule of some merchant who just got blown out of the unfriendly skies? Most people had that kind of immersion experience somewhere in their past, and they don't want to go back there for nostalgia's sake, but to lose themselves completely in a game/movie/song/book/car/fizzy drink again as they were able to in their past. A remake is the attempt to satisfy the yearning for something that cannot be recreated by using the original, because we're not able anymore to be touched by the original as we used to. Or at least the director of the remake isn't.

Are all remakes therefore bad?
Ethically maybe yes. You could compare it to buying the same sort of dog and giving it the same name your dog had when you were a kid. You could teach him all the tricks and avoid all the mistakes you made - but you're spoiling his life while doing it (by not allowing it to be itself), and you're spoiling your own memory, as well as your ability to accept YOURSELF as you are now. But you can almost certainly argue it the other way round.
Aesthetically maybe no. The Ben Hur version of 1959 is way more pleasing than the 1907 original, in any aspect - visuals, sound, special effects, storytelling, actors, set. The Psycho version of 1998 doesn't gain much over the 1960 original, although almost the same technical criteria can be employed. The simple answer: It depends on what the one doing the remake is trying to achieve.



Concerning a WC1 Remake:
I feel that twinge of yearning for immersion - the "What if?"-effect that starts the pictures rolling in your head: A fighter as great as the Rapier in a decent 3D engine - what fun! But I also feel the gnawing doubts - will it really be that much fun? I've recently played some great remakes (technically great), but got tired very quickly because it didn't spark off the old magical moments.
So although I'm unwilling to, I'd have to say: Nice idea, but better not do it. Let the people create new stories using new technology - sequels, prequels or whatever, but let's not try to model the Mona Lisa in Rhino3D.


Now, an updated sprite engine would be something different... (hands the microphone to BradMick..)
 
It'd be fun to play a WC1 remake, but impossible to do because you *will* piss everybody off if you make any pragmatic changes.
 
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