elcome to the Shadows of Time
homepage.
This is the official
homepage for the video game based on Joseph J. Reinemann's best selling book
series "Shadows of Time." Here you can find (mostly) up to date
information regarding the production, status, and release date of this highly
anticipated game.
Well the gaming industry is going to be seeing one of the most anticipated
releases of the year tomorrow. Yes,
that's right, "Super-Green-Thing Spelling and Math".
If
you would all put down those two-by-fours now it would be greatly appreciated.
Unfortunately, here
at Time's Shadow Productions we are still reeling from the fact that we have
now lost our fifth coder. Perhaps
referring to them as coding consultants is just asking for trouble, I don't
know. Personally, I just think that
the coding division is cursed, possibly from an ancient spell put on it by our
initial lead coder.
Well, we'll probably
survive. And if not, we have the
addresses of half a dozen coders, a car with a very large trunk, and five rolls
of duct tape.
Sadly, we have no
new screen shots as we have temporarily switched all our efforts into developing
the parser for the scripting language, as well as the language itself.
The good news,
however, is that the decision has been made that we expect to have a playable
demo by the holidays. Dialog
recording for the demo will begin shortly, just as soon as Ty
and I come to an agreement on when shortly is. I am of the opinion that shortly means
any time now, while Ty is of the opinion that shortly
means when he's whipped his computer back into subservience.
Okay, technically this really isn't that much of a leap from the last update,
but I just had to show someone this, our first in-game footage.
I think we would all
agree after seeing that that THIS GAME IS GOING TO MAKE YOUR EYEBALLS EXPLODE.
Well, to be
honest the only new thing is the fact that we do have the full engine now, and
we got a new coder, but I really doubt any of you are interested in reading
about that.
I would mention the
rendering progress, but that's really just putting extra layers of polish on
what we already have, so that also isn't really news.
But, we do have to
make a confession. We've starting
doing product placement. To see the
advertisement for our <cough> "benefactor" <wink>
<cough> <overdoing it a bit, aren't you?> just click here and enjoy.
We'll have it up on
the downloads page in its proper place as soon as one of us gets around to
updating it, in the mean time enjoy the new, improved WMV version of the
trailer. This one actually has all
the correct colors/sizes/text.
It's
been a while since our last update, and shame on anyone who failed to notice.
First
off, what do you think of our new layout?
I know, most of you (perhaps all of you) can't see it right, but we're
still working on it. Unfortunately
for you, that may take a while, because much of our attention as of late has
been devoted to (drum roll please):
THE
ENGINE.
That's
right, we have an engine (well, almost) and have begun experimenting with
putting models in it. We're very
excited with what we've got so far, particularly the fact that the
cinematic-quality models can be used in this engine. Some of these things are near-photographic
quality; our expectations for the graphical splendor of this game have just gone
through the roof.
Speaking
of which, here's a screenshot of one of our environments:
Good
news: The trailer is now up!
Well,
at least in WMV and Quick Time format.
I know the quality isn't that great, but my computer has been giving me
some trouble with the original file, something concerning different file
formats I think, and sadly these were the best I could do. The Quick Time format is bigger and
understandably has better picture quality, while the WMV file is small. Very, very, very small. So, if anyone out there is still using a
2600 baud modem, that's the version you want. You also probably want a new modem.
As
for development news, progress is being made on the character models for the
prologue and the rest of the game. Hopefully,
soon we'll be able to use some of those models to produce a characters
page.
I
would show you a picture of the John Roley model, but I figure it would be
better to wait until I do some texture work on it, perhaps make him look less
shiny.
Ah
well, enough of that for now. Go
and download one of the working versions of the trailer. Then feel free to warn Ty just how bad the sound quality is to prevent him from
going into shock when he finds out what happens when he leaves an author alone
with a microphone for just one month.
Well,
as you can tell, we finally updated the website. We now have a book history page and a
downloads section which advertises a trailer that is almost, but not quite
done. Rest assured we'll do our job
and provide lots of self-promotion once it is.
Work
has slowed down a bit for summer, but is still progressing. True, our lead coder has his computer
stolen. True, our lead modeler has
been spending his time being urinated on by cows. True, all we can say about our lead
artist is that he is probably somewhere in the
Hey,
at least we have a cool trailer.
The biggest
development on the project this week was that we fired Bill.
Unfortunately, we
then realized that we had made a horrible mistake and an enemy of a very, very
dangerous man, and rehired him at ten times his previous salary.
Since his previous
salary was approximately $000.00 per week, this did not stress the budget
nearly as much as it could have.
Work began on a new
part of the opening cinematic, and while we are still in the pre-production
phase of most of the game, we have begun the work necessary to finish the
opening cinematic, and with the progress we have made on the engine we hope to
have a playable demo or an extremely impressive trailer available on this site
around this time next year.
Until then, we will
be posting new screenshots, wallpapers, videos, and updates on our progress for
all six fans out there.
Also, if you live in
the
Anyone
else who knows trueSpace and feels that they might be
able to assist over the internet, contact us anyway, and we'll see if there's
some way you can help.
E-mail Ty: Lead
Sound And Voice Acting Consultant
E-mail Joe: Main Leadership, Writing, And
Ownership Consultant
If you succeed in contacting someone who isn't a consultant, could you please e-mail us to tell us who they are?