The Sega Saturn NetLink League

Hey, I'm looking to create a BRAND NEW Saturn game. I have an idea I'd like to toy around with, and even though I'm still in school I would like to start doing some brain storming and pre devolpment stuff now. I was thinking a fighting game with up to four characters on screen at a time. Team battle capabilities and maybe even netlink compatible. But first thing is first.

ARE THERE ANY PROGRAMMERS HERE INTERESTED IN WORKING ON THIS PROJECT???

Yes.

(By that, I mean me.)

Netlink is a huge undertaking, especially for something that needs such precise timing as a fighter. Also, because you're dealing with modems, you could not have more than 2 Saturns linked at a time.

I realize the netlink is a bit of a stretch, but I would like to toy with it after the rest of the game is finished. I realize that it can only be two saturns, but I'm thinking that you could have two players on each saturn, team battle kind of thing. Of course, classic one on one is always still a part of it. If you have a multitap and three friends you can play four characters at a time on the same screen and either free for all or team battle. I'm feeling like 2D sprites on a 3D field. I am currently looking for some artists to help with some character design and to do some hand drawn sprites.

unless you think we should do all 3d?

I really want to help make a game.

Are you set in stone on the fighting idea? Might be nice to make an adventure/action etc. But Ill surely help with anything I can.

You need more than programmers....you need artists.....and.....sound designers....and that's about it.

And it should totally be a stop motion game....like Platypus or Neverhood or Clayfighters or the upcoming Cletus Clay. Cause stop motion and claymation is awesome....not because I'm majoring in it or anything though <.<

Most of my ideas for making a Saturn game also happened to be geared toward an adventure/action game. However, I'm not sure I'd want to compromise on my vision for that game, so I wouldn't be opposed to working on something else, even another adventure/action game.

I think that 3D would be really cool, but there's a decent chance that we'd have writing our own engine from scratch, and while that's something I've always wanted to tackle, I don't feel I'm ready for it yet. Unless one of you is highly confident that you can create a 3D graphics engine or we can find one that we can borrow from somewhere else, I think we'd better test our abilities on an easier 2D game, first.

If we want NetLink support, I'd recommend writing the code with NetLink support in mind from the very beginning - from what I understand about it, it's hard enough to do as-is without trying to add it in at the end. Different types of games might be easier or more difficult to do with the modem... normally you'd try to synchronize the Saturns every frame, but depending on what genre of game we'd be tackling, we might be able to go with a different approach that can tolerate lag more easily than the old Saturn games.

I can do design, art, level design, modeling. But if we did a 3D or polygon game Id have to fool with the highest tolerance of polys on a model for a bit.

Would be cool to make a 3D polygon platformer like a Croc or Mario 64 but thats tough to do... or even a Survival Horror/MGS type game.

But I think a 2D game might be the best place to start. Even if a side scroller or something to that effect.

At this point, my area of Saturn specialty is probably the NetLink, although I'm sure I could help out in other areas as well. I actually prefer assembly over C, but I've worked with both. Also, while the projects never got past the planning stages, I've worked on the story, art/design, move balancing, and level designs for an RPG, a turn-based strategy game, and a side-scrolling shooter.

I'm excited to try my hand at AI, graphics coding, and audio coding.

Well I do need all the help I can get in all areas. As mentioned earlier, I do absolutely need more than just programmers. I am open to discussion about the game.

I did have an idea for and adventure game. It's about a dishwasher who has to save the world from invading aliens. Basically aliens invade and enslave humans, and the only guy who manages to stay free has to go and free other humans build a resistance and save the world. Kind of going for that classic cartoony feel of an adventure game. You know one of those chubby guys with a five o'clock shadow and wears a t shirt that's a little too small. Fights off aliens with a spatula and throws plates at them and what not. haha

I thought it'd be fun, I am of course open to discussion. I'll take any ideas that y'all have and then we will decide which direction to go in.

Trip Mercy wrote:I did have an idea for and adventure game. It's about a dishwasher who has to save the world from invading aliens. Basically aliens invade and enslave humans, and the only guy who manages to stay free has to go and free other humans build a resistance and save the world. Kind of going for that classic cartoony feel of an adventure game. You know one of those chubby guys with a five o'clock shadow and wears a t shirt that's a little too small. Fights off aliens with a spatula and throws plates at them and what not. haha

For some reason I feel like I've heard nearly that exact plot before... I think in a game that was released. That and/or one of my friends talked about a similar idea when we were trying to come up with a game. *shrugs*

Maybe I'm wrong.

I've never played a game like that, but there are plenty of games I haven't played. Well again I'm open to all game ideas.

I think it's all well and good to want to make a game, and it's just fine to plan a game...

But I don't think any of us have actually programmed for the Saturn before. I think we should do some kind of relatively simple tech demo first, and then worry about making a game.

Suddenly, pinball comes to mind...

I like pinball

I agree, something simple, tech demo etc...

I watched videos of the Saturn programming contest and alot of graphic adventures like Myst that were easy to create.

So many ideas you can do.

I have lots of past experience in FPS games. They are incredibly easy to develop for like a Doom clone. Too bad we cant get the Slavedriver engine that Labotomy used to make Duke Nukem and Powerslave.

While difficult, I'd rather develop all our own code, including the graphics engine. That way we shouldn't have to worry about legality issues.