Starcat

Hi! That's great news! I can't wait to hear and see more of it. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Merry Christmas everyone! For me this will be the time of the family and I guess I'll take a bit of a break from playing for that time. Although I'll probably be doing some writing on the Eerievale novel. Afterall there is no better time to let the Eerievale family celebrate their own Christmas than Christmas time itself. I wonder what little Hina will find under the tree Time will tell. Have a great time everyone! Regards, Lars.

Hi! I think the main problem of the Jaguar is not even that many people don't know how to use it properly, but rather that there are too few people to use it at all when it comes to game development. More people and better communication instead of envy and flaming between them would make some great new games possible. Until that miracle happens most of those few remaing developers will probably work alone, which means everybody has to reinvent the wheel and make his own mistakes to learn from. Which of course means long development times. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Hmm if I was you, I would just visit ebay and get a cheap MegaCD unit with the games... A lot cheaper than getting a Jag with JagCD. I also think building an emulator cart or porting the games would not only be illegal, due to copyright reasons, but in my opinion there is absolutely no reason for this to be done either. An absolute waste of valueble time that could be used to do something new and unique on the Jag. And of course the final product if it ever got finished would cost more than you would ever spend on the original system with the games you would want to play. Maybe it's just me, but I can't really understand why so many people seem to prefer ports of games over new original games or want to play the games of other systems on the Jag anyway. If you want to play the Jag, then do it. If you want to play something that you consider more fun, why not just get those systems? I mean you can pick up most of the original systems even a lot cheaper these days as a Jag and if you want emulation anyway, why not go and use a PC right away? At least a lot of the emulators for PC are working fine. Personally I will always prefer the real system over emulation, though. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Sorry, I can't offer videos at the moment. Maybe I will upload a video once I have some more time. I'll keep it in mind, so in the worst case a video will be there when the standard version gets finished. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks! There probably will be a standard version released, but I don't know exactly when that will be. Currently I am still a bit busy with other things. I also haven't decided yet in what way exactly the game itself will differ from the current version, so that will probably be a factor too. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Okay, after writing three pages of text and a browser crash, I decided to just write a short note.... To me the most important piece of hardware the Jag really needs is in development already... it definately is the compact flash adapter. I think only things like a better medium for games or different controllers one actually needs for a game make sense. So personally I just need the Compact Flash Adapter and a PS/2 or USB mouse adapter to be happy on the Jag. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Regarding the Ebay auction, I don't think it can be compared with BS. First of all, there was a lot more interest in BS than in Jagmind and at the time the auction started, the game could be ordered and was still available. And the game could be ordered for more than three weeks. If others were faster than you, it's simply bad luck. To be honest I was surprised as well that it actually reached twice the sale price of the game even though it could be ordered on my site at that time, but I assume that's just the typical ebay phenomenon. Regarding a standard version of the game, I just don't have the time to work on it at the moment. Those who got the game are welcome to send me feedback and ideas to improve it though. And bug reports if you happen to find any that were overlooked during testing. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Just wanted to let you know that the game is sold out now. Regards, Lars.

Hi! I'll not discuss the quality (or lack of in this case) of trevor mcfur (afterall everybody has his own taste), but go right to answer your question. Actually from my exprience the M series were the Jaguar models which had problems with certain games, not the K series. However the problem with trevor mcfur sounds a lot like something is wrong with your cart or the contacts of your Jag might be worn out. Another thing I have seen happening with early Jag games, is that they don't run anymore (or crash) when the E2prom data gets corrupted. It happens with cybermorph and others for example, they crash before you can do anything to reset the e2prom if the data is corrupted. Of course normally it doesn't happen that the data gets corrupted (or at least it shouldn't). I just had it happen because I wrote tp the save e2prom with one my programs and cybermorph got confused by that and didn't run anymore. I had to manually format the e2prom using Matthias Domin's e2prom tool. Either way, could be that i'm also wrong in this case and it's no problem of the e2prom, but just something weird with your cart or jag. Why don't you just try to find a cheap replacement for trevor mcfur? or try it on a different jag? Regards, Lars.

Hi! I produce them myself. But the Ejagfest edition of the game is limited to 48 units in total. I don't know yet if or when I will release a standard version of the game and in what way it will differ to the limited edition. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Just wanted to mention that those who are interested in the game should hurry, because I have only 12 units left at this point. To those who ordered already, most orders have been shipped by now. Regards, Lars.

Hi! No problem The story and information on the website also is just a rough version, because the player has to experience the story himself. Telling it all before would spoil a lot of the fun. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Don't take this as attack or anything, but I got to say it. I love it when people interpretate things. Just for the fun of it, because they hardly ever come close to anything the writers, artists, musicians etc originally had in mind. Maybe it's just that I spoke a lot to and about artists lately due to my study and we ended up in some funny discussions regarding that topic. The best statement of those discussions probably was "The picture means, what the viewer wants it to mean. No more. No less." It almost seems like an unwritten rule that interpretation is only correct when it differs from what the creator originally had in mind. Anyway. I get your point and the game is not as political as it might sound. And it's also not about capitalism or socialism. The idea was, that at a time when the poor had little or no chance in live, a city was created where they got a chance. It doesn't go as far as socialism though. It's better to compare it with the loan of a bank. And they get a job, they get some property and they get the chance to pay it of or work it of. And later it's theirs and they get the chance to live a normal life like the middleclass, instead of living in total poverty. However all this is just the framework for the story. Most of the game itself takes place inside the mansion and on the Eerievale property and is focussed a lot more on the characters than on the world outside of the property. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Good to hear that. Yes, Eerievale does indeed have parts that are quite weird, abstract and dark and also a bit disturbing sometimes. But also very different parts so there is quite a big contrast between the two. But you probably saw that in the trailer already. Regards, Lars.

Hi! D was released on most CD systems of that time... PSX, PC, Saturn, 3DO and I think Mac as well. However when you say it reminds you of it, I'm not sure if it's actually a good thing or not Afterall there were a lot of split opinions regarding D. Also in what way does it remind you of D? I never played D much, so if Eerievale reminds you of D, it's probably just as much as other horror graphic adventures might remind you of D. Although there aren't many games of this kind, so maybe that's it. Anyway the gameplay and controls of Eerievale are very different. Do you even get an inventory in D at some point? If you mean it reminds you graphically of D, I think I really need to spend more time doing graphics. Regards, Lars.

Hi doctorclu! Yes. That's the two player deathmatch mode, in which one player has to crack the code of the other. Regards, Lars.

Hi! It's not really a problem of Ocean Depths or any other game in particular, but a problem of the jaguar cd drives. And thus a problem of all games, especially those on CDR. This also means there is no other way around it, either releasing a game or not releasing a game, because some might have problems playing it, That's the only choice. Compact Flash will hopefully solve this once and for all, but until then we are stuck with JagCD or cart (which is far too expensive and too annoying to work with). Besides I don't think people would be willing to pay $60-75 to play JagMIND on a cart as it's only a small game. However to answer your question, there can be a whole varity of problems making a game unable to boot. At least some of those problems should be a lot better in JagMIND as it was in Ocean Depths. The CDR media is higher quality and loading times are reduced to a minimum. Which also means the ecrypted data and the chance of an encryption check failing and not booting the game or bad data reads inside the game that could cause crashes, are a lot smaller than in Ocean Depths. So if your drive has no problems with CDR, it should be able to play the game. I also have not heard anybody complain so far, but of course that's no surprise as the game is still very new. Regards, Lars.

Hi RJ! Thanks. Of course the final version will be proof-read. Don't worry about that. Besides I'm sure when the time has come, the game will be tested enough to make sure no mistakes remain. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Yes, you got it right, I'll edit the text again to make it more understandable. Regards, Lars.

Hi! JagMX, great that you changed your mind about selling your jag collection. Fredifredo, there is none. You are welcome to convert a version yourself. I originally thought about a cinepak version, but I gave it up, because it just didn't look and sound good enough as cinepak. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks! Just wanted to let you know, that JagMIND can now be ordered on the Starcat Developments Homepage. Regards, Lars.

Hi! Dude, if this is really a Jaguar game, it looks bad ass. If not, you suck for yankin' us around. Nice use of Ron Jeremy's mug, by the way. 966419[/snapback] Hmm, let me think... First picture is either something prerendered or a screenshot of a current generation game. The second one clearly is something NES related, with maio being in it and the third looks like a 16/32-bit beat em up. Also the screenshots style, resolution and quality and even filetype and URL vary greatly. What conclusion do I draw from this? "The Great American Game" is an ironic mockup on vaporware. And T2kFREEKER, you should look more at Jag games, because I think it's obvious the Jag can't do the first pic. Not even in that resolution and color depth if it was a static picture. Let alone render it in realtime Regards, Lars.

Hi! I agree with Peter. Game development just isn't a safe thing, even a lot of professional projects never get finished (though many don't get announced either, so you will never know that they didn't get finished) and as it is now, Metro Blaster is just as likely or unlikely to be finished as any other homebrew game, that just started. They definately deserve a chance, just like every new project announcement does. Personally I don't hold my breath for any project until I have something to play or know a lot about the project so I can get an idea how skilled the team is and how likely it is for them to finish it. And we all know that nothing is for sure until you actually hold the game in your own hands. However I wish you the best of luck with the project and if it gets finished, I'll be really looking forward to a cool new shooter on the Jag. LanDi, I'm surprised to hear such a statement from you. Especially because you mentioned that you were working or interested in working on Jaguar projects yourself. You didn't show any material yet, so what makes your project more likely to get finished than this? Regards, Lars.

Hi folks! Thanks a lot for the great feedback I'm curious too, is that being rendered by a jag? Or if it isn't, could it be? 967750[/snapback] I don't understand the question "what it's running on" in this matter. As said before, it's no gameplay footage, but a teaser. I don't know yet, how much animation can be put into the final game on the Jag. Some animation will be there for sure, I just don't know how much yet. Regarding the question, if it's being rendered by a jag, it depends on your definition of the term "rendered". The game will be using pre-rendered bitmap graphics, similar to games like myst. The trailer is definately not rendered on a Jag, if you mean that. It took more like two PC systems (one althlon xp 2600, 1 GB RAM and one centrino m 1.5 GHz, 512 MB RAM) a bit more than two weeks rendertime in total. Now if the Jag could do that, I would be in heaven. But as the game is using prerendered graphics, it doesn’t matter how long it takes to render. The Jag will just have to display the pre-rendered graphics, and the biggest limitation with that would be memory. The trailer is in 320x240 resolution, so even the resolution will be about the same as in the final game. Graphic wise all versions will be very similar, except for different resolutions. Also these are not the final graphics yet. It’s more like concept graphics for the environments shown, so the final graphics will show the same environments, but they will be more detailed and another bit better looking I hope. Yes. Even though Eerievale is more complex than Myst engine wise (and gameplay/story wise) the game will look similar on the Jag, with static screens similar to myst. The filename "trailer_jag.mpg" was chosen, because there were two different versions of the trailer, which had a different order of systems appear at the end. Except for that it was identical though and I prefer this one. Good question. Let me be honest, I don't know when it will be finished. It will for sure still take some time and I don't want to restrict myself to a fixed date. It could be less than you mentioned, but it might also be more. I really can't tell yet. Adventure game development is probably the most time consuming genre one can do, next to RPGs, if you want to make a really good decent game. Although for me it's of course impossible to say if Eerievale will be such a great adventure game. The players decide about that, I just hope it will be Next to the very time consuming aspects of a lot of researching (for the story for example) and all the writing of the story, dialogues etc there also is the design of the game itself which takes long, and coming up with all the puzzles and making sure it all fits together. Some games especially newer adventure games had the problem, that they were simply lacking the traditional adventure feeling. The player didn't feel like he entered the game world and actually was a part of it, but he always had the feeling of the game being just a collection of screens and obvious puzzles he had to solve to finally see the ending and get it over with. The player also couldn't feel any love to detail in those games. The games just felt too "technical". And storytelling just isn't something technical, but something that involves and affects the player if it's supposed to work. Afterall you could say a really good adventure game is the child of the marriage of a great novel and a great movie. Giving it elements of all three, the story of a novel, a bit of the presentation of a movie and the interactivity and gameplay of a game. So there are many elements you need to take care about, which are not important in other games. And of course there also is the graphical aspect and music, which is very important. The actual coding will probably be done in a few months in total for all systems, as I got some ideas and experience in writing the tech demos of the game already. There also will only be two versions of code, one cross-platform C/C++ code and the custom Jag assembler code. So that makes it easier. You are right that, Eerievale is getting a more ambitious project as it develops. Since the early demos it grew into something much bigger and much better too. It's also a project I have always wanted to do, so you can be sure that I want it to be as good as I can make it at this time. And I'd rather put more time into it, to make the player feel all the love to detail and all the blood and passion that went into the project, than being dissapointed with it myself later. So I'm sure it will be worth the waiting time, because the game is constantly improving. "It's me, Mario..." Ummm, I mean... Lars? Regards, Lars.