It is no secret that back in the day video games left a lot to the imagination. This was no bad thing, and this is one of the reasons I remember the original game so fondly. The one thing that the original got so right, was the creation of the Eagles Nest Castle.
It felt like an occupied castle. There were storerooms, mess hall with German soldiers, billets and even lavatories. Even more important, from a gameplay perspective it felt like you were sneaking around and exploring it.
You can see all the levels on the original ZX spectrum game over here.
When I started out, on my original intention was to make a 1:1 - or close to as I could replica of the original opening level. You might notice in the video, that the top left corner looks rather barren - thats when I described to scrap it.
Two things became very apparent when I started working on the Enemy AI.
- With the addition of the enemy shooting, more space is needed to allow the player a chance to escape from a hell of bullets.
- To be able to convincingly move around and shoot, the player would also need more room.
So why not just scale everything up? On the first recreation attempt I was using the Village Interiors kit by 3D forge - which I love by the way, but first impressions from scaling is that everything becomes rather repetitive and blocky. The German soldiers being grey and the stone being grey meant they were disappearing into the background. I should point out, that I am not as yet ruling out Village interiors altogether.
Before continuing to look for solutions, I needed to answer the question of how much space do I actually need. Though I have yet to do much work on the character controller, I have in my mind how I want the controls to behave. I, therefore, decided that they would need one cube in each direction of space to move.
Looking at various reference images of real castles, one of the defining aspects is the curtain wall , so I decided that I would construct this first with towers at each four corners and use the player scale from the original level design.
To rationalise the space, I decided that each corridor linking each tower would be ninety squares in distance. Why, because nine and three (and multiples of) share a nice relationship. The end result is bloody huge as you can see.
It did strike me for a second, that I was going to struggle to fill that space, but that's the nice thing. I don't have to. One of the other defining characteristics of a castle is a courtyard. This also nicely solves my problem of giving the enemy enough space as well.
Continuing on the other defining themes of castles, most castles include a great hall and a chapel - which are also large spaces. Halls require kitchens, kitchens require larders etc,etc. It was actually quite easy to define the space.
Building it, is going to be a different matter. I will do a separate post for this a bit later on down the line as I am currently researching my options. What is clear, is it going to be a lot of effort and as this is a hobby project, I don't want to fall into the trap of giving myself too much to do. The original intention was just that opening level after all.
However, I think this space is going to work well. I am not going to complicate things with different floors and instead try and capture all the original game elements, such as rescuing prisoners, salvaging artworks and blowing things up within this space. My thoughts are something like this at the moment.
To rationalise the space, I decided that each corridor linking each tower would be ninety squares in distance. Why, because nine and three (and multiples of) share a nice relationship. The end result is bloody huge as you can see.
It did strike me for a second, that I was going to struggle to fill that space, but that's the nice thing. I don't have to. One of the other defining characteristics of a castle is a courtyard. This also nicely solves my problem of giving the enemy enough space as well.
Continuing on the other defining themes of castles, most castles include a great hall and a chapel - which are also large spaces. Halls require kitchens, kitchens require larders etc,etc. It was actually quite easy to define the space.
Building it, is going to be a different matter. I will do a separate post for this a bit later on down the line as I am currently researching my options. What is clear, is it going to be a lot of effort and as this is a hobby project, I don't want to fall into the trap of giving myself too much to do. The original intention was just that opening level after all.
However, I think this space is going to work well. I am not going to complicate things with different floors and instead try and capture all the original game elements, such as rescuing prisoners, salvaging artworks and blowing things up within this space. My thoughts are something like this at the moment.
- You need to take out the Radio post so the Germans cannot call in re-enforcements.
- Get the master keys from the Kommandant office
- Blow up the armoury to create a diversion
- Rescue the prisoners who are being held in huts in the courtyard
- Steal the Fallen Madona painting
- Escape the castle and be home in time for tea and medals.
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