I apologize if this has been asked before; how open is the engine in terms of modding and cross-platform capability?

Read about it and decide for yourself: http://www.bitsquid.se/

Worth noting the features page lists the following:

Thanks for the info. :)

Ah, so hopefully we will still some fizzling deaths? I love those. Haha, sorry about all the questions by the way!

E: New page.

Unlikely that it will be on Xbox though, isn't it? They're still having their quarrel.

Adding ragdoll physics sounds good! That is, as long as the ragdoll effects don't overdo it like Tomb Raider Underworld- sliding all over the place like the floor is made of ice!

Personally, I would prefer the falling deaths (where Abe crunches into the ground and doesn't bounce) remain animations. It really gave the impression Abe was physically weak, just skin and bone, which added to the feeling of vulnerability in my opinion.

I don't think this has been asked before- in terms of the new camera, how far will Abe be from the screen? Will Abe be roughly the same size on screen as in the original? I only ask because I remember someone saying that we will see the sligs go back to sleep once we're out of range. Going by the screen distance of the original, wouldn't this mean that sligs can't see Abe/give up chasing him when he's only 10 (ish) meters away?

I suppose with a dynamic scrolling camera, it could automatically pan slightly at set points to see round a curved path, or zoom out when passing a nice open piece of scenery (to introduce Paramonia, for example- kind of how Ratchet and Clank levels begin with the camera way out to show off the planet :D)

That's the idea. Abe is the same size relative to his environment, and the camera shows roughly the equivalent of one old screen, but it should be trivial to play with the camera and achieve the kinds of pans and zooms you mention.

It's going to take some experimentation to get the AI to behave both practically and believably. Just like the original, Slig behaviours will have to vary between individuals.

Since 'gore' is going to be turned down could there be an option to turn it up that requires parental controls? What about beating muds and such to death with sligs? Will that be removed under the violence/gore banner too?

I don't believe gore is going to be completely removed, I was under the impression it would just be toned down a bit.

It's not going to be any less than the original.

Ragdolls maybe für a FPS but not Oddworld...

For Oddworld i prefer a nice hand made death Animation. Just like in the original, only in real time. Ragdoll deaths just look so cheap in a movie quality game like Abe. Oddysee's and Exoddus' animations still look great today. Ragdolls will make it look like some cheap indie game... It doesn't fit the cinematic quality of the rest of the game.

Abe always had great animations, why exchange it with some crappy ragdolls only cause it's common nowadays. I actually hope they recreate all the animations from the original game.

I would be okay though, with the Euphoria Engine (or whatever it's called) that has been used in GTA, so it wouldn't look cheap and yet every death looks unique.

Does this mean we will be introduced to new death sequences?

Except that in a 3D environment, a death animation could send the deceased character flailing through a wall or floating off the edge of a cliff. That's exactly what happens in the original, but we're more forgiving of that because it was standard for the time. Ragdoll is great because it increases the believable interaction between (floppy) characters and the environment; it's popular for a reason.

They're a way from being created and implemented, but they're definitely in the designs.

Ragdolls are buggier than death animations. And loved less by the developers. They just put them in instead of making the animations with soul D:

It really looks soulless, when bodies just fall over like dummies with no movement at all. This is why i don't like ragdoll physics. To me animations in general are a very vital characteristic of the original Abes Oddysee, and i don't want that messed up in the remake. :D

One thing I would ask is that you try and conceal the 'cutting of the puppet strings', the switch between an animated model and a ragdoll, somehow.

It's a big immersion killer for me and presumably at least four other people.

It's just a question of getting the balance correct between the two. Some games do it quite well (namely Rockstar's games).

Team Fortress 2 kinda did that (like in backstab deaths), but it's hard for me to say if it could be done better or not.

I think what always breaks the illusion with ragdolls is how bouncy they are.

Bodies have bones and joints and aren’t made of rubber; they don’t bounce and flop around randomly. If someone falls, they land heavily and come to rest quickly.

AO and AE got that right.

Heavy ragdolls would be a good solution, then?

I want the very stone to split under Abe’s lifeless form, god dammit.

I don't think Abe should be THAT heavy, but I see what you're all getting at, and I agree.

Will NPC corpses remain on screen, or will the shrink in to oblivion like in the originals?
Are you going to support widescreen monitors or keep the aspect ratio the same?

I think this was the subject of minor debate earlier. I'm interested in how you will handle this. If you're going to have the bodies fade away, I think you should keep the sizzling/shrinking animation. Having them just fade out won't be theatrical enough for me.

Would be pretty silly for any modern game to not support widescreen these days... Imagine the backlash if it was only in 4:3. Seeing as its a from-the-ground-up remake, there's no reason for them not to support it.

However, I imagine that it's something that will need to be hard-coded, rather than giving the option to the player to choose aspect ratio. It would affect gameplay far too much to change the visible area.

I don't think there's any reason to remove them from the scene. Memory isn't the problem it once was. But if we do, I'll be campaigning to keep the sizzling deflation.

Ooh, good question. I have no knowledgable answer for you. But since AI will be linked to real distances rather than arbitrary screen joints, seeing further to the sides shouldn't be too big a deal.

Having a wider field of view would change the difficulty level, though. And much of the gameplay experience in a puzzle game comes within the player's head, so more or less awareness of the world will change the experience significantly.

If the bodies are to stay on screen, I'd love if they rotted after time.

It’s a minor point, but the way the PC version always scales to fit a monitor means most people in this day and age already played the game in widescreen. And to my eyes the graphics manage to scale surprisingly well and don’t look all that stretched.