Lorne Lanning Soulstorm Electric Playground Interview
 

New interview Just posted on the Electric Playground Youtube Page

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxqZwK_giM0

Lorne called Soul Storm the second part of the Quintology (still a stupid word), but I thought traditionally he considered Exoddus to be a spin off and not part of the main series.

That's true, but SS is not simply an AE remake. He also said that the Quintology is now about Abe.

The Quintology is whatever you want it to be

The Quintology is the friends we made along the way.

The Quintology was inside you, the whole time.

That's...worrying.

I think the idea is that he's trying to tell the same larger story about Mudos, but without adding extra heros along the way. So I'm guessing in Soulstorm we're gonna be seeing about Maggie and Sam and hints towards Maggie's grandma with Gorman Disenza.

Is there anything in this video worth watching it for?

I'd say no and neither in the other video. He's just repeating shit we've already heard many times. Disappointing, but not surprising.

Well what did you expect? That's basically the company's tagline at this point.

He said on Twitter that we'll learn more about Abes stitches in Soulstorm. So if that's still tied in with Sam then Nate may be right.

I hate the camera angle.

what in the goddamn hell i thought it was hogshit who the hell does he think he is god damn back in my day you worked for a living god damn it and look at him flouncing around with his luscious hair talking about oddworld like he fucking gives a fuck i tell ya one thing my friend if there ever is a day that my demented pointless mind becomes barely conscious of the things i'm saying i'll tell you this buddy, it won't be today because if we're all going to come down to it it's like we're all part of one big organism you know? we're all just different variations of the same person and if we all hold hands and stand in a circle, maybe we can use the power of love to make the world a happy place or maybe just maybe if we all rub our cocks together we can create a cosmic space baby capable of destroying entire galaxies but ohhhhh noooo, lorne won't allow it the bell end

my favourite thing about lorne is that he made my favourite game and i hate it and him

do you have a bigger res of that i want to use it

http://www.oocities.org/timessquare/...cters/slig.jpg This + mspaint

well my anti Malware hates that site

Nobody hates Lorne. He is a doofus. People here seriously love jumping to extremes.

E: I take that back. FANDOM MENACE ASSEMBLE! ENGAGE MAXIMUM TOXICITY MODE

i wasn't jumping to any extremes, i was just making a dumb joke my contrary little friend.

No you weren't and I'm not contrary!

no u!

Kids, stop fighting. The toxic demons aren't going to kill theirselves.

I don't know if the devs monitor the forums for feedback (and which topic is better to live your feedback in) but I have to say the following. Overall I like the trailers and the gameplay footage but there are so much flashing lights in the environment it's distracting (and it also kind of deminishes the atmosphere). I mean all the neon direction lights going from the levers to the corresponding machinery, the lights at the ledges etc. To me it would've been much better to replace the aforementioned neon lights with colored wires and mark climable and un-climable ledges with paint as it was done in Exoddus. The less bright lightsources - the better. I'd also refrain from using the lightning effect on the teleporter doors but use wires to show where the door takes Abe instead. I see the devs are putting alot of effort in the game but I hope they tone down the visual atmosphere a bit.

Anyway, I'm a long-time fan of Oddworld and look forward to Soulstorm.

I perceive the over-the-top lights and action to be an allegory for current society, full of technology and stimulation. I assume that will be juxtaposed with the other environments, such as Paramonia, to illustrate just how extreme the difference is.

the notion that every level will look exactly the same as comet depot is an odd one, for sure.

But the notion that the areas we've already seen look shitty isn't at all odd...

you'll always be my favourite OWF member.

It takes a lot to get you to listen
Edit: Sorry, it isn't you who doesn't listen. I know it's not your fault, you always did your best. It's not your fault.

Jesus fucking Christ dude do you ever take a day off?

:fuzsad:

Often. I come out of the woodwork to criticise things that used to be good but aren't any more. If this was upsetting to you, you should see some of the things I've written about game of thrones

Regarding action and animations being too fast-paced and 'spastic'. The one thing that I have always loved in the original Oddworld games was their 'fantasy-realism' which was to a large extent achieved by smooth, extremely well-timed in-game animations. In the New and Tasty they sped up the animations for some reason and while the models themselves were good the effect was lost. Same here; at least at the current stage of developement. I hope this will be addressed. They are going for grimdark atmosphere after all and goofy animations don't really help. At least this is how I see it.

Regarding the over-saturated visuals, I specifically point out the elements which are intended for the player only, i. e. not the neon advertisements but the neon tubes that connect the levers, the lights at the ledges, levers, trapdoors etc. They stand out too much and break the fourth wall in a bad sence, i. e. make it harder to suspend disbelief. The original games had signs that were only intended to help the player, too, but they were fitted the environment far better and stood out much less.

For example, take the trapdoors from N'n'T. They had those blinking lights on them. From my point of view these serve no good purpose at all. They neither really help the player nor add up to the atmosphere. Same goes for the levers and grinders. Stylistically these lights look too 'hich-tech' and out of place. While Oddworld facilities do have high-tech stuff among the more crude-looking machinery but in the established style these elements also usually look kind of run-down or the use of such devices is limited. Speaking from the in-universe perspective, some Glukkons may have a thing for decoration but I highly doubt they'll bother placing all those expensive LED lamps and electricity-consuming neon tubes to mark ledges, levers etc. Simple cheap paint would've done a much better job. Especially in a purely industrial area such as Rupture Farms. It's also good enaugh to help the player recognize climable or non-climable ledges, etc.

Another example I've mentioned are those lines of neon tubes which are indended to help the player to understand which lever activates what. If you want to have alot of neon in the environment for the purpose of storytelling it can be done in much more immersive ways. The neon ads at the passenger terminals make sence. And you could also make appropriately designed guidance light strips composed of those neon tubes that lead the passengers from one terminal to another or to a hub. But these lines we see here do not seem to have any other purpose but to 'connect the dots' for the player. This causes them to stand out so much. They could've been easily replaced with wires which would have served the same role but without standing out of the environment too much. This worked perfectly fine in Exoddus after all.

I'm pretty confident that Lorne will deliver a perfect story but since they're going for the gimdark style the visuals are very important. This kind of setting really relies on immersion and suspension of disbelief. So there has to be as few of those elmenets that remind you that you're playing a game as possible. And they have to be as natural to the environment as possible.

P. S. I hope the devs will provide us with a level editor :D

Up. Up. Up. Up.

You can't take 15 minutes of gameplay in one area and then fret that it's indicative of the entire game's aesthetic.

Christ STM, he pointed out why the bits that we have seen look bad, not that the whole game does, but if this gameplay is anything to go by, I wouldn't blame anyone for fretting.

He even said he's confident that Lorne will deliver a "perfect story", which is giving him far more credit than anyone should, but no, that isn't good enough.

Yeah, let's wait until the game is out to criticise it, you know, so the developers don't have any chance to fix it? Solid plan.

STM, no need to be white-knighting here. If I didn't care about Oddworld I wouldn't have even bothered to recall the password to my account here, let alone write any long-winded posts. Nepsotic is right -- it's better to voice your concerns early on while it's still possible to make corrections without too much effort. And it's not only those 15 minutes that lead me to the assumptions I've voiced above but also the on-going flaws of the previous game (N'n'T). Some issues may be due to placeholders from N'n'T being used. So there's hope that they are going to be corrected later on. I don't really rely on my opinion being taken into account but since OWI staff seemingly visit these forums I decided to post. Maybe it will come out useful. This is only my humble opinion, of course. But then again, that's what the forums is for - for sharing opinions (and not only praise and worship; no criticism - no progress).

Regarding why I care and nitpick so much. There are few games, let alone platformers, that manage to let you suspend disbelief, take them seriously and live the story. Oddworld hit the nail on the head, which was pretty unique. It wasn't just a platformer where at any given point in time you were fully aware that you're playing a computer game. The latter may be fun but it's not what I expect from and Oddworld game, especially regarding the high goals stated by OWI themselves.

Also, achieving the aforementioned effect does not mean 'carbon-copying' Abe's Oddysee and "getting that shade of green just right" as Nate has put it in another topic. I would've been totally fine with OWI ditching the platforming gameplay altogether as long as they found it necessary to get the story across. And it's not about making each and every level look like Rupture Farms either. There's just a fine difference between a mediocre work and a masterpiece. The former may very well be enjoyable and the latter may not be really perfect, it's overall consistency that plays the key role. It's attention to detail but not as in literally putting as many small details in the environment as possible but rather as in carefully choosing and combining thereof. Keeping those help elements that remind you that you're playing a game as few and as implicit as possible is definitely one of the important things.

I repeat that all in all it's clear that they're putting great deal of effort into the game. The amount of modelling and texturing alone is formidable. I like how most of the in-game models look, the new design for glukkons and the concept art. But the devil is in the detail. I wouldn't have cared less to comment if Oddworld were just another mediocre game universe. I really hope Soulstorm does not turn out to be one of those 'play and forget' games.

P. S. I also really hope they release the editing tools. It's understandable that the creators may prefer to hold full control of their property but take a look at Half-Life for example. The SDK became available roughly at the same time as the game was released. It's been around for more than 20 years and people still keep making really good add-ons for it and updating the goldsource engine.

I pretty much agree with you about the state of SoulStorm but I would argue that Oddworld's strongest aspect was the gameplay and the atmosphere. The story was never the outstanding aspect about Oddworld, although it was well-told in AO.

Since AO the games have gradually ditched the tone and gameplay aspects that made the original so memorable, in service of Lorne's ever-changing "vision" and his insistence on having this huge epic Quintology that I don't think he even has much of an idea about.

AO was a fluke. OWI had the right people at the right time, everything came together really well and it pretty much shat out a golden egg. Then, maybe a few white eggs, but now it's just giving us rotten eggs with yellow paint on them, and telling us that they're gold.

Because that makes such a difference...

---

Admiral Zaarin I completely agree with your reasoning (plus the addition of double jump!). You're completely right in why AO was loved and I would love a sequel true to the flavour of the original too.

However, you are not going to get it. Ever. AE was the closest you'll ever get to your perfect sequel.

Despite how much I hate reading what he writes, Nep is kind of right:

There are going to be so many things you dislike in SS, that you "want to help improve" before release, but it won't change much at all. Most of what we have seen is past the point of no return.
There are so many examples of spectacular original entertainment (Shrek, Toy Story, Assassins Creed and Command and Conquer to name a few) where they may get a great sequel or two but cannot maintain that success.

Let's just be patient, maybe lower our expectations so that we can love the game we get even more, stress less and try to enjoy life.

Nah them eggs is rotten boi

Yes, instead of setting our standards high to get great work, let's just hope for shit and then settle when we get piss.