Postmortem: Rev7
By Marty Bee
Rev7 shipped in the spring of 2003. It is a new look at games for Christians.
I had some things go very right with the game and some things go very wrong. I want to discuss what works and what doesnt (and what I have learned for the future!) Specifically I would like to discuss the following:
What is Rev7?
Rev7 is really the THIRD generation of an idea that began in 1998. I wanted to do something that related to the Book of Revelation. The Left Behind series of books was very popular then and I had found the Book of Revelation to be very interesting to study and look through. But as I started to work my way through the book I found that I was getting into the first 3 chapters a lot more. These are the chapters everyone ignores because Christ is talking to each church and telling them what is wrong with what they are doing and what they can get as a reward if they fix it. Next step was to decide whether its going to be historical or allegorical. I chose the allegorical path.
For instance the first church, Ephesus, has left its first love, Christ. So he says they must return to their first love then they would be able to eat of the fruit of life in the Garden of Paradise. So I got a garden, I got a maze to follow. I added an angel in each level to sort of tell you where to go and what to do. This one was a little farmer dude. When you enter the level you are assaulted by walking alarm clocks (you havent been spending time with God so Time is the enemy). If you can make it through, you arrive at the Fruit of Life jelly jar.
The overall look and feel borrows a lot from architecture of the 60s and 50s, better known as the Atomic Age or Jetson look. I aged everything appropriately so its more like run down Atomic Age. What else goes better with this sort of look than Surf Guitar and Beach music?
I took a shooter approach to it. Seeing as you are really not shooting anything human, that solves the moral conundrum of killing things in games for a concerned Christian or parent. Also the enemies dont explode in a spray of blood and guts, they just fade away most times (its just a story anyway.)
What Went Right
1. A look and feel no one else had. It fit a look and feel that hadnt been out there in the Christian Market yet. They have Quake style games like Catechumen and Eternal Warriors, they have excellent RPGs like Battle at Hebron but nothing that fits the odd, little funny games like Alice or Oddworld.
2. The look fit my personal style. An illustrator from Dallas I admire very much told me that I couldnt do dark games, I wasnt dark enough. But I COULD do weird and a bit funny. I explain it this way, I do a cartoon rabbit but it sort of looks like Uncle Festers bunny from the Addams Family. I do cartoons and weird little monsters in my head and on paper ALL the time. Nothing gets my creative juices flowing better than watching really BAD science fiction. The characters reflect this sort of aesthetic.
3. I added a bible study. It may be more correct to say I did the bible study then added a game. In other words, I did the study on Revelation 1-3 then asked myself how could I twist this into some sort of gameplay.
4. I LEARNED a lot of new things. Sounds lame, but I didnt really know all that much about game design, modeling or anything else before I started this process in 1998. I began with the A3 version (read DOOM like engine) from Conitec.
5. Dealt with 3 engines. The first engine, A3, was very good for its time. But it was just being replaced by A4-A5 which brought me into true 3D rendered environments. The problem was that it is VERY good if you know enough programming to add some very basic things that are missing from their templates like melee combat and a changing controls. It is superior to the engine I chose finally for making puzzles, and a lot of new ideas on gameplay. The engine I chose is really a shell for Genesis3D. It is the engine that drives Catechumen only with the Reality Factory shell, all the hard C++ stuff is taken out and you only have to do some very minimal scripting. I am relatively happy with this engine and shell although I am looking very seriously at the Torque engine (Tribes2) for the future.
What Went Wrong
1. It took too long really. If I would have made my game engine a priority I would have not stayed as long with A5 and Game Studio. But my loyalty was so strong& I could have probably redone the Quake 1 engine in the years I spent dealing with this engine problem.
2. Reality Factory Problems. No engine is perfect. Being open source and basically unfounded, the engine has bugs that just dont get worked out. Some XP machines with sp2 tank when they try to run an RF game. There is also no multiplayer with the current release. It seems I will forever be trying new engines...
3. I didn't plan as well as I should have. Someone very early on told me NOT to make a game till you get it all worked out on paper, gameplay, sketches, flowcharts. Whatever it takes to solidify a plan. I PLAN to plan next time& hindsight is 20/20
4. I don't play enough games. I get so involved in doing and making I dont spend enough time playing. One of the best levels in Rev7 is the Thyatira circus ring where you are chased by flying clown heads (with batwings). You escape them by jumping into teleporters which send you to another part of the arena. I got that inspiration reading about Unreal Tournament level design, so DUH, must get console, DUH, must play games (my PC works too.)
5. I didnt find a BIG partner. The idea of a success takes a TEAM, or at least partner with enough money to finance the project, OR you find a partner that provides what you dont have. In my case I really needed TWO partners; a programmer, and an investor.
The Bottomline
I think that what I learned from the process is really the reward from the journey. I learned that I really dont need to do a game that looks like a game. If I try to hard at emulation it ends up looking like a cheesy copy. What I really need to do is listen to my internal compass, and its telling me whacky, do whacky&. Someone once told me I need to do 10 games before I get a good one, this is really only number 3& (expect 7 more).
The other thing that is just dawning on me is that I need to work from the sketch to the game. Tim Burton's movies and dolls and books are all an extension of his drawings. They are the genesis of the movies, not the other way around. So its shut up and draw time.
Future thinking
I havent followed my own rules. I am done with a serious survival shooter called XIBALBA. It is an outgrowth of an earlier game study I did in Game Studio. Then because that was done I just extended it into a haunted house game using the same game shell and menu& When House of Spirits is done (XIBALBA is DONE by the way) I want to return to my whacky roots. I have a vision of a game that happens between life and death, you play a college student on the way home for Christmas, you get in a wreck and find yourself between life and death, Heaven and Hell, in a very strange and deadly place, and you need to make the right decisions& Of course the enemies are darkly comic, such as Nietzches clowns, the Root Man and the flying Santa Skull Bats.
