Story Changes

[Bek]

We should be realistic guys. This mod will never be released with tasks like that (rewriting the whole story, implementing new main characters etc). Even though the ideas are good and interesting, it's just not realistic for our small community. We should work with what've got from JK2 and JKA and try to make the best out of it.

*Ouch* You might as well lock this thread at this point, I totally believe that this mod can be released with these ideas implemented (to a certain degree) in the final version. All it takes is knowledge, willpower, and time; something which not everybody has. Regardless I always look to the Half-Life 2 Black Mesa mod for inspiration here. Although to a minute degree, it changed some of the flaws the original game had in the first place, while adding new content (ignoring the fact it was a HD remake).

 

Keep faith in your abilities, guys! You're some of the smartest people I know. All these ideas I'm hearing are awesome keep them up.

[afi]

I think most people who are around as long as I am and worked on big mods will agree with me here. Almost all mod projects fail because of the unrealistic goals. And working with people who are enthusiastic doesn't help because half a year later one of them is busy with school/work, one other works on another project and the last one doesn't care anymore about modding at all.

Again, I like all those ideas (and it's not for me to decide which are good or bad anyway) but I'd rather have a smaller but finished mod than one that failed because of unrealistic goals and infeasible tasks.

If you come up with an idea on how to implement all this in a way that doesn't mean years of work then I'm all for it though (no sarcasm intended).

[Kualan]

Yeah, I think people - enthusiastic as they are about the possibilities - can often underestimate the time, effort and committment needed to make even the smallish of changes to a video game.

 

As someone who made a total conversion mod for Skyrim, trust me - a project of even modest scale takes hours, weeks and even years to complete. Granted, we're not talking total conversion here, but JKA also isn't as easily moddable as Bethesda games, so it balances out.

 

Example:

 

Replacing Tavion with Hethrir or someone else, for example, is not undoable so long as we have a good voice artist. We would essentially just do a model-swap from Tavion to the new character, then re-record all of Tavion's lines with the new characters. So long as the new lines match up one-for-one with the vanilla ones in terms of quantity and placement (and file names), we won't have to edit scripts or cinematics as they would draw automatically from the new voice files.

 

However, then comes the butterfly effect.

 

Okay, Tavion is gone. Hethrir is here. All the lines now speak with Hethrir's voice. But what about all the occasions where other characters talk about Tavion? Are we going to re-record Luke's dialogue? And Kyle's? And Jaden's, Rosh's, Alora's? From one replacement we already have a vast web of corrections and alterations to make - and that's even without changing the actual story. I'm sure @@Circa would attest to similar issues with his Prequel Conversion mod (that I still play from time to time when I fancy an SP run).

[Circa]

Just read the past two comments and I get what's being said here. I recommend not replacing characters. That'll be a huge project, like Kualan said. For me, getting new dialogue might be simple enough but that's a lot of dialogue and changes to be made.

 

My recommendation is to make new missions to fill the empty space in the story and make characters more interesting, rather than completely changing the story itself. Sounds like too much work, and like afinity said, probably won't get done.

 

Small goals. Mod projects should be accumulative. Start small, build upon what you have. There are too many projects that just get abandoned by people dreaming too big too fast.

[Guest Redemption]

"Well hello there...."

 

therfiles asked for any ideas and that "nothing was off the table". I gave mine and "we" got constructive feedback on why such an idea, if given attention is a bad way to go, due to the effort involved. Ok, I agree on what has been said... to a certain degree.

 

I am well aware of the amount of time and effort involved with modding. I have been modding as a hobby for years. One of my mods for an example is for Dawn of War 2 which I started way back in 2010, that I come back to now and then; still not happy with it but I keep at it until I get the results I want or accept a nice compromise. So I DO understand the frustrations involved, as in...  trying to get something to work by learning by trial and error/tutorials and on the other hand, awaiting for a mod that may NEVER be released due to well, what was said in the earlier posts.

 

I do not agree with the assumption however, that was associated with my post of being ignorant to the effort involved. The countless hours in modding, I know all to well thank you very much.

 

My own edited version of Outcast, which I am very pleased with, includes many mods from the community which I am glad to be apart of. Edits of mine are tinkerings here and there of others contribution's to models, skins, shaders, effects and textures. My own are slight animation edits and mostly menu alterations (only accredited to me can be placements and photoshops of included imagery). I've noticed others have come to the same idea of adding saber crystals and holocrons, as by a means of enhancing the players abilities. I think its a nice touch, so I added this to Outcast awhile back and will expand upon it in Academy eventually.

 

I am grateful to the modders who have created their works to improve in my opinion, the best Jedi/Shooter game out there (JO).

 

Back on track.

I am not a fan of most of the animations in Academy specifically the wallrun/flip ones. I much prefer the more realistic and smooth ones from Outcast

How can I forget, the saberlocking in Outcast to me is way better, as in you didn't go into a stupid kill animation everytime that you won!

 

I know these animation changes ain't story changing, they just take me out of the game.

 

Link to Steam Pictures:http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198006056436/screenshots/?appid=6030

Edited September 14, 2015 by Redemption

[gerbilOFdoom]

I would say building new missions would come first.

 

A new tier of missions and an 'academy' hub would be a good start.

 

After that modifying the original story arc and characters would be a reasonable goal.

[Kualan]

I would say building new missions would come first.

 

A new tier of missions and an 'academy' hub would be a good start.

 

After that modifying the original story arc and characters would be a reasonable goal.

 

Yeah, as suggested for the Saga Mod, I'd recommend we settle on a consensus for a single mission everyone feels they can contribute to - then focus on bringing that to fruition as a proof of concept. If a single, polished SP mission can be put together, then it makes it easier to expand that to more and more missions in the future as we would have (hopefully) ironed out most of the creases in the process the first time.

[afi]

Sounds like a plan

[Xycaleth]

Yeah, as suggested for the Saga Mod, I'd recommend we settle on a consensus for a single mission everyone feels they can contribute to - then focus on bringing that to fruition as a proof of concept. If a single, polished SP mission can be put together, then it makes it easier to expand that to more and more missions in the future as we would have (hopefully) ironed out most of the creases in the process the first time.

This is exactly what I would suggest. It's also a good gauge to see how long everything takes, how much interest all the contributors have in pushing things forward and potentially identifying any problems you have along the way.

[afi]

The good thing with this mod is that not everything needs to be finished in order to release something. Not like a total conversion where everything needs to be at 100% before you can release it as a whole.