The concept of the idea in general is absolutely brilliant. However, I feel like a seperate, yet connected atmosphere would be beneficial to this - having our own forums, but constantly connects to FuturePoly. I can get a forum up and running - the money it would cost is near negligible, but I'd like to talk to a few people about it before I finalize everything.

For those of you who are interested, send me a PM with what you think the forums should be called, and I'll tally you down. In the end we'll decide on a name, and I'll host it.

Also: Elias, you have nice taste in gaming - Demon's Souls is my favorite game of all time, thus far.

@ Michael - I feel something related to GW, but a parallel dimension /parody was a relatable content. That way the instructors can ooh/ahh the publiks intepretation of their content but it is still different and unique enough for its own verse. I was feeling between GW + expansion packs and GW2, what was the missing story, the rougue element that woke up all the dragons tsunamis and chaos.

Well, my intepretation of it was other beings. This could range from modern day New Yorker, Milanese, Londoner and the commonswine flu, being chucked through Portal and straight into the tail end of GW. The chaos that results is purely farcical and almost bumbling, but had catostrophic results (and maybe...it ends up with saving the day)

Put it another way, what if some bumbling Joe blog, bumbled into the backlot of a casting and stage studio of Guild Wars....

Pro Edit: I was thinking, that to start off  - if some folk are amenable to this, that a moodboard (encompassing 6-10 key elements) are established.

The Moodboard

So for example, on the Left corner - are 6 enviro pieces of GW1, on the far Right, are 6 contrasting enviro pieces from GW2 (from what can be dissectable online. there was a large post of stuff that Daniel showcased at last years GDC, so much so he had to catch his breath inbetween)

Then, for the art direction and style folks want to establish and produce, you stick yoru 6 choosen references inbetween. The art direction aspect (can take weeks) but to make it quick and dirty, just choose 6 KEY aspects that is enough to make GW 1.5 different( eg. mars attacks) , + bonus (and maybe one thing that still ties it all in the GW world)

Why a Moodboard

For our daily work, it is essential to produce bespoke content for the client. Now, if you are lucky - lets say 2-3 clients want you to design a new asset, say a new action figure hero, but they all choose the same REF image (seriously, I gurantee you 60% of publishers/developers have the same image at some point) eg. Josh Holloway

Thus, you have two choices.

One, paint exactly what the client wants.

Two, paint what the client wants, but go far left, far right and middle whilst still retaining the bare essence of the supplied character ref.

To produce something unique and different, will require iteration and exploration. This means, doing the basic homework of reference hunting (applicable to ANY art asset - eg enviros, props, transports, creatures, hero chars) either with one owns photograpy, books, life drawing and... google (perhaps ignore the first 20 hits - chances are, some otehr studio has typed in the same variables, so do NOT get hooked on the ref you really like or offer to use it as a base for your client. But keep it handy - because if you're really, REALLY lucky - the client wants you to paint exactly the ref supplied)

In addition, the moodboard allows you to internally establish your own art direction. It helps you build, fill and enrich your visual database. Even if you've been doing the same art genre and style for 15 years, the moodboard (diligently explored) is crucial - much like warmups for martial arts so one does not get stale.

eg. Does the big Daddy needs rivets. Are these rivets large, small, smooth, shaven, welded, grooved on etc...

Here is a quick analysis of the current GW2 vs GW1 architecture, mood and feel available on the net.

File Attachment(s):

GW2-Moodboard.jpg (1,328kb) downloaded 294 time(s).

GW1-Moodboard.jpg (1,335kb) downloaded 291 time(s).

Hello all, sorry if I was not around these past few days. I agree with David in going out of the box; this is for fun completely; for example, we can fantasize that our army of engineers have developed a way to put together 500 people in one massive FPS. Our job is to create the environments and the chars that will run wild in this brave new world.

How about this: anyone with an idea, post it here. Give some specifics if you want, like where and when its your idea based, what kind of game (RPG, FPS, etc.). Just don't go overboard with details!

We also give it a deadline for ideas submission: I propose the 20th. When all ideas are submitted, we can vote on which one we all like. And then we begin work =)

I'll go ahead and present mine: it's called "Airland" (yes, it has an humouristic tint), and its about an entire town that has been long enamored with the idea of taking up to the skies. The genre is a mash-up of sandbox ala GTA, and simplistic flight simulator. We need a main character, chars for multiplayer, lots of vehicles, and of course, ludicrous landscapes that allow for wild sky acrobatics and heart-pounding races.

I'll leave it at that so anyone who reads the idea starts cranking mental images for this :)

I think this is an epic idea, but why make it a faux concept?  Take it to the next level.  I am part of a open source game development team.  Curently we are working on our engine but some of use use pre existing engines (UDK, Source and Unity) 

I would really like to see more than just the 8 or 9 of us we have now on our forums.  So any one who is interested please come over to our forums and help out or start your own projects.

http://legacyofterror.net/forums

The engine and community are call Rabbit Byte.

What is RabbitByte:

RabbitByte is a Free open source game engine and community aimed at a single goal, Freedom.  

The Engine, RabbitByte is a Open Source game engine written in the Python programming language. It utilizes OpenGL and is designed from the ground up to work on any OS with 3D acceleration, OpenGL and Python support. Our only goal for RabbitByte is to provide a powerful engine that can rival even the best proprietary engines. Lets show the world what Free can do.



Community:

RabbitByte is developed by a group of gamers who have become disenfranchised with the major game publishers for there flawed secretive development process.  At RabbitByte we feel that game development should be open to the person that will use the software the most You.  This means that every update on every project from concept to completed game will be released to the community.  Unlike most major game publishers updates these will be in depth progress reports, every thing the development team knows you know.  Each monthly update will have all: Concept art, Models, Storylines and Source code from the previous month of work.

Have an idea? share it with us.  We feel that the creativity of the game community as a whole is largely untapped by major game publishers.  So we are always looking for new talent, please share your: Game ideas, Artwork, Code help, and Models have a specific item or mechanic you particularly want to see in a game, you no longer need to ask the developers and just hope the see fit to grant your wish.  You code/model and texture it and we will do our best to incorporate it into the final product.

I loved playing stalker! What if we combined a few of these, made a city in the sky that had a nuclear reactor on it for power that had exploded and created mostly wasteland in the floating city, and the reason they made a floating city in the first place was because of an increase in terrestrial distasters continually happening on the surface. Haha, I'd play a game in that setting

finally got back from interstate and away from that crappy wireless internet.

Well my msn is... gkrit581@hotmail.com PM me here any details I should know (if possible).

Gotta get back into the swing of things here and hopefully I can jump on board with everyone else.

I would love to participate too. Please put me in, my MSN is: danilofs85@hotmail.com

Perhaps we could start a group on Facebook to keep everything organized.
And BTW i really agree with David that it would be better if we just wait for our 8 classes to be finished, first for having full time to dedicate ourselfs on assigments, and second for having the chance to put all 8 week classes knowledge into our project.

What you guys think about that? :)