Rayman: Revenge of the Dark

[Spanex]

Well phew. It saved a recover file there. Thanks for telling me.

[Adsolution]

Goodie! Doo you think you'll have it done by today or tomorrow perhaps?

[Spanex]

Not today anymore, and I have a long workshift tomorrow. But after that I'll have plenty of time. However I've already made a template of the texture for the eyes, feathers and clothing. I only need to think of a good template for the beak, and the rest of the bones won't be hard.

I also found out the ribcage and spine were lost in the process. I'm too far to redo the whole thing, so if I just send you a random seamless bone texture, you can use that on the missing bones once you add them back in. Is that an idea?

[LKPettin2]

Rayfan,
I have one minor (or not) question for you.
I'm really interested about the beginnings of making ROTD. What induced you to making a fangame being only 14(or 15, just I looked at announcement date-2009). Were you really interested in making 3d models, animating, etc.? Or someone affected you?
Sorry for mah curiosity, but I think that revealing some secrets about this would be really interesting and...inspiring for me.
I'm beginner in creating games, and you're the person who may be....some sort of pattern (I mean person who is worth following, I'm learning English so if am I writing wrong, please correct me. RPC is good place to learning new things) and inspiration...
And sorry for my English. Again? xD

[PluMGMK]

(I mean person who is worth following, I'm learning English so if am I writing wrong, please correct me. RPC is good place to learning new things)

I think the word you're looking for is "hero". (but it's definitely not "pattern"!)

[Shrooblord]

'Rolemodel' is probably the word you were looking for.

Didn't this use to be someone else's project that you took over, RayFan?

[Adsolution]

@Shrewb: No.


I've explained this once a while ago, but I didn't go in-depth whatsoever really. Let's see if I can actually dig up some old sketchbooks of mine from when I was eight or nine...

It all started when I was seven, and I started drawing a little sidescroller of mine named "Rayman & Moskito." It was kind of disturbing in a way, but I worked on drawing out every bit of every level until completion three years later. /the plot is very similar to Revenge of the Dark here, except slightly modified, implying that Moskito was along with you for the whole adventure. It's actually startling now how much I realise that Revenge of the Dark is like this little thing I made up in primary/elementary school. Anyway, without further ado:

"Paint Planet," very reminiscent of Rayman 1 here:



Music Mountain:


And then, this is where it starts to get a little more disturbing: the mosquitoes think that you are Dark Rayman, and are killing themselves before you can reach them because of the torture stories they had heard. Some are even killing eachother, some of which did not want to die:



And then here's the 'cut scene' leading up to the final phase of the final fight:




Kay, well it's not really that, er, "disturbing" from this point of view here, but in one of the other 40 sketchbooks I used to draw out this game (which I all have I believe, I just don't feel like looking), there's... a lot of torture, hahah. One of them includes Dark Rayman squeezing together Moskito's mother's eyes, popping them, then burying Rayman alive, forcing Moskito to use his dead mother's proboscis to dig him up. A couple things like that.

Later on though, as I grew more fond of digital stuff I started learning how to use flash when I was eight or nine, and I eventually came across Google Sketchup when I was eleven. I made an extremely half-lame (but not god awful) Rayman model with it (August 2007):



I really had no hero or inspiration per se, I just came up with the idea to remake the Rayman model in May 2009 after downloading 3ds Max for some reason. I never intended to use for anything, but then I thought for a moment: Rayman 1 is my favourite game of all time, what if it were to be made into 3D? My first real Crysis mod? So I started making up a Dream Forest-like environment and slapped my shitty Rayman model on the basic Crysis biped rig by following a tutorial. I began making this mock-up Dream Forest using default Crysis assets:




I just called it "Rayman 1 3D Project" at that time. Sabertooth0000000001 posted the video here on RPC before I joined, under this thread, and it got attention a month before I even signed up (I signed up because of this); my first post is the second post of mine on the first page. The first OP was Sabertooth, but DesLife gave me ownership of the thread in late 2010.

In December, when a guy by the name of Wariofan (or as I like to call him, Wariofuckingfaggot, which I'll explain later)" suggested the subtitle "Revenge of the Dark" after I decided it wouldn't be a clone of Rayman 1. I liked it, so I called the game "Rayman 1.5: Revenge of the Dark." Later though the 1.5 sounded stupid, so at the advice of many forum members here, I dropped it. I worked on it for a year till I got this custom piece of crap in October 2010:



Why do I call him Wariofuckingfaggot? Because he also inspired a few of my level concepts such as Into the Blaze, and a couple others. We got into an argument in which he started breaking the boundaries of illogicality, claiming that I was a corporate sellout if I didn't listen to my fans 100%, and include their ideas exactly 100% as they were originally stated. After his load of highbrow and personal insults, I decided to completely kick him out and use his slightly modified concepts and title without giving him credit whatsoever. If he wants credit for something, he can do it himself, that fucking twat.

I started slowly working on more levels, but shortly after in 2011, with the release of Crysis 2, it was announced that a free, standalone game-development tool was going to be released shortly thereafter. When August came around, it was released, and I put up this load of crap:



And then in November:



The following year was troublesome. As many may remember, at the end of January, the index chip on my hard drive containing ROTD was suddenly scrambled while doing an overnight rendering project, so I woke up to find it entirely inoperable. The only chance at recovery was to pay upwards of $1000 to have it sent to California to be repaired. Many members were willing to donate, but in my view it wasn't worth it, so I started rebuilding after losing over four months of progress.

Then came the really freaking tricky part. Because of the method I was using to work Rayman's mechanics, it was not permanent, it only stayed per-level and could not be worked on something instance-based, which was very bad. I needed to truly export a rigged, animated character. I was given the opportunity to work closely with the animation-programmer lead of Crytek (while simultaneously working on other environments seen in various videos of mine), taking months and months solving this limbless-character mystery that had never been done before. Then, on July 7th of all days, Record Day, we finally solved it and Rayman was successfully exported as an all-purpose animated CryEngine character. This caused me to ignore Record Day for the most part and spit out about ten different animations, resulting in only about 230 posts instead the exact 1000 I got last year. Then at the start of September, I released the long-awaited half-hour update, the first time showing a gameplay in ten months:



Now, I have largely improved what's even seen in that video. For instance, the running animation is a lot more "hop-skippy" like it was in Rayman 2, and also more detailed. I've even added modified animations for running uphill and downhill, which greatly add to the dynamic of the gameplay, and I've added an idle landing and jumping animation, as well as high-fall rolls (like in Rayman 2, but they only happen if you jump from higher up), sliding, ledgegrabs, and complete helicopter animations (the mechanic of which still has to be implemented). I've also vastly improved many of the staler looking environments seen in the August/September update.

How is Rayman & Moskito similar to Revenge of the Dark? Well, I had gone back to my original concept, and I've actually attempted to incorporate some of the very raw and twisted things I had originally come up with back then, including Dark Rayman's personality: A hurt, angry, childish and powerful leader with absolutely no soul or regret or pattern in what he does. He's never satisfied, he just wants the world to burn along with himself.

So ya, thar you have it. That's sort of a history run-down of this game.

[Minor-T5]

Lets give Rayfan a big applause!
EDIT: Or a big thumbs up for telling us that story.

[Adsolution]

Hah thanks! Also, thanks for the signature quote.

[Minor-T5]

Your welcome.

[Master]

That was a most interesting and enlightening read, Rayfan, it's nice to hear just how far you've come and although I've known of this project for a while, it's interesting to hear events preceding my knowledge.

[Shrooblord]

I just called it "Rayman 1 3D Project" at that time. Sabertooth0000000001 posted the video here on RPC before I joined, under this thread, and it got attention a month before I even signed up (I signed up because of this); my first post is the second post of mine on the first page. The first OP was Sabertooth, but DesLife gave me ownership of the thread in late 2010.

Ah yes, this is what gave me that idea in the first place; I remember you saying at some point that you got ownership of this thread, so that made me assume that the whole concept of the thread was orignally someone else's.

He's never satisfied, he just wants the world to burn along with himself.

Oh that's very grim. A good personality flaw for an evil character, though I wonder what hardship could have possibly twisted his mind into this desire.

So ya, thar you have it. That's sort of a history run-down of this game.

It was very interesting to hear about it! You've been planning this for a long time, I see, far longer than I have. I started thinking of my game after I sketched a character that will belong in the Rayman universe but currently doesn't. This was the Summer holiday of 2011, so that's more than one year ago, but not more than that. Coincidentally I am - while writing - listening to recording of music for the game from almost exactly one year ago.

[R3fan2]

I was going to say something but now I don't think I will.

[Shrooblord]

I was going to say something but now I don't think I will.

Then... why do so? Don't worry - you can speak your mind.

[Disionity]

You are an inspiration to me Rayfan, in terms of veritably proving that anyone can make a video game. I've been coming up with ideas for a 2D platformer since October 2010 when I first created the main protagonist and the universe and characters that surround him. With no knowledge of programing, my alternative software is GameMaker for developing the project. My vision is to create a very fun and unique game that really pushes GameMaker's 2D capabilities. Being the name of the main character thus, the game is called: The Screech. I might upload some old character sketches later for a start. And if the project gets fully off the ground, I'll make a thread for it. Anyone can tell me if they're interested to see more details.

[Haruka]

It was nice reading your resume, Rayfan!

Only reminding that I found absolutely epic when I saw your project video footage for the first time.

[LKPettin2]

Thank you very much for telling us that awesome story!
It in one part reminds me.
When I was 11 I made a lot of games on The Games Factory, but I haven't copied them on any CD or something else and with crash of my computer it had lost...
At the moment I'm playing something with Doom Engine and I started this year learning in...mhm...I don't know what will it be called in English, but it is Informatics school (?)....So I'll discover more about programming, 3D, repairing computers, etc.
Also guys thank you for correcting me... I felt that "pattern" would match better to clothes xD

[ikke471]

I have to say that that was quitte informing.
Thank you, I really enjoyed it (not being sarcastic here)

[TeensieKing]

I'm impressed by how it all started with drawings when you were 7 and now it all turned into this. You're gonna go far, I'm sure this game is going to be big and you're gonna get to work for some good company! Maybe Ubisoft Or you could end up making the perfect return for Crash Bandicoot, or making really imaginative and cool Mario games, the next Raymans...

[Tortwag]

I can't believe I missed so many things because of Highschool. I'm gonna post a real comment after reading that.