Before he left us like they all do, like they always do, our dear Lighthouse Customer took a look at Interstellar Marines [official site], a tactical sci-fi FPS making its way through Early Access. Even back in October it was in pretty decent shape, with some horrible robots out for your organic blood, so how's it looking after another four months of updates? Well, you can see for yourself, as it's now in a free week-long trial on Steam.
]]>Each Monday, Chris Livingston visits an early access game and reports back with stories about whatever he finds inside. This week, screaming in space can definitely be heard in Interstellar Marines.
As an interstellar marine, it goes without saying that I'm the best of the best. I'm tough as nails. I've seen it all and I'm ready for anything. I scream like a preschooler and fire entire clips in a messy panic. Okay, maybe the last one doesn't fit with the image, but I can't help it: when malfunctioning robots run at me from the darkness I scream. Then I fire a flood of panicky bullets into them far longer than strictly necessary. Then I run away and try to hide. I'm an interstellar marine. And I'm terrified.
]]>In the early days of alphafunding, long before we settled on the term "early access", Zero Point Software came up with the loathsome "AAA Indie". In 2009 they started crowdfunding Interstellar Marines, a type of game impossible in AAA Dependent: an FPS about space marines. Oh, but I'm too cruel. After years of prototypes and milestones ranging from a shooting gallery to competitive multiplayer, Zero Point updated it on Friday with the first iteration of what they've teased since 2006: single-player and co-op story missions.
]]>Indie Gala's latest bundle looks a rather nice one. The IndieGala Intersellar packs in Cubicity, Interstellar Marines and Rush Bros. all for a buck, and then Beast Boxing Turbo, Sang-Froid: Tales Of Werewolves, Interstellar Marines' Spearhead Edition, and PixelJunk Shooter for $6. Or more, of course. And they've just added in another game (although the website doesn't acknowledge it yet), Finding Teddy.
]]>Zero Point's Interstellar Marines has a perception problem. I had a look at a bunch of comments people have made about it in the various news stories we've posted: some people are intrigued by the promised RPG shooter that's been inspired by Deus Ex and System Shock; others decry it as 'generic', and failing to live up to its promise. I can see both sides. For all their promises, all that's really been delivered is a multiplayer shooter and bits of admittedly impressive tech. For a game announced in 2005, that's not a huge amount of progress. It's something that the developers address a little bit in the trailer below, with a breathless narrator mocking the lead dev's ambitions as he pitches the game to Steam Early Access customers.
]]>Zero Point, the team behind ambitious tactical sci-fi FPS, Interstellar Marines, have sat down to talk to you guys about their "Prologue" game. With just a few days to go on their Kickstarter they are still a long way from their $600k target, and they're aiming to tell you enough to get you excited about their project. As they explain: "Since our Kickstarter campaign started it has been clear to us that our explanation of Prologue has been somewhat vague. So we decided to sit down in a cozy environment, with the limited time that we have, and go through the experience from A to Z, like we've never done before!"
Take a look at their ten-minute video below.
]]>Interstellar Marines developers Zero Point have sent word that they'll be making their proof-of-concept multiplayer game taster, Deadlock, available to everyone for E3 week, and the following weekend. It's right here. The game is provided in a Unity plugin, so you can play it straight from your browser, into a multiplayer game.
Zero Point have also produced a rather heart-felt new trailer for the rest of their project, which you can see below. The glimpses of the game that are shown in there certainly look pretty promising, and it encompasses both a single-player campaign and multiplayer tactical shooter stuff. Ambitious indeed. Go take a look.
]]>A year ago we spoke to Zero Point about their extraordinarily ambitious Unity-powered tactical sci-fi shooter, Interstellar Marines. They told us about how they were largely relying on the support of the community, and pre-order packages, to get the game made. To that end they've been releasing a few bits and piece of technology to their pre-ordering folk, and the biggest release so far appeared yesterday, and is detailed in a video below. Deadlock 0.3.0 is a multiplayer game mode that should, the devs explain, give players a better taste of the vision they have for the game. It's also the first thing that Zero Point have released in some time, so it must come as a relief to those who have shelled out cash for the project. See below for more.
]]>Earlier this week I took some time out of my merciless schedule of reblogging the trailers for the sequels to 2007 action games to have chat with Danish indies Zero Point. Game director Kim Haar Jørgensen told me about how Hired Guns, System Shock 2, and Deus Ex had all fed into the creation of their Unity-powered co-op sci-fi shooter, Interstellar Marines. You might have already encountered this “AAA Indie” project via Bullseye or Running Man, the browser-based mini-games that Zero Point have used to promote their title. The full game, however, is something much more formidable, as Jørgensen was to explain. It's quite project for just a handful of devs, so I was keen to find out how they were getting on.
]]>Zero Point want to explain their (frankly fairly impressive) Unity-powered first-person shooter, Interstellar Marines, to you. To do this they have created a four-minute trailer, which shows off the game in action, and talks about how you can support their attempt to make a full-blown FPS without the resources of a big studio. It's fun. It's even got some jokes in. Go take a look.
We'll be talking to Zero Point about their project quite soon.
]]>I've said it before, but I really like what Zero Point Software are doing with the little Unity teases that they are releasing for their game. The most recent is some "Advanced Combat Training", which you can play over on the main site.
The training takes place two kilometers below ground deep inside a secret military facility. Here you'll face an onslaught of challenging Combat Training Robot in a range of different training environments. If you succeed you'll be one step closer to becoming a part of the elite battalion of Interstellar Marines secretly being established as first line of defense against other sentient species.
And they've trailered it for our convenience, below. Good stuff.
]]>Perhaps the most impressive thing about Zeropoint Software's unity-powered FPS Interstellar Marines is the way they've packed a website with tidbits leading up to release. You've been able to check out a bunch of the game models within the Unity plugin, and even test out some of the weapons. Folks who pre-order will now be able to play a test version of the game, called Running Man. All placeholdery stuff of course, but even that has a sense of style, and it looks as if Zeropoint have crafted the most solid shooter I've seen in Unity itself. I'm genuinely interested in seeing how this is going to turn out. Fancy trailery stuff below.
]]>The preview/hype campaign for Zero Point's upcoming 'AAA indie' shooter Interstellar Marines continues to be interesting. Following on from their Unity-powered 3D scene thinger, they've now made a browser-based minigame to show off some of the tone and feel of the thing. Sure, it's just about shooting pop-up targets - an FPS tutorial stage writ large - but they've made it more than the sum of its cursor-onto-cardboard-face parts.
]]>Zero Point Software have released a clever new preview asset of their game, using the Unity plugin. It's a kind of "3D screenshot" that they're calling The Vault. You can go in and have a look around, and see some of the titular marines in 3D, frozen in time fighting some manner of shark monsters. It's pretty neat, and the dates on the vault walls suggest that more of these 3D vignettes will be revealed in the coming months. The sci-fi co-op shooter has been in development for quite some time now, so we're hoping this indicates the start of a more concerted reveal of just what's going on with the title the studio are calling a "AAA Indie" project.
Folks who can't be bothered installing Unity (and given the amount of cool stuff it's throwing up now, you probably should be bothered) can get a taste of the vault via a new teaser trailer which I've posted below.
]]>Hmm. Interstellar Marines is an indie-developed high-sheen FPS which is... well, I'm intrigued for a load of reasons. Partially because it looks novel (Talking about trying to do a realistic first-contact alien event) and partially because of its route to market. The short version - for more read the press coverage - is that in 2006 they used a high-end game engine to do a demo, which got attention, they turn away from major publishers in favour of indie-dev... which makes the engine too expensive, so they're moving over to another one. Which they can't show in game footage publicly. Yet. It's also got an interesting development philosophy - interesting in that it manages to be both self-deprecating (in its insistence on the import of the community and attention) and self-aggrandizing (not least in calling it "AAA Indie". As in, if they're AAA indie, what are everyone else?). Do read. Those videos they can show are below...
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