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VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

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VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby icarus » Apr 17, 2010 9:24 am

Almost exactly a year ago, we heard reports that a company called Nihilistic Software was working on a video game adaptation of Voyage of the Dawn Treader, but since then we have yet to hear a single thing about the game. So today i thought i would turn my attentions to seeing what i could find out about the status of the game and/or when we were likely to see something of it (i'd imagine there will be some sort of presence for the game at the E3 event, June 15-17).

So anyway, in my searching, i came across the online website for Tim Miller, who is the Lead Level Designer at Nihilistic Software, and his website contains a few plans for level designs which should immediately catch the attention of any Narnia fan out there, even if the they don't specifically say they are for Narnia. There are four or five images which i believe to be Narnia related, and can be found at this link below (they should be the first 5 images as you scroll through the images clicking right). As always though, these images come with the warning that they may be based on outdated concepts based on previous incarnations of the movie script, and of course that video game adaptations of movies always take massive liberties in expanding upon the source material to make for much more involved gameplay. So as always, don't read too much, if anything into them, however i'll offer my interpretation on the images below:

http://www.tim-miller.org/design.html

1. Lone Islands Map - The thing you should probably spot straight away, and the thing that most easilly identifies this map as the Lone Islands, is the labelling of "Doorn Island" in the top right corner. The other main points of note on this map would be the "Tree of Protection" in the middle (sounds a bit like something from the old movie script) and the fact that there are two windmills (i would never really of considered Narnia to be a Windmill sort of place). The second of these windmills is identified as being the "Hermit's Windmill". A Hermit is also referenced on the next map, so this could be some sort of recurring feature in the game, kind of like the travelling man in the Resident Evil 4 who pops up in random places to enable you to buy items for your character, rather than any particular character from the movie.

2. Dragon Island Map - The main thing that identifies this map are the annotations reading "Eustace Dragon End Flight" and what i would presume to be "Eustace Dragon Start Flight" (the text is cut off at the edge). You should also see labelling for the "Dragon's Lair". (You should also be able to see "Hermits Lair" this time). The most interesting point of note here, is that there is a smaller inset map provided reading "Flashback", whilst the main map reads "Present Day". My interpretation of this would be that they planned on including a flashback in the video game to the time of Lord Octesian on Dragon Island. Again, this seems like the sort of thing they would do in order to expand the amount of playable gameplay sections in a video game adaptation, but something that probably wouldn't be in the movie.

3. Island Connections Map - This map seems to show the various islands, and the connections which exist between them in the game, suggesting that the video game may have a non-linear structure to it. Its pretty hard to read what is written on them, but you can make out more than a few - the smaller sausage shaped blobs seem to read "Dawn Treader A", "Dawn Treader B" and "Dawn Treader C", indicating 3 levels set aboard the Dawn Treader. The big Orange circle in the bottom right corner clearly reads "Aslans Country", the big grey one i would assume to read "Dark Island" and unfortunately the green circle right in the middle unmistakably reads "Green Witch Castle". Though like i said, these are likely to be very early plans, based on long outdated concepts from an early draft of the script, so no need to panic.

4. Another Connectivity Map - This map again shows the various connections that exist between elements of the game, again suggesting the game will have a non-linear narrative (some of the islands descriptions here seem to be broken down into "First Visit" and "Return Visit" suggesting the game would require you to visit some islands more than once). Again its hard to read, but you should be able to notice a few things to identify it as Narnia, such as the little box with a little illustration that says "Rescue Lord Rhoop" and numerous references to various islands, characters and events.

In the bottom right of this diagram you should be able to see a list of playable characters, and below that a list of "Lords by Location" - interestingly GoldwaterDragon is listed as a single place, with two Lords credited as being found there (Restimar and Octesian you would assume). However, oddly there appears to be 8 names on the list. The notable anomaly here is that someone is listed as "Found Alive on Island of Voices", whereas in the book, this was the one main island that did not possess a Lost Lord. Glance over to the top right corner, and you should see a box that i would assume to represent the Islands of Voices in the game, and in is description it would seem to read "Lord Mavramorn, Dufflepuds", even though 3 Lords were still listed as being found on Ramandu's island on the previous list.

Also notable on this diagram is that all the "Boss Fights" are indicated in Purple, with the sea serpent cropping up as a boss a few times, a boss fight with Eustace Dragon also appearing, and under Dark Island... a boss fight with "Nightmare King"?. Also, in the middle of the diagram, another reference to the leaked script in the form of a box, seemingly representing the "Underland Kingdom" Again though - its only a videogame / its probably based on outdated early concepts.

5. Menu Systems - This one i'm not to sure about, as there is nothing on it to definitely tie it to Narnia. Anyway, it seems to be some sort of diagram showing how the menu options work. Contains possibly some test images from the in-game engine, which look to be on an island of some sort, so you might assume it was VDT.

http://www.tim-miller.org/design.html
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps?

Postby Reepicheep775 » Apr 17, 2010 10:45 am

A Narnia game made by a company called "Nihilistic Software"? I'm sure C.S. Lewis would be thrilled about that.:-w

Otherwise, cool find icarus! :)
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Lady_Liln » Apr 17, 2010 12:59 pm

Pretty interesting find, icarus! :ymapplause: I only poked around the rest of the website a tiny bit, but underneath his Writing Samples, you can scroll over to the "Quest Example" and it's most definitely from that first map. (Warning: one non-family-friendly word). Not really anything there, except that "Slave Girl" might be Gael? Also the idea of defeating "the Dragon" at this point. . .? :-\ But, as you said, much of it seems to be from the old script.
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby icarus » Apr 17, 2010 2:07 pm

Ooh, good spot as well there Lady_Liln. :) Yeah, i'd probably agree the story elements of that scene description fits in more with the old script (Slaves being sent to work in the mines etc) but i can imagine that the gameplay mechanics it describes are probably what you would expect from the finished game.

I still think its fascinating to get a glimpse into some of the ideas they had been experimenting early on with the movie. Perhaps one day we will finally get the full story on the entire development process, the leaked script and all. At the very least, even if the final movie doesn't live up to our expectations, we will all be able to say "You know what, it could of been alot worse" and i think we all know it could of ;)
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Narnia_Fan12 » Apr 20, 2010 7:41 am

Maybe the old hermit could be Coriakin in disguise? :ymsmug:
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Liberty Hoffman » Apr 22, 2010 12:01 pm

this is very interesting! I can hardly wait to find out what this all means! yay!
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby HighQueen_Of_LanternWaste » May 21, 2010 9:07 am

This is all very interesting, they are definitely experimenting with several ideas, it's nice to have some sort of insight on how they throw together ideas for the story. Can't wait to see the final result.

And I believe the one with the menu systems might not have to do with Narnia, In the yellow box titled "On-Line" it says "The Crucible", and the image right after the next one says something about colonists, so I'm assuming maybe it's another game based on The Crucible? Not exactly sure.
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby DamselJillPole » May 21, 2010 11:04 pm

That actually sounds very nice. I hope it is true, I can't wait to get this game and finally play it. (I'm collecting everything VDT ;) :D :D :D )
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Bother Eustace » Jun 01, 2010 10:18 am

Oooh, fun! This is a great find; cool to see and try and guess what they're doing. I'm not worried at all about anything there, though, because as Icarus pointed out it's just a video game early concept probably based on an early and outdated concept for the movie. Still, it's interesting to see.
In that "Quest Example" tidbit, I find it interesting that the Hermit refers to the 'North Sea'. Doesn't he mean the Eastern Ocean? Probably means nothing as far as the film (or even final video game) is concerned, but it's interesting. And who knows what Blood Island is. :p
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Dinode » Sep 06, 2010 8:16 pm

The VDT video game production was canceled. :(
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Liberty Hoffman » Sep 14, 2010 2:06 pm

^^ yes, unfortunatly :(
oh well.....
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby icarus » Sep 14, 2010 2:40 pm

One thing i've just noticed on those... there is another island type map, about 9 along to the right, which I didn't comment on before, and it doesn't contain anything immediately obvious to identify it as Narnia like the others, but it does seemingly show a level plan, with timings given for each point in the level, and at the very end of the level the annotation reads "Ivory Broadsword".

If you recall from the recent image we saw of Lord Bern's sword, it did appear to be not quite an ordinary metal sword, and i could very easily believe it may in fact be an ivory sword. If so, that could mean that the entire concept of the Seven Swords plotline was a much earlier idea than we all thought, if, as it seems, that it exists in these leaked-script era level designs.

Though i guess that map could very well be for the Conan game as well. Hard to say on that one since the map doesn't have any unique identifiers. But still, intriguing none-the-less.
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Liberty Hoffman » Sep 15, 2010 1:40 pm

^^ ivory sword? they can make swords out of ivory? wow, good eye!
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Dinode » Sep 15, 2010 2:02 pm

Liberty Hoffman wrote:^^ ivory sword? they can make swords out of ivory? wow, good eye!
Why not? Animals use ivory tusks as weapons.
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby Liberty Hoffman » Sep 17, 2010 9:10 pm

^^ oh yeah! good point!



Icarus: so what you are saying is that you think that the Seven swords (the 7 lord's swords) are going to be made of ivory? if they are that would be cool!
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Re: VDT Video Game - Level Design Maps? *spoilers*

Postby narniaexpert » Oct 30, 2010 11:11 am

This is very interesting. Thankyou for sharing it.
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