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How hard would it be recreating Sacred from scratch?


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Okay, maybe silly idea:lindor:, it's like super late rn and I should rather go to sleep, but hear me out.

After my thoughts on reading/participating in those discussions:

Spoiler

 

On 12/29/2014 at 4:42 AM, Flix said:

Sacred series has traditionally had a very anti-modding stance. Even mentioning mods or talk of altering the game is banned on the official forums to this very day. I think this is due to the creators and players typically viewing the game as a multiplayer experience, which would be ruined by mods giving players different (possibly unfair) playing experiences.

 

Speaking as a Sacred 2 modder, I don't mod Sacred 1 because it is several orders of difficulty harder to mod. Things are encrypted and obscure, and even if you are able to decrypt files to change them, the game rarely accepts your changes. Sacred 2 on the other hand bares its insides to anyone who is willing to just peek into the installation folder. Changes and replacements to files are easily made.

 

I thought:

Maybe I wasn't on the right track with Sacred mods, just cause it worked for Sacred 2 doesn't mean it'll work for Sacred. So why trying to mod a game that is notorious for making modders life hard, why not simply recreate it? In the early days, that would definitely be an impossible task.

But nowadays?

We don't have to create an engine, UE4+UE5 is free real estate out there for everyone to use.
We can script it completely in easy to understand language for noob like me who is bad in C/C#/C++and can only speak lua properly.
We can do all modelling and texturing and animation with Blender, GIMP and Photoshop without that INSANE .gr/.gr2/3DSmax dilemma.
We could make it completely modifyable.
We could even write tools for modding.
And the best part: Since we create all game mechanics from scratch there will never be any confusion/unclarity/uncertainty and doubt about game mechanics!
We could complete the wiki with 100% accuracy and no doubts left!
And if it has success, maybe the company whose engine we use provides multplayer servers :o

Maybe Dax is right and the correct aproach IS all the modders coming together in a new project after all. Is this idea too insane? Would that be possible?:lindor:

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Let it be, Lindor.
If you want to bring your talents in, then join Thoriums LifeLeech project. He is well known here
and among the devs of Sacred1. His team has won some kind of contest and even the backing of a
studio or publisher. So if you want to become more active, go there since Thorium needs all help
he can get. New games flood the market on a daily basis and it will be a hard job to stay over water
in an environment where players are getting hyped by the wildest promises only to bind them to studio
and product. Even selling only the cheapest cr!p seems to be acceptable nowadays the hyped player
literary begs to be betrayed by the company and gives his hard earned money away for the craziest
things.

Speaking of self grown worlds.... Forget it! I have seen the most wondrous gameworlds going down
the drain despite the makers put work in beyond any imagination. Hope fades away slowly over months
and years and you sit there, desperately hoping for players to show up, only to realize in the end
that you have not only lied to yourself all the time, no, even worse, believed your own lies.  
S1 is rather nostalgia modding, there is no time pressure involved. Time flows far slower here and
if a mod appears a month earlier or later, does not matter.

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7 hours ago, Lindor said:

I thought:

Maybe I wasn't on the right track with Sacred mods, just cause it worked for Sacred 2 doesn't mean it'll work for Sacred. So why trying to mod a game that is notorious for making modders life hard, why not simply recreate it? In the early days, that would definitely be an impossible task.

But nowadays?

We don't have to create an engine, UE4+UE5 is free real estate out there for everyone to use.
We can script it completely in easy to understand language for noob like me who is bad in C/C#/C++and can only speak lua properly.
We can do all modelling and texturing and animation with Blender, GIMP and Photoshop without that INSANE .gr/.gr2/3DSmax dilemma.
We could make it completely modifyable.
We could even write tools for modding.
And the best part: Since we create all game mechanics from scratch there will never be any confusion/unclarity/uncertainty and doubt about game mechanics!
We could complete the wiki with 100% accuracy and no doubts left!
And if it has success, maybe the company whose engine we use provides multplayer servers :o

Maybe Dax is right and the correct aproach IS all the modders coming together in a new project after all. Is this idea too insane? Would that be possible?:lindor:

Jesus how cool can it be ? I mean Sacred 1 DE or remake 🔥 ,it sounds good

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11 hours ago, Dax said:

If you want to bring your talents in, then join Thoriums LifeLeech project.

I know it. I have big respect for the Thorium and the team. The decision to take something like that into action requires courage and creativity.  But - and forgive me here please for my openness - I want Sacred not LifeLeech. It's not like I wouldn't give LifeLeech a chance, it's just Sacred, that's what my heart desires.

11 hours ago, Dax said:

New games flood the market on a daily basis and it will be a hard job to stay over water
in an environment where players are getting hyped by the wildest promises only to bind them to studio
and product. Even selling only the cheapest cr!p seems to be acceptable nowadays the hyped player
literary begs to be betrayed by the company and gives his hard earned money away for the craziest
things.

True. That's why I go back to old games. And I believe more and more people will join me in that decision. But in the end I don't care - I want that game primarily not for others, I want to play it myself. And then comes interest from the community. Primary motivation is own vision becoming true. Secondary is it being a gift for and achieving feedback from an interested community, the most awesome community I've ever met.

11 hours ago, Dax said:

S1 is rather nostalgia modding, there is no time pressure involved. Time flows far slower here and
if a mod appears a month earlier or later, does not matter.

What if we keep it as a community project and see what happens?

11 hours ago, Dax said:

Speaking of self grown worlds.... Forget it! I have seen the most wondrous gameworlds going down
the drain despite the makers put work in beyond any imagination. Hope fades away slowly over months
and years and you sit there, desperately hoping for players to show up, only to realize in the end
that you have not only lied to yourself all the time, no, even worse, believed your own lies.  

We need to have hope because when there is no hope, then there is no hope. We simply have no choice but to hope. Speaking about lies to ourselves:

Spoiler

 

Take @SupremeJoker as an example. He is the most passionate Sared player I know. I saw comments from him on Youtube videos about Sacred and Sacred modding from over 8 years ago, and I bet there are much more much older out there. During all that time, has he ever stopped playing Sacred? I bet you no. And I find that inspiring. His fire burns and keeps burning:gogo:

 

But then there's also the other side. I'm not SupremeJoker, I'm myself. Do I have what it takes to be part of such a massive project until the end? I believe no. I can start the idea, but I am not patient nor mentally durable enough to finish it. I can start it alone, but can't and won't finish it alone.

10 hours ago, SupremeJoker said:

Jesus how cool can it be ? I mean Sacred 1 DE or remake 🔥 ,it sounds good

Yes, yes it sounds so good and it would be completely moddable as well, the more I think about it the more I want it, forget Sacred 2, forget Sacred Gold, forget Sacred ReBorn, Veteran, HD, 2.8, unofficial patch, VK, Darkbloods, forget it all, I want Sacred 1 DE!

 

 

What is plan now? Start with some modeling in Blender, load in UE4 (not decided yet) and make screenshots and videos like you two make for ReBorn, friends! Dax, your HR-Wallpaper-quality Screenshots, Supremejoker, your inspiring and passionate Videos, this is so good. There is courage in this community. You showed me what to do, now I start doing. My Sacred 2 mods - I don't know. If my motivation and hope fades, if this turns out to be too big and no one wants to join, then at least I have something I can go back to.

Thank you for your care Dax. I'm about to do something not-well-thought-out. Should I really rather forget the whole thing?:lindor: I can't. It's more than just a spooky thought in my head by now, I want to do it. Be excited for the first results.

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46 minutes ago, Lindor said:

What is plan now? Start with some modeling in Blender, load in UE4 (not decided yet) and make screenshots and videos like you two make for ReBorn, friends! Dax, your HR-Wallpaper-quality Screenshots, Supremejoker, your inspiring and passionate Videos, this is so good. There is courage in this community. You showed me what to do, now I start doing. My Sacred 2 mods - I don't know. If my motivation and hope fades, if this turns out to be too big and no one wants to join, then at least I have something I can go back to.

Thank you for your care Dax. I'm about to do something not-well-thought-out. Should I really rather forget the whole thing?:lindor: I can't. It's more than just a spooky thought in my head by now, I want to do it. Be excited for the first results.

Well I will help with the videos and tutorials maybe im I will do a trailer or something ,I like to edit :D , it will be very nice to see such a project getting life 

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9 hours ago, Lindor said:

.

Stop it! The only thing you will get is a burnout.

Rather do some smaller steps which lead to a quick success. You can stop at any given time and the amount of mods increases which also might attract the interest of other modders here.

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Instead of doing a remake yourself, try to pursuade THQ-Nordic to remaster both Sacred games instead.

 

Iirc in one of the discussion area's of these games, I have seen a comment from someone from that company they're considering it, but are looking at other options as well.

A project like that may have a lot more chances, considering doing things yourself may take countless years and could eventually end up with something unfinished and lots of lost hope for the community.

I've seen it happening before with a group of Modders working with Paradox about a new version for EU III; something that eventually got halted completely and I've seen it happening with SkyWind and SkyBlivion. Especially the last two are projects being worked on for 10 years now, but I doubt those will ever be finished.

At the same time, I've seen how a larger studio did a remake of Commando's two and had it released within two years.

 

So, check which bets are best.....

 

 

Thorin :) 

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I do not think that it makes sense.

Doing a remake is a pretty dangerous project for a game studio nowadays, since gamers are extremely vigilant and want to see the oldspirit revamped. Only one single step off path can trigger an immediate sh!tstorm. Example:  Gothic remake, System Shock remake, or the successor of Baldurs Gate 2, Baldurs Gate 3.

The risks are pretty high. And even if the studio is willing to do a remake, it will be, most likely, Sacred 2. Sacred 2 has better colors, ambient lights and world building, while S1 smells rather like a complete rework from scratch, which means more money has to be spend from the studios side. An interesting aspect for the studio is surely the remaining amount of players and if you search for S1/Sacred 2 videos on youtube, or twitch, it does not look that great. Having 1000 viewers at all is already close to world record. And the numbers are dwindling. Under such circumstances, would you, as a studio, put 500.000 bucks into a remake, which does not get sold after all?
 

Edited by Dax
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1 hour ago, Dax said:

I do not think that it makes sense.

Doing a remake is a pretty dangerous project for a game studio nowadays, since gamers are extremely vigilant and want to see the oldspirit revamped. Only one single step off path can trigger an immediate sh!tstorm. Example:  Gothic remake, System Shock remake, or the successor of Baldurs Gate 2, Baldurs Gate 3.

The risks are pretty high. And even if the studio is willing to do a remake, it will be, most likely, Sacred 2. Sacred 2 has better colors, ambient lights and world building, while S1 smells rather like a complete rework from scratch, which means more money has to be spend from the studios side. An interesting aspect for the studio is surely the remaining amount of players and if you search for S1/Sacred 2 videos on youtube, or twitch, it does not look that great. Having 1000 viewers at all is already close to world record. And the numbers are dwindling. Under such circumstances, would you, as a studio, put 500.000 bucks into a remake, which does not get sold after all?

yeah it is true what you re saying,all of the studio's now a days think just about money,but I believe if they make a good rework and fix the bug's ,mechanic's,lag's in many instances ,it might be a chance,the game have such a low community ,because over the years,they did nothing for the game and I believe the old communities will come back if the game is polish and done properly ,this is just my opinion :D

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5 hours ago, Thorin Oakshield said:

Instead of doing a remake yourself, try to pursuade THQ-Nordic to remaster both Sacred games instead.

 

Iirc in one of the discussion area's of these games, I have seen a comment from someone from that company they're considering it, but are looking at other options as well.

A project like that may have a lot more chances, considering doing things yourself may take countless years and could eventually end up with something unfinished and lots of lost hope for the community.

I've seen it happening before with a group of Modders working with Paradox about a new version for EU III; something that eventually got halted completely and I've seen it happening with SkyWind and SkyBlivion. Especially the last two are projects being worked on for 10 years now, but I doubt those will ever be finished.

At the same time, I've seen how a larger studio did a remake of Commando's two and had it released within two years.

 

So, check which bets are best.....

 

 

Thorin :) 

Oh my god how did I not know this?

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/thqnordicofficial/discussions/0/1318836262650849360/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/225640/discussions/0/2252307485545174287/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/225640/discussions/0/2252307485538379571/?ctp=2

How cool would that be? THQ making Sacred 1 remastered? YES PLEASE!

10 hours ago, Dax said:

Rather do some smaller steps which lead to a quick success. You can stop at any given time and the amount of mods increases which also might attract the interest of other modders here.

I think you're right. Mods have always been good. Will go back to Sacred+Sacred 2 modding.

 

As much as it's uneasy to trust a company on doing it in a good way, it's the best chance we got. I believe companies want make good games, but it's as you said, it's as if the customers want to be part of the hype-and-betray-game. Don't need AoE4, D4, anything, need Sacred 1+2 remastered with full moddig support. I think it's the biggest opportunity for a company, now, when the expectations are lowest and the love for the games is highest. The more mods and advertisement, screenshots and youtube videos there are, the bigger the interest gets, the more likely a good Sacred remaster gets.

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