Projects

Left to Die

Introduction: “Left to Die” is a first-person/Third-person shooter for the PC that utilizes the Unreal game engine to throw the player(s) into the role of a pioneer turned gunslinger in an epic saga of revenge, justice and honor in the lawless old west of America.

Background: The Unreal game engine has excellent track records. There is a plethora of editing sites, add-ons, and scripting sites on the internet that facilitate many tasks.

Description: You find yourself staked to the blistering desert sands under a blazing hot sun, vultures circle overhead, exhausted, you pass out to blackness. Movement awakes you, your sand caked eyes make out the figure of a savage Indian with a knife! Although you struggle, your weakened body forces consciousness into the void. Warm water brushes your lips then slips its way to your parched throat. When you awake, you are alone, your bounds have been cut, a savage looking knife protrudes out of the sand, you grab it. As you survey the surroundings, you see some large boulders with shade, a horse, and what appear to be a waterskin and some food. You rush to the water and food gulping it down. Life is restored and your thinking clears. Did the savage leave these gifts for you? If he did, and it seems so, then why? Still, you are grateful. So you hold out your hand to clam the horse, as you approach him he bucks wildly, but you continue to calm him down till you mount him. In the saddle you ride out, but where to?

There are mountains to the north, open desert to the east and south, canyons and boulders to the west. You are lost, with only a horse and a knife. You’ll need food and water soon.

You were left to die and you want to know why.

Key features: The Unreal game engine will be able to handle nearly all of the mechanics, yet here are some of Left to Die’s unique features:

• Advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI): Left to Die will allow the player to influence the behavior of many of the NPCs and NPC animals (monsters/vehicles) such as chasing off a horse to run wild or calming it down to ride it and/or train it to come to you when you whistle, tipping a hat to a lady, or buying a drink for a rancher, etc.

• Interactive Environment: Left to Die will exhilarate the use of the environment giving the player a multitude of solutions to problem solving; breaking a bottle to use as a weapon, a chair, cutting ropes to bridges, creating landslides, moving ladders and or breaking them, lasso animals or NPCs with rope, etc. Vultures circle overhead when the player nears death or is dying of thirst, wolves stalk etc,

• Dynamic Landscapes: Clouds move, tumbleweeds roll, and the Sun and Moon cross the sky, rivers flow, waterfalls pound, etc.

• Open Ended Story Line: The player “makes” the story by the choices decided upon during play. This method allows the player to feel as if he or she has a free will and is not forced to perform certain act to accomplish their goals.

Genre: A first-person/ third-person shooter action and adventure. Set in the time of the old west of America as the cross continental railroad is being completed.