Hyrule: Total War - Link to Subforums in First Post

[UndyingNephalim]

Looking good, normally I would have scoffed at the idea of a zelda total war game, but you're doing a good job at changing my mind.

Just a couple ideas I feel like throwing out there, feel free to ignore them (they might be terrible ideas :p )

1) I like the idea of hero units, and it reminds me of Aristeia TW. I almost think that using much smaller unit sizes (50-60 for normal infantry) would be very atmospheric.
2) The Kokiri worry me a little bit. I love your designs but I almost feel like it would be hard to take a bunch of little gnomes seriously in Total War, especially fighting Gorons or something. I almost feel like they'd need their own gimmick or "superweapon" to make up for their small size. Something they can do or use that gives them an edge and makes the player actually believe they could beat another faction's army. As it is, most people just know them as peaceful little elfs from the woods.
3) Not so much a suggestion, but I like what you did with the Gerudo. If I were in your position I probably wouldn't even have considered making them, as I always thought the whole rat women thing was kind of cheesy. But your designs were great, I like how you made them look more like desert amazons.
4) Have you considered making up new stuff? Especially down the line if you commit to making a campaign. There aren't a lot of "cities", or for that matter, "empires" in the Zelda series. I almost feel like you'd have to really bend the lore, re-purpose the lore or make new things up to get a really dynamic campaign map put together. Would you be thinking about scaling things up and making new areas of the world beyond Hyrule or maybe scaling everything down and adding new depth to Hyrule itself?

1) I'm considering using smaller unit sizes (it will help me out with races that use larger swarms like the Gohma so that there's not an overdose of lag)

2) In a way I do hope the "not being taken seriously" aspect works for them. While against players it's not so big of a deal but in the actual universe I figured everyone else scoffs at them. If it helps the Kokiri are composed of other creatures as well such as Wolfos and large Deku Trees (I presume they could be compared to LOTR's Ents). The actual childlike Kokiri themselves are pretty much just canon fodder though (think of a huge swarm of standard peasants in M2). I could actually draw a lot of comparisons between the races in Zelda and LOTR (Kokiri = Hobbits, Gorons = Dwaves, Zora = Elves, Moblins = Orcs, Gohma = Goblins, etc.)

3) I suppose I chose the Gerudo because they seemed like the only race other then the Hylians that actually had a standing military force. That and they are the army of Ganondorf, naturally.

4) I am for sure going to be making up things that have not appeared in the games, though I'm doing my best to blend it in with things already established so it does not stick out like a sore thumb. I have found that many of the established races in the Zelda series could muster standing armies (the problem is in the actual games no one really organizes them into standing forces, and the three times that they do we A) Never see the resulting battles as is the case in Ocarina of Time because the player is trapped in the Temple of Time during the seven years that the war goes on B) Set everything up for a battle but then everyone just surrenders as is the case in Twilight Princess when Zelda drops her sword instead of ordering her soldiers to hack apart Zant's forces... or C) We are told about huge wars that happened a long time ago but never see them, as is the case in A Link to the Past) As for a map I'll probably be tweaking this one that I made awhile back:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[cire992]

Ohh, that's a very neat map. I like it how it incorporates all of the various places from different Zelda games (obviously, that seems to be its purpose ). It's nice to be able to pick a spot in the universe and then point to it on the map. Looking at that I can also see where you're coming from with the various factions. One initial impression I had with the faction list is that a lot of these groups were going to be pretty broken up and scattered. But I was thinking more in terms of the maps from the games. Now looking at this I can see how the different factions can carve out fairly reasonable borders and have breathing room.

You made a good point about the Kokiri, they kind of are like hobbits, both in terms of appearance and their role in the zelda story. And looking at the map there they are in a big forest right in the middle of the map. Now, the hobbits in both lotr-tw and TATW are worked into factions with stronger units to support them. In that sense I think they should be fine, if you consider some of the other things living in the woods which could be connected to the Kokiri. As long as they're balanced enough in the end. Don't know, it's hard to tell. Every mod has 'that faction', the weakest link that has the wrong units, or the wrong starting position and always gets sandwiched or obliterated 20 turns in.

[UndyingNephalim]

Ohh, that's a very neat map. I like it how it incorporates all of the various places from different Zelda games (obviously, that seems to be its purpose ). It's nice to be able to pick a spot in the universe and then point to it on the map. Looking at that I can also see where you're coming from with the various factions. One initial impression I had with the faction list is that a lot of these groups were going to be pretty broken up and scattered. But I was thinking more in terms of the maps from the games. Now looking at this I can see how the different factions can carve out fairly reasonable borders and have breathing room.

You made a good point about the Kokiri, they kind of are like hobbits, both in terms of appearance and their role in the zelda story. And looking at the map there they are in a big forest right in the middle of the map. Now, the hobbits in both lotr-tw and TATW are worked into factions with stronger units to support them. In that sense I think they should be fine, if you consider some of the other things living in the woods which could be connected to the Kokiri. As long as they're balanced enough in the end. Don't know, it's hard to tell. Every mod has 'that faction', the weakest link that has the wrong units, or the wrong starting position and always gets sandwiched or obliterated 20 turns in.

I'll probably be remaking that map in the next day or so, since when I made that one it was long before I even thought I could pull off an RTS. I do want to keep the factions mostly concentrated, though it might be fun to have one of them scattered and about (Stalfos maybe?)

There does usually seem to always be a faction left in the dust... balancing is the hardest part of any RTS because there are so many variables to take into account. I get the feeling the Kokiri won't be ending up near the bottom of the underpowered faction list though before I get into balance testing.

In the meantime I added in the Gerudo Scimitar Warriors and took some screenies:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Yuko]

great job! the units are looking really good. but i am curious, how are you doing the "only one male" thing? will you make good old Ganondorf the only general? and if he dies?

[UndyingNephalim]

great job! the units are looking really good. but i am curious, how are you doing the "only one male" thing? will you make good old Ganondorf the only general? and if he dies?

If it's possible to have more then one general voice for the pre-battle speeches then I'll be making the generic Gerudo general a female. If I'm stuck with one voice per faction then I may be stuck with Ganondorf.

[PaulH]

Are you going to be making various campaigns which feature for each major period, or will you be finding some method of having all the races appearing in a single campaign map?

Also.. if those map realms are correct, then you've sneakily revealed a couple of races you haven't already, most noticeably the pink fairies in the top right of two maps! =D

[Blackwolf]

I would like to have us create more than 1 campaign preferably differnt campaigns for the different time periods like Ocarina of Time &Twilight Princess. Blackwolf would alos maybe like to see a campaign if Majora's mask maybe too???

[PaulH]

Perhaps the preferable option would be to have the usual "Main Campaign" which has all the races in a typical Total War scenario, maybe set a few decades prior to Ocarina of Time. But then smaller campaigns set at different periods which have set goals for each race? Would allow people to experience the different timelines, as well as being able to do a truly "grand" campaign featuring them all.

Something to think about!

[UndyingNephalim]

Perhaps the preferable option would be to have the usual "Main Campaign" which has all the races in a typical Total War scenario, maybe set a few decades prior to Ocarina of Time. But then smaller campaigns set at different periods which have set goals for each race? Would allow people to experience the different timelines, as well as being able to do a truly "grand" campaign featuring them all.

Something to think about!

That's my plan indeed. There will be a sort of no-story-specific campaign, much like M2's grand campaign that just features all the races. I figure each race will have a rival race that they must destroy to win or something like that. Once that's done I'll probably do a series of 'historical' battles or more specific campaigns and whatnot. First off though I need to make Gohma skeletons.... I'm having massive problems just getting mounted skeletons to export into M3SD though and merging animations though so.... might be quite awhile before I make progress.

[PaulH]

I always struggled with skeletons, they used to frustrate the hell out of me in Warcraft 3 modding, still do in fact! Perhaps you should work on the "easier" races for now and wait with the Gohma. I know it's hiding from a problem which you'll inevitably need to return to, I'd think it would be more important to finish off a number of "easier" races before returning with-a-vengeance to the Gohma skeleton work. However, thats just me, and I tend to put stuff off alot that way!

It's good to hear that the Grand Campaign will be that way, I want to conquer Hyrule beneath the green cloth heel of the Kokiri!


Also.. the pink fairy on the maps... is that a hint at one of the secret races? As I've had wonderful visions of an army of Navi's kin conquering evil across Hyruke. =D

[cire992]

^ You won't want non-humanoid units becoming the 900 pound gorilla in the corner. I find its always best to get the workflow down for all the different aspects of a project. That way you aren't restricted by what you don't know how to do. This usually results in more consistency in the quality of your content and more freedom to experiment with more edgy concepts. If I might make a suggestion, Digital Tutors has an excellent set of video tutorials on character rigging for games. I'd highly recommend it if you can get a hold of it.

Good pics btw, as I said before I really love your Gerudo designs.

[UndyingNephalim]

@PaulH and cire992
I probably will end up just working on the humanoid races first, however I made an attempt at a Gohma skeleton and made a few idle animations that I'll upload here and attach to this post. To anyone who has experience in custom skeletons, is my skeleton set up properly? I want to make sure everything is set up right before I continue making animations. It would be horrible to finish all the animations and then find out all my joints are wrong and wont import into M2 right..

[Yuko]

great news about the Grand campaign, all of the land shall know the kingdom of Hyrule's rule!
and from what i know, it's just one voice file for factions.

[alreadyded]

Where do I find the grappling hook and master sword at on that map? Oh and the big gold shield, I'll need that too.

EDIT: I checked your skeleton, it looks like it is good to go.

[Lemoniser]

For the voices of the one faction which (from what ive gathered) has one male in total, I'd suggest making the voice female if you can. That might mean getting someone to do the voice though, or you might be able to find something, maybe a voice clip from an emulator or something like that. After all if this one male, who i'm guessing is like a king bee was in command of an army it's entirely possible that he would have someone else strain their voice with the speech, meanwhile in an all female army it would be hard to explain a male voice. Unless the generals really butch

Obviously getting someone to do voice acting would be difficult but you could put something up somewhere on here and hope, but I'd suggest trying to find voice clips. Also, will the voice clips be different for everything else in game? Such as while playing this faction will the armies respond with the normal voices or with custom ones? The princesses from med 2 could just be used as an easy substitue rather than these.

Anyway keep up the great work and amazingly fast progress.

[alreadyded]

For the voices of the one faction which (from what ive gathered) has one male in total, I'd suggest making the voice female if you can. That might mean getting someone to do the voice though, or you might be able to find something, maybe a voice clip from an emulator or something like that. After all if this one male, who i'm guessing is like a king bee was in command of an army it's entirely possible that he would have someone else strain their voice with the speech, meanwhile in an all female army it would be hard to explain a male voice. Unless the generals really butch

Obviously getting someone to do voice acting would be difficult but you could put something up somewhere on here and hope, but I'd suggest trying to find voice clips. Also, will the voice clips be different for everything else in game? Such as while playing this faction will the armies respond with the normal voices or with custom ones? The princesses from med 2 could just be used as an easy substitue rather than these.

Anyway keep up the great work and amazingly fast progress.

You could just run the existing male voices (strat and battle) through a synthesizer (there are hardware and software versions) and make them sound female through altering the pitch, etc. The software does it all for you and you can probably find a few freeware products. Your sound card may even be capable of doing it, mine is. Then just save the file and put it in its place. It is easier than voice acting and shouldn't take but a few minutes.

[cire992]

Skeleton looks good to me, too. Any problems will just have to be tested out in-game. Good job on the idles btw, very organic looking.

[PaulH]

Unfortunately I'm unable to look at the skeleton and animations, I'll just have to wait till a proper reveal for them ^^.

Concerning the Campaign maps, are you going to have special "wonders" in certain territories to show their importance? For Example, the locations of the Great Fairies, or the Temple of Time, etc? And will those "wonders" bestow certain useful stats upon the territory they are in?

[UndyingNephalim]

@ Lemoniser and alreadyded
After trying out TATW I think I'll just end up making hero characters their own units (much like how Sauron and the Balrog are) instead of generals for each faction. I'll end up making the Gerudo general female (I do have a female acquaintance fortunately that's done voiceovers for me before, I'll probably get her to try out for the Gerudo general). In the end I'd like completely custom voiceovers for everyone, though sound is one of the last things I'll worry about.
@ PaulH
That's actually a great idea that I never thought about. I'll do that for sure.

[PaulH]

=D

Glad to be of service!