HPL3

[Romulator]

Makes me think of a "The Last Of Us" approach ~ no loading screens unless you start speedrunning it, and a really long loading screen to start/load.

[GrAVit]

Makes me think of a "The Last Of Us" approach ~ no loading screens unless you start speedrunning it, and a really long loading screen to start/load.

It's a good thing that SOMA will (very likely) be quite a slow paced game, so hopefully we won't notice anything.

[Paddy™]

When SOMA was first announced, it was said that custom stories and modding would enjoy more powerful support in SOMA than what was offered in Amnesia: The Dark Descent. In case anyone was worried that this might have changed, Frictional tweeted this today:

Gotta say, we feel extremely proud to have a modding community that have managed to produce so many amazing and crazy things over the years.

@frictionalgames Imagine what they'll do with SOMA.

@ProphetsAwaken Exciting indeed! This time we are putting a lot more focus on making sure modding is smoother and more powerful too!

[veraziul]

Ok, excuse my retarded question, but:

Since we're talking pixel shader 3.0 and probably DX 11, roughly, what kind of overall specs should a PC have to run this - smoothly? And again excuse me for double-posting, but is shader 2.0 /dx 9 support completely out of the question?

[Googolplex]

Yesterday I started playing Amnesia (both) on my brother's PC in 4K resolution and I noticed that when you set a high resolution like 3840x2160 the font and GUI will be very small. 4K will become more and more to the new standard and it's even a much better experience than 1080p, so it would be great when SOMA will be 4K (and higher) optimized by default.

[Kein]

glnext/Vulkan support?

[Thomas]

Some answers regarding streaming:

- Depending on how the transition should be it is everything from super easy to super hard to change from one level to another.

- You have to specify in script when the streaming of a new level should start, so it is completely optional.

So if you do not want to you can make the game work just like in Amnesia.

Also another fun nugget of info: Almost everything you see in the game, loading screens, main menu, etc are done in script files which means everything is up for change. We have implemented all custom story stuff yet, but the idea is that you should be able to easily specify (by just making files of certain names) what stuff you want to replace. So you can just make a map and keep all stuff from the core game, or you can overload the player class too and make some minor change there (change how cross hairs work for instance), or you can replace just about everything.

The idea is that those who wanna do things fast and simple can do that. Those that wanna dig deeper and change stuff at a fundamental level can do that. And loading these sorta mods should be seamless.

Okay that was more than a nugget, but I got excited when I started writing

[Paddy™]

Thanks for the info! It sounds like custom stories/mods will be much more n00b-friendly this time around, which is good news for me

Thomas, while you're here, maybe you can answer a few tiny wee innocent questions

1. Will custom stories be available to those who play the console version of the game?
   
2. Will assets from Amnesia: The Dark Descent and A Machine For Pigs be usable in HPL3?
   
3. Is it still too early to give even a rough overview of the minimum/recommended system requirements?
   
4. Is it too early to ask how much the game will cost?

Thanks man!

[PythonBlue]

So, after a few hits and misses regarding other projects of mine, I've finally decided to return to Frictional's modding community. One reason is because of SOMA and HPL3; as much as I love Amnesia for its modding potential, I much prefer science fiction stories, combined with the offerings of much more with the HPL3 engine. I'm particularly hopeful for if there will be a terrain editor, which would effectively make the engine more useful for outdoor levels and scenes, though in the end, I realize I still do my best in mapping as a lighting person; otherwise, I'm best for music and scripting.

Regardless, looking forward to this game and its engine, and hopefully I'll have a few demo pieces for other modders to use when it's out.

[Thomas]

1) Most likely not.

2) Need to mod the specular for it to look good and ent file might need changing. Otherwise most stuff should work from the get go.

3 & 4) yes