[torchinomotorino]

Greetings Gloryhounds!

 

I acquired the Hero6 source code about two years ago, just before the Cole's announced Hero-U (School for Heroes at the time).  It collected virtual dust until last week when I started inspecting the game code.  The game looks to be 80-90% complete with most of the artwork already rendered (my weak spot).  In my spare time, I've started finishing the game.  I'm not sure how long this will take, but I suppose the amount of time will be equivalent to my attention to detail.  

 

I just thought I'd post something here in case someone had already taken steps toward finishing the game.  I'd love to hear back from anyone interested in assisting.  The dissolution of the Hero6 forums was a major resource loss, but the remaining information still available should be enough.  

 

All contributions are welcome and appreciated!  If there's enough interest, I'll start posting progress updates.  

 

Here is a quick run-through of the initial game play.  Follow the cursor to see what I'm pointing out.  Also, watch for the pink shadows of sprite-doom when I move diagonally - fun stuff!

 

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=-r_nG7f9Wm8

 

Cheers!

 

 

 

[Orion]

I, for one, am very interested, and I'm sure there's a ton of others out there that are as well!

 

I'd suggest posting on both the Sierra Gamers and Sierra Chest's Facebook pages, as well as hitting up a few of the other forums linked to at the Sierra Forums Gateway.  There's a ton of people who had worked on the game at one time or another for varying amounts of time who I'm sure will be interested in seeing it finished. (I did some help for a few months over 10 years ago, and last I heard, that work was scrapped anyways LOL). 

 

Putting the 'word' out about this is good! It'll garner more interest, and may give you a bit of extra help (don't get over-eager with help though, that's really what led to the downfall of the project in the first place), as well as letting you know just how much the completion of this is wanted overall!

[Construed]

I Don't mind pitching in a little here and there, I'm an intermediate AGS coder as well as a pixel artist and I had interest in finishing the game myself, but the only way i would have been able to do so would have been to rip the gfx and throw it into my GQ framework and I just wouldn't have felt right using all their graphics in a manner inconsistent with their original storyline.

So just let me know if you need a little help here and there

[torchinomotorino]

Construed,

I assume you're referring to the pink-shadow/transparency issue that many of the sprites have.  The sprites appear to be well organize.  I was planning on exporting each folder, one at a time, and touching them up with GIMP.  It'll take time, but I think it'll be worth it to avoid generating new sprites (again, my weak spot).

So far, I've been taking an ordered approach where I touch things up as I play through the game.  I wish there was some kind of storyboard to work with though.  Deltamatrix posted an informal story line on another forum and I've decided to follow that layout.

[Blake00]

Great to hear man, a few of us out there have the source code however I have no programming or graphic abilities so I simply compiled it to make my videos you've probably already seen in the other thread here. The videos got good attention and feedback as there's a lot of fans out there wishing they could play it (although no one can see the feedback now as I just had to repost nearly all of them fresh due to a youtube problem grrr).

 

I would agree that 90% of the world is done, but there's probably only 10-15% story and quests done. Using various tricks to avoid the bugs you can talk to every character and finish 3 acts in the demo in 30 or so mins (which I do in my videos). There's next to no side quests and as you say we only have Delta's rough outline post about the story elsewhere to go by so there's still a lot of work there.

 

Deltamatrix still roams around here occasionally and can likely answer any questions you might have. There are also good QFG and AGS fan communities with talented artists and programmers (many who previously worked on Hero 6 at some stage) at AGS Forums, Quest for Infamy forums, Himalaya Studios and the old AGDI Forums.

 

Keep us updated on your progress mate, and IF you abandon the project one day, please please please do what delta did and release the code to the fans so another hero can continue the work one day! As long as someone talented like you to putting some spare time into the game then the dream isn't truly dead. 

Edited by Blake00, 16 December 2013 - 02:59 AM.

[Construed]

Well said indeed blake,

 

So what's causing the pink outline issue? Is it png images with an anti aliasing problem, or have they chosen the wrong pixel color for transparency within the engine? There might be other workarounds besides having to manually edit each one.

[torchinomotorino]

Blake,

I saw those videos, great work.  Your fan site is also remarkable.  I'm working on a new Hero6 website now.  I'll keep a current version posted on the new site just in case anything happens to me.  What software did you use to capture the low-res full-screen?

 

Construed,

It seems that they were using BMP and the pink transparency color.  If it is an anti-aliasing problem, it was most likely during the rendering of the original graphic from whatever drawing software they were using.  I'm not inclined to think that is the case because some of the issues occur at the edges of the sprite (e.g., one of the attack gestures for the guard2 sprite had outlying pink dots - this one has been corrected, but you may be able to see it in Blake's demo).

[Construed]

Ah, I see.

I'm downloading the source now and I'll see if their's anything I can do to help.

 

 

 

-Edit, Looks like the bandwidth of the d/l server is super slow so might be awhile..

Edited by Construed, 17 December 2013 - 12:09 AM.

[Soulforge89]

I really hope this game comes out someday!

[Blake00]

Blake,

I saw those videos, great work.  Your fan site is also remarkable.  I'm working on a new Hero6 website now.  I'll keep a current version posted on the new site just in case anything happens to me.  What software did you use to capture the low-res full-screen?

 

Thanks man. When you get your new Hero6 site up I'll be sure to update my Hero6 page and get the word out in the fan forums.

 

Hmm its a been a while now but I know I had all kinds of trouble getting a recording program to record Hero6. In the end I think I went with Hypercam and even with that I still had to force AGS Hero6 to be played in a window as it wouldn't work with full screen. With the MAD version I had even more troubles and had to run it in a win98 VM with Hypercam manually recording the Hero6 window inside VM window lol. Was crazy!

[Construed]

Strangely the source download seems to stop halfway and not finish downloading ><

[Construed]

Could one of you possibly upload a copy of the src to a faster download site?

[torchinomotorino]

Okay, I have a website up now.  It's more of a placeholder right now, but it has a forum, the current source code, and an executable version of the game at its current state.  Hopefully, this will provide faster access to the files:

 

http://hero6.org

[Construed]

Ah, thanks. That seems to be much faster!

[Construed]

Dang, file seems to be corrupted