noclip

So, what are we working on?

Added 2018-01-26 13:44:26 +0000 UTC

Hey Patrons!

Since the year started we've been editing Noclip Sessions, extended cuts from Horizon and a few other things, but we've also been working hard to secure some interesting projects for the first few months of 2018. A lot of those plans are starting to solidify, so I wanted to give you an update on what you're going to be hearing from us over the coming weeks and months. So, let's get to it.

Warframe - The Free to Play Success Story Turns 5

I've always been fascinated in free-to-play and the communities that revolve around them, but there aren't that many F2P "core games" that have really made it work. There' DoTA 2, World of Tanks, and Hearthstone - and then there's Warframe! Digital Extremes have been guns for hire on other's people's games for almost 25 years, working on everything from Unreal Tournament to Bioshock. In those years they developed a games themselves including The Darkness 2 and Dark Sector. Five years ago when they launched Warframe on PC (and later on PS4) nobody expected this weird looking third-person, online, persistent shooter to amount to much. How interesting that in the five years since that game's release it has steadily risen in popularity and for years has been in the top 10 on Steam (it is currently at #7 with 49,148 players playing right now). It's one of the most played games on PS4, and stands as one of the most successful free-to-play games ever made. In February we'll be travelling to London, Ontario, Canada (my first time in the great white north) to talk to the team about how they managed to pull it off.

Our Accessibility Doc is Happening

It's no surprise that I've been looking at tackling this project for a while now. I often talk about talking to Steven Spohn at AbleGamers about doing something, at some stage - and I'm happy to say we're in the final moments of planning for this one. Accessibility is a big story in the world of games. From color-blind modes, to subtitles, to custom controllers for folks who have trouble using traditional game pads, and so much more. We want to show the experience of these dedicated gamers and the people working tirelessly to help make games more accessible to them.

I'm working closely with Steven to get interviewees who can speak to their experiences, and will be talking to him and some other folks at The AbleGamers Charity about the work that they do and how we can help. In fact yesterday I interview Vinny Caravella from Giant Bomb about his experience with color blind modes as somebody who has trouble distinguishing between red and green. We will be filming this over the coming months.

GDC 2017 - What to do?

It looks like we're headed back to GDC - in fact we have a special showing of one of our docs around that time that hopefully I'll be able to talk about soon. We're also going to be filming more interviews at the show this year. We've not decided on whether or not we'll do the 'Sessions' thing again this year, or take the time to work on a San Francisco based studio. I'd actually love to hear your thoughts on this. I'm feeling very malleable about it at this stage to let me know what you think.

Project Lambda. (Work in Progress)

This one is a real loose concept that may or may not work out, but I wanted to get the community involved to help me put it together. My favorite game of all time, Half-Life, turns 20 in November and I want to create something to help us all celebrate this fact.

I've put some feelers out to the folks developing Black Mesa and have even reached out to some friends in the Counter-Strike community about the possibility of doing something, but ultimately I need to talk to the folks at Valve, and get time with people who have since left. I want to interview the voice actors, or the crazy super-fans that live out there. I want to create something that allows us to celebrate the wonderful legacy of that series and everything is started (Half-Life 2, Counter strike, the Steam Marketplace). Who knows where this will end up, but I wanted you to all know we're putting in the effort to see if it's possible.

Bonus Level! (aka The Point returns)

All this month I've been hard at work on our latest project for Noclip entitled 'Bonus Level'. Effectively it is my new op-ed show, taking what I learned from The Point and my brief work on Danny's Disk Club last year. Expect a highly produced, short-form video series about the work we do at Noclip, my opinions on what's going on in games and more. I've gone back and forth on whether I should publish this on the Noclip channel, or make a sub-channel for editorial work (or publish on my own YT channel) but I've decided to take a swing at creating an incredibly polished production and see if it works or not. Patrons will get access to this first and I look forward to sharing it (and our awesome motion graphics) with you all in the coming weeks.

AOB

That's all we can talk about right now. We're hard at work on other projects that I can't talk about but hopefully the four above will keep you satiated while we continue to work into 2018. Let me know what you think of what we're doing, and expect a full news blast on the Warframe news over the coming weeks.

Delighted to finally share some of this with you all. Let me know what you think.

Danny