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Koko Ricky

Development hell

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Doom '16 is an obvious example. It was announced in 2008 and finally, 8 years later, it's here! Duke Nukem Forever spent something like 12 or 13 years in development. It kind of fascinates me. Any other noteworthy example? I know Derek Smart had that fiasco with that space game, the name of which I can't recall right now.

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S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (the first one) - 6 years

Half-Life 3 (or HL2: Episode 3) - 9 years and it's still in development..

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Kirby's Return to Dreamland - 11. FUCKING. YEARS.

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ChekaAgent said:

Half-Life 3 (or HL2: Episode 3) - 9 years and it's still in development..

I'm pretty sure it's not still in development. Gabe Newell has said that Valve is done making "traditional" single-player campaigns.

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Cynical said:

I'm pretty sure it's not still in development. Gabe Newell has said that Valve is done making "traditional" single-player campaigns.


Half Life 3 will be Valve's answer to Hearthstone.

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ChekaAgent said:

Half-Life 3 (or HL2: Episode 3) - 9 years and it's still in development..

It's never going to come out.

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Not really related, but that movie "Toys" from 1992, with Robin Williams, had spent a decade or so in dev hell.

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That one game by the guys that did Rune. Uh.. Prey. 11 years. Used a modified Doom 3 engine. Did pretty well.

Also if we're talking non-games, mbv by My Bloody Valentine had its inception in ~1996 and was finally released in 2013. It was a really good album too, to the surprise of many.

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I don't know if I'd exactly call the new Doom a case of development hell or not, maybe more so yes and no. The thing's predecessor was slashed and burned, the team gutted for the most part, and the most of what it retains from the original might be, aside from the goal of creating the next Doom game, a few minor assets. Everything seemed to come together at a shockingly rapid pace after the initial start from scratch, so it really seems to be a different beast.

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Jaxxoon R said:

I don't know if I'd exactly call the new Doom a case of development hell or not, maybe more so yes and no. The thing's predecessor was slashed and burned, the team gutted for the most part, and the most of what it retains from the original might be, aside from the goal of creating the next Doom game, a few minor assets. Everything seemed to come together at a shockingly rapid pace after the initial start from scratch, so it really seems to be a different beast.


I don't know if anyone else has noticed, but the super shotgun is from the scrapped version, there are probably a few other things that have survived.

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I know all about development hell - Hypertension is going on 8 years...I just want it to be done already :-( almost a whole damn decade of my life!! :-)

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Every Tormentor667 project, released or in limbo.

For a personal favorite, Run Like Hell, which had a 5 year run but amidst that the team had gone through two executive producers, three producers, three lead programmers, and two lead artists. They started out with the idea of a Resident Evil in space but this was changed abruptly by upper management from survival horror to an action game, with the aliens weakened and made more numerous. In the end the game was scrapped altogether by management AGAIN and then restarted in just ten months before the release date! Thus the game's actual programming was done in the span of ten months even though the game was in development for half a decade, which is one of the reasons why the story and characters seem so fleshed out while the gameplay seems rushed and unpolished. The game was also meant to be a trilogy, and it ends on a cliffhanger.

For Brian Freyermuth, the lead designer of RLH, to say that production did not go smoothly is a serious understatement. Interestingly enough, this game seems to share a lot of elements, like story, the setting, and some characters and creature designs from the first Dead Space, which is a trilogy of games now. Whether someone working on Dead Space was a fan of RLH or had worked on RLH prior isn't known, but the similarities are kinda striking. I'd best describe RLH as a combination of Mass Effect and Dead Space, the former for a large sci-fi universe with many different races co-existing together and the latter for the horror setting and deadly antagonist.

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I don't know the details but I believe the first Half Life was scrapped and re-created, which I'm sure would of added some time to its development, just like Doom.

Stalker and Duke Nukem was already mentioned.

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I know I'm cheating a little bit, but here (in video game section) you can find a large list of games that were developed for too long.

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Honestly, it's probably good that Doom was put into development hell, imagine if they had gone through with their first draft they had, would have probably been referred to as either "Call of Doom" or "Doom Forever".

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Apparently, I forgot about Mother 3. Its development spanned for nearly 9 years... not quite as long as KRTDL, Prey or DNF, but still, that's a long time, especially for Earthbound/Mother fans.

Gez said:

Mordeth.

Hey, THAT'S a good one... :P

Cyanosis said:

Every Tormentor667 project, released or in limbo.

If you ask him (and I personally wouldn't), you should never rush perfection, friend.

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MetroidJunkie said:

Honestly, it's probably good that Doom was put into development hell, imagine if they had gone through with their first draft they had, would have probably been referred to as either "Call of Doom" or "Doom Forever".

Doom was too tough for Hell to contain and simply emerged much stronger and so much better (I hope) :P

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I know it's just lols, but it's not really cricket to compare Doom projects done in spare time by disparate team members to spectacular fails by people doing it for a living together every day...

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MetroidJunkie said:

Honestly, it's probably good that Doom was put into development hell, imagine if they had gone through with their first draft they had, would have probably been referred to as either "Call of Doom" or "Doom Forever".


You know, as generic as it looks, and as ridiculously outdated looking as the soldier/fighter gear is, I think we can all agree that if id is able to develop a sequel to Doom '16, it will undoubtedly be set on Earth. This version of Doom had promise, but got too caught up in having mountains of normal human characters, and environments that were too close to the generic urban/post-apocalyptic locales from recent shooters.

I'm hoping that, if we do get a "Hell on Earth" style sequel, that it can look a bit more distinctive. Doesn't have to be full-on Blade Runner, but something gritty and cyberpunk, with some arcane shit thrown in, would be cool.

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GoatLord said:

I'm hoping that, if we do get a "Hell on Earth" style sequel, that it can look a bit more distinctive. Doesn't have to be full-on Blade Runner, but something gritty and cyberpunk, with some arcane shit thrown in, would be cool.


Crank up the demonic factor, don't just make it a nuclear apocalypse abandoned decaying building kind of thing. Don't be afraid to use hell elements like rivers of blood and flesh walls.

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Final Fantasy XV. That was in development, for what, 10 years or something? Originally called Final Fantasy XIII Versus or something and was originally supposed to be released for the PS3, if I remember correctly. It's finally being released this year.

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printz said:

What about HPack: Demonic Uprising?


Hence Tormentor667 projects, I was following that since 2010 or so, which was 6 years ago. The Realm as a whole has slowed the fuck down in the last three or so years.

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MetroidJunkie said:

[video]

I'm a bit out of the loop here, but did that even have anything to do with Doom 4? Looks to me like they were brainstorming a Rage sequel/prequel.

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Cyanosis said:

Hence Tormentor667 projects, I was following that since 2010 or so, which was 6 years ago. The Realm as a whole has slowed the fuck down in the last three or so years.


An immense amount of work is going into the WolfenDoom: Blade of Agony mod. Every day the project gets bigger and better.

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Dragonfly said:

An immense amount of work is going into the WolfenDoom: Blade of Agony mod. Every day the project gets bigger and better.


I'll say that's probably the only T667 project I'm interested in checking out, since I'm a big Wolf3D fan.

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