Following on from here Star Trek Legacy: Aftermath releases (HF), the latest release will be handled a bit differently than before. Main reason being its almost a complete rebuild of Legacy into a completely different game.

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Moving on, what is Aftermath: Battalia Requiem? Well that one your going to have to wait. The official announcement for that is on my laptop which cooked itself. Unfortunately, that announcement explains everything.. Been waiting for the part that I need to come in and then I be good to go. While I wait for that to arrive, I will start teaser promo for Battalia Requiem.

There will be a few 'shocks' when the official announcement drops but one I will let out today is Aftermath: Battalia Requiem will be released in 2011. Originally the release was to happen this year in November but unforeseen circumstances happened and alot of things I had going all came to a halt. Aftermath being one of them but everything is back on track.

Below is your first teaser into what Battalia Requiem looks like

Legacy has lens flare in it, alot of mods took it out and at one stage Aftermath had taken it out too but it makes everything look plastic. So I put it back in and updated it a little. Having the lens flare in adds some realism to it.


As the graphics engine was updated, several maps now display more advanced lighting techniques with Des Neros bearing most of the benefits. Des Neros already had a self manipulated light source but now it has all new effects. The type of lighting effects are very similar to those seen in the new Star Trek movie. Many of these type effects are more consistent throughout all the systems that make up the Berratta Verge.

Something a little different today, some beta footage of the AM dev engine being tested by Dagger/Rusty. This is test footage of the AM Engine applied to an existing Aftermath install. The engine is being stress tested in various forms of Legacy (stock, existing Aftermath installs, Battalia Requiem and other mods) and over a wide variety of systems ranging from laptops, low end, mid range and high end. Also testing are XP, Vista and Windows 7 compatiability testing. Daggers footage is from a Windows 7 machine.

Legacy 2010-05-03 21-42-48-81.avi

Legacy 2010-05-03 21-44-19-25.avi

Legacy 2010-05-05 22-24-29-59.avi

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Post Merge: 10 May 2010 10:45 AM

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Instead of having development of Battalia Requiem 'hidden away', I want to break from the traditional aspects of modding and have everything out in the open. Artwork wise not code wise. Ive worked on many mods and the visual elements other than ships and environments is something that is kept hidden until time of release. Alot of the time the player never gets to see the development process of said artwork (interfaces, transition screens, story-board concepts etc). Ideas too, that will be out in the open more too. Its one way of showing growth and gives the players a chance to see something grow from an idea to in-game. They will see the whole process.

Today I started working on my transition screens for Battalia Requiem. These are also more known as loading screens. Something I have been wanting to do for last couple years is build a more seamless transition process. The guys who worked on previous Aftermath releases know of it too and some of the ideas that were being thrown around for it. The transition screens are an area of Legacy that very little thought gets put into it as mainly no one really knows what to do with them. Even with Aftermath we really didnt know what to do with them.

Below is the first concept of Battalia Requiem's transition screens. I want this area to focus on the region where the game is set: the Berratta Verge. Some of the ideas I have for it have come from other games and also some real things like Vegas and K-pop/J-pop. With games like Mass Effect, the main worlds are all different and have their own distinct look the ones I most interested in are Illium and Omega from Mass Effect 2. The transition screens for Battalia Requiem I want to set up in sort of like a travel brochure for each system but with that 'Vegas glitz' like look to it. With the K-pop references, the music videos of alot of the K-pop artists are very slick and high impact. Over the coming months I want to build a working prototype that combines these aspects. The look also mimics the interface so everything must tie together. Below is a text sample that I want to use:



With Battalia Requiem, once you start seeing it come together you soon realize there is very little ST influence in the game. Its just something Ive found over the last few years working on not just Aftermath but all the other mods Ive worked on too, ST is overdone. I want to put out something fresh.

Battalia Requiem is essentially a Star Trek game but it wont have that usual Star Trek feel to it. It will be a very different realization of the brand. Its a very big risk to break from tradition but you cant move forward if you dont take the risk.

Once the write up for Battalia Requiem is out everything becomes clearer but it will also put a big question mark over the BC version of Aftermath...

Something that gets brought up alot with Battalia Requiem are the treatments ships and races get. These treatments are what also give Battalia Requiem its unique look. Some ships have a glass like effect to them (Romulan Gryphon) while others have a metal-hull effect (Klingon D7). Below is a treatment for the Constellation class that gives it a 'bronzed/aged hull' look. These treaments also take full advantage of the environments they are in, reflective capabilities. Another unique one are 'dual appearance' ships such as the Proxima family (Proxima, Refit and Philadelphia), the ships in darker environments have that evil and sinister look to them but in lighter environments they have that 'ship from the heavens' look. The ships looks interact with whatever environment they are in. Gone is the 'everything looks like plastic' look and that matte/flat look many have done before. The AM ships are more 'realistic' in terms of battle damage and aging effects. I dont want the AM ships looking like they just came out the spray booth.

Its something the Legacy community needs as too much stuff is developed 'in-secret' even in team environments. It certainly does nothing at all for the community and creates rifts within teams. Seen this first hand many times on many teams. When people see exactly how much work and effort goes into mod making hopefully it makes them more aware of what they are getting. Plus it opens people up to the entire mod and not just one ship in particular or a map. They get exposed to all of the mod.

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Another new concept that I will let out today is the GBS concept.

The Glorified Battle Sequence Concept (aka Kill Shot/Power Move)

Another concept that is on the table for Battalia Requiem is a gameplay element called a 'Glorified Battle Sequence' or GBS for short. This concept comes from games like Darksiders where on an enemies defeat, a finisher sequence plays out on an enemies death. The GBS is a replacement for the sub-system targeting feature of Legacy. Battalia Requiem's focus is gameplay, offer the most intense game style on offer to any ST mod or game. The idea behind it was to finally do something with Legacy's sub system targeting feature; a feature of the game that has been constantly slammed by modders and players since the game released. It is something I want to try and do something with by replacing it with something else.

How does the concept works?

The GBS sequence starts the same way as the existing sub-system targeting feature works; require a full target lock on an enemy and enter the sub-system targeting ability of Legacy. This is where the similarity ends. Once you get a full target lock and enter the GBS sequence, the game slows down for a short time to allow the player to have free targeting capabilites on an enemy ship to provide a 'kill shot' type experience. As the game slows down to allow the player to chose a specific part of the ship, the player can either fire their phasers or torps at that particular spot of the ship at a higher damage rate. A power move. Once the shot has been fired and either an impact or miss happens the game then returns to normal speed.

Will this occur anywhere else?

This style of gameplay was considered for the death of a ship but with the amount of ships that can be seen on screen at any given time (upwards of 500), it was decided to keep it as a 'event' type element; hence replacement for the sub system targeting feature. The game slowing concept is also up for consideration for near-misses to add more feel to the battle experience.