Looking for some help

[Roosterkin]

Hi I am a student who is moving onto university and have chosen to study game design. Since a young age I have always messed around editing games like duke nukem and blood also making some modifications.

I messed around in a lot of engines and created some good stuff but they were mostly 2d engines.

My university portfolio needs some work and so does my friends. We are planning to create a small but effective tech demo and also giving us a timescale of about a year to make a small horror game. I know the limitations of engines and it will not be multiplayer at all.

We understand how hard it is to make a full game but we have a lot of ideas going around and a 5 person team, and even with that we are only hoping to archieve 2-4 hours gameplay but maybe more as the pace of the game will be slow.

We have access to 3ds max, maya, and zbrush. Now we have made a whole book of concept art and looking for an engine.

We want our game to be fully in the dark using a torch to look around (most of the game's setting is underground and compact) using nice lighting techniques, bump maps and shadows. So far many of the engines just don't appeal to us. We are looking to have some nice AI system too, as we want the enemies to be more scary than just leaping out and shooting you. We don't want to have many enemy encounters at all, rather focusing on atmosphere.

Please advise us as what to do about the engine, I noticed people said ogre with other libraries is good but we have not got any coding experience between us, were all graphic design students.

Thanks for reading,

Roger

[Kenneth Gorking]

Have you considered modding an existing game? From your post, it sounds like the game F.E.A.R (http://www.whatisfear.com) is very much suited for your purpose. It has some real nice graphics, the best AI I have seen yet, destructable levels, etc.

If you don't know it, it is a horror fps, with some seriously freaky shit (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4NmNwKaHj8) going on.

[Reedbeta]

OT: I started playing F.E.A.R., but I quit after the second or third map because I felt it was getting too monotonous (same old hallways, abandoned factories, office blocks, and suchlike that a gazillion other games have done). Does it get better later on?

[fireside]

If you're not coders, you could try Reality Factory, or possibly 3d game studio, otherwise you could do a mod as suggested. Unreal is a fantastic engine for the price of the game. I hope game design works out for you, it's getting to be a very crowded field and it's going to be very hard to get a job.

[Kenneth Gorking]

OT: I started playing F.E.A.R., but I quit after the second or third map because I felt it was getting too monotonous (same old hallways, abandoned factories, office blocks, and suchlike that a gazillion other games have done). Does it get better later on?
:offtopic:
Absolutely, when the paranormal stuff starts to kick in, that's when it sets itself apart from the rest. I have completed the game from start to finish 10 times, and I still think it is fun. Hell, after watching those videos on youtube last night, I installed it and started playing again :)