http://ebd.unrealsp.org/shoal/shoal_release.zip
Backstory:
A Job Posting on RNGCube, the Galaxy's Leading Spacefarer Recruitment Platform reads:
This is your chance! No more living in the slums of Wasteworld 7ad2. You sign away your life without a second thought.Howdy there sailor! The Star Shoal is seeking talented ship operators like you help crew this vessel and bring construction supplies to the outer frontier. Help build the galaxy! Minimum 5 year contract. No background check necessary!
Looking back, you really should have had a second thought. Hindsight is 20/20 right?
The Star Shoal is old. She's pretty barren as far as the facilities go. her computer could probably run on a potato or two. Worst of all? She is crewed by a bunch of insufferable jerks.
First there is your boss. He is a total cheapass and scrimps money anywhere he can, sometimes as the expense of safety or common sense. He insisted to leave a bunch of wiring exposed in the emergency teleporter room because a panel to cover it would "cost too much." Best not to go near it...
Then there is the drunkard. You've never seen him sober and he vomits everywhere.
[img]http://ebd.unrealsp.org/wips/rum_is_for_sissies.jpg[/img]
The drunkard, drinking away his minimum wage as usual. Then there is the lady who talks to herself in the engine room sometimes. You don't try to speak to her ever.
Last is the jerkwad who administrates the systems and makes sure the ship's autopilot stays on course. You know, that ass who is always staring back at you in the mirror.
...
Right. You've been on the journey a while now, and your secret steak stash is running low. Still, at least you managed to pick up some stuff to amuse yourself with. Trash is piling up on the ship. Boss man insists on holding onto it to use as fuel for the heater, but then refuses to turn on the heater in order to save fuel (trash).
...
You twiddle your thumbs again. Was there some kind of mistake? Surely. The Star Shoal is a slow vessel, but this is outrageous. It has already been 366 days and no signs of ANYTHING that might break up the monotony. While pacing about you find yourself in the engine room and decide to run diagnostics on the engines, just to pass the time.
Engine #1 looks good. Load at 78% percent. It emits a nice hum.
Engine #2 seems to be in stellar condition. Too stellar. Load is at 0%. Functionality tests don't report any problems, so someone must have powered it down manually. You wonder if it was your boss tying to save fuel. You power it on and return to the bridge to adjust the throttle. From your bridge controls, you smile with satisfaction as the screen indicates that the ship is accelerating at a faster rate than before.
After a while the rate of acceleration drops again. What?
And sure enough, you find the second engine powered off with no signs of damage.
...
And so here you are, some more time into your journey. You've stopped counting the days. You've been keeping up with your drills on emergency teleportation protocols just in case some does happen. You try not to let yourself get too hopeful though. You wonder if the teleporter even works...
The ship is passing by a planet today. The passive analysis suggest it could support human life, but it isn't in the galactic database. In any case during the planet's night there were no lights suggesting the presence of civilization, or at least higher civilization anyway. Maybe aliens? Not unheard of in these parts of space.
You consider for a moment powering on the active scanners and giving the planet a good solid scan for interesting details, but you know your boss would throw a absolute fit when he found out you wasted power (and fuel) on something like that.
He was mad enough about the space junk you tractored on board and the only way you convinced him not to toss you out the airlock was to tell him it was a useful and valuable device and that it just needed to be repaired. In truth, you don't really have any idea what it is, you only wanted it to pass the time.
What is this dribble?
It is a single player map I've been working on on-and-off since April 2014. It uses firetrucks and trashbag to enhance the narrative and gameplay experience.
Can I get an abstract?
You play as a very bored guy on a space ship.
firetrucks? from ebd? Hot dog! I expect the very best!
You'll be disappointed.
How big is it?
Right now it is about 8 megabytes, including a soothing custom musical selection composed by yours truly.
Right, I forgot ebd is challenged in many ways and can't interpret questions correctly. How many levels is it?
Just one.
About the music: its not that autotracker shit I hope!
It is not.
Is the music good?
No.
When is it being released?
Before the end of 2015, regardless of whether it is ready or not. If it is not ready by that time, the Honor Demon will insist that I commit sodoku.
What is a firetruck? Why are your putting them in trashbags?
firetrucks is a cool toolkit for mappers to add more intractability and other things like cutscenes and dialog. trashbag is an addon to that package that adds more content, but it doesn't really change the heart of what firetrucks is. You can read more about the two packages at: http://ebd.unrealsp.org/firetrucks/ http://ebd.unrealsp.org/trashbag/
As a player, that means you will get to enjoy increased interactivity, dialog, and cutscenes, if all that is your cup of tea.
Does it work in coop?
Nope.
I won't play it then.
Sorry to hear that, but making firetrucks work properly in netplay would be more work than I really have time for anymore.
