[seraphuriel]

Hello all...


Since many years on FS an a few hours searching, i wondered if there are campaigns where you play the Shivans themself.
Arent there some? And if not, why? Wouldn't there be a great chance to explain there motives a bit more?

Same fact is for vasudans. Sure - not that exiting than the Shivans, but there is always a Terran/Ancient view for the player.

So why? Maybe there are technical restriction i dont know, but i dont think so.

Any suggestions? Hope this is worth a discussion...

[Arpit]

Hello all...


Since many years on FS an a few hours searching, i wondered if there are campaigns where you play the Shivans themself.
Arent there some? And if not, why? Wouldn't there be a great chance to explain there motives a bit more?

Same fact is for vasudans. Sure - not that exiting than the Shivans, but there is always a Terran/Ancient view for the player.

So why? Maybe there are technical restriction i dont know, but i dont think so.

Any suggestions? Hope this is worth a discussion...

Yes there are. AFAIK Darkness rising was a campaign where you replay the Freespace 2 campaign from a Shivan point of view.

Procyon Insurgency is a campaign where you are a Vasudan pilot.

There might be more available.

[MatthTheGeek]

Shrouding the Light for some solid Zod-side campaigning.

[Lorric]

I would highly recommend the Vasudan Imperium Demo. It's a campaign for the Freespace Port that unfortunately was never finished, and it's basically FS1 from a Vasudan point of view, re-imagining the core campaign as if it was a Vasudan pilot that was the hero.

This Darkness Rising campaign sounds very interesting. I'd love to play the FS2 missions from the other side, if that's what it is. Additional Shivan campaigns would interest me too.

[seraphuriel]

Jep, as said, there are some snippets, but wouldnt it be nice to be into this swarm driven culture thing. Maybe a side story to TGW1 or Capella. Just some of my thoughts... I saw the "Tides of Darkness" campaign, which is not exactly what i ment.

The question itself is, why there is so less intention in concentrating on that?

[Black Wolf]

I think that for the Shivans at least, it's really hard to fit the way most people see them into the architecture of the Freespace gameplay. They're typically seen as very alien, probably a hive mind, and with motivations that we don't (possibly even can't) understand. So how do you impart that sense to the player? Would a hive mind have briefings and debriefings? Would they need to communicate with messages during a mission? Would they need objectives in the Freespace sense? The answer, I think, for most interpretations of the Shivans, would be no, and that leaves you with a pretty significant presentation problem. How do you advance the story if you eliminate all of your storytelling tools? You pretty much have to play the Shivans as humans in red ships, and that's deeply unsatisfying.

[seraphuriel]

Yeah thats the point i think. Good answer! Somewhere around here is a topic with "your opinion on the shivans" or so, and cause it seems impossible to combine all those thoughts.
But in Starcraft this also works. Sure, the game mechanics like briefings and ingame messages remain, but thats no obstacle i think. Sure, your human in red ships argument is valid, but thats how it works.
I intended the question, cause i really would like to see some point of shivan views. But i think the main problem is: who will create the story, as you said. Lots of people will have other wishes...

Difficult thing!

[Lorric]

I've always thought the biggest problem with the Shivans is simply that we don't have (by default) Shivan ships the player can pilot.

But yes as Black Wolf says, the Shivans are so shrouded in mystery, it's very hard to get a handle on them if crafting a story.

The Vasudans lack a reason to play as them, as they are allied with the Terrans, you don't need to choose, you can have both in a campaign. Vasudan ship naming conventions would be a huge stumbling block for me, I'm always impressed by people coming up with original names for Vasudan ships.

[NGTM-1R]

You pretty much have to play the Shivans as humans in red ships, and that's deeply unsatisfying.

Or possibly very effective if your goal is to obscure they fact they're playing Shivans until they actually start the mission, which was something I toyed with doing to the player as part of a campaign concept that would have involved playing through two views of the same campaign.

The key to it all is that the Shivans are, in the end, doing something very similar to the player on a tactical scale. They're sending in ships and using them to fight. How? Why? You don't have to say. Much of the time the actual games don't. You just have to put them on the field and have them fight. You could even make a point of using their anonymity and mystery as a narrative device while you're portraying them. Things happen and you don't know why. You're not told beforehand about things they'd say to you in the GTVA. Ships on the field do not communicate beyond the basics.

The briefing you are giving the player does not have to be a literal briefing (and you don't actually have to give one, really; there are options not to). Even something like the objectives list does not have to be acknowledged as something that really exists inside the universe of the game, it's simply a narrative convenience or play aide.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

Actually the mod I've been working on since I started FREDing is called (temporarily) A Vasudan Point of View. Basically, my objective was to retell the events of Freespace 2 through the eyes of a Vasudan pilot (cause I loved the zod missions in the original game).

Over the years, I've also given thought to making a Shivan centric campaign, which prompted me to include segments in which you suddenly fly as a Shivan at the end of some of my most borring missions. The funny thing is, I thought a Shivan PoV campaign would actually be somewhat easier to make in some areas. Briefings and debriefings would have been very informal and straight-to-the point ("do this", "destroy that", ...), in-mission dialogue could be stripped to the bare minimum since you wouldn't need to have your wingmen or warships to feel like human/vasudan beings. It would also give you all sorts of excuse to introduce new mechanics within the Second Incursion timeframe, such as respawning, calling in reinforcements or Shock Jumps.

Really, I'm surprised that over the years, there hasn't been more attempts at putting the player on the Shivan's side. Besides, flying Shivan crafts and weapons make you realize how much they generally suck compared to what the GTVA has.

[Lorric]

Have you played the Vasudan Imperium Demo, X3N0-Life-Form? I'm guessing you will have done, but if not, it will be an excellent source of inspiration for your campaign.

That is also how I would do the Shivans. I must admit what Black Wolf said initially surprised me, but it got me to thinking how a lot of campaigns are driven by a story and that thus those people might be turned off by the Shivans. Me it would be simply about the novelty of playing as the Shivans. Obey orders without question. You will do this, you will do that, you're just a cog in the machine, you have a number not a name, that kind of thing, like an army of robots. Everything on a need to know to know basis.

But just off the top of my head, I could imagine something like this as an intro:

Another flame burns too bright... dangerous... out of control... it must be extinguished... permanantly... not even the smallest ember must be left... the flame must not burn again...

[seraphuriel]

The point in this will be NOT only playing orders but getting some shivan story and history. Thats what realy would be nice (i think). But as discrussed - difficult...

[Deepstar]

I remember that there was a package named "Shivans" out there... no i do not mean the FSPort campaigns.
It was a set with playable Shivans ships and shivans primary and secondary weapons, cbanims, comm-anis, and a shivan interface and hud, mainly for fredding own shivan campaigns. But it contained some demo missions that take place during FreeSpace 2.

Also there was a shivan campaign called "Hidden Terror" for retail, even years before the SCP. It was never finished, but i remember also a sort of demo release back then.

[Phantom Hoover]

Vassago's Dirge has a couple of short segments of Shivan gameplay.

[Hobbie]

Hang on. There's a perfectly good way to keep the mysteriousness of the Shivans.

Tell the story from someone else's point of view.

Keep the individual mission briefings highly specific, something like "Enemies here. We will kill them. Adapt and exploit weaknesses," but have the command briefings and debriefings as reports on what you're doing to the enemy. Something like "The GTD Minnow was destroyed by Shivan forces yesterday in a surprise attack on the Ross 128 node" or whatever with the recommendation being "Hunt. Prey on the interloper."

In addition, to reinforce the alien-ness, you could even name all of the enemy ships variants of things like Prey, Meat, Weak, Opponent (for worthy enemies), Goal rather than the actual names they have. Likewise, your allies could be Pack, Hive, so on and so forth.

Finally, no allied comm chatter, just directives and messages of panic and fear from the enemy. Keep the feeling that you are a terrifying force from beyond space.

I think I want to make this.

[Megawolf492]

Obey orders without question. You will do this, you will do that, you're just a cog in the machine, you have a number not a name, that kind of thing, like an army of robots.

Or an army of orcs. At least that is what that reminds me of. It doesn't make me think of the shivans, unless it was their slave/outcast class, which doesn't make sense in a navy of specialized ships & equipment. I think more of the Hanar from the Mass Effect universe (which, I guess, is the same universe, we just haven't found them yet...). They would talk in an absolute, but somewhat passive tone: "This cruiser must be destroyed. There can be no other options. This will be accomplished and this will lead us (or these ones?) to victory in this system." Sure, they won't be exactly like the Hanar, but less like orcs. They would have done this thousands of times in the past, so it's almost like they've resigned themselves to the fact that they will win, so let's get it over with. So I guess part Hanar, part Reaper.

Finally, no allied comm chatter, just directives and messages of panic and fear from the enemy.

I do like the fact that you could listen in on the GTVA chatter to give you hints on what you should do: "Alpha, you need to destroy the five reactors ASAP!" And you could have the death screams of all those you kill.

[Goober5000]

I remember that there was a package named "Shivans" out there... no i do not mean the FSPort campaigns.
It was a set with playable Shivans ships and shivans primary and secondary weapons, cbanims, comm-anis, and a shivan interface and hud, mainly for fredding own shivan campaigns. But it contained some demo missions that take place during FreeSpace 2.

Also there was a shivan campaign called "Hidden Terror" for retail, even years before the SCP. It was never finished, but i remember also a sort of demo release back then.

I don't suppose you happen to have either of these campaigns (or modpacks) downloaded, do you?

(All I know about Hidden Terror is the music track that appeared in Inferno.)

[seraphuriel]

I have also never heard of those. If someone find them please stick them in here.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

Have you played the Vasudan Imperium Demo, X3N0-Life-Form? I'm guessing you will have done, but if not, it will be an excellent source of inspiration for your campaign.

Oh, I did play it. In fact, I've been thinking about borrowing the Vasudan HUD, even though it's closer to the FS1 HUD. It's a shame the full mod couldn't be finished, it would have been most interesting.

[Lorric]

Have you played the Vasudan Imperium Demo, X3N0-Life-Form? I'm guessing you will have done, but if not, it will be an excellent source of inspiration for your campaign.

Oh, I did play it. In fact, I've been thinking about borrowing the Vasudan HUD, even though it's closer to the FS1 HUD. It's a shame the full mod couldn't be finished, it would have been most interesting.

Indeed. I actually had thoughts to do a small campaign, based around stopping the "vulture squadron" as I would have called it that you start out with, you know, where you're hitting soft targets in an Anubis. But then I settled on my WoD campaign.