This is interesting...

I've made an interesting discovery today in my continuing experimentations with the Jupiter engine. All of the retail Blood maps could be easily converted to run in NOLF 2! There would be no need to recreate the original geometry by guessing.

Of course additional work would be required such as texturing, removing unnecessary brushes and enemy placement. It would also be necessary to increase the scale approximately 1.2 in size, however the basic geometry would be an exact match.




It even works in Contract Jack!


When a light is finally added, the potential of this experiment is realized...


But it seems unlikely that I'll be using the Jupiter engine unless a coder is willing to come forward, so this information is somewhat irrelevant, although rather interesting.

The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow is so close yet so far away...

Official Trailer

I've released several Resurrection videos since I first began all of this, but they were all simply demonstrations of the state of things at the time of recording. Some of them were also somewhat experimental such as the one I uploaded a few days ago...

But it seems that some people don't really care for lengthy atmospheric experimental videos such as the one I previously uploaded. I've heard that it was far too long and the most boring thing ever witnessed.

So I decided that for those with limited time, or short attention spans, I would create an official trailer for the Blood 2 Resurrection project. It's short, action packed and uses a modified cheesy sci-fi horror theme for its presentation.





I think it'll most likely be awhile before I ever create another video. There's too many other things for me to do and I don't really feel like listening to complaints about things.

I'm too tired and cranky and I think I need some sleep...

Atmosphere, Appearance and Ambiance

I seem to be committed to using this old lithtech engine. Or perhaps, I should be committed for using this old lithtech engine...

But if I can't have any decent tools to work with, or fancy shiny eye candy, then I'll just have to put more energy into the appearance, atmosphere and ambiance of this old game. The gameplay is constantly being worked on, and the coding still takes up far too much of my time. But every now and then I take the time to re-examine some of the older levels that I've worked on.



As I previously mentioned, I'd like to try to combine the style of the original Blood with a somewhat more modern appearance. My hope is that this will ultimately give a unique and fresh look to the game. It's difficult to describe what I'm talking about, so I'll attempt to give an example with a video. My apologies for the low quality of the video. It was fine before youtube got a hold of it...




The level itself is currently incomplete and not yet optimized, so it does run a little choppy in spots. It also doesn't have much in the way of action but I thought that would better demonstrate the appearance and atmosphere of the level. The slow pace is also enhanced by the fact that I was eating a sandwich while recording, lol.

The level is complimented by the fine ambient contributions of Marek "Nivo" Boguta, who seems determined to create enough ambiance to fill up 10 games. I really do appreciate all of the vast efforts that Nivo continuously puts into this project though, and I'll always look forward to anything that he may wish to contribute. While most volunteers have disappeared, Nivo remains committed to helping this project grow, and that kind of support certainly means a lot.

I've also recently heard from Håvard "Hoby" Felberg, who has also previously donated some well done ambiance for the game. He plans on contributing further work to this project in the future, and I'll look forward to his eventual return. Still missing in action is Nicola "Neurological" Capecci, who supplied some excellent tracks for the game earlier this year. I did warn him about those black holes but he apparently chose to ignore my advice.



So, volunteers may come and go, but the ambiance, atmosphere, and appearance of the game is continuously being worked on. Things should keep on improving with time and I certainly appreciate all of the support that's been offered.

There's still much to be done, but first I think I need another sandwich ...

Ancient Cities in an Ancient Game

Working on this project has often been a little frustrating, due to the limitations of using such old technology. I'll admit that I often wish that I could have some better tools to play with, and occasionally I turn to the Jupiter engine to check on things.

The Jupiter engine which is a more advanced version of the lithtech engine, was used in NOLF 2 and it would be a pleasure to be able to use this version in Blood 2. Through experimentations I've discovered that the unprocessed Blood 2 levels and around 75% of the models could be converted to the Jupiter engine with some effort. However the game code is far more complicated, and NOLF 2 has virtually nothing in common with Blood 2. If someone out there wants to volunteer their efforts into transforming the NOLF 2 game code, then I'd certainly be willing to move this project over to a newer engine. But it seems unlikely that anyone else would devote that kind of energy into this project, and I'm probably insane myself for even considering it.

So since I seem to be stuck with this old engine, I'm continuing to try to make the most of it.

I've been experimenting with the idea of mixing more realism and horror into the game. The look of Silent Hill for example might produce some rather interesting results. The textures may not have the detail and environmental mapping of the Jupiter engine but the results could still be worthwhile.


In addition I've been revisiting some of the older levels and experimenting with things. I think that by combining several different styles into one game, it should give a rather unique and interesting appearance to things. But the game's appearance still needs to feel related to the original Blood and that's where the challenge lies.

Using the Ancient Cities level from retail Blood 2 as an example, I might be able to better demonstrate what I mean. The appearance of this level now seems somewhat more realistic with the use of some greater detailed textures, yet it still incorporates some of Blood's and Blood 2's original textures as well.


I'm not really sure how well any of these different styles will work, but if I don't at least try then I'll never know...


There's still much to be done and I'll continue to be be around, even if these updates may become less frequent.

(I should probably also try to get some sleep before I attempt to do any more posting, lol)

Restless Zombies

The zombies seem to remain unsatisfied with these coding changes, despite my best efforts to give them more brains. After all that I've done for them, they've certainly proven themselves to be ungrateful.

But actually the coding is going quite well despite what any of these zombies might say. I'm continuously testing the changes that I've been making, and progress is coming along nicely.

But this coding will most likely continue to keep me busy and its possible that I may not have any new screenshots for awhile. So in the meantime here's some more shots of those lovable cadavers.




I've also added a new page of random nonsense to the site for anyone that may be interested in that sort of thing. It'll be sure to either amuse or nauseate any visitor, with my feeble attempts at humor.

Well, there's still much coding to be done, and the zombies are getting restless...

More Words on a Page

As I previously mentioned, I've been rambling on about this project for over a year. These updates seem like a good idea but sometimes I almost feel like I need to continuously come up with something new and interesting just to keep people's interest.

The coding will most likely keep me busy for some time, so other then continuously saying things are going well, I probably won't really have anything new to say for awhile. So here's a couple of shots of an incomplete haunted mansion level in the meantime.




The mansion still needs much work as do all of the many new levels.

Eventually though once I've completed a significant amount of coding, I'll put together some sort of video and then return to creating even more levels, models and textures.

Somebody really needs to come up with a way of adding more hours to the day...

Second Year Online

This website has now entered its second year online, as of Halloween. Unfortunately though the renewal process wasn't as automatic as it should have been, due to an expired credit card. I'll admit that it was a little shocking to find that the website had disappeared over night, and it took me a few hours to straighten things out.

I've also been experimenting with the appearance of this site, and I'm sure that eventually I'll find something that I'm happy with. There's still much work to be done not only on the website, but mainly on the goal of repairing Blood 2, and I'll continue to do my best for as long as this takes.

Well, back to the coding....