TimeSplitters Rewind - PC-only HD update of the series' multiplayer

[Patticus]

Crytek-authorised TimeSplitters Rewind in development for PC

 

A Crytek-authorised TimeSplitters game is in development for PC, built using the publisher's sparkly CryEngine 3.

 

TimeSplitters Rewind is being worked on by a team of fans - including members of the original TimeSplitters staff at Free Radical Design.

 

Rewind will include multiplayer modes and challenges taken from the original three games, re-packaged in HD.

  

The team plan to include over 300 familiar faces.

Online play for 8-16 players and bots are in, project manager Michael Hubicka told Cooking with Grenades. But split-screen is out - CryEngine 3 simply does not support it at the moment.

 

A demo is planned for December.

 

TimeSplitters Rewind is the latest effort by the game's fan community to get a new entry in the British cult shooter series made. Previous attempts by the 100,000 Strong for TimeSplitters 4 Facebook movement have included campaigns for the unfinished TimeSplitters 4 to be completed, or work to begin on an HD version of series highlight TimeSplitters 2.

 

Crytek boss Cevat Yerli has said he would love another TimeSplitters game to be made, although has pointed to the various struggling online petitions as indications that fan interest simply wasn't convincing enough.

 

Yerli eventually told fans that they could make a TimeSplitters CryEngine mod using assets from the original games without fear of being sued. Work on TimeSplitters Rewind began shortly after.

 

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-03-15-crytek-authorised-timesplitters-rewind-in-development-for-pc

 

Could they be testing the waters, perhaps?

I was a huge fan of the TimeSplitters games on the GameCube, back in the day. Top notch multiplayer, a really good map editor, a pretty good musical score andfantastic singleplayer levels kept me coming back for more. Sure, part of the appeal was probably the lack of competition from other shooter series', which probably made it a bit of a 'big fish in a small pond', I'll admit to that freely, but I really did enjoy the series immensely.

I hope that these games do really well, and that Crytek commissions a proper sequel. Gotta have more o' dat Cortez.

TIME TO SPLIT!

[Tara]

I'm not a fan of FPS games but I have fond memories of fun times with TimeSplitters.  What seals it is definitely the MapMaker, the huge cast of diverse and often times humorous characters (Badass Cyborg, Snowman, Gingerbread Man, Harry Tipper, etc.), and an equally extensive array of assorted weaponry.  Not to mention, the multiplayer is a hoot.

 

Definitely going to keep my eye on this, though I probably won't be able to play for awhile.

[JezMM]

Oh fucking yes.  Part of me worries that multiplayer will never be quite the same online as it was with friends gathered around the splitscreen.  Like, a tiny, finger sized part.  The rest is excited as ever.

 

 

My only sadness is there'll be no way for me to convert my crapton of single player mapmaker stages I made as a teenager onto the PC, I'd love to have a more permanent version of those, but ah well.

 

 

 

EDIT: Okay I read a bit too excitedly, they said just multiplayer and challenge modes - that's too bad, the single player and co-op campaigns were fantastic on 2 and FP, and Mapmaker was a blast.

 

 

Ah well, as long as Assault mode and Harry Tipper's Nightclub are in, my friends and I shall be most happy.

Edited March 15, 2013 by JezMM

[Patticus]

Hopefully, Rewind's mapmakers will be moddable if no major changes are going to be made to it by the developers, so that an array of new skins and level designs will be possible. As good as the old map makers were, all the levels I made felt really sterile, and never having anybody to play multi with, I had to go up against bots all the time, which got boring fast.

[JezMM]

Yeah I admit by today's standards the Mapmakers are primitive as hell, so if they do include it, modability will be great.  It was really fun to squeeze as much out of them as possible back then though.  My crowning glory of achievement was constructing a working "push the switches in the correct order" puzzle, and taking advantage of the intricacies of rooms depending on tileset (for example, the 4-story tall thin room, on the industrial tileset had little ledges that the player could sneak across to another door, used to love hiding shortcuts and goodies with those sorta things).

 

The only thing I disliked about Future Perfect's mapmaker was how they force you to use both Cortez and the gravity-gun knock-off thinger, but otherwise it had a great range of new features, especially having doors lock/unlockable by triggers, and most importantly, allowing text messages to be displayed on screen to provide hints and story.

[Tara]

Best thing to do on MapMaker:

 

Have a friend test-play your map... set it so that they either-

 

1) Fail the mission immediately upon starting up

 

2) Press a switch which releases an onslaught of heavily armed guards to kill them.

 

That was always fun.

 

One feature I'd like to see in the new Mapmaker is an outdoor environment and the ability to add buildings.  All of the Mapmaker tile sets are indoor environments, which was especially obvious in Future Perfect because of how unfitting it felt to be able to add cars.  I also hated that Gravity Gun ripoff thing in Future Perfect.  I mean, I like that they tried to make something innovative, but what I like about TimeSplitters is its simplicity.  It's just a fun, primitive shooter with insane characters, locations, and weapons.  It doesn't need to be innovative because the premise alone is interesting.  At least, mutliplayer-wise anyway.

[Jin.]

Holy shit new TimeShift game--

 

Wait...

TimeSplitters?

...Welp there go my hopes ;A;

[Patticus]

Well fucksicles, looks like singleplayer's out, and probably the map maker too:

 

Rewind focuses on the fast-paced multiplayer and skill-based Challenge Mode of the series, ditching the campaign and co-op modes in the interest of finishing the project in a reasonable amount of time.

 

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/vi ... ns-Onto-PC

 

It would be so nice if Crytek would take a chance on a new TimeSplitters game, maybe some sort of franchise reboot, but so long as they take online petitions as an actual barometer of how many people would buy a new one, I guess they won't.

[Tara]

Well fucksicles, looks like singleplayer's out, and probably the map maker too:

 

 

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/vi ... ns-Onto-PC

 

It would be so nice if Crytek would take a chance on a new TimeSplitters game, maybe some sort of franchise reboot, but so long as they take online petitions as an actual barometer of how many people would buy a new one, I guess they won't.

Thus ends my motivation to buy at full price.

[Goldenlink64]

Have a friend test-play your map... set it so that they either-

 

1) Fail the mission immediately upon starting up

 

2) Press a switch which releases an onslaught of heavily armed guards to kill them.

 

I can't believe I've never thought of doing this before. brb, booting Future Perfect back up again.

 

As a successor to GoldenEye/Perfect Dark (...okay, mostly GoldenEye despite the latter being my favorite game), I love the TimeSplitters series to death, but there's something that concerns me about this...

 

But split-screen is out-CryEngine 3 simply does not support it at the moment.

 

For the PC version, I can understand, but if this applies towards future releases on consoles... Aw man... I'm not sure if I wanna see a single screen only TimeSplitters game. That's like making a TimeSplitters game without... splitscre... oh.

 

I play these games with my friends in person. I mean, like, if I wanted a solo online playing game, I'd just play Call of Duty or something. This is TimeSplitters, and I play TS for the amazing local multiplayer. But hey, I've been getting into GoldenEye Source recently, so there's still potential to be amazing on PC.

 

Thus ends my motivation to buy at full price.

 

Actually the article says that the game will be 100% free "with batches of new content".

Edited March 15, 2013 by Goldenlink64

[Stacy]

No single player? Okay. 

 

 

EDIT: I thought asking for a console re-release collection would be too much.

Edited March 15, 2013 by BW199148

[Tara]

Actually the article says that the game will be 100% free "with batches of new content".

Oh, well, that's much more reasonable price then!  Nevermind!

[JezMM]

I confess I'd love if they could just re-release the original games digitally, no bells or whistles, to accompany the updated all-in-one multiplayer remake.

 

I know it's not as simple as that to port older games of course, and they prolly wanna put all resources into making this game as good as possible, but... yeah, can still say I'd like it.

Edited March 15, 2013 by JezMM

[Tara]

I confess I'd love if they could just re-release the original games digitally, no bells or whistles, to accompany the updated all-in-one multiplayer remake.

 

I know it's not as simple as that to port older games of course, and they prolly wanna put all resources into making this game as good as possible, but... yeah, can still say I'd like it.

I've been hoping for a Steam release for the original three for ages now.  In fact, I'm kind of surprised they haven't done so already.

[Remy]

Holy shit new TimeShift game--

 

Wait...

TimeSplitters?

...Welp there go my hopes ;A;

Someone in this world prefers Timeshift to Timesplitters? Well I'll be. 

 

 

I'm pretty dang glad that someone out there rememebrs this series exists! Yay! and the multiplayer too! Yay!

 

 

The only thing I'm worried about is, if this is on PC won't it play weird as shit? The whole setup, controls and weapons wise seemed to make Timesplitters a console specific kind of thing. Dunno how it'd play with the precision of a mouse. Might make some weapons too good? IDK! 

[JezMM]

The only thing I'm worried about is, if this is on PC won't it play weird as shit? The whole setup, controls and weapons wise seemed to make Timesplitters a console specific kind of thing. Dunno how it'd play with the precision of a mouse. Might make some weapons too good? IDK! 

 

It will be kinda weird but Timesplitters didn't have an unusual control scheme.  Just as games like Half-Life 2 plays fine on a console despite being originally for PC, the same thing can happen in reverse.  With services like Steam pushing PC gaming back into the mainstream again, they probably would have released them on PC if they were made in this day and age anyway.

Edited March 16, 2013 by JezMM

[Tara]

The only thing I'm worried about is, if this is on PC won't it play weird as shit? The whole setup, controls and weapons wise seemed to make Timesplitters a console specific kind of thing. Dunno how it'd play with the precision of a mouse. Might make some weapons too good? IDK! 

 

 

It will be kinda weird but Timesplitters didn't have an unusual control scheme.  Just as games like Half-Life 2 plays fine on a console despite being originally for PC, the same thing can happen in reverse.  With services like Steam pushing PC gaming back into the mainstream again, they probably would have released them on PC if they were made in this day and age anyway.

That never stopped games like Nightfire being released on the PC as well as previous-gen consoles.  As far as I know, it's not that hard to just alter the timing so that certain weapons couldn't be used in certain ways.  With that said, I think legalities, what with Eidos no longer being around, stand in our way more than technicalities when it comes to getting a digital release.

Edited March 16, 2013 by Akito

[Remy]

Nightfire made it to PC? outrageous! 

 

I was thinking about it, and considering the staff are like ex free radical guys odds are it's going to play fairly great regardless of platform

 

 

unless the FR staff are the haze people  >.> 

[Candescence]

Nightfire made it to PC? outrageous! 

 

I was thinking about it, and considering the staff are like ex free radical guys odds are it's going to play fairly great regardless of platform

 

 

unless the FR staff are the haze people  >.> 

Haze was basically the result of some very problematic development issues (such as the task-based AI which was supposed to be revolutionary simply could not work on the PS3, so they had to scrap it, yet another reason why the CELL processor was a terrible idea in hindsight for Sony), and Ubisoft fucking around with the development way, way, way too much.

 

There was no way in hell anyone could have salvaged that game.

Edited March 16, 2013 by Masaru Daimon

[Tara]

Nightfire made it to PC? outrageous! 

Nightfire's been on PC since 2002 (and Mac since 2004).  Where have you been? =P

[Goldenlink64]

I think it's time I bumped this topic, quite a bit of information has been released today.

Guess what started development on PS4?

 

“We're actually going to go ahead and start development [of Timesplitters Rewind] on PlayStation 4. Just because we're pretty confident Crytek's going to say go ahead and do it. But we don't want them saying go ahead and do it when we're caught with our pants down and we're like halfway through development and [then] start something for the PlayStation 4.

"So we decided that since they released the SDK to allow us to do this, we're going to go ahead and do it ourselves, and when they say 'yes' or 'no' we can decide what to do with that. For now we're just going to go ahead and do it. So at least we're prepared”.

Sadly, for Xbox One though... it doesn't look so good.

 

“In terms of the Xbox One, we haven't really looked into the development behind it, because there's still a lot of details we need to look into.

“For example, the Xbox 360 did have that – I think it's still there or if they finally broke it off – but the certification process, I think, is like $10,000 per patch – that's if the patch gets approved, if not there's like some other fee just to do an update to that patch.

“There was a weird process for the Xbox 360 and it was a huge turnoff for me, and they still haven't really said anything appealing to me that would definitely make me think 'Okay, let's do this for the Xbox One'. It doesn't mean that I don't want to, because the more the merrier.”

Honestly, I want a WiiU release. I'm not so hot with PS4 (though I'm not exactly against getting it if this game becomes exclusive, just.... I don't wanna buy anooooother console >.<).

Also the TimeSplitter's facebook page has posted a list of answers to FAQs they've been getting in response to this too

 

• TimeSplitters Rewind is STILL being developed for PC. PS4 development will take place alongside this.

• Rewind is not an exclusive, a release on other platforms has not been ruled out. The intention is to bring the game to as many platforms as possible.

• A PS4 release is not guaranteed. Although it is being developed, it is ultimately still up to Crytek to decide if they want to release to PS4.

• The idea is to let PC and PS4 players play online together. This will however be up to the server admin, they can specify 'only PC' or 'only PS4' if they wish. There will be dedicated servers.

• Although splitscreen is not supported by CryEngine on the PC, it will feature on PS4.

• Rewind release will be simultaneous across all platforms.

Sooooo, what do you guys think?

[JezMM]

Still very excited.  I hope the experience matches up to the local multiplayer days of old, though considering I mostly played TS2 alone I'm still sad that this is only a partial remake.

[Autosaver]

Nightfire made it to PC? outrageous! 

I'd like to point it out that it was not a port and instead was a whole different game.

 

...It sucked compared to the GC version.

[Goldenlink64]

Still very excited.  I hope the experience matches up to the local multiplayer days of old, though considering I mostly played TS2 alone I'm still sad that this is only a partial remake.

 

Does that mean you never experienced the amazingness that is co-oping TimeSplitters Future Perfect's Assault Mode against bots with a friend? D:

 

Mars Prison Assault man... Heck, even Training Ground is good too, but ya gotta do it with a friend who knows what he/she's doing.

[Tara]

I echo JezMM's thoughts on the matter.  I'm still a little upset that there's no single-player or at least co-op story.

 

I'm still looking forward to it, though.  I loved the multiplayer in TS2 and Future Perfect, but really... I'm just plain terrible at online games, and I don't particularly like the experience of racist and homophobic slurs being tossed every which direction.  Maybe if the game supports bots and private servers, the game will have a lasting value to me.

Edited September 5, 2013 by Akito