FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Altor Systems, Inc.
Altor Systems announces Nightfall, a real time 3D puzzle/adventure game
Palo Alto, CA - August 18, 1997 - Altor Systems of Palo Alto, CA announces
the unveiling of their forthcoming game, Nightfall, for the Macintosh and
PC. Due for release on the Mac in the first quarter of 1998, the game
features a rich virtual environment set in Egypt with unprecedented freedom
of action.
OVERVIEW
Based on an Egyptian legend - a deep, consistent, engrossing plot with
that feeling of reality.
A puzzle solving game in real time 3D with beautiful images and lighting.
Unique interaction - puzzles can take place in a real time environment.
Things can happen with you and to you while you are doing something else.
You can be a part of the puzzle. Puzzle elements can be 'alive', and have
their own agenda.
Unique puzzles - real cultural symbolism and artifacts lead to acts that
go beyond magic and into myth.
Solve puzzles the way you want to - use the environment in ways it wasn't
designed for. Less chance of getting frustrated and stuck.
A virtual environment that allows you to go where you want to in the way
you want to travel - exploration becomes fun.
Controlled random elements mean there's more than one way to succeed,
adding to the replay value.
Hundreds of textures, each with a high level of detail.
True 3D objects and 2D sprites, used to best effect.
Fast software renderer for 8, 16, and 32 bit screens, utilizing complex
shading and dust models.
Support for 3D hardware via the Apple RAVE standard.
Ambient music and 3D sound effects.
Game editor allows you to make your own games - use tried and tested technology.
Play other people's games, or customize ours to suit you.
ABOUT THE GAME
The Story
You are an eminent archaeologist exploring an Egyptian tomb for
signs of a wonderful secret. Suddenly an earthquake hits the area. You are
stunned by rocks and blackout. When you wake up you are trapped, the
entrance covered with rocks. Still stunned, do you wait to be rescued, and
risk more aftershocks, or gather up your notes and find another way out?
Has anyone been this way before you, and who or what lies in the chambers
beyond?
The Environment
Based on a real myth and actual characteristics of ancient
Egyptian culture, experience a depth of game play that could only come from
real life. Explore a vast array of tunnels and rooms, solving puzzles which
have taken months to design. At the same time, these puzzles use the best
of 2D and 3D environments to provide new ways of playing as well as new
types of problems to be solved.
The Experience
A custom 3D engine has been specially designed for this game. In
all, hundreds of megabytes of textures are used to create an environment
rich with detail - images on objects and walls provide critical information
for your survival, and add to the feeling of really being in an ancient
complex. High quality real time lighting, dust and mist effects contribute
to unique puzzle designs. Combined with ambient music and 3D sound effects
these help to provide a dream like environment .
You have a virtual hand allowing real and subtle control of your
environment. Click the switch you choose to, or move that object just a
fraction to the right to line it up. Move a stone to climb up to a ledge,
run and jump across huge chasms. Favorite aspects of 2D and 3D control are
combined to give you freedom of motion and action. At the same time, all
this is easy to control - point the hand to use something or go somewhere.
EXTRAS
Editor
We will be releasing the editor used to develop the game. Tested over 18
months, it is stable and flexible. Lay out levels, import textures and 3DMF
objects, set behaviors, appearances, and sounds. Control the colors on the
screen. Endless combinations are possible.
Flexibility
Our goal is to allow the user greater control over their environment, where
the environment itself plays a key role in puzzle solving. Currently
available products do not allow complex interactions with the real time 3D
environment and rarely display enough information to create complex and
involved puzzles. To this end, the engine has been designed specifically
for environments with high information content. Moreover, data can be
manipulated in complex fashions, allowing objects within the environment to
affect one another in diverse manners.
Build games like no one else's with as much or as little as you want. Our
interface allows control that no other real time 3D game released to date
offers. You have a virtual hand, which can push switches, pick up, move,
and put down objects. For adventure games, this allows puzzles and
interactions with great and subtle detail - multiple objects can be moved,
arranged, stacked, and interact with one another and you, in a real time
environment. For action games, things may be used in ways they were not
designed for - if a gun runs out of ammunition it can be thrown, or used as
a club. Wrestling with enemies in a first person game is now possible - you
can grab enemies, they can grab you - you can even throw them at each
other!
Altor Systems, founded in 1995, is a software development company located
in Palo Alto, California. The company is dedicated to providing leading
edge content and technology for virtual 3D worlds. Additional information
about Altor Systems is available on the Internet at:
Altor Systems web site.
Product names or services may be trademarks or service marks of others.
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