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Poll Poll

What features do you find most important in a Stranded Remaster Collection?

Only registered users are allowed to vote
Enhanced Graphics
50.00% (2)
Modern Controls and UI
0.00% (0)
More Stuff (Items, Objects, Plants etc.)
25.00% (1)
Early Access (Playable Alpha)
0.00% (0)
Ability to Write Scripts and Mods
25.00% (1)
Keep It As Original As Possible
0.00% (0)
Make One Game Instead of Two
0.00% (0)
4 votes cast

old Poll Stranded Remaster Collection – Advent Calendar

Spark Fountain
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1 - Stranded Remaster Collection

Yes, you read that right. There will be a Stranded Remaster designed and implemented in 2025. Since the development of Stranded III is still ongoing, and the two old versions of Stranded have more and more compatibility issues, I feel it's time to go for a "modernization".

IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Stranded-Remaster-Collection-Landing-Page.jpg

The Stranded Remaster Collection will bring the "Robinson" flair to modern browsers, since it will be realized with web technologies. While most of the original charm should be ported, the overall gameplay experience will be enhanced in terms of graphics, textures, player controls, inventory system, and many more.

To make this process more transparent and exciting, I will provide detailed information on the conception and even share some early footage. As it's December now, there will be one new section per day in this post

Your ideas, thoughts, inspirations and criticism are very welcome! And just to inform you right away: The Stranded Remaster Collection is not developed by DC, but he is very open to the project.

1 - Game Engine
IMG:https://babylonjs.com/assets/img/BabylonIdentity.svg

Babylon.js 7.0 will be used to implement all relevant game mechanisms. It is based on TypeScript (a super set of JavaScript) and brings a lot of cool, modern features:

> Procedural Geometry
> Global Illumination
> Gaussian Splat Rendering
> Ragdoll Physics
> Native Collisions Engine
> Global Illumination with Reflective Shadow Maps
> State of Art WebXR Support
> State of the Art glTF support
> Seamless Texture Decals
> Advanced Ground Projection
> ... and many more

While Babylon.js is a good choice for 3D rendering, it lacks of good-looking UI elements. Therefore, I will implement the HUD and menus directly in HTML with CSS, using the library React for state management.

IMG:https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRm2jf3gjLM0ePHpbXmAHrhK2-weYYKMaldBA&s


2 - AI Enhanced Textures
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/ai-upscaled-textures.jpg

Since this will be a Remaster and not a Remake, all original resources are being used. That includes models, textures, sounds and UI elements. But wait: It's 2024 and we have plenty of AI tools to enhance their quality!

So I played around with https://www.upscale.media and https://deep-image.ai/app/de/tools/upscale. Both provide a range of options to scale up existing textures and add more visual details. While both work perfectly fine with JPG files, only one of them is able to enhance PNG images with transparency (the other tool fills the transparent areas with color, making it unusable). Both tools have a limit to the number of uploads, but you can easily bypass the limitation by opening the website in a private browser tab

The results can in fact be seen. Below you find an image with a direct comparison between the old Stranded II rendering engine and Babylon.js using the upscaled palm textures.
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/palm-tree-comparison.jpg
edited 5×, last 09.12.24 12:50:02 pm

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3 - Compendium

I was inspired by the layout and contents of the Red Dead Redemption 2 Compendium. It provides a detailed overview on animals, weapons, special objects and many more aspects of a Western Game. In my opinion, this is a perfect tool - like a manual to look up details on game elements you already discovered. But you can also see empty slots of different categories, so you know there still must be items or objects to find...

IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/rdr2-comparison.jpg

Just think of the countless possibilities for a Stranded Compendium:

> Animals to find
> Food, herbs and mushrooms and their effects on health
> Characters with who you can interact (e. g. native or weed grandpa)
> Buildings that can be constructed
> Combinations (either with preview mode or hidden until found out)
> Skills (which you already have or still can be unraveled)
> Mission progress in the campaign (e. g. 2 of 6 islands visited)
> ...

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4 - Shadow Rendering
IMG:https://doc.babylonjs.com/img/how_to/shadows/softTransparentBottles.jpg

Of course, the new Stranded Remaster Collection will support shadow rendering. This is an essential feature of Babylon.js, which provides a variety of shadow casting systems:

> Poisson sampling
> Exponential shadow map
> Blur exponential shadow map
> Close exponential shadow map
> Percentage Closer Filtering
> Contact hardening shadow

Even transparent objects / textures can throw shadows with accurate geometry, as you can see in this image:
IMG:https://doc.babylonjs.com/img/how_to/shadows/transparencyShadow.jpg


I played around with it a bit and funnily enough, I encountered the same trouble which DC already had twelve years ago with Ogre Palm trees planted below the ground will still cast a shadow on the heightmap... Maybe I'll ask DC whether he ever solved this problem and how...

That was DC's approach...
IMG:https://stuff.unrealsoftware.de/s3_shadow01.jpg

...and that's mine Look at the trunks on the right side.
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/palm-trees-shadows.jpg
edited 1×, last 10.12.24 12:14:38 pm

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5 - Gameplay

One of the most important reasons why Stranded (especially the second game) is still popular today, is the gameplay. Having a big island where you can walk around, explore, dig, swim, dive, shake coconuts from trees, flee from wild animals, find hidden treasures, and communicate with strange individuals, increases the level of freedom massively. Not even speaking of the numerous buildings (and vehicles) and the ability to literally modify the entiry environment by destroying and planting stuff.

However, in my opinion some gameplay mechanics are no longer state-of-the-art. Let me go into detail about some decisions I made for the new implementation(s):

> Building
Having an empty construction site is kind of boring. But what's really frustrating, is the build process itself: You need to click for every single item! Even if you want to construct a well and have 200 pebbles, you need to press the right mouse button 200 times...

This will no longer be the case in the future - I have two alternatives on my mind. Either one click will be sufficient to put all stuff from your inventory to the construction site; or you'll have a menu similar to the trade function, where you can decide which amount of which items you want to use for a building.

Moreover, the construction site will no longer be empty all the time. While it would be too difficult to create partial "Work in Progress" models for every constructable game object, I tend to implement a transparency parameter which decreases, the more items you already collected. So you always see a silhouette of what you are about to build.

> Inventory
Once again, I am inspired by Red Dead Redemption II ( no advertisement ). From my memories, the Stranded II inventory was very confusing, because all stuff was simply listed in the order you collected it. Without search or sort function. In RDR II, you have a set of category tabs like food, drinks, medicine, valuables, and some more. This simplifies the process of finding an item you would like to consume or use for a combination.

In detail, I would like to expand the Stranded inventory to also have category tabs, plus the option to sort items manually. Maybe there should also be a quick-select function (like in RDR II), which provides a default item to eat / drink / restore health etc.

> Moving on foot and in vehicles
Since the size of islands in Stranded I and II was very limited, the moving speed (on foot) was very slow. The missing sprint option (shift key) will definitely be added in the Stranded Remaster Collection - as well as the overall size of islands, which then corresponds with a good gameplay experience again.

Also, the vehicle speed was very slow and there was no land vehicle at all. In future, there will be at least one or two means of transport like a bamboo bicycle (DC invented idea that years ago) or a simple waggon, drawn by a raptor or lion.
edited 1×, last 09.12.24 02:35:10 pm

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6 - Environmental Enhancements

The islands of Stranded use to be arbitrary playgrounds of wild plants, lions walking peacefully next to sheep and terrain where you could simply climb the steepest hills! While the fun of the game should not be eliminated by a too high degree of realism, there are a few improvements on my mind:

> Seasons and Climate Zones
There is an option in Stranded II to let it snow. Which doesn't make too much sense if at the same time tropical plants are growing Most likely, in the Stranded Remaster Collection there will be an option for the random island generator to choose a "climate zone" (e. g. tropical, temperate, arctic, windy etc.) which automatically determines what kind of weather you can expect. If you choose a temperate zone with seasons, you will encounter effects like falling leaves (or at least having color changes) or plants bearing fruit only in summer.

> AI animal behavior
DC implemented several behaviors for animals, like "predator", "flee", "walk sideways" and so on. However, wild animals only seem to hunt the player and ignore everything else. I want to change that and let at least predators also hunt tame animals in their vicinity. Also, the moving speed of some animals will be "corrected" to become more realistic.

> Grass and Snow
In the Babylon.js forum, there is a link to a nice grass demo.

Check it out: https://www.babylonjs-playground.com/#PDP62V
IMG:https://global.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/babylonjs/optimized/3X/5/3/535472d20937f023ad4e70f242ee003a6faec522_2_690x383.jpeg

I would like to achieve something similar, where the player can choose the grass density level. Besides that, I dream of the possibility to have a "real" layer of snow on the ground whenever the snow falls. Depending on how long it snows, they layer would become thicker and it could become harder to walk, resulting in a reduced moving speed.

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7 - Atmospheric Soundscape
Maybe I have too many references to Red Dead Redemption II in these posts But still this game inspires me on so many levels in terms of immersion. In the following, I would like to outline in which way the atmosphere of a deserted island can be intensified:

> Music as an effect: In general, both Stranded games work very well without background music. So adding some short pieces of (repetitive) music can be used as an effect to signal a situation change: Dangerous music indicates you are in trouble, maybe hunted or hurt. Warm music could sound when you reach the place where you built a hut and/or campfire. And some special instrumental effects will point to a hidden secret in a new area you just reached.

> Environmental sounds: To my best knowledge, both Stranded games only have a very boring rain sound. There is some ambience during sun shine, and you can hear the waves at the beach. But what about wind, birds, trees cracking, chirping crickets? There are numerous ways to intensivy the sound experience.

> Story music: Since I am composing music in my free time, I would like to add new musical motives to the story mode. (And maybe introduce an entirely new story, but that's another topic ).

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8 - AI generated dialogs

Hey, it's 2024 (almost 2025): Artificial Intelligence became an indispensable part of our lives. Simply because of curiosity, I checked out the ChatGPT API some months ago and would like to actively use the chat feature to some degree in the Stranded Remaster Collection.

There are several characters in the story mode with who you can interact. My mission is trying to "train" ChatGPT to offer a real, free chat with characters! However, there still must be some guidelines such that talking will not result in endless debates, without progress on the actual story But I find it's a nice idea to check out how a text-based AI can enhance the immersion of a survival game. Maybe the AI controlled characters will tell you secrets if you ask the right questions...

IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/weed-grandpa-talking.jpg

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9 - What about Stranded I Remaster?

It's not a secret that Stranded II was a massive further development of the original survival game. Let alone all new objects and items, scripting and modding ability, terrain shapes and textures, mini map feature, combinations and many more.

However, Stranded I is still the original survival game by Unrealsoftware and thus deserves to be modernized as well. First I thought about the possibility to "merge" both Stranded games in one remastered edition, but they seem to be too different to make it fit. So there will be two seperate remastered games in the end.

To be honest, Stranded I Remaster will be the "playground" for me to experiment with Babylon.js and other technologies. Here is a broad overview on what you can expect:

> Contents and gameplay remain
There will be no big changes worth mentioning on the overall gameplay and contents. I'll try to bring all existing 3D models to the Remaster Edition and upscale the textures with AI. Item pictures will most likely remain as well, only the UI might be slightly adapted to fit for larger screens than we had in 2004

> Larger and varied islands
Since there was only one heightmap in Stranded I, which I consider a no-go for a 2025 game, there will be larger islands. Also with variables shapes as you know them from Stranded II. Whether the terrain will be changeable, I cannot promise. But at least heightmaps with scale factor will be suported.

> Skybox
Many years ago, I had a look into the Stranded I source code (based on Blitz3D) and found that it uses a crazy giant sphere with an inner sky texture that turns around its Y axis That always looked weird to me and I will definitely replace it by a more realistic skybox.

> No animations ( )
Yep. Unfortunately, I cannot export the old MilkShape 3D animations in any format that can be re-transported to Babylon.js... Right now, I am not willing to "re-animate" all the animals and characters, so I leave them as static objects.

Volunteers wanted: If anybody would like to help me re-adding animations to the old Stranded I models, please feel free to contact me!

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10 - Support existing modifications (?)

In the years between 2007 and ~2015, there have been soooo many wonderful and cheering mods for Stranded II, it would be a shame if they couldn't be available with a new game engine.

Of course, 3D models can be easily ported (still the animation problem remains). However, all the game scripts would have to be re-written to TypeScript, since I am not willing to re-implement the S2Script interpreter

Wouldn't it be nice to have graphics like this again?
IMG:https://small-games.info/s/f/s/stranded_2_1.jpg


Anyways, I'll try to contact as many authors of SII mods as possible, whether their contents could be used in the Stranded Remaster Collection. Feel free to also provide modifications you created our found at Unrealsoftware.de. Not sure if this works out, but at least it's worth a try!
edited 1×, last 10.12.24 03:08:03 pm

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11 - Visual Effects

With Babylon.js, I want to actively use some visual effects which can increase the level of immersion. While I would like to keep the "dreamy" graphics look in general, I think of some temporary effects like the following:

> Particle System
Fair enough, there is already a very good particle engine in Stranded II. Babylon.js simplifies the process of implementing such particle effects, providing for example shape emitters and animated particles with changing properties over time. Most visual effects can also be directly rendered via GPU, allowing for even better performance.
IMG:https://doc.babylonjs.com/img/features/particle0.png


> Fluid Renderer
A new fluid rendering component has been added to the Scene and allows you to render particles as a fluid. The results are very promising and could enhance water rendering a lot. Whether it works with underwater scenes as well, we'll have to see
IMG:https://doc.babylonjs.com/img/features/fluidrenderer/fluid_intro.jpg


> Post Processes
There are numerous methods to apply post processing effects to a render scene. One of the best known features is "Motion Blur", which you should still know from the Stranded II adventure start. Of course, in Babylon.js things look a little more like 2025 Other post processes are FXAA (full screen anti-aliasing), a "Vignette" effect, and "Refraction". You can even customize your very own post processing effects (if you have enough knowledge on that topic).
IMG:https://doc.babylonjs.com/img/playgroundsAndNMEs/pg-17VHYI-15.png

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12 - HUD

As you might know, the HUD (heads-up display) "is the method by which information is visually relayed to the player as part of a game's user interface." (from Wikipedia). With regards to Stranded, this comprises the status bars (health, thirst, exhaustion, energy), the compass and the selected weapon / tool.

In the 2000's, it was common to have fixed UI elements always showing the current information. However, since the 2010's there was a change of mindset: Nowadays, values like player energy and selected weapon are only optionally shown, for example when you are hit by bullets or buying a new weapon.

For the Stranded Remaster Collection, there will be two options: The "Classic HUD" and "Modern HUD". While the former will look almost exactly like in the original games, in the modern view those elements will be hidden in-game. This will reduce the amount of overlays, so that you can dive even deeper into the immersive island world. Only if a relevant event occurs, like an animal attacking you, you'll see a modernized energy bar (or even circle) popping up at the bottom of the screen. Moreover, I am willing to add visual feedback (see also 11 - Visual Effects) whenever something happens that affects the player's states. This can be a simple measure like a shaking camera or a red overlay, but also a more sophisticated effect like highlighted objects at night when you feel very healthy.

One more thing I would like to add is an improved mini-map, which can be optionally enabled. Sometimes it was kinda nasty to open up the island map everytime and try to find the right direction to your target. Having a small mini-map in the bottom left (or right) corner follows the modern approach of 3D games like GTA or RDR.

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12 - Gameplay Modes

As I announced yesterday, there will be a classic and a modern HUD implementation. I refined this thought and came to the conclusion that this approach should not only be applicable to the HUD, but also to the overall gameplay experience.

In Stranded II, you have a mix of realistic and funny elements. Let me name a few examples: You have to drink fresh water instead of sea water, but you can catch butterflies to loose weight. When you sleep outside over night, your energy is reduced - and if you own a medikit, you are invulnerable. There are numerous options to combine items to retrieve weapons or tools, as well as crafting potions to speed you up or let you breathe underwater.

Of course, a video game should always have funny and challenging elements. It's not a survival simulation for soldiers, but a leisure activity ) And still, I always liked Stranded because it intentionally dispensed with zombies and other crap (which I personally never liked). In my opinion, a high level of realism increases the immersion and you can identify better with the character you play - as it feels like you would suffer yourself from the loneliness and sparse resources.

Long story short: In the Stranded Remaster Collection, you will have the option to choose between two gameplay modes: "Arcade" and "Realistic". Here is an overview of features and changes you can expect for the latter:

> New Skills: Immune System, cooking, vision - and the way to improve them will be more realistic (e. g. it's not enough to cast out the fishing rod to increase your fishing skill)
> Dangers: Sunburn, freezing at night, psychological aspects like loneliness etc.
> New Diary System: The diary will be used way more often (maybe with help of AI generated messages) to mentally survive - besides finding friends like Wilson
> Remove Unrealistic Elements: There will be no carnivorous plants, raptors, swords, weed grandpas, or rocket launchers.
> Better Use Of States: In Stranded II, you often had bleedings or fractures. In the Realistic Mode, there will be states like sunburn, hypothermia / hyperthermia, infection, tinnitus (don't worry, it will be temporarily and not annoying the sound quality all the time), and dizziness (in a more realistic way)

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13 - Destructible Environment

A breaking change from Stranded I to Stranded II was the possibility to use your hands and tools to interact directly with the environment. DC introduced an "energy system" in which every object - be it an animal or a static thing - has a specific energy value. Every time it takes damage, the energy value is decreased and if it reaches zero, the object gets destroyed / the animal dies.

Funnily enough, this empowered our main character to literally destruct the entire environment by simply hitting objects often enough. After a while the island became more and more empty. The player only had a chance to learn how to plant leaves and branches to create new trees and bushes, but think of all useful resources: Iron rocks, lion rocks, water rocks, or generic buildings and animals which didn't re-spawn... Spending a longer period on the same island always led to a loss of possibilities from my experience; at least on random maps.

With the Stranded Remaster Collection, I want to reduce the overall destructibility. To give permanent damage to larger or heavier objects, it's not enough to simply use your fists anymore. For example, it requires a good axe to cut a tree (most likely, the axe will get broken before a large tree collapses). Natural resources taken from rocks should not even be completely destructible at all - with one exception: I want to introduce a kind of TNT or similar stuff to explicitly allow the player to destroy a specific game object, as long as it's not protected by script. (Okay, whether TNT and a "realistic mode" go together still has to be evaluated )

In short, the natural environment of islands will be more resistent in future against damage. While the player can still modify the look of certain regions, it will be better controllable whether objects should get lost or not. In the old Stranded II, sometimes objects simple collapsed and I was in a bad mood because there was more or less only terrain left

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14 - Combinations

What would Stranded be without combinations? Finding items and trying out how to make new fancy stuff from them has always been a basic feature. Most combinations are easy to find by "trial and error" - hey, on your first day on the island you only have natural resources anyway! Most likely you'll immediately try to play around with branches, leaves, barks and stones. However, the longer you play the game and find / craft more objects, the more complicated the combinations become. Even baking a bread takes several steps (harvest wheat, grind grains, create dough, use it on fire).

Of course, there are many ways to unravel all secret combinations. The easiest is to read a fan page or look up the Unrealsoftware forum. You can also inspect the game definition files (Stranded II) and create a list of item ID's to find out hidden assemblies.

But wouldn't it be nice to have some optional hints? Imagine a wild animal just attacked you. You managed to escape but now you're heavily bleeding. Instead of dying few seconds later, the game could display a tiny message that the bleeding could be stopped with the help of a leaf and a liana. Moreover, players could have a small button in the inventory, which highlights all items that could potentially be combined. Remember: The inventory will be restructured anyways, with several tabs for a better item ordering. So to find combinations, the player still has to click through several tabs maybe. - Okay, to be fair: I didn't finally work out the UI for combinations and inventory, so this is just a collection of ideas

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15 - Realistic Ocean Waves

By chance, I found this demo playground of an "FFT-Ocean" implementation: https://playground.babylonjs.com/#YX6IB8#758

IMG:https://github.com/Popov72/OceanDemo/raw/main/src/assets/ocean/ocean1.jpg

IMG:https://github.com/Popov72/OceanDemo/raw/main/src/assets/ocean/ocean2.jpg

It renders very realistic water and waves, which also affects objects on the ocean surface. Recently I didn't have the time to dive deeper into the code, but the result is very stunning and motivates me to try and use this for the Stranded Remaster Collection. Since the original water implementation with a flat plane always kinda annoyed me )

As you can see in the screenshots, the level of wave intensity is variable. I would like to add this feature as well, such that at stormy conditions, it will become difficult to swim or use a boat.

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16 - Ragdoll Physics

One more feature I would like to introduce to the Stranded Remaster Collection: Ragdoll Physics. Here is a short explanation from the engine Babylon.js on what this means:

"Babylon.js 7.0 builds on the momentum (see what we did there?) of Havok physics support in Babylon, by adding support for ragdoll animation. This allows any skeletal rigged asset to collapse and flop around with limp lifelessness at the push of a button."

IMG:https://i.ytimg.com/vi/w1eR7IYqDWY/maxresdefault.jpg

In concrete terms, this means that 3D models react physically correctly to gravity and have sensible collision models with other world objects. As you might know, the Stranded games have very low-poly meshes, leading to less complexity when it comes to ragdoll definitions. Moreover, there was a very rudimentary physic system implemented by DC, which I want to replace by the features Babylon.js provides out-of-the-box.

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17 - Some UI Conceptions

Today, I have only some screenshots for you which show several conceptions for future UI menus. Have fun

Item & Combination Overview
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/items-and-combinations.jpg

Item Detail View (weight, possible combinations, damage points, etc.)
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/weapons-detail.jpg

A General Search Function
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/search.jpg

"Compendium" Approach
IMG:https://sparkfountain.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/compendium.jpg
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