After our teaser announcement two weeks ago, the Fusion Soft team is proud to officially announce their new total conversion modification entitled "Project Omicron: 7". This new mod will be a science fiction RPG/shooter hybrid, which allows us to use many of the RPG systems already developed for our previous project "Dilogus: Winds of War" - which has been put on hold for the moment - without having to deal with the issues related to developing a satisfactory melee combat system. Posted below is a short introduction to the story and the setting of the mod, as well as a description of its planned features. Even further down you will find our first media release, namely some screenshots of one of the maps that is under development, as well as some concept images for the game.


The Setting:
The story itself is set in the year 2063, and is based around a substance called Xicclat, which attacks a plant's chlorophyll. After the surface of Earth gets entirely infected and the foliage dies out, life becomes a chaos on the planet. Two of the main factions start a power struggle, whilst the third one (The Rebels) strives for freedom and equality amongst the surviving people. And to make matters worse, other, hostile creatures start appearing.

The player is a soldier of the Elite Omicron Project, namely subject 7. After his memory erasing device gets damaged, he starts to realize things that happen around him, thus making him gain self control. His first goal is a face change so that he can blend in with the rest of the humanity as someone totally unknown. The face change will allow the player to walk into various places, including the areas of the Elysium Government, Earth Rise Artificials and the United Rebels. The main story will focus on two things: the past of the player and the restoration of foliage on Earth.

While the main story will be in place, the player will still be able to pick how he wants to solve things. His decisions will affect his reputation towards the three main factions, and the progression of the whole storyline as well.


The Factions:

E.R.A. - Earth Rise Artificials: was previously a company that was producing various highly automated vehicles and automated small robots. Over time, the ERA developed to be one of the most powerful companies, and after multiple threats the ERA seperated from the EG and declared independence. ERA is at war with EG and the UR. There are no human members of ERA, only four half human cyborg scientists, who are the leaders of the faction.

E.G. - Elysium Government: covers the two artificial planets orbiting Earth and it's population. EG is known for it's high-end weaponry using Elixor (PECC) weapons, suits and vehicles. EG sees itself independent from Earth with it's own laws and army. EG is at war with ERA and the UR.

U.R. - The United Rebellion: or as by some called The Junkers, is a gathering of various human groups (clans) that first did not agree with the new, harsh laws of the EG towards those left on Earth. The UR is known for it's unmatchable survival technologies required for living on the surface of Earth. Since the UR is not a very strong, technological group, they steal and use technology from others (EG and ERA). The UR counts the highest number of members from the three sides in the war. The UR is at war with EG and ERA.

The Mutants: is a general name for all the creatures that roam the wasteland and are not part of any faction. According to scientific logs, these creatures were a result of various experiments trying to produce animals that could easily survive the harsh environments of the barren Earth.

Unknown: nothing is known about these creatures or their origin.


Features:

Weapons
The player will be using various unique weapons that will aid him in fighting other NPC's, which will be mostly guns using the four main technologies available in this world. Tachyon, Micron Laser, Elixor and Bullet based weapons will all be present, allowing the player to choose which type to specialise in.

Besides unique weapons, there will be a procedural weapon generation system present in Project Omicron: 7, which will provide seemly unlimited number and types of weapons both by their looks and stats wise.

Elixor Suit
The player starts with a special suit that is based on Elixor technology. He can't take off this suit, however he can upgrade it with special permanent upgrades or enhance it with various addons that boost the suits' functions for a limited period, quite similar to an equipped armor piece in a typical fantasy game.

Both upgrades and attachments will visually appears on the surface of the suit, thus allowing the player to enjoy the looks of his/her character.

Power Glove
Besides the weapons the player can find and use for his own purpose, the suit he possesses will be equipped with a special glove that will provide interesting combat elements if used in the right way. This power glove is best described as a medium between the player and the enemy, which projects various energies that are equipped onto it using Add-On Power Cells. The glove will not be extremely powerful, but if mastered it can be a very interesting aspect of the game.

Quest System
The quest system will be very open and reward reputation points besides the regular rewards that are provided as a gift to the player once the quest is completed. The quests will usually have more than just one way of being completed, therefore enhancing the game's replay value.

The quest system will be accessed through conversations with NPC's, or in rare occasions by triggering the quest with various actions.

The player will be also able to access various voice, text and possibly video logs from the Logs menu of his status screen, where those that enjoy exploring the lore of the story can collect and enjoy numerous lore elements found throughout the world.


Equipment System
The planned equipment system of Project Omicron: 7 will be quite similar to the standard RPG games. The player will be able to equip himself with different kinds of equipment in the form of addons instead of real armour parts, and use weapons to aid him in his needs. This will feature a special paperdoll and an inventory system, as well as a shopping/looting system alongside the rest.



Advancement System
Since it's an RPG, the mod will feature an advancement system similar to the standard RPG's, but with a special, unique twist: next to the personal attributes, skills and various talents (accompanied by a detailed talent tree) will be present.

While in usual RPG's the player can instantly learn a special skill or talent, in Project Omicron: 7 the player will need to complete special "trainings" in the forms of quests if he wishes to learn the specific talent. Of course, in order to start a training for the desired special ability, the player will need to match the requirements for it as well.

Reputation System
The player will be able to choose his side by doing various quests for either of the three main factions. Doing so will increase the popularity towards the specific faction whilst decreasing it towards the other two. The player starts neutral towards all three, but in later stages of the story he will be free to pick his allies and enemies any way he wants.

Movement and Interaction System
[*] "Noise/Sound" made and "Visible/In Shadows" determination. The player will also be able to keep track of how much sound/noise he makes and how hidden/how much he is in shadows through the HUD interface. The AI will react on these actions and it will impact the flow of the game.

[*] If the player steals items from NPC's, attacks and/or kills NPC's in front of others, it will result in hostility from the allies of the victim. Civilian behaviour is another key element.

[*] The player can engage NPC's through an interesting conversation system which will be affected by the players reputation and active quests.

And others, that will provide a very interesting gameplay...


Media:
Shown below is a selection of media to show some of the progress we've made so far. First we have some pictures of a map currently under development by our level designer Nick (also known as nick73). The first to images show the aftermath of fighting between the UR and the ERA, which had some civilians caught in the crossfire. The other two images so some other parts of what is left of the city, giving a bit of an impression of the atmosphere of the game. Further down are concepts of the X540 "Behemoth" class assault robot, the Y533 "Stalker" class recon robot, an ERA sniper rifle and an ERA Micron Laser minigun, all made by our concept artist Aaron (also known as RoboMan).

In-Game Screenshots



Concept Art



That's it for our official announcement post, you can expect more detailed information on the factions, story, history, weapon types, locations, game systems and plenty other things over the coming weeks. Any and all comments, suggestions, or questions are welcome, so please do post them here if you have them.

Kind regards,
The Fusion Soft Team

Related Links
- Forum Thread: Project Omicron: 7 - [Update 28/12: Official Announcement]

Loving the concept art!

wow dis is badass awesome work.

I am really digging the concept art. It has this great sci-fi vibe I would like to see in any RPG game! Unfortunately, I can't see that on in-game shots presented in this well interpreted overview of the mod. Of course these are set in one same environment, so I might be overlooking something you guys are already having behind the scenes.

My advice is to create the colour palette differentiating your visuals from Fallout 3. Make it stand out more, make it more unique. This is what makes every explore-based experience special visually. It sucks player more in. I know the project would be more ambitious that way, and it would take more time to develop, but it would be worth it, if done properly, incorporating some good ideas. The concept might be the best way to go.

It's definitely hard to come up with new mechanics in terms of gameplay, but from what I've read, this would kind of mixing up elements from STALKER, Fallout 3, Far Cry 2, FEAR, Star Wars and Command and Conquer (these popped to my head reading the mod overview).

This is just my opinion, you probably already know about these things. You know what am I hungry for personally? Borderlands RPG mechanics in some sci-fi open-world game. That would be really cool.

dEM0NSVK, thanks for the feedback, rest assured that the wasteland setting is only one of many types of environment that one will encounter in this mod, as will become evident in future updates. Also, all of this is still heavily WIP, and changing the mood can be achieved relatively easy through the amazing ToD tool.

As far as Borderlands go, procedural weapon generation is one of the planned features, though apart from that I can't really draw any comparisons as I haven't played the game.

Thanks for the positive comments guys!

amazing project i love it

been waiting on this update and everything (especially the concept art) looks great!

Looks pretty good, I love the level design and the mech concept art

pretty god damn awesome , but theres one thing i have to do though.. http://theinfosphere.org/Omicron_Persei_8

The artwork is really fantastic!

Looks great - cant wait to see more material xD

WOWzas! hope it doesnt take as long to be released as mwll

This is looking brilliant! I will be following this one closesly.

HOT DAMN!! THATS NICE!