On April 25, 2005, I released the first episode of a project that would take until 2009 to finally finish. The beginnings of it actually go back to about 2002 or 2003, with an earlier level pack that I never managed to finish. Also, one of the levels in the fifth episode dates back as far as 1999. Suffice to say, this thing took me a while.
The Resurrection of Devan Shell is a high difficulty, plot driven series of episodes that are set a little over a hundred years after JJ2. I took a lot of liberties with the storyline, and added my own elements though, so it's pretty different. Also, it's a lot more "serious", though much of it is deliberately over the top.
Each episode is a different length, but all together the series has several hours of gameplay. I can't give an exact count as to how many levels there are, since many are revisits or cutscenes, but there are only a couple of other series that I can think of which rival this one in terms of size, and none of them have much of a storyline.
This thread serves as a place for discussion of these episodes, and also a place for me to post info and links to all of them in one convenient location.
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UPDATE (2008 April 30): Episode 4 has been released. Thank you to everyone who contributed something, even if it was just ideas.
UPDATE (2009 June 6): Episode 5 is almost done and I'm looking for testers. See my post on the 3rd page of this thread for details. It should come out sometime this month, or next month if things are delayed. Overall it's a very big level pack, and I'm glad it's finally done with. I won't be doing any rereleases of old episodes like I did last year, but I am doing small updates to them, to fix a few problems.
UPDATE (2009 June 9): Episode 5 will come out on the 27th. Testing has begun. In the time between now and then, I'll be fixing bugs and also working on the new (and probably final) versions of the other 4 episodes. I've also rewritten the first few paragraphs of this thread, since they were getting a bit outdated. Oh, and screenshots.
UPDATE (2009 June 26): Episode 5 has been released. And a day early, depending on your time zone!
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Episode One: The Invasion of Deserto
Synopsis: This episode takes place on the planet of Deserto. It has just come under attack, and you are a resident of it who has suddenly been caught in the middle of what is soon to become one of the biggest wars in history.
I started working on this years before it was released. The original intent was to make a large, non-linear level pack comprised of five main levels, each quite gigantic. You can still find threads I made back then in the JCS forum where I talked about the development of it.
That plan fell apart, but a number of levels remained. I took some of them, changed the story, made a few more levels to tie it all together, and released it. Because of the very long amount of time this was being made, episode one is the longest in the whole series. I decided that this story would be told in five parts.
I wasn't even able to use all of the levels I made, so some of it got used in the next episode.
Screenshots:
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Episode Two: The Rebirth of Evil
Synopsis: After the events of the first episode, you leave the planet in search of answers. What you discover is that things are much, much worse than they initially seemed.
A few old levels made their way into this one, although for the most part the only thing that survived was the concept. The only one that survived in its entirety was Devan's Fleet. Deserto Orbital Base for example, the largest level I have ever made, was originally a completely different level with a similar feel. A few parts of the original level made their way into the finished version, but most of it was made specially for this episode. In any case, due to the large amount of pre-existing stuff I was able to draw on, episode two also is longer than the later ones.
People seem to think this is the best episode of the lot, and I can understand why. I put more work into the main level of this pack than I ever have put into any other level, and probably ever will.
Screenshots:
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Episode Three: The Battle for Carrotus
Synopsis: You have finally arrived at Carrotus, bringing with you an urgent message: an enemy fleet is on its way to conquer the planet. To help fight them, you enlist with the Imperial Forces and are ordered series of missions sabotoging and destroying enemy ships.
This one came out over a year after the release of Episode Two. For a long time I didn't work on it at all. Then, when I decided to begin making it, I found out that the plan I created for this episode was completely unfeasable.
So I decided to swap the plans for episode four and episode three, with some story adjustments. And then I threw out the plan completely, and rewrote almost the whole thing.
The end result still worked out to be pretty good, despite the troubled development process. This episode is much more plot-heavy than the previous ones though, and the levels are not as huge either. Somewhere along the line my focus shifted from level design to storytelling. It might just be because I don't have as much time to make levels, though.
Screenshots:
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Episode Four: The Resistance
Synopsis: You have been a prisoner of war for the last five months, held by the enemy occupying Carrotus. Suddenly, you are freed by members of the Carrotus resistance force, and are given an opportunity to continue fighting.
It's been about a year since my last release, but most of that time was spent simply thinking about what to do with the fourth episode, and carefully laying out plans. Overall the final product turned out to be quite close to the plans I originally made before the production of episode three, but there are a couple of key plot points that were added quite recently. The original plan also had this epsiode being rather non-linear, but I scrapped that idea due to it being impractical and not very fun to play.
Most of the levels were made in the last few months, except for the Forest Path level which is actually completed from a highly unfinished level that I started around 2003. There are more levels in this episode than the previous one, but they are also shorter on average.
This episode, like the previous one, is very plot-heavy. A lot of that is because of necessity: my plans for the fifth episode don't leave much room for storytelling, so I have to cram as much of the plot as possible into this one. It also didn't help that it turns out I really hate using the Carrotus tileset. Still, the quality here is on the same level as the previous ones.
Screenshots:
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Episode Five: The Fortress of Ruin
Synopsis: The final confrontation with Devan Shell is near. You have traveled to the planet Nippius where it said that he is hiding, but something very strange is going on there. You're going to need to take a few detours, it seems...
It's the last episode, finally. I wanted to be done with this in April, but what's a few extra months?
This is by far the longest episode, and personally I feel it's the best one. I used almost all of the ideas I had, and unlike the previous episodes, refused to place any limits on myself when it came to plot or setting. Everything I wanted to get done is in here, and I'm glad I managed to do it.
This episode is much more gameplay-heavy than the previous ones, with the plot mostly being confined to scrolling text. It's structured around a massive "hub" level, which branches off to a bunch of different unique areas. Each area consists of a regular level, a "fortress" level, and a small boss level. The hub area also mirrors that format somewhat, just on a larger scale.
All of the levels are new, except for one, which was started way back in 1999, and abandoned for a very, very long time.
This is the final episode. There won't be any sequels continuing this storyline. Perhaps one day I'll make another level pack, but it will be a new story, set in the same "universe" with a different protagonist. Maybe a prequel. That's just speculation though. Maybe if JJ2+ ever adds new single player features. Other than that, I'm pretty much
retiring taking an extended break from level making. I just don't see what else I can do from this point, other than repeat what I've already done. To be honest, I'm glad this is finished!
Screenshots:
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And yeah, this thread is pretty much an advertisement. Still, you might as well get some use out of it, so if you have any questions or comments, this thread is for you. Plus I know a lot of people don't check the downloads page all that often, so it's good to point out when a major release has been made.