Natural Selection 2
| Natural Selection 2 | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Unknown Worlds Entertainment |
| Designer(s) | Charlie Cleveland |
| Engine | Unnamed proprietary engine |
| Platform(s) | Microsoft Windows |
| Release | TBA |
| Genre(s) | First-person shooter Real-time strategy |
| Mode(s) | Multiplayer |
Natural Selection 2 (NS2) is a multiplayer computer game mixing First-Person Shooter and Real-Time Strategy gameplay. It is set in a science fiction universe, and is currently under development.
Natural Selection 2 will be set a few years after the original Natural Selection left off.
Development Status
A Development Blog is maintained to help show how progress is going. Developers are also active on the Unknown Worlds’ Natural Selection 2 forums.
On August 31st, 2007 podcasts by Max McGuire and Charlie Cleveland were released. Since then, these audio updates have been released at irregular intervals. They discuss the development process, funding, focus, and serve as a basis for interviews with other big names in the industry.
Development History
The game was officially announced in October 2006. It was to be developed by the Natural Selection creator's newly-founded company, Unknown Worlds. Charlie ‘Flayra’ Cleveland will be continuing his work on the game and Cory (concept artist from Natural Selection) will also be contributing concept artwork.
On December 1st, 2006 the first major announcement of a possible feature was announced called Dynamic Infestation.[1] A video containing an example of Dynamic Infestation was posted on the Unknown Worlds development blog, which then quickly generated over 300 comments and was listed on Digg.com’s front page.
On April 7th, 2008, Unknown Worlds established an office and hired additional employees using newfound funding for Natural Selection 2. Although work had been taking place up to this point at near full-time, this solidified Unknown Worlds' commitment to the game.
On July 10th, 2008, Unknown Worlds announced their move from the Source Engine to a in-house developed engine that is as yet unnamed. [2]
Concept artwork is often shown on Unknown Worlds development blog. This includes environment concepts, computer terminal concepts, marine and weaponry concepts.
Distribution
Charlie Cleveland announced in an interview that the game will be distributed through Steam. [3]
It has been announced that a Tech Release (named NS2TR) will be given to the community so that user created maps can ship with NS2. Natural Selection did the same thing and numerous creators have gone on to work on games such as Quake 4. However, since Natural Selection 2 will be retail Unknown Worlds will be purchasing the rights to the maps that are selected to be in the game. [4]
Weaponry
All marine weapons and alien abilities are planned to have alternative fire. The sequel will be set several years after the original, so marine weaponry will be more advanced and have new art. Several concepts have been created by Nate Wolcott and released to the public.
Charlie Cleveland also announced that the much anticipated Flamethrower will be making an appearance in Natural Selection 2. [5]
Game Engine
An as-yet unnamed game engine is being developed specifically for NS2. It is based off of code written by Max McGuire, which was originally designed for loading Source engine media (the Source engine was originally the target for NS2 development).
NS2's engine will utilize the Lua scripting language for game logic, allowing for easy expansion of the game's mechanics. [6] Physics support is being provided by several third-party libraries, and will be part of the multi-player experience. [7]