Koronis Rift?

[Luke]

Just curious: Was this fine game inspired by Koronis Rift at all?

[Khallis]

That is certainly an influence. I was a TRS-80 Coco kid, and I played a lot of KR on the coco 3, though I think it was best on the C64. I tried to include a few polite nods and easter eggs to acknowledge that, without looking like I was trying to copy it or rip it off - you might find them in play. A tip of the hat for you spotting it. There's some similarities and a lot of differences.

You were physically on board your rover in all of Koronis Rift, not operating it remotely. I think limited information is a key to suspense and tension. In a horror movie, you generally don't get a good look at the monster until the third act - forcing you to fill in the gaps with your imagination makes it far more effective. Horror movies use camera control to do that - the cameraman didn't let you get a solid look. In this sort of game, you are the cameraman, so that won't work. A whole lot of games - thousands of them - have used darkness for that, so much so that it's now frustratingly overused feeling - and it's also sensitive to monitor gamma adjustment. What one person could thrillingly barely glimpse in the shadows, another saw plainly because of a brighter monitor, and another never at all. The static interference is a way to limit your information without being something you're tired of seeing a thousand times and without being so dependent on how exactly your monitor is tuned.

KR had a bunch of different alien species all afoot on the same planet, and a series of levels for you to progress through, and the maps were all hand-built. There was a puzzle in it, to winning it, but only one - and once you found that, you were pretty much done. It had about four objects you could find that really broke the rules and were weird, and those were a thrill. I remain deeply impressed with what they managed to pack in to the tiny computers of the era.

Georg Rottensteiner did a straight-up remake of Koronis Rift about twelve years ago for a free game jam. I think the original looked a little better than that remake. Other than that, the world seems to have mostly forgotten about it - Rescue on Fractalus gets all the fame.

Scavenger SV-4 is a little bit "What could Koronis Rift have been on a bigger computer?" - but it's also a little bit "What if you were Ripley watching the scratchy video feeds from the crew on foot on LV-426?", and it's a whole lot it's own thing straight out of my imagination as a lifelong sci-fi fan.

[Luke]

Good stuff. I played Koronis on the Atari 400 platform, as well as Fractalus (which was instead titled Behind Jaggi Lines on the Atari).

I always had a sense of fear when picking up those guys in Jaggi/Fractalus, would they knock on the airlock or turn out to be enemies? Would I be able to react in time? They randomized some of the delay times, so it was never quite predictable.

You've done some great stuff here, it brings back some fond memories from childhood.

[Darloth]

I remember Koronis Rift, and this game reminded me of it strongly from the moment I saw it. I'm glad it hasn't been entirely forgotten, as I always thought it was more interesting than Rescue on Fractalus.

[fortuiteer]

Rescue on Fractalus wasn't a particularly good game. Gameplay was fairly repetitive and the majority of it was flying, which didn't have the framerate to make it very enjoyable. What made it popular was that one gimmick of the assaulting alien, which was the only good reason for people to start up the game and showcase to friends, for a scare and a laugh.

Koronis Rift had significantly more depths, but it took a fair bit of patience for players to discover that. You started out with the slowest movement speed, driving over a fairly plain surface, and there was no indication that the vehicle could ever be faster. Not the most motivating scenario to keep playing in.
I also seem to remember that it required at least 2 devices to effectively increase velocity, something like a better engine and a generator powerful enough to provide the energy for maximum efficiency. I think there were other factors involved and it took a fair bit of trial and error + luck to get the best combinations. According to my memory, I was quite impressed by the game's maximum speed. But it took quite a number of hours to get there.

And, yah, Scavenger SV-4 immediately reminded me of Koronis Rift, just by reading the description.

[UK_John]

Mentioned Koronis Rift as a rebuff to the You Tubers mentioning Starflight! :)

[Luke]

Oh man, I would be so excited if someone made anohter Starflight spiritual successor! That would be great!

TLC is pretty great and so is ProspectorRL, but I'd love to see something as amazing as SSV4.

[LeftPaw]

Those days...
When games were magical. A pixel on the screen was you, in both mind and body. The slightly larger pixel was your space craft that you valued so dearly, and the really big pixel was that unknown world from which you may never return.