In my last blog I wrote about the mechanics that I feel were in Grand Theft Auto. After deciding what the main mechanics are, I looked back into the past and looked at some of the games that had the same sort of mechanics and if that game could have influenced the Grand Theft Auto series.
One game that I wrote about was Elite. When Elite was first released it revolutionized computer games, and was one of the first games to use a fully black and white wire frame engine. I feel that this game holds some of the key mechanics that the GTA series has today. In this blog I be looking at Elite, how the idea was conceived, from who made it to have the developers made anything similar since.
In Elite you, the player, assumed the role of a deep space pilot. Your task was to deliver cargo from planet to planet or solar system to solar system, some missions included bounty hunting. When you started the game you were given a harmless rating, and the more missions that you completed the higher up the ranks you would go, including average and dangerous. The goal was to attain the ultimate ranking of Elite, also when you completed missions you would gain credits (Money). These credits could be used for upgrading items, e.g. buy a laser upgrade or extra missiles for your ship.
Elite was written by David Braben and Ian Bell while they were at Cambridge University. When they first met Braben had been writing a simple 3D space game for the Acorn Atom. It consisted of a 3d star field with very simple space ships. At the same time Bell had been working on a game called Free Fall. When they decided to write a game together, they decided upon a space game, but they wanted a space game that was exciting and had combat in three dimensions against enemies that exhibited some kind of technical knowledge. They wanted players of their games to play for much longer then the quick ten minutes that games back then offered. They wanted to get away from games that told the player what experience they were going to have, they wanted to make a game that left the player to decide what to do and where to go completely up to them. So when they set about working on ‘The Elite’ which was later shortened to Elite in 1982, they started to work on ideas that would make the Elite unique. They wanted part of the game where you had to dock your space ship with a space station, and to keep players interested they wanted to allow the player to upgrade the weapons on their ships, so they could use different tactics in later battles. Braben and Bell decided that the way the player could upgrade would be that the player had to earn it. They decided to allow the player to earn credits when it killed a space pirate, but Braben and Bell decided that that this could get a bit samey. So they decided that the game should involve trading as well, using the ship as a cargo hauler.
The game took two years to develop and was published by Acornsoft and was released in 1984 for the BBC Micros computer. When released it sold 150,000 copies, but there were only 150,000 or so BBC Micros computers, this game had a massive impact when it was released.
David Braben used the rewards from Elite to build himself a career in the games industry. David Braben was the founder of Frontier Developments who is currently a leading independent games developer. They currently develop games for the Playstation2, Xbox, GameCube, Windows PC, Microsoft Windows Mobile Pocket PC and Nokia Series 60 Phones. Games that they have worked on include,Wallace and Gromit games, including the recent game of the film, the curse of the were-rabbitn and the RollerCoaster Tycoon series,
One game that I wrote about was Elite. When Elite was first released it revolutionized computer games, and was one of the first games to use a fully black and white wire frame engine. I feel that this game holds some of the key mechanics that the GTA series has today. In this blog I be looking at Elite, how the idea was conceived, from who made it to have the developers made anything similar since.
In Elite you, the player, assumed the role of a deep space pilot. Your task was to deliver cargo from planet to planet or solar system to solar system, some missions included bounty hunting. When you started the game you were given a harmless rating, and the more missions that you completed the higher up the ranks you would go, including average and dangerous. The goal was to attain the ultimate ranking of Elite, also when you completed missions you would gain credits (Money). These credits could be used for upgrading items, e.g. buy a laser upgrade or extra missiles for your ship.
Elite was written by David Braben and Ian Bell while they were at Cambridge University. When they first met Braben had been writing a simple 3D space game for the Acorn Atom. It consisted of a 3d star field with very simple space ships. At the same time Bell had been working on a game called Free Fall. When they decided to write a game together, they decided upon a space game, but they wanted a space game that was exciting and had combat in three dimensions against enemies that exhibited some kind of technical knowledge. They wanted players of their games to play for much longer then the quick ten minutes that games back then offered. They wanted to get away from games that told the player what experience they were going to have, they wanted to make a game that left the player to decide what to do and where to go completely up to them. So when they set about working on ‘The Elite’ which was later shortened to Elite in 1982, they started to work on ideas that would make the Elite unique. They wanted part of the game where you had to dock your space ship with a space station, and to keep players interested they wanted to allow the player to upgrade the weapons on their ships, so they could use different tactics in later battles. Braben and Bell decided that the way the player could upgrade would be that the player had to earn it. They decided to allow the player to earn credits when it killed a space pirate, but Braben and Bell decided that that this could get a bit samey. So they decided that the game should involve trading as well, using the ship as a cargo hauler.
The game took two years to develop and was published by Acornsoft and was released in 1984 for the BBC Micros computer. When released it sold 150,000 copies, but there were only 150,000 or so BBC Micros computers, this game had a massive impact when it was released.
David Braben used the rewards from Elite to build himself a career in the games industry. David Braben was the founder of Frontier Developments who is currently a leading independent games developer. They currently develop games for the Playstation2, Xbox, GameCube, Windows PC, Microsoft Windows Mobile Pocket PC and Nokia Series 60 Phones. Games that they have worked on include,Wallace and Gromit games, including the recent game of the film, the curse of the were-rabbitn and the RollerCoaster Tycoon series,
posted by Matthew Battison at 1:52 AM
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