The Ancient Project

I thought i better post it here since this is a modding forum, so here goes;




https://img226.imageshack.us/img226/6928/banner34bc.png

PREVIEW 1

What is the Ancient Project?

The Ancient Project is an Ancient era mod for the upcoming Medieval 2:Total war. It is the first of its type, and will be a great mod because it will utilise the full potential of the Medieval engine, for instance in hoplite units, all soldiers will look different, which will be a major step towards historical accuracy. Although this is a Historical mod, we also view gameplay as equally important, although because of the state of Medieval 2, it is hard to comment on the gameplay of it at the moment. The Ancient Project is the result of much interest in making a Greek era mod, and i have made a new thread because we now have a new name, team, and many new ideas.

Well, gimme some info about it

Well, although we havent finalised these decisions, we beleive the mod will start around 500BC, just before Xerxes' invasions of Greece. We are planning on having around 35 factions in this mod, but we recognise that because of possible hardcodes that this number will more than likely be reduced and changed throughout development.

1.) City of Lacedaemon (Sparta)
2.) City of Athenai (Athens)
3.) City of Korinthos (Corinth)
4.) The Kindom of Macedon
5.) The Boeotian League
6.) The Ionian League
7.) City of Syracuse
8.) Republic of Carthage
9.) Republic of Rome
10.) The Persian Empire
11.) Etrurians
12.) Thessaly
13.) Samnites
14.) City of Taras
15.) 'Sicilian' Faction (Sicily sub-faction, will challenge Syracuse and Carthage)
16.) Italian tribe 1 (Italia sub-faction, will challenge Rome, Greek Cities, and Etruria.)
17.) Italian tribe 2
18.) Italian tribe 3
19.) Iberian Tribe 1
20.) Iberian Tribe 2
21.) Iberian Tribe 3 (The idea behind this is to have more than one faction in Iberia, excluding Carthage.)
22.) Celtic Tribe 1
23.) Celtic Tribe 2 (The map should be pulled up north just slightly, so we have Cisalpine Gaul)
24.) Africa Sub-Faction 1- possible either Libya or Numidia
25.) Africa Sub-Faction 1- possible either Libya or Numidia
26.) Cretans?

The Map

Yet again, we will have to prepare for any hardcoded issues we might face, but this is a concept for the map we will have...

https://img420.imageshack.us/img420/2498/map9td.jpg

Areas in Red are high priority territories. They are areas that cannot be left out, and at the bare minimum due to hardoded stuff this would have to be our map

Areas in orange are 2nd priority. They are areas not nessesary for the mod's developent, but are still quite important places for this time period, and these will certainly be attempted to put into the map.

Areas in yellow are desirable areas. They arent nessesary, but these areas would add expandability to the mod. These new territories depend also on the faction limit as to how we can go about expanding this map.

And these are some draft regions files done by our mapper/historian Xiphos;

https://img92.imageshack.us/img92/25...s8hg4fu2db.gif

The Peloponnesian Peninsula (a toungue twister I think)

https://img108.imageshack.us/img108/8623/sicily2gb.gif

And this is Sicily :P

Units

Now, we will plan to include as many units as we can in this mod, and we are working away to acheive this, by researching everything about this time period.

Here is some concept art, draws by Blank;

https://img189.imageshack.us/img189/8674/spartan4xr.png

This is a Spartan hoplite, although it could possibly be used as a royal guard...

https://img121.imageshack.us/img121/...rincipe2jt.png

A princepe.

Some shield designs
https://img119.imageshack.us/img119/...sc057307zs.jpg

https://img151.imageshack.us/img151/...sc057319ff.jpg

a levy hoplite with secondary weapon

https://img155.imageshack.us/img155/...mancopy4es.jpg

And an egyptian spearman, done by myself...

Now, here are some WIP models and skins, done by myself...
I know myself that there are many bugs, inaccuracies and problems with the models, they are very 'rough round the edges' but they suffice for an idea of what the units will look like...
The general, carrying his helmet under his arm, marches alongside his men
https://img150.imageshack.us/img150/...ralcopy4wv.jpg

A fierce battle between an Athenian, and a spartan. The Athenian lunges to strike, but the skillful spartan has found his target, and strikes the unfortunate Athenian in the neck.
https://img234.imageshack.us/img234/...le1copy8nh.jpg

A man of Athens, standing guard.
https://img234.imageshack.us/img234/5316/hoplite7ei.jpg

thats yer lot :P

Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed this little update

The Ancient Project Team;

Lentonius- Director, Modeler, Skinner, Art
Dionysios II The Great- Co-Director, Lead Historian
Blank- Art, Historian
Xiphos- Mapper, Historian
Pieman.Uk- Coder, Historian
Illyrian- Historian
God Zeys- Historian
Shiponja_hayabusa- Historian

I sure hope i havent left anybody out:2thumbsup:

Also, please show your support by using these great siggies, made by Blank;

https://img251.imageshack.us/img251/...ggy11cx9ws.png

https://img377.imageshack.us/img377/8604/siggy61hf.png

https://img266.imageshack.us/img266/757/siggy50hd.png

https://img484.imageshack.us/img484/3442/siggy42av.png

https://img57.imageshack.us/img57/4391/siggy30je.png


We also have a website kindly given by Marcvs Trajanvs, its WIP but please have a look;

http://www.tap.mods.medievaltw.com/

I really dont think that Syrcause was its own independant city-state at that time. If anything it was probably just a small colony of some other greek faction.

Regardless good luck. Id really love a mod for this time period.

I would like this mod 2 sounds gr8 do u think you will be able to make it so its like an extra campaign instead of replacing all of mtw2 so we could have it as a side game

@cunobelnius- well, we will have to see the limitations, although if it is possible without ruining mtw2 im sure we could do that.

@shifty- yeah, syracuse is quite small at the beginning, although many factions like roma are also small. we are going to make them grow in power as time goes by.

Regards
Lentonius

Good luck!

Note that all those signatures are too large in size (one is over 100kB!). Would be better if you save as JPG or as GIF if you don't want loss of quality. Your images will look good enough with just 256 colours.
But this whole page has 2,5 MB worth of images, do you hate 56K users? :wink:

I'm definately in if you want some help with this i have some experience in moddeling plus i study archaeologi at moesgård in demark, wich means I have unlimmited acess to infomartion plus if i cant find it I mite be able to ask the proffs.. so let me know if you could use some help.

@DJ, haha, i didnt realise that, sorry. I find image sizes quite hard to make smaller but i will try to make em smaller:2thumbsup:

@Tutankamon- please register at our forums and we'll make you a developer Your help will be gladly appreciated.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shifty157

I really dont think that Syrcause was its own independant city-state at that time. If anything it was probably just a small colony of some other greek faction.

Regardless good luck. Id really love a mod for this time period.

---

from wikipedia,

Syracuse was founded in 734 or 733 BC by Greek settlers from Corinth, led by the oecist (colonizer) Archias, who called it Sirako, referring to a nearby swamp. The nucleus of the ancient city was the small island of Ortygia. The settlers found the land to be fertile and the native tribes to be reasonably well-disposed to their presence. The city grew and prospered, and for some time stood as the most powerful Greek city anywhere in the Mediterranean

Update 6/10/06

We are still alive, and at present are researching faction and unit lists in the one month-ish left until release. We really need some more members. Any skinners, modelers or historians are all greatly appreciated!

Plus, any people wishing to learn how to skin please contact me, as this would be a good opportunity for both sides. I will personally teach up to 10 people how to skin and use photoshop, all i ask in return is to assist me in making some skins for the mod once its out. If you're interested please contact me.

Regards
Lentonius

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shifty157

I really dont think that Syrcause was its own independant city-state at that time. If anything it was probably just a small colony of some other greek faction.

---

:book: According to Herodotos, Syracuse was in fact independent (although it had close connections with Sparte, connections the Athenians got to feel during their Sicilian adventure), and the polis was in fact the most powerfull of all of Sicily: she succesfully fought the Carthaginians. Syracuse was, still according to H, so powerfull that she claimed the command of either the land forces or the naval forces: due to reluctance of both Sparte and Athenai to accept this and the fact that the Carthaginians launched their attacks on Sicily Syracuse decided not to get involved in the Persian Wars.

So it's only fair to have Syracuse as an independent faction.

Wow, this look pretty cool.........Good Luck:2thumbsup:

Do you have a list what what factions you think might be playable?