How Serious Sam's Demo Saved the Game From Extinction | War Stories | Ars Technica
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- čas přidán 2. 10. 2018
- Croteam founder Davor Hunski discusses the long development history of the first game in the Serious Sam series. Starting development all the way back in 1996, Serious Sam went through many different iterations, with big shifts occurring every time a new ground-breaking game released. With money running out, Croteam went for a Hail Mary. They crafted a vertical slice that packed all the best bits of the game into one demo.
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How Serious Sam's Demo Saved the Game From Extinction | War Stories | Ars Technica
Provided by Davor: 2 items commons.wikimedia.org/w/index... 1 items Provided by Davor: 2 items Old Man Murray website: 1 items - Hry
"How Serious Sam's *lack of crates* saved the game from extinction".
I laughed so hard at that part :D
The inverse of Crash Bandicoot.
Sam said it himself: I hate crates.
This made me give Serious Sam 3 another go - lo and behold the first crates appear around 2 seconds in, as soon as you walk out of the room you spawn in. Oh how the mighty have fallen.
@@Nohiro.3D Ya that sounds true
So THAT'S why Sam hates crates!
It all makes sense!
But why does he hate running backwards
That, is a serious question
It wasn't even a question.
@@kaldo_kaldo r/whoosh
"Give gamers a chance to try before they buy"
Right? Right?! Nowadays there's barely any demo being released and yet they expect us to preorder and fully trust them.
Seeing preorders with "year one season pass" makes me sick, i rather buy it with all dlc few years later for less than a half original price. Heck, here in Russia ubi was selling division 2 for 2$, and i heard it was 5$ in US, if i was day 1 player i would have been pissed...
Only entitled incel manbabies expect to be able to try a game out before spending $60 on it. /s
@@tartrazine5 wow, you're so fluent in the current buzzwords. I suppose we shouldn't be able try on a pair of shoes before we buy them?
actually you can return a steam game within a few hours after buying them, so you CAN actually try them out to see whether you like them.
That is true but sadly only on Steam. Consoles suffer.
No crates, 10/10.
No crates, no capes!
To be honest, when I had a chance to play Serious Sam at a LAN party the complete lack of crates threw off my usual play style to the max in a GOOD way that's stuck with me all these years.
Still remember when I bought the first Serious Sam, I couldn't believe how much fun that game (and next chapters) gave me.
Thank you for sharing this interview
I remember too !!! I was only 10 years old and my father had to go to the cashier with me so I could get it , as it was rated 16 , which means for people age 16 and up. :D Haha good times !!!
I remember it vividly as well. I had just bought a new computer when it came out, but i kept my old pentium 2 with voodoo 3 in it. And i remember i was shocked when serious sam could actually run on that old computer, and that i also could play it in single player coop with a friend, and with hundreds of enemies on the screen. It was sorcery tbh, i had no idea it could be done. And it was a blast playing it.
It's a mind blowing game.
I picked it up for a bargain price at a large general store. I had no idea what it was and had never heard of it before.
@@storerestore That sounds great, enjoy it and let us know if you like it!
Happy fragging the hordes!
You wanna know how cool Croteam is? I bought the original serious Sam bundle on steam, which didn't have all the games yet. When they added all the rest of the games to steam, they were added for free. I didn't have to repurchase like some bundles do.
Some of the smaller studios do it on occasion. When Dear Esther Landmark Edition was released owners of the original got it for free. More often though you usually get a 50+% discount to a remake/remaster. Not so good, but it oftentimes sums up with seasonal/weekend sales, so you get like 70+% actual discount. There are some devs though, usually AAA or high-budget ones, who just spit right into you face with full price for that remaster (not even a remake with loads of added stuff, I mean, a Black Mesa style of remake deserves to be priced at it's $30-40 for the sheer community effort in development and the details added). The only kinda stuff that saves the situation is the abundance of pre-release trailers with actual gameplay, like DooM Eternal has, for example, and the fact that many of high-budget projects are parts of series where you sorta kinda may know what to expect, like CoD, Assassin's Creed and a few others.
"we invented" "we invented" wow these guys are amazing. They didnt have something so they just made it. hes so casual about it too lmao.
That's how it was done back in the day when daddy didn't pay for everything and google could add most of the knowledge.
and people this day and age are looking everything up and playing copycat think they are ''CREATIVE''
@@michael2305 and publishers these days are turning away indie teams that are not working on either Unreal Engine or Unity because they think developing and maintaining a full game code base is too much effort for one team to handle. For some innovations, it is still the path of best end result.
So... Eastern Europe after the cold war?
@@KawaiianArgument ROFL lets keep my sex life out of this!
@@toddgerr any holes the goal
As a guy in his early 20's that just missed all this 90's to early 2000's pc gaming, this series is like... a goldmine. So interesting!
Dude...yeah you missed out, I'm so sorry lol I'm 38, and the mid-90's and early 2000's was really interesting. Lots of advances made, but seeing the games evolve was really cool. I started on Wolfenstein 3D, then went to Doom, then to Quake, Half-Life, etc. But demos and shareware were exceedingly common back then, especially in the 90's. My brother and I would occasionally get demos from somewhere, I think mostly from his subscription to Electronic Gaming Monthly (EMG, a magazine) but it would sometimes include CD's or 3.5" floppy disks. Then I remember this one time we picked up this 2 CD set, called "1000 games in 1" (2 discs) and there were literally 1000 games on it, all shareware or demos from all over the place. Amazing time for PC's.
My favourite thing when watching "making of" documentaries and interviews is whenever they go "We wanted/needed X, but couldn't afford it or it didn't exist...so we had to use, I dunno, bread delivery boxes or make it ourselves." And the end result is always great. Less is more. Every movie or game that had to find ways to work around it's limitations made for better experiences because they had to get creative with it. Creativity is what makes art, art. Not money or names.
Facts - and I feel like you reach the highest level of creativity when you are pushed to the extreme. It like you either sink or swim!
Guess that is why Sam says "I Hate Crates" in the second encounter lol.
HAHAHAHAHHA i remember that line. It's when you find your 2nd weapon or something i think
George Daravigkas
I think it's when you're finding the "secret crate bus".
I am refering to Serious Sam 2...
@@LeorioSusano
..Even though the OP talked about TSE?
Yeah nevermind. I was wrong either way. I thought he was saying the line when you found the first Shotgun on SS2 but he wasnt, i just checked it. I dont remember where i heard now but i am sure i have
i love serious sam! :D
Lo so Ludo, lo so. È uno dei migliori.
@Bore96TheGaming mi guardo quanto erano sfigghi croteam
@Bore96TheGaming hehe
Pure ioooh :)
Cmq ciao ludo :)
I didn't get into Serious Sam until I found the HD re-release on Steam sale for a few dollars. So I missed all this history, but even so I really like these games. While the trend in modern titles is to "aim higher" with complex story and RPG elements and whatever, Sam makes no apologies and sticks to his guns.
I didn't know serious same existed until i played the talos principle and kept finding easter eggs referencing some sam "Serious" stoned dude. Got the hd remaster for less than a dollar i think.
Never late to play them. Play classic and HD, not just HD ones.
Nookie Nookie I agree, unfortunately the variable gravity doesn't work in the new engine, so there's still reason to play the original. For the time, it was a very impressive engine. Not just because of the enormous number of enemies that could be on screen with no slowdown, it just legit looked good.
@Sam A3 You may be surprised, but Sam has a huge stprytelling and lore potential.
@@irllcd13 both it and the Doom 2 engine are phenomenal engines. If you've ever watched some of the slaughter maps from Doom 2, it's mind-blowing how many monsters can be on the screen at the same time with zero slow down. Same with Serious Sam. A+ engines.
"Whaaaa, stupid headless freaks!" I loved the game!
Its interesting how he said that they wanted more enemies than other games, like 10x more. Now look at the Serious Sam 4 Planet Badass (amazing name love it) trailer, its like 1000x more! Croteam is 100% my favourite game development company.
Well when I saw the trailer, it wasn't exactly mind blowing, but I felt safe about the future of the game, the series, and Croteam. They just need to make sure Damjan Mravunac writes their soundtrack, and that's a game many will love.
Yeah, but a trailer is only a trailer. And the gameplay trailers are only to showcase the power of the engine + it says that this is not the final version. But still, i am so hyped for the next serious sam! Especially when you are hanging out with friends and pass the controller around after dying.
Both 1st n 2nd encounters were my childhood.
here is my childhood CDs thgtr.com/wp-content/uploads/eski/graphic/20030706/images/cdler.jpg
Serious Sam 2 as well, all 3 games were awesome! I hope they continue the plotline with Mental
too bad 4 is yet another prequel, i mean i will play it but i would really want to see the final encounter with Mental
Who would have ever guessed that it was Serious Sam that needed saving?
Amazing demo back in the day, especially that Temple of Effects where you could check all the models with different visual effects from tech used in the game. The complete game was amazing too, very smooth and with an options menu that still puts many modern titles to shame. Also I like how Croteam cares a lot about optimization: low end hardware first, then scaling up to the powerful stuff.
Serious Sam 4 is going to be amazing if they keep using the same design philosophy, and I can't wait to play it.
they care about customers/gamers in their homecountry too, where salaries are low and therefore people can hardly afford high-end gaming machines.
Yeah, Serious Sam is one of the most optimized games I have ever seen. It's Unreal. Pun intended.
Low end is the most people... and if you want everyone to play it... You need to build it also, and just a few people in a few rooms, not the latest hardware again.
@@wobblysauce There's no more common GPU architecture than Intel HD... ...sadly...
TSE options are insane, there are like 50 options at least to configure the game to run as best as possible (as long you took the time to tweak everything)
When I was a little kid and did not have my own money to buy the Serious Sam FE and SE games from stores, I used to play the Demo for the Serious Sam SE, over and over again. It was the map where you had to collect two golden jaguars and place them on some device on a small pyramid in the middle of the map which would open a door in another pyramid, where you eventually find a skull and you get a cutscene with Serious Sam saying "To be or not to be, that is a serious question". This demo is tattooed on my heart and will stay with me forever. Wonderful games SS:FE and SS:SE are, of course later on in my life when I got a job I could buy these games, they worth every penny.
I'm kind of sad that you don't have any replies on this Comment, even tho you look like a die hard SS fan.
@@FR4M3Sharma im kinda sad you got no comments on your reply to the original comment
Based!
One of my favorite games in my life.
Ahhh Karnak, what sweet memories and the countless times we played through this gorgeous level.
It definitely sold myself and all my friends on buying the full game
Oh my god, suddenly all the crate jokes make so much more sense...
I love this company...
30 publishers and only 2 answer with no.
just like applying for a job
publishers weren't historically all that savvy
and neither are HR departments, to be frank
I played the demo with friends... a lot.... i think it is crazy how ars did a video on a simple demo of a cult clsssic game i put many hours into. High volume rock music and serious sam with your friend.... good times, you get in the zone, so to speak.
I spent hundreds of hours on the Starsiege:tribes demo. I can relate.
TALOS - the most underrated fps puzzle game in history.
the problem with talos is that it had good story, but the puzzles didnt backed it up 15+hours of lazer connecting isnt really fun, even with adding many items that made things complicated. Portal's level felt new even in the later stages due to physics and moving rooms
As someone who only ever cared about the story in Fallout 3 and already believe that life is a shared dream/simulation by a single consciousness (because quantum mechanics proves that indirectly), I really dislike Talos. It's boring, unimaginative and forcibly drawn out, making me feel like I'm wasting time at the expense of the game artificially extending it's empty lifeless self. The game is incognito insulting throughout, terminals not excluded.
Say whatever you want about Talos, but that soundtrack is god-tier.
underrated wat. Overwhelmingly positive on steam, multiple awards and critical praise. noot underrated man
They built a clone of Wolfenstein's engine and then simply "added" a vertical camera after seeing Duke Nukem? That must have taken so much rewriting. He made it sound so easy lol
Yeah I was like "Wha?" He said it like going from 2d to 2.5d to 3d was as simple as changing your socks.
This is trivial, because vertical look feature in Duke3D is fake. Hovertank 3D, the game that preceded Wolf3D, had vertical camera wobble.
another game that evolved by simply adding features to Wolf3D-like engine is Chasm: The Rift
@@noop9k and that was a freakin awesome game!!!! i still remember for me it was the first game where i was able to shoot body parts off my enemies. so nice
Hazardeur Yeah, Impressed me too, but flat Wolf3D-like level design took some points off :)
This is a bit insane- take improved 2.5 Wolf3D engine, add polygonal decorations and enemies that look more complex than Quake, but the game is still flat 2.5D and you can’t look up or down too high.
What's really cool is: Old Man Murray is still up. You can go there and read the first Interview (from 2000) and the second interview from 2001.
2:03 Oh man, Diamond Multimedia video cards; that brings back memories!
@PeePee2000 You were using 3DFX cards up until 2015?
Prva prava igra u kojoj sam istinski uzivao kao klinac, svaka cast! Pozdrav iz Srbije!
To druze, pricaji srpski da te ceo svet razume haha :)
Очень хорошая игра, правда. Привет из России!
@@abatollo привет от България :)
Hearing that they started out with a wolfenstein 3d spin off, and DN3D, Doom and Quake came out well before the game launched, gives insight on how long it took to develop this game
Seconds to Crate (STC) should never have been abandoned as a metric! Also, khm , - GO TEAM CRO!!!!
Well crash Bandicoot was amazing.. soooo
now it's milliseconds to microtransactions
Serious Sam 1 and 2 were fabulous, I was mesmerised by them !
God, Erik Wolpaw was a cool guy from in the past to the present. So glad SS was able to come to fruition, and along with other Croteam games.
All SS games are good..i wish this franchise was so not underrated. More people should support croteam thought...
The Talos Principle was also an amazing game by these guys
My first game on my first PC. Thank You!
Being a game developer I am very biased, but I find these stories fascinating! They deserve to go viral.
Biased against what?
That is a serious matter that we need to discuss Bleubleu81.
biased toward, @@Drakensson
I’m not a game a developer, and I agree 100%.
this is why i love croteam. they still know the importance of demos.
Awesome video. One of my favorite games of all time.
I was about 11 years old and played The Second Encounter with my uncle for hours every night
what a great interview! i remember playing that demo so much in my childhood! you guys did an amazing job from your garage!
I attended a speech he gave on my faculty, you should hear what croteam did with even more ancient tech,
Football Glory
In essence a clone of Sensible Soccer, Football Glory was a more laid back, and at points, a much more comical approach: apart from several new features such as overhead and heel kicks, it included several seemingly unrelated animations (including female streakers and hooligans with assorted police officers chasing them, toilet paper and firecrackers thrown to the field by the audience after a goal, and cartoon-like talking bubbles after a referee decision, after which the player was allowed to chase the referee), and various other little amusing touches, such as the snow-ridden field having a snowman as a corner flag and icicles hanging down from the crossbar.
Serious Sam was Amazing for the Day. The Clip plane was unbelievably long. You could see across valleys. The game was colorful, (the standard was brown, grey, more brown). Then animations were original a over the top fun. You guys kicked butt!
I'm really loving these War Stories series and I really hope you make more of them!
Subscribed :)!
This is so true, infact, I remember this demo copy coming with many computer related magazines,feautured on many tech forum and tbh i even remember buying a limited edition? which stopped me playing the game halfway through! but it saved these guy, and now i got the whole franchise bundle in steam for really good price.
This game was and still is fun. I remember hunting for the demo after reading the OMM review.
I had that Serious Sam demo back in the day too. It's the only reason I ever heard of the series at first. Good times, even though my old computer could barely handle running it, lol.
Serious Sam First and Second Encounter are Masterpieces!
8:20 it's OK to say brilliant. Because it is. 😊
Croteam guys are real legends here in Croatia. Really enjoyed playing Serious Sam so many years ago, the engine was brilliant at the time.
Wow, that was great to watch. I first came across SS on a computer magazine disc and it blew me away, it ran so smooth and had huge outdoor levels. ...and the sounds!
I remember playing Serious Sam 2 and finding two aliens having sex in a bush, and a miniature football stadium.
"BLING! Secret Sexy Bush has been found!"
Had to look up if I remembered that right after posting. Sure enough. These games were so special they completely ingrained themselves in my memory, but to be fair I played a few times. Absolutely nostalgic.
I love Croteam's games
That story about the first review is amazing. Well done.
Thanks that brought back a lot of memories from the days of the SS Tests and Demo. So much anticipation for the game release. I still have about a million screenshots. I'll never forget having my 'They never learn' one-liner accepted in to the game and being credited 🤜
Still one of my favorite games to this day. I can't wait for Planet Badass
The lesson I learned from this story - never listen to the nay-sayers. Parents who think that their kids are probably doing drugs and orgies and not inventing the next big thing. People who can't get the concept but would try to bring you down, make complete fun of your project and try to humiliate you with their own "significance" and "understanding of world and business' that you with your little project obviously lack. But if you know that you've envisioned something big, something unique, something that can offer great experience and be a bestseller - it's your job, then, to stop hearing all of they naysayers and to deliver your product to the world as you envisioned it. It's your vision, your responsibility and your success, not theirs.
the lesson i learned form this story is that, a very very good demo is better than any pitch
Man i do hope to have some intelligent friends and have a cyber in my garage and work on our personal-made game ... i think it is a very good way to pass time, not just we will be learning new things every day but also... with some hope maybe soon, we can make a benefit for our fun work, i have many dreams or trying to create my own vision of games and hope some someday i can be a mediocre developer at least just so i can see that my work has some meaning and im not wasting my time for dreaming... haha lol... but sadly im far away from being a computer expert or a programmer and my brother said "if you want to develope a game you atleast need programming skill"... which i didnt lol.... and i dont care if my idea may not be half great as the any other successful game developers but just at least i can have a chance to work on it and see it live even just by an inch... i will die proud....
You learned the wrong lesson, then. Maybe your parents aren't qualified, but those other nay-sayers just might save your behind. 95% of software projects fail - discarding that information leads to survivorship bias. Learn from those who failed, because there are many more of them.
Except when nay-sayers are actually right, like in the case of "Theranos" company, as wishful thinking is not enough to overcome real obstacles.
Wait, why can't I have drugs and orgies AND invent the next big thing? 🤔
man staying up late as hell as a kid drinking soda playing serious sam multiplayer coop. So so good. one of the first and best fps coop experiences.
Igra za sva vremena.Posle ove igre vise nisam bio samo obican igrac.Imam sve delove i nadam se novom sto pre :D Svaka cast CROTEAM
2:20 I love that he still rocks a 90's style keyboard to this day. 😋
I will forget the first time i saw Serious Sam, i was only 15 years olds at my first Lan party, the dude next to me was playing it on a 21inch Trinitron monitor running some crazy graphic card at the time, I couldn't believe my eyes and watched him play for hours. I was instantly sold from that point on-wards and couldn't wait to upgrade my PC so i could play it at a decent FPS. Thank you for the countless hours of CO-OP play with friends.
Amazing video, so happy you and your team stuck at it when most would have failed !
Thank you so much for the work you put in. Love it all
thank you sharing your experience making your game Davor Hunski. i found the whole story very interesting. i learned alot!
Epic game. There was nothing like it back then (even today). The sheer size of the battles, humorous secrets, and creative level design was so amazing. Countless hours and many sleep overs were spent playing serious sam with my friends & brother (THANK YOU SPLIT-SCREEN). I can't wait to share the experience with my brother in-law.
Yes! I love this series, I'm so happy you continued it!!!
lol imagine EA releasing demos for Anthem or Mass Andromeda
demos were the best way to test a game in late 90's/early 2000s. There was limited internet and having discs with the PC magazines was the way to find new titles.
I wish more games sent out demos! I played the Orcs Must Die! demo for like 5 minutes and immediately bought it.
I remember buying this for $19.99 at Wal Mart when it first came out. I absolutely loved it and still do.
I was about 12 years old when I got second encounter on PC. Finding the big head development team Easter egg blew my mind.
Still the most satisfying secrets in the business.. see that palm tree like 3km away? Guaranteed secret.. see that wonky coloured brick? Hit it.. secret. Just fantastic
me and my neighbour played the first level from First Encounter, we accidentally found the secret room with the big headed fans, and the palm tree in the distance, since we noticed there were no barriers and we were (me in particular) curious how far you could go out, then the 4 Biomechs spawned
I played serious sam as kid and I remember thinking what a cool game, graphics were really cool and overall atmosphere were great, with ancient buildings and heavy metal music in background, such a great times!
I remember getting a demo disc like that back in the day with a magazine. Lots of memories.
Used to love playing Serious Sam when I was young as, such a fun game, have them all on steam now too. such a fun game, that last mission/ending was so much fun! Cheers for this upload Ars Tech, so many great videos and its straight to the point :D
Thank GOD noone put a crate in Karnak
Serious Sam still its one of my favorite games, and I did know it for your demo. I Think that you made a very positive choise releasing a demo of that quality and quantity of detail. I own the titles in Steam, and gifted my little brother the package. You guys understand that we gamers are people, you care for us, and we'll keep supporting you.
I think every developer should give a nice vertical slice, especially on PC to games we want to buy. You guys are doing the right thing.
Thank you, Mr Hunski, and all of Croteam for pouring all your heart and soul into these great games. Serious Sam 2 was one of my childhood favourites, I particularly enjoyed the humor!
I love this series. I really admire these guys. Keep it up.
Serious sam was the first game I've ever played and i was completely blown away by this medium. At that time this game was crysis barely any computer could run it. It was truly incredible and made me the person I am today.
This game was my childhood and I still play all the new ones.
I salute you and your team.you made my childhood.
I didn't play Serious Sam very much but my late father was really into it back in its day. It always reminds me of him :)
I still remember trying out the demo back in middle school and was blown away I wanted the game but wasn’t able to get it since I was to young to buy it
Thank you for building this awesome childhood memory :)
one of the best first person shooters with lots of big dynamic open worlds, an with probable the best easter eggs and secrects any game ever made
I remember playing this with all my school buddies in Lans at my house. All with beige CRT monitors. Great days - thanks!
One of my favourite gaming experiences of all time. Really enjoyed it.
I remember playing the demo. I sent feedback, it was a great demo. I got a response from the devs. I think they even wanted me to get more involved. I'm kind of bummed I didn't respond, but such is life.
damn :(
I can still close my eyes, and remember every second of that demo. It was the only game that I had back then and I used to finish it twice a day.
20 yrs ago i played this demo at-least a couple of hundred times on my office PC.
Played this demo for many hours and then even more in a full version and SS2. Probably the only game back then that had a lan co-op. Makes me want to play this game again.
Serious Sam is easily one of my favorite games of all time...it was my first PC game, and I loved and praised this game for years. This game is seriously the greatest hidden gem of all time, though I got this probablythe first year it was released, I'm pretty sure many people haven't heard of this game. It was so unique and ahead of its time.
2:36 he is really wrong, showing DooM footage was a mistake
I love Serious Sam! The whole ambience of the Egypt theme just worked so well. The experience was quite a thrill. I remember the biggest thing was like oh... a thousand freakin enemies attacking.
Very cool. I hope they make more videos like this.
Excellent documentary about this beautiful game 👌👌
My first game on my first PC. The best choice for the very first game.
One of my all time favorite series. In fact, it was the first ever PC game I begged my parents to get when I was a wee boy. I initially saw gameplay of the game on a trailer from a demo disc in an old school PC magazine. Nobody in my family understood English, with me knowing a handful of words, so my parents had no idea what the darn thing was called and didn't really care tbh. I then one day went to an internet cafe with my cousin and saw that they had the game. I played it and adored every second of it. Then the all mighty Second Encounter came out and a friend of mine happened to have it. He sadly wasn't the one who had it installed on his PC so he couldn't give me the CDs, however we played it till death on his lil rig, along with many other classic shooters and RTS games. An year later, I got the demo of Second Encounter from a demo disc and played it like crazy. Another year or two passed and my good ol' cousin got the game and installed it on my family PC. Boyyy did my mom hate the game, but hell, I finally had Serious Sam!!! I've waited 3 years but I'm finally blasting hordes of monsters at my leisure, oh man it was great. I was the happiest 10 year old at that moment. This takes me back.
Watched for the Old Man Murray reference and it didn't disappoint
I remember buying the Serious Sam Gold pc release way back in the day, had TFE/TSE. So much fun and I was super impressed by the graphics tech back then with it.
I remember this was one of the first games I picked up on PC Gamer UK's budget range, back when they were publishing budget titles for £10-15 each of the best games they had reviewed. I knew nothing about it initially and am now a huge fan of the series. Really looking forward to Planet Badass.
Nice love the serious sam series