Oblivion Lost

Oblivion Lost
Information
Developer(s)	GSC Game World
Publisher(s)	Russobit-M Big Blue Box
Engine	X-Ray Engine
Release date(s)	Planned for Q2–Q3 2003

Oblivion Lost — a cancelled first-person squad-based tactical shooter, developed by GSC Game World on their proprietary X-Ray Engine. The publisher in the CIS would have been "Russobit-M", outside — Big Blue Box. Engine development began in 1998, content development in May 2001, the announcement was on November 13, 2001, and release was planned for Q2–Q3 2003.

On March 27, 2002, it was announced that the game would receive a new name and concept, although the first trailer, released on April 1, retained the old concept.

Gameplay

Plot

Different sources indicate different plotlines, but they share the same setting — the distant future.

Version 1

The game would take place in the distant future, in an era of galactic empires, powerful corporations, and advanced technologies.

The story would resemble that of the film Stargate. Researchers discover a new way of space travel: hyperspace tunnels connecting specific planets. The technology is of scientific and practical interest but also dangerous for people, as it is still poorly understood. The protagonist, as part of a team, is a "volunteer" for the first (or one of the first) space transfers.

Version 2

A conceptual evolution of earlier GSC's projects: Piligrims and Commandos. The plot implementation had not been started.

An obvious continuation of the two previous concepts in a new form with different gameplay accents (mechanics).
Still an RPG-FPS, however the combat dynamics were based equally on three combat tactics: melee, ranged, and counteraction (defensive tactics). During combat, the tactic type changes dynamically, and the hero can develop with one or two primary specializations. Vehicle control and riding creatures were included.

The atmosphere is set in the distant future of humanity, where the entire planet is covered by multi-tiered cities, and the skies are filled with stations and artificial moons. All planets of the Solar System are colonized — even Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus.
A peculiar mix of the atmosphere of the films The Fifth Element to some extent Star Wars and Battlefield Earth.
Life on Earth is stratified vertically: population layers have distinctive technological and cultural differences. Life in the upper levels of the city is much better than in the depths — no uprisings, unrest or aggression, since they are suppressed in the early stages through nano-implants. The planet's surface is largely covered with waste-processing complexes and titanic supports extracting energy from the planet's core to feed the cities.
The planet's strength is waning, the atmosphere rapidly diminishing, solar radiation forces the construction of protective domes and orbital power plants. Life in the depths of cities under artificial light sources greatly affects the inhabitants; their adaptations and mutations caused significant stratification and conflict. Underground cities are populated by robots servicing generators and strange beings hardly resembling humans, who formed their own culture and titanic technologies.
Average playthrough time of one scenario branch — 16 hours.

In the planet's densely populated environment, there still exists an oasis. However, for the planet's inhabitants, it is a white spot, a wound: unexplored, deadly, anomalous. This desert region spanning hundreds of kilometers is accessible only to resourceful wanderers of the lower city levels — death-seeker hunters chasing exotic animals and unique artifacts — akin to Mad Max 2. Stalker-hunters find cracks in the wall and force dome, bypass combat turret zones, and reach the desert expanses surrounding the lush, unapproachable epicenter of tragedy on the horizon. The fortifications with gun emplacements and field barriers are meant to contain the anomaly, but it changes inwardly too: tectonic structures and mineral layers of the Earth have greatly transformed. Spatial-temporal rifts appear, along with incursions of alien beings — a major problem for established life on the planet. Only small groups of prophets see these processes as salvation, as the planet's self-healing.

The "tumor" was fought with many methods — destructive weapons, attempts to extract and launch it into space — but nothing worked. Giant ships with scoops and containers monumentally decorated the indomitable wasteland and ruins of cities; expeditions disappeared, and study advanced extremely slowly and inefficiently.
The cause of this zone's appearance was a meteorite impact. The scattered remains of a once-epic city, like a shattered nutshell, formed a labyrinth of ruins split by rifts of space and time, with properties akin to a small black hole. Vast territories were inhabited by creatures from other worlds and predatory plasmatic ghosts. The catastrophe occurred centuries before the events of the game.

The main character is a teenager from a tribe living in a small settlement in tropical areas within the anomalous zone. At first, he is unaware of the surrounding cities. The tribe's life is tightly bound with all anomalies and beings emerging from parallel dimensions. Their culture and customs are intertwined with the "non-human" conditions of life. The player experiences the naturalness of jumping across worlds, using symbiotes and mutational abilities. Upon reaching adulthood, after ritual trials, the hero's playstyle shapes his specialization (gains a symbiote companion, survives poisoning and mutates, masters firearms and throwing weapons, learns efficient melee combat).
According to the design, after completing the main scenario, the player could begin anew in one of three warring factions. The first alternative storyline — that of a smuggler, adventurer (similar to Mad Max), starting on the city border while transporting a dangerous monster in a container for sale. Meeting the mysterious teenager in the desert inspires the hunter. Another storyline could be played from the perspective of a simple engineer-inventor (with paranormal abilities) living in the lower city levels, who shelters the escapee and teaches him language. A third variant — through the eyes of a police commissioner (a former fighter pilot) from the upper levels, akin to Korben Dallas, beginning with hostile encounters but allowing roles to change later. Each character accompanies the hero in key missions — fighting, helping organize uprisings, inventing or hacking systems, mastering new abilities and qualities.
All three characters cross paths, clash, rival, and befriend one another, gradually revealing the backstory of the tragic events leading to humanity's extinction. Parallel quests and random missions allow gathering a significant squad of AI-controlled companions before key missions. (For these characters, a unique self-learning AI system was planned.)

Meeting a huntress (stalker) from the city deep in the desert, the hero falls in love. In pursuit of the mysterious girl, who captures "friendly predators," he reaches the desert's edge — the city wall. The hero can become a pirate-smuggler, join rebels, or attempt to enlist in the confederate combat forces. In all cases, he begins a difficult path of social ascent — first on Mars, later on other stations and planets — to find minerals essential to Earth. The game's main task is to find a crystal combination capable of strengthening the planet's core, restoring atmosphere, clean oceans, and humanity's survival — by reestablishing harmony with "all necessary dimensions." Across all three story branches, heroes must expose harmful phenomena of human life from different angles, resolve conflicts on each planet of the system, and unite factions while countering alienation and dehumanized leaders. In the end, the main mineral is found precisely at the meteorite's crash site. Final missions require diving deep into the planet's core, fighting robot hordes and viruses in virtual spaces, to disable energy extraction machinery and deliver antimatter sealed in a mineral container into the core. A new nuclear reaction prevents the planet's extinction, and humanity discovers new horizons of development across parallel worlds, achieving peace and resonance with the space.)))

Description by former artist and game designer Alexey Moseychuk

Gameplay

Most of the gameplay — shootouts

While exploring Aztec pyramids, one of the male protagonists, Jeffry or Bob, or the female Barbyin unknown military gear, must fight T-800M support modules alongside allies. Vehicles were planned — a helicopter model was created, as well as military cars and boats.

Locations

15 levels were planned. Developers modeled about fifteen draft locations, 2 of which were early mockups of a futuristic city without textures. One level, titled Metropolis, consisted of two parts. Resources also contained the Cordon, which later belonged to S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion Lost. Possibly also early Crimean-concept assets.

Gameplay takes place in abandoned Aztec areas

One of the main enemies — hostile AMP

Dead territories

Weapons

Weapon name in-game	Brief description
Railgun	Borrowed from Quake III Arena, first appeared in Build 749, later unused.
Sniper rifle	Sniper rifle, first appeared in Build 756 (Oblivion Lost), later unused.
M134	Handheld machine gun, first appeared in an unknown build, soon in Build 788, and used in Build 1098, Build 1114, Build 1096, later removed from player use.
FS 2000AP	Assault rifle with aiming capability, first appeared in 1098, available in the first and second build versions.
Groza	Assault rifle, first appeared in 1098, available in the third build version.
Protecta	Shotgun, first appeared in 1098 resources, not available to the player.

Features

Graphics engine

The engine supported ~50 light sources without performance drop

Main article: X-Ray.

The X-Ray engine was developed specifically for the game. It could handle indoor and outdoor spaces, high-detail geometry (~100k polygons) with ~60 FPS, detailed character models (500–10,000 polygons), realistic skeletal animation, vertex shaders, detailed small objects (grass, stones, etc.), hardware state caching, dynamic colored lighting with soft shadows, support for ~50 dynamic light sources per frame without slowdown, intelligent shader subsystem, dynamic textures, high-performance collision detection, realistic physics, fallback for visual effects during performance drops, realistic particle system, 3D sound with .mp3, .mp2, .wma, .adpcm support. Built-in scripting, support for all 3D accelerators starting from 2nd gen (TNT, Voodoo2, etc.). Supported modeling SDKs: 3DsMAX 2.5/3/4, Lightwave 6.5/7.

Artificial intelligence

AI supported NPC virtual vision and used a system of pre-calculated cover.

Reception

Game demo at Milia 2002

ECTS 2001

Before the official announcement, the project was first shown at the European Computer Trade Show (Sept 2–4, 2001) at booth No.1555D by publisher "Russobit-M" alongside other GSC Game World titles: "Cossacks: The Art of War" (also shown at cdv Software Entertainment booth.), Venom. Codename: Outbreak, Hover Ace, "American Conquest" and Arlandia. The demo was "XRAY Engine" demo build 788 Engine compilation date: Aug 27 2001. Presumably represented by Sergiy Grygorovych and Oleg Yavorsky.

Milia 2002

From Feb 4–8, 2002, Russobit-M showcased GSC titles at Milia 2002: American Conquest, Hover Ace, Oblivion Lost, and FireStarter at booth R34.13. The demo was "XRay Engine" build 1098 Compilation date: Feb 3 2002. Company representatives: Sergiy Grygorovych and Oleg Yavorsky.

History

1999—2000

At the end of 1999, the CEO of White Lynx, Yuri Storchak, began experiencing financial problems. Because of this, without resigning from White Lynx, two programmers — Oles Shyshkovtsov and Alexander Maksymchuk, who had been working on the Alien Logic project — started looking for new work. While job hunting, within a few months they created a technical demo of a networked first-person shooter on the engine they had built during their time at White Lynx, called XRay. The demo used resources from Quake III Arena, since they did not yet have their own models, textures, sounds, and other assets. Later, in late spring of 2000, Oles and Alexander interviewed at GSC Game World and showed their work to company director Sergiy Grygorovych. Sergiy liked the shooter and hired them. The programmers began developing and improving the engine.

By September, a third-party scripting language Scripting engine (also SeeR) version 0.94a had been integrated. It was written in 1998 (version 0.94 was released in 1999 and is the last) by Polish programmer Przemysław Arkadiusz Podsiadły while studying at university. According to his site, it is a C-like multipurpose script library, designed to serve as a universal scripting engine: for AI in games, macros in editors, and more. It integrates with the Allegro multimedia library. Being a C library, SeeR was ultimately intended to become nearly a complete C compiler.

At the end of September, the engine architecture began to be reworked. Migration of the level editor to the Borland C++ 5.0 development environment was started, support for .tga format was added, and further compilation of .bmp textures into a special engine format (created earlier during the development of Alien Logic) with extra parameters was discontinued.

In October, geometry and lighting rendering were accelerated, and AABB and OBB culling was implemented. Level compilation was moved into a separate project — xrLBuilder, which was compiled into a separate DLL library. Thus, level compilation was now performed by a standalone level compiler — LevelBuilder.

In early November, collision detection, particularly RayPick, as well as general math operations and skeletal animation were optimized. The engine was ported to the new DirectX 8.0 API.

In December, work was done to improve skeletal animation for hardware rendering and progressive geometry, pseudo-static and pseudo-dynamic geometry, clouds in the sky, flare and wallmark systems. Demo Play and Demo Record were implemented.

On December 26, the LevelBuilder library ceased to exist, becoming a full-fledged application — the xrLC level compiler, fully independent from the level editor. On December 28, a shader was written using the Texture Coordinate Modifier technology, which allowed manipulation of texture coordinates in models.

2001

L1_Ruins — the first known level modeled for the project, intended as a technical demo of engine capabilities

On January 4, 2001, 3D artist Sergey Karmalsky joined development and began work on creating the first game level — L1_Ruins — an abandoned temple in the style of Yucatan architecture. By early March, the global geometry of the temple was completed, with the rest of the month spent on detailing. On March 19, flora was made and work on the landscape began. On March 30, the landscape for L1_Ruins and its textures were completed. On April 4, a background was created for the test level, followed by a test compilation to check sector and portal functionality (support for which had been added at the end of March). On April 12, a cliff was added to the southern part of the location and the background changed. The final compilation took place on April 20, after building the engine source code. On April 19, Build 749 was compiled, intended for testing and showcasing graphics.

The level was planned to feature several enemy monsters, but these were later commented out. Because there was no resource cleanup, this build retained early content from Quake III Arena, including models of armor, medkits, and ammo, though most of it was unused. There were also leftover references to Alien Logic: the System.ltx file still contained its menu code, and startup.ltx included an engine script from "XRAY Engine" demo build 748, referencing the WhiteLynx company and its project The Returning.

Unused textures were also present, some from other GSC Game World and Tavex (which bought WhiteLynx) titles.

On April 23, .lwo format support was added. On May 4, with the connection of the DXTC library, .dds texture format support appeared. Major work on upgrading the editor began. The decision was made to abandon storing shaders as separate files; instead, a single shader library file was introduced, using a lossless compression algorithm.

On May 17, the first shader library was created, with shaders such as default, font, glow, and null. This introduced the .xr format. The shader editor contained nearly all current technologies and was simple and convenient to use. Occluder support was added directly in the editor. On May 18, a decal shader was created; on May 22, one for dynamic models. On May 25, the editor gained the ability to highlight objects and view polygonal scene meshes. On May 30, the first light animation was created using multitexturing and environment mapping.

By summer, concept artist Aleksey Moseychuk joined the company, beginning to shape the project's concept and create art materials.

Shader Editor interface and an example shader using multitexturing

On May 18, Sergey Karmalsky imported into the game a sniper rifle he had made for his portfolio in 1999. To test the animation system, he used a special forces model from Venom: Codename Outbreak; by late May, the model and base animations were ready. Later that month, Sergey experimented with other scenes. For example, textures such as Crete_Walls1.tga through Crete_Walls10.tga and Grate1.dds were modern urban style (found in the textures folder of Build 1098), while textures like book1.tga, ground33.tga, cement.tga, and walnut1.tga belonged to modern interior styles (found in the maps folder of Build 756). These had nothing to do with futuristic geometry, indicating that at the time there was still no defined concept for Oblivion Lost, and instead various demo levels like l1_day were being made. One such experiment produced the Room-103 level.

On June 5, Karmalsky created the Apachetka helicopter (without working blades). On June 6, $ShaderTest textures and technical models for them were made — these would be required for shader creation throughout the entire engine's lifetime. On June 11, a model of the XM-134 minigun and a helicopter with blades, geometry, and glass was created. Work began on animation and the ability to fly the helicopter; the next day a test map heli was made.

Comparison of helicopter models — with real blades vs shader-based texture plane (build version)

It is unclear whether the rotor animation was ineffective or simply impossible to implement, but by June 18, a helicopter model was ready where blades were flat planes, and rotation was done via shader. On June 21, another player visual was made, later used in Build 788, along with the Library level.

On June 26, Build 756 was compiled.

During development, programmers considered implementing the engine on the Xbox console — discussions took place with Anton Bolshakov, but work on this never began.

On July 4, the player model was updated, adding hand textures for the minigun view model. On July 8, Alexander Maksymchuk created a vertex shader. On July 16, Oles Shyshkovtsov made a special shader for branch sway in the wind using TCM; two days later, Sergey Karmalsky created the XM-134 minigun HUD model. Likely the next day an unknown build was compiled — compared to build 756, it had HUD hands, the heli map was populated with cedars from Venom: Codename Outbreak. Afterwards, Karmalsky began work on the Demo location for ECTS.

Besides helicopters, other vehicles like military cars and boats were planned

Aleksey Moseychuk, while also working on FireStarter and Hover Ace, collaborated with Sergiy Grygorovych on the X-Ray project's concept. The team only learned of the chosen concept after it was finalized. Aleksey's task was to create so-called "cases" — market strategy packages. The third concept, after thorough separation of features and epic scenarios, was officially adopted and announced to developers like Sergey Karmalsky and Roman Nesin, who was just preparing to join the project. Later, work began on a demo using Karmalsky's models and the Demo location for ECTS. Around this time, the project's name was coined: Oblivion Lost.

Work on the new test location for the tech demo began with a bridge and river station with sliding doors. The door with animations was finished on July 31, and geometry work continued. On August 9, tunnels began to be created; by August 22 the location was nearly complete. On August 23, a sarcophagus was made, after which Karmalsky worked on flora and extra objects.

Dark variant of the Apachetka helicopter for Build 788 in the editor

On August 27, Build 788 was compiled, with additional objects in the location. On August 28, Karmalsky created a dark-textured variant of the Apachetka helicopter. On August 29–30, the level was compiled again, with a helicopter flyby animation and camera path, completing the build for the show.

With the ECTS showcase from September 2 to 4, starting September 5, information about the game began appearing online, and some media outlets reported the game would release not only on Microsoft Windows, but also on Xbox. That same month, Venom: Codename Outbreak lead artist Andrey Prokhorov began observing the project — impressed by the engine's capabilities. However, after closer acquaintance, Prokhorov told Grygorovych he disliked the project's concept. No reaction followed, and development continued.

In September 2001, work began on artificial intelligence. Shyshkovtsov and Maksymchuk developed algorithms and architecture for AI code. The xrGame library appeared, and characters learned to crouch, aim, shoot, react to sounds, search for the player from memory, and work in teams. Ricochet sounds were added. By late September, it was decided to move AI movement to a special AI mesh, where AI would build graphs on AI nodes and move along them. At the end of September, the AI mesh compiler xrAI appeared, generating nodes inside the compiler for game use. During October, node smoothing, light calculation, cover points, and node merging were added.

That fall, the X-Ray engine was experimentally applied to different genres: FPS, RTS, and hybrids. Two experimental projects were formed: Piligrims and Commandos. The former was to be an RTS with FPS elements and large-scale battles; the latter, short multiplayer mission arenas. Both tested mob scalability and load, but due to heavy resource demands, development was abandoned.

In mid-October, Sergey Karmalsky began work on Lev5_aztec, starting with the main Aztec temple. By early November, the global geometry was done, and detailed work began. Around this time, character modeller Ruslan Konovalchuk joined GSC and was assigned to the project.

On November 13, the project was officially announced, and from that day, more information continued to appear online.

The temple was not created entirely from scratch. For example, the spiral staircase, parts of the ornaments, the hippopotamus statue, and some textures were taken from the old map — l1_day. On November 25, work on the temple was completed, and the creation of flora for the location began. On December 1, the road with columns near the temple was ready, and a little later work on the basic flora of the location was finished. On December 11, underground passages were created. On December 21, Sergey Karmalsky created surrounding structures. Two days later, he created a torch model and placed them with light sources around the temple. On December 26, he stepped away from refining the demo level and made a prototype of one of the tiers of the multi-level city of the future, resembling something like an administrative building. Two days later, he recreated the game design of the temple's surroundings. Added were fuel vases, torches, and in flora — an abundance of ferns and burdocks, willow-like trees, and hanging vegetation appeared.

The next day, a hangar section of an unknown structure was created.

2002

One of the screenshots of an unknown build

The graphical result of the level with the current vegetation still did not produce a satisfying outcome, and it was decided to add more variety to the flora of the location by including various snags and dried vegetation. On January 8, new flora models were made, replacing the old flora and the number of light sources was increased. The result proved successful, and the creation of new trees continued further.

On January 14, a prototype scene of the multi-tiered city of the future was made. It featured a crossroads and a square with a tree growing in the center. The next day, a test scene of the temple's surroundings was created, with mixed forest and windfalls. The location received a new skybox taken from the game HoveRace, which was shown in Build 1098. Later, by the 20th, the flora was further refined, with some tree models borrowed from HoveRace along with original sprite-based variants.

On January 17, the company Russobit-M announced a trip to the Milia 2002 game exhibition, for the first time mentioning the publishing of the Oblivion Lost project.

By the 20s, FireStarter 2D/3D artist Andrey Prokhorov joined the project's development. While Sergey Karmalsky was fixing geometry bugs, Prokhorov imported a marine model from FireStarter, edited its model and texture, named it Jeffry, and on January 22 made grass models for the demo level. Two days later, Prokhorov began importing some of his weapon models from FireStarter. This is how the Tunder S14 and Eliminator appeared.

During one of the test runs of the level, performance issues were noticed, requiring optimization. Some forested areas were reduced, and by January 28 Karmalsky added extra sectors and occluders to the level. On the positive side, on the same day, Ruslan Konovalchuk created a model of the Robot, still with neutral coloring, and GSC Game World announced their trip to Milia 2002, where they presented seven screenshots from an unknown build . The color palette of the build was significantly different from its predecessors. Developers were thoroughly preparing for their first demonstration of actual gameplay rather than just graphics, so no news came from them for a whole month.

On January 30, Prokhorov imported his XM-134 model from FireStarter, and two days later Konovalchuk created two textures for the AMP to visually distinguish friendly and hostile versions.

Before the game's demonstration at Milia 2002, Alexey Sytyanov joined GSC as a level designer on the "Cossacks: Back to War" project. During preparations for the exhibition, Sytyanov accidentally ended up at a computer running an Oblivion Lost build — he studied it and was impressed by its technological capabilities for that time.

In March, the magazine "Домашний ПК". — 2002. — No 3. — p. 73 — 76 was released, where journalists interviewed the company about their upcoming games before Milia 2002. Interviewers were impressed with the capabilities of the X-Ray engine, with particular attention given to grass detail. The publication also mentioned plot details for the first time and announced approximate release dates — January–February 2003.

The Strugatsky brothers' "Roadside Picnic" — there is a "Zone" with various artifacts, and we play as a stalker who enters this Zone and, risking his life, brings out all sorts of valuables. In addition, in the center of the Zone, there is a certain object ("Golden Sphere" of the Strugatskys), attracting all adventurers. It is also known that you will be able to acquire a robot assistant (a very amusing all-metal "chick"), capable of performing simple commands, supporting you with fire when necessary, or carrying out reconnaissance functions.

"Домашний ПК" on the game's plot

On February 1–2, two builds were compiled: Build 1096 and Build 1097. On February 3, for Milia 2002, build Build 1098 was compiled three times, and instead of the Protecta shotgun, Prokhorov modeled the FN2000 rifle. About a week later, after the exhibition, Anton Bolshakov asked Sytyanov if he knew anyone who could write the game's script, to which he replied he could do it himself. Sytyanov showed all his design documents and everything he had made. Anton liked it all and redirected him to work on Oblivion Lost. At that moment, the project had only one two-page design document with a list of required models.

On February 8, the developers presented the last six project screenshots . On February 11, three official renders were released, showing the AMP, FN2000, and M-134. On February 12, Russobit-M shared photos from Milia 2002, one of which showed a monitor running Build 1098 .

On March 18, the first official trailer of the game appeared online, which later surfaced across various sources . It also showed the new title — S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion Lost. On March 27, the developers officially announced the project's renaming to S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion Lost, and information appeared online about a concept change (initially the title Stalker: Oblivion Lost was considered, but GSC faced copyright issues).

On April 1, Russobit-M published 3 new and 1 previously shown screenshot of Oblivion Lost, as well as 2 renders relating to both projects . On the same day, the official trailer appeared on GSC's website , and the next day it was published on the publisher's website .

Links

Research on development history

• Stalker-Portal.ru — Рождение Легенды S.T.A.L.K.E.R., с пеленок и до совершеннолетия
• Gameplay. — 2007. — No 9. — Page 18 — 23
• PC Игры. — 2007. — No 40
• Stalker.pl — Seria: Od zera do stalkera #1, 17 февраля 2013
• Шпиль!. — 2007. — No 19. — с. 2 — 9
• Лучшие компьютерные игры. — 2010. — №101. — с. 72 — 79
• Podcast dedicated to the history of the project

Gallery

Logos

Concept art

Renders

FS 2000AP

XM-134

Robot

Character Jeffry

Probe

Screenshots

2001

2002

Miscellaneous

Loading screen of the game builds

New Year wallpaper from December 26, 2001

Notes

General

Links