Prototype build of a game found on my XDK hardrive

Just like Project Velocity using clips from FnF, didn't make it an FnF prototype.

 

What we know so far that's obvious

- This is an engine test/tech demo to show off its capabilities, nothing more then that.
- Many test kits were found holding this build on its sidecar, my XDK was just lucky enough to get it from its original owner (tester maybe, friend?)
- It's not leaked anywhere on the interwebs

 

i have a 1.18 gig build as well

 

thats runescape

 

nevermind i saw ur menu picture...., does look like it tho

 

Any one who has this build on their XDK/testkit but has yet to modify the games code to boot other levels will be familiar with this level, i got creative the other night. This video was made for friends, hence the goofy comedic input. but why the not show it off i guess ..

This also is just more footage for you guys, im aware the build is rare now, so ill try to get as much footage for you as possible!

.. enjoy?

 

video is no more availybale :/

 

Really intriguing stuff! Thanks for sharing with those videos I bet there's even more hidden in those files than just those two maps.

In terms of development process nomenclature:
Prototype = early tests and proof of concepts
Vertical Slice = one fully playable level/map/section of the game
Alpha = feature complete, art incomplete
Beta = feature complete, art complete, bug testing

So this looks like it could be a "prototype" in the truest sense of the term. Actually, it might not even be a prototype, but rather a few one-off test maps or tools for engineers to test specific elements of gameplay or functionality.

 

What I'm thinking, since the files do indeed say there were created in 2010, 3 years before Diablo 3 came out on consoles and 2 years before PC, it is possible that it was a spin-off game of World of Warcraft, but more of experimenting how Diablo could play on consoles. Either one is possible, but it's more clear it's a simple prototype by the timeframe of the announcements.

Diablo 3 was not in development with consoles in mind as it started development in 2001. This could mean that they were making some other game, and canceled that in favor of porting Diablo 3 on consoles. I came to this conclusion because the console versions were not announced for quite a while. There was this:

Times do fit for it being a port, and that was just purely a prototype to allow the higher ups at Blizzard to get a feel of Diablo on consoles. The parts that does bug me, is the detail to the map editor. Could have been a gameplay mechanic, or simply to make quick maps to present their higher ups.

 

very cool! thanks for sharing, never heard the term veticle slice, gonna start using it

@epicerrorjack Thats some deep research! Thanks for what you found i hope one day we can figure out EXACTLY what this is!

 

only XboxSurgeon has been blessed to see these

- but as per request, here is some debug stuff (from xex and ini modifications)

Sorry for the quality, .BMP to .PNG is sloppy, editing my name onto a .bmp in Photoshop just isn't having it. lol

Considering uploading a video of it, is it worth it? perhaps ill just set the video to unlisted.

 

Looks like someone found the bumpmap modifier.

 

More debug photos on other maps coming tomorrow!

 

the thing thats weird is the bloody character interface gui, you can see its the original wow interface but modded, i'm just wondering...."if" it was some sort of test to see if wow was doable, why would they bother modifying the UI a bit, and not only that wow has never really been a gory game, no real blood or anything, it wouldn't really fit well with the wow atmosphere imo.

but idk it does seem like they lifted an awful lot from wow for it to be a coincidence, maybe it was just 1 dev having a play around to see if it would be possible, it doesn't seem like something that made it very far anyway, unless it is indeed the very early stages of diablo, or maybe this ended up as a different game and wasnt even developed by blizzard, but was just some PoC work for a wow style game....say like two worlds, and they just used wow assets for placeholders at the start of development

 

Hmmm that is quite true. Im considering asking blizzard them selves, but how the hell do you say to a company

"i have a debug,prototype and engine test build of your game.. Care to enlighten me?"

 

i would reckon the best hope of getting an answer would be going to one of the dev's who worked on diablo 3 directly........still doubt you would get any sort of info from them though, its rare for companies to share any sort of development info, but if it was going to happen it would have to come from one of the dev's themselves the standard customer support staff wouldn't have a clue

but i also assume any staff would be under strict NDA's so even if they know they may not be able to share any info anyway

 

NDA gets lifted when the final project gets a retail release. And Stipo and I were checking out the game files, and it seems to have other company files in there as well, such as EA and Crytek. It seems that the boat player is played as an RTS styled game, and you get to build buildings to become more powerful. If you see in the video on the boat gameplay, where he brings up the radial menu, there are 3 buildings shown that don't do anything. In the game files, we can tell the buildings were supposed to be Smelter, Cathedral, and a Black Castle. They're all styled with WoW graphics. There are even character models with textures, animations and more, with WoW styled graphics as well.

This was supposed to be some other game, where you fight in naval combat in an RTS style, and go to shore with the Diablo 3 sort of combat.

 

I don't think there's a need to debate whether is a World of Warcraft or Diablo 3 prototype/concept/port/whatever to the X360. As I think the engine used in Diablo 3 is based on WoW. Even if modified greatly.

Heck, it's even possible this is a completely new game that just uses assets from World of Warcraft. An awesome find. Thank you for sharing.

 

Two new photos added for you guys!

 

This is fucking amazing