Red Baron creator leads Kickstarter revival of classic dogfighter
Creator Damon Slye is leading a team at Mad Otter Games to bring back classic dogfighter Red Baron with a persistent online multiplayer world; "MOBA-style" maps; randomly generated player careers; Oculus Rift support; and much more.
The developer is seeking $250,000 via Kickstarter. If funding is successful, the new version of the WWI sim is expected on PC in November 2014. As well as a full single-player campaign with 30 missions spanning 1915 to 1918, it will have a persistent multiplayer game world, with historical and "MOBA-style" maps.
Mad Otter boasts of a simple learning curve as well as no subscriptions, no pay to win, and offline, DRM-free single-player. It's also very proud of its various immersive features, like g-force effects such as blackouts and red-outs, blind spots when facing the sun, shell casings, gun muzzle flashes, gun jams, oil splatters, explosions, smoke, exhaust, dirty windscreens, detailed environments, clouds, fog, mist and sunsets.
Players will chart their own story through single-player, via randomly-generated missions string out across the campaign, acquiring and customising new vehicles as well as earning medals and promotions. Sometimes events will be triggered by player actions, such as earning the rivalry of an enemy pilot.
In multiplayer, matches are expected to last between 20 and 40 minutes, and will include some elements of strategic defense and offense as well as all-out dogfighting. Mad Otter hopes to support matches of up to 50 players.
Available planes the French Nieuport 17, Nieuport 28, Spad 7 and Spad 13; the British Sopwith Pup, Sopwith Camel, Sopwith Snipe and RAF S.E.5a; and the German Albatros D.II, Albatros D.III, Albatros D.Va, Pfalz D.III, Fokker Dr.1 Triplane, Fokker D.VII, Fokker D.VIII and Fokker E.V.
Red Baron will support Oculus Rift as well as a variety of controllers including rudder pedals, joysticks, 3-axis joysticks, and standard Xbox 360 controllers, but Mad Otter hopes its flight stick code will make flying with the mouse just as good as with a joystick. A realism panel is available for those who'd rather make it harder but more true-to-life.
Slye was a founder of Dynamix, where he designed and produced Aces of the Pacific, Aces over Europe, A-10 Tank Killer and Arcticfox among others.