Some time ago, I posted to say things were still happening behind the scenes and well, that was true at the time. Obviously things have moved on a little and well, here we are, 12 years later. The team are all working proper jobs that pay mortgages or rent and all that boring adult stuff and so the odds of this appearing back from the grave are pretty slim.
I (Ging) went into academia and I ended up running a games development degree because if you can’t do, teach. The Duke-Cox twins are working at their own studio, currently developing The Siege and the Sandfox. Gusdor abandoned games and became a proper software developer. John Roberts produced art for indie hit Gunpoint, following that up with Heat Signature and he’s now working on Tactical Breach Wizards. Ricky C joined and stayed in the games industry, including a stint working on the MotoGP series.
If it ever does reappear, it won’t be a mod and it won’t be on Source and that’s a huge if, so don’t get any hopes up.
Obviously, there have been some clones that have popped up over the years since we last released an update. Some of those are in the spirit of the mod and might just take an element of two of our gameplay. Others have been a little more blatant and gone ahead and taken basically everything (one in particular just went ahead and lifted everything including our name).
We’ve never given permission to anyone to remake the game directly – if folk want to make a game that’s similar, go for it, just add your own spin to it and make it your own, but don’t lift our lore, levels or just boringly clone our mechanics (definitely don’t use our name, please). We’ll continue to deny permission to remake the mod exactly, if you think you want to do that, don’t – use the energy to produce something shiny and new instead!
It bothers me how you discredit Source engine & say that a successor isn’t bound for Source at all. The only reason your game is so succesful in the first place is cuz of Source engine physics/quirks like prop killing & Source movement techs. Furthermore, the only reason it is still alive today is cuz of Source enegine enthusiasts such as dr.n0 hosting a server & making modern level design content.
When I approached you in 2023 to make a redux version of The Hidden: Source on Source 2 with a bunch of the work already done on maps – you were not even interested in looking at the work I had, you just got upset & made this blog post. Even tho with the accolades on Source engine I have with projects like XPlay & Treason, something great coulda came about to be enjoyed for generations to come on Source 2. You are super disappointing, Ging.
I’m not discrediting Source at all here; but there is currently no formal SDK for Source 2 unless Valve agree to give access and the only non-valve game that I can think of that has that is S&box from facepunch. So we’d either be using the 2013 SDK to effectively make a mod again or we would have to look elsewhere and in the process, take advantage of expertise developed across the team in non-Source engines.
And you’re right, I was not interested in seeing the work you had put in prior to reaching out to ask permission and I’m still not, for all the reasons I mention in this post.
I can live with being super disappointing.
The formal SDK for Source 2 is called Counter-Strike 2 SDK, which is what I described to you back then. The Hidden has the knife, which is the rarest item in Counter-Strike 2 & all of the FPS mechanics required for The Hidden to work are baked into Counter-Strike 2 already. I just thought the reason you may have been disgruntled was cuz of skins & cases in CS, which is reasonable, but you claim you don’t want the game remade on Source at all which is sad.
That is what I proposed – a sequel to The Hidden set in the Counter-Strike universe, with IRIS having faded into obscurity & V Corp having taken over expriments. It would have also included the Tactical Awareness Grenade which was used on Guardian & Danger Zone missions from Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. If you are dissatisfied with Counter-Strike 2 as an FPS player controller & SDK, I still think S&box would work – maybe even better.