Saboteur

Intruder alert.

Infinite Level game discussed: The Future Project

Now that The Future Project has a new trailer, I suppose this would be an excellent time to finally show off the game's main antagonist. After all, they've appeared both at the end of the first trailer and is a prominent element of the second, so no need to be so secretive about this mysterious character anymore. Plus, what's a video game without an antagonistic force to be reckoned with? Don't worry, I don't plan on spoiling any major story beats in the game. This blog is more of an introduction to the character, giving you a general overview of what they're about and what to expect when you face them in game.We'll save the surprises for when you play the game yourself.

Our antagonist is known as the Saboteur, a name given to them by the people working on the titular Future Project. This name is assigned to them due to the Saboteur, well, sabotaging the project. They're here with the intent to destroy the Future Project, destroying humanity's change to journey space. The player's first contact with them can be seen in Distant Sibling, shortly after defeating the first boss fight (you can actually experience this yourself in the demo). When you first speak to them, they only say one word, "Icarus", and nothing else. You don't even see the character at this moment, but rest assured they'll make themselves known to you later. Interactions with the Saboteur continue on from there, primarily through other cryptic messages like these. Ocassionally you may get a peek at the character physically in front of you before they disappear just as quickly. And of course, as you will notice in the trailer, there will eventually come a time when you need to fight them. Interestingly, they seem to be using the same technology that powers the Future Project to accomplish their goals.

What are their motivations? Well, they don't exactly make that clear. Theories suggest that they're another one of those types who don't wish to reconnect with the aliens encountered in Impressions. It's not unusual for protestors to figure out details such as developer homes and harass them in that way, though these tend to get curbed pretty quickly. What's different about this is the attack is directly on the Future Project data, the very data that you, the player, are working in. So while they may not pose a physical threat to you or anyone's wellbeing, allowing the Saboteur to have their way with the Future Project codebase could spell trouble. As they seem to be using a similar connection to the player's to access simulations and AI training, it's assumed that defeating this Saboteur in one of these simulations could help protect the data. As you progress through the game, the Saboteur will discuss their findings and attempt to convince you and anyone who will listen of the Future Project's nefarious purposes.

There will be times when you have to fight the Saboteur using the weapons you have available. They'll appear at various points in the game to cause the player some trouble, whether it's in the form of a few surprise enemies or a full blown battle between you and the Saboteur. It's the one on ones that I reckon will be most interesting to you, so let's talk about those for a bit. As the only repeated boss fight in the game, I wanted to figure out a way to grant the Saboteur additional moves and powers on top of the ones they already have when you first meet them, allowing for a growing sense of power to match the player's. I mentioned earlier that they appear to be using similar technology to the Future Project's AI Soldiers, which is how they're able to manifest themself inside the simulations. You could say they're using this new connection they've made to the project to incorporate additional abilities onto themselves, then using those abilities to stop anyone trying to interrupt their connection via the simulations. So, by using this connection to the Future Project database, they're able to scale their power with yours. Well, that's the in-universe explanation for this at least.

You’ll find that the Saboteur often communicates like this.

Any time you fight the Saboteur, the two of you will share abilities. For instance, if all you have are the strafe, missile, and fire abilities, then they'll have the same. Then when you fight them again with more elemental and movement abilities, the Saboteur will have new attacks in response. This means it's possible for players to have differing battles depending on how they tackled the worlds of the Future Project, though I'm anticipating the vast majority of players will have similar battles. Despite the similar abilities, the Saboteur uses the bot's powers in a way uniquely theirs. For starters, they use a one handed sword in lieu of the basic gun that the player has. This means they'll be more aggressive towards the player, dashing forward and sprinting towards them to keep players on the defensive. Their use of elemental abilities also differs, incorporating the sword to create powerful elemental attacks.

Unfortunately, without making a full gameplay video or dipping into story spoilers, this is about all I can say about the Saboteur as they relate to the story and gameplay. Secrets, am I right? But perhaps you may find it interesting how the Saboteur came to be? While I didn't know the exact form they'd take, the overall concept of the Saboteur has been part of the plan since the beginning. I wanted there to be some hacker-like character that forces their way into the player's routine, in-universe labor and start a conversation about what the Future Project really is. I also figured early on that it would be interesting to have them be a kind of dark mirror of the player in terms of appearance and abilities. The appearance of the Saboteur came later in development, about the time that I actually needed them made to properly implement the boss fight. My design notes had given the description "similar to the player, but distorted." That's honestly not a lot to go off of, but I at least had the player design sketched out and worked off that. In my original sketch, the Saboteur has some of the parts that we'd see today but had a noticeably "Roman soldier" look to them. There were also notes leaning into the idea that the Saboteur would glitch uncontrollably but this idea ultimately got scrapped. As far as ideas that stayed though, the Saboteur's sword has managed to look exactly the same as I envisioned it in my sketch of the character as well as elements of the overall Saboteur design, with the shoulder pads and wires managing to stick around among other things. Here's a fun fact for you – the player was originally going to have a sword as one of the items to pick up in the game, but I couldn't make it work with the rest of the game's design and ultimately gave it to the antagonist instead.

Saboteur prepping their special Earth attack. They channel energy into the sword and have green lights decorating them.

As for the implementation of the Saboteur in code, that took some time. They're undoubtedly the most complex boss battle in the game due to the way they evolve with the player. I had to come up with several attacks for the character and then allow and disallow those attacks based on the player's progress. Some of the attacks were easy, like any involving projectiles (or at least what the game considers projectiles) since I had a routine down for implementing those kinds of attacks by then. Others required a little effort, namely most of the sword attacks. You'll notice that The Future Project has little in the ways of physical attacks, and that's by design since the game is a metroidvania and first person shooter hybrid. Shooter games don't usually have you running up towards an enemy to take them down unless it's for some cinematic purpose or if the game is called Doom. Battles with the Saboteur will buck this trend slightly and see the player having to make quick movements away from the Saboteur in order to avoid attacks. My end goal is to have the player weave in and out of the Saboteur's range and various attacks, creating a dynamic feeling battle that's unlike anything else in the game. This extends to the Saboteur as well, who will also move in ways that no other boss will do.

You'll have to wait for the game's release to see more of the Saboteur, but this should give you an idea of what you're up against in the full game. The Saboteur has a strong resolve, so don't expect them to go down very easily. Personally, I have found that the Saboteur is one of my favorite fights in the game. They're good at keeping me on my toes, and that element of surprise is precisely what I find fun about them. I hope you enjoy taking them on when you finally get the chance. Also, since I've got your attention, as of this writing The Future Project will be partaking in Steam Next Fest from February 6th to the 13th. A big focus of this is the game's demo, which you can actually download now. I'll also be performing some livestreams showing off the game in more detail on February 7th at 8 PM CST and February 9th and 7 PM CST. It'll be a great oppurtunity to get an in-depth look at The Future Project gameplay, so be sure to check it out. That should be it for promotion from me! Just wanted to get that out there since Next Fest will be starting shortly after I publish this blog. Got to spread the word where I can...a bit like the Saboteur, now that I think about it.

Until next time!

-Lance T.