I Hate Mountains!

Posted by Nicolas (permalink)

Here we are. Almost half a year passed since we began communicating on this project and we believe it's time to unveil our next plans. Welcome to I Hate Mountains! Stay focused on this new website from now on!
Beware, the following is a shameless copy of the about page.

What? You hate mountains?
No, it's not a joke, and no, we don't really hate mountains (only Francis does).
"I Hate Mountains" is the name of a brand new Left 4 Dead campaign made by three french friends. This campaign is built the Valve way, we are not trying to revolutionize anything, we just want to provide more content to this awesome game.
Read ahead to learn more about it.

Why are we doing it?
Because we friggin' love this game.
We are playing Left 4 Dead together since the early days, during the Festival du Jeu-Vidéo in Paris, in 2008 (before the release). We played this game so much and always on the same campaigns that we believe it needs fresh new content, quickly.

More details on the campaign
The I Hate Mountains campaign is divided into 5 different maps, just like Valve did with their own campaigns.

	Forest Our survivors crashed their bus in an utility pole of this dark mountain forest while fleeing. They must now find their way through the trees.
	Manor Now that the survivors managed to get out of the forest, they must reach the highest point of this manor and try to launch a distress call from the radio.
	Underground Escaped from the manor, the survivors are now fleeing though an old system of caves and tunnels running through the mountain.
	Lumberyard Freshly escaped of this oppressing cave system, our survivors are now looking for help and rescue in the lumberyard nearby.
	Lakeside Fleeing the now infected and deserted lumberyard, the survivors are now stuck and eagerly waiting to be rescued by whoever could see their signal.

Who are we this time?
Mostly people from the Portal: Prelude team.
We are three friends with a professional, a student and an amateur background of the videogame industry. Check out the Meet the team page for more details.

Portal: Prelude wins third place at FilePlanet's best of 2008

Posted by Nicolas (permalink)

Looks like I'm repeating myself over again, but after our third place at ModDB's Mod of the Year Awards, Portal: Prelude didn't win the FilePlanet's Best Mod of 2008 Awards either, but made it to the third place (again)! Surprinsigly enough, we managed to beat the most downloaded mods of 2008 (again).

1. Pirates Vikings and Knights 2 (Half-Life 2)
2. Insurgency (Half-Life 2)
3. Portal: Prelude (Portal)
4. Lost Spires (Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion)
5. Forgotten Hope 2(Battlefield 2: Modern Combat)
6. Angels Fall First: Planetstorm(Unreal Tournament 3)
7. Killing Floor(Unreal Tournament 2004)
8. Project Reality (Battlefield 2: Modern Combat)

I must say that I'm really happy with this result (again).Thanks (again) to all our fans, to all the people who helped us and tried to help us in any way, and thanks to all the people who sent us feedback via e-mails, comments, discussion boards or our forums.

Post-mortem Interview (kind of)

Posted by Nicolas (permalink)

I just did a "post mortem" interview on Portal: Prelude, the Mod of the Year Awards, and stuff with the folks at GamesModding.com. There's nothing really new if you followed the development of this blog from the start, but if you didn't and/or want to know a bit more about the hows and whys of this mod, you should pay them a visit.

The interview is right there.
There's some really interesting questions, like "What is the most surprising thing you discovered while making Portal: Prelude?" or "What do you wish you had known before starting making Portal: Prelude?". Kudos to them for asking uncommon and interesting questions.

Portal: Prelude wins third place at ModDB's MoTY

Posted by Nicolas (permalink)

Ok, that's right, it's a kind of big surprise. After 114,000 votes, Portal: Prelude didn't win the ModDB's Mod of the Year Awards, but made it to the third place! Surprinsigly enough, we also managed to beat the most acclaimed mods of 2008, including nearly every mod that got into Steam during the year.

1. Project Reality (Battlefield 2)
2. Zombie Panic: Source (Half-Life 2)
3. Portal: Prelude (Portal)
4. First Strike (Battlefield 2142)
5. Zombie Master (Half-Life 2)
6. Pirates, Vikings and Knights 2 (Half-Life 2)
7. Eternal Silence (Half-Life 2)
8. Age of Chivalry (Half-Life 2)
9. Stargate Empire at War (Starwars Empire at War)
10. Half-Life 2: Wars (Half-Life 2)

I must say that I'm really happy with the results, it's kind of the best place ever for a little mod like ours that grew up rapidly from nowhere with a really small team but a really big motivation. It wouldn't have been fair to finish first or second regarding the amount of work and devotion put into some of the mods out there. Some of them who recreate everything from scratch and build something during years with sometimes hundreds of people. That's why I'm happy to be third!

I must say that our little team is quite proud of this result! After all, it proves that even if we crossed a terrific jungle of insults, harsh criticism and mockery, we managed to please the people at which this mod was first aimed: all-time Portal fans, hardcore challenge-looking players and a few of them who thought Portal: Prelude was cool enough to buy Portal once and for all (no joke here, I could cite you some e-mails I received).

Thanks to all our fans, to all the people who helped us and tried to help us in any way (e-mails, voices, forums, scores, bugfix, etc.), and thanks to all the people who sent us feedback via e-mails, comments, discussion boards or our forums. Thanks for the hundreds (maybe thousands) of e-mails to tell us your experience, your disappointements and your best moments. We couldn't reply to everyone (even if I tried to reply to at least 70-80% of them), but I can assure you we read everything.

Check the "meet the team" page to see all the people who really helped us.