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UPDATE: Got some great news about Drift Rebels Japan.

1. First, the official Fanpage is up on Facebook. I'll still be on the forums but that will be the main place for official updates on the game.

2.Second, we got written about. Tech in Asia named Drift Rebels Japan one of the top 12 Asian games to look out for in 2015. Link for that below.

3. Third, the game is in a rough prototype phase. I have a playable build on my iPhone but the steering is currently messed up from an analog steering controller we were messing with. Once we open the office this week we'll get a more playable build and then I'll grab some gameplay video.

4. I've made contact with Travis Stebbins AKA Ken Blast. Don't hold your breath but I'm doing what I can to license the best Eurobeat tracks possible.

5. I finally acquired some code that I've been needing for opponent AI. It also added a Nissan R-34 and NSX car models to our inventory.



Drift Rebels Japan Facebook Fan Page

Tech in Asia Article




Hey all, first off, I'm a huge Initial D fan, love the art, love the music, love the story. I've driven performance cars in Japan before and have challenged Akihabara residents in Arcade Stage on numerous occasions.


Little Backstory
It's honestly been a few years though since I watched any of the animes. In the meantime, I've moved to Thailand and started a game company. We've been open for about a year and a half but just recently, we've started to produce Unity games and will release our first title this Friday. After poking around on various asset stores, it dawned on me that I have pretty much all the ingredients to make an Initial D type game.

Here's what I have

1. A parking/racing engine that we built. The physics supports tons of vehicle variables, drifting and runs well on Android and iOS

2. Access to the following vehicle models:
AE-86 Trueno
Supra
Sileighty
RX-7
Silvia
Evo
WRX
GT-R

3. Accurate scale environment of Akihabara and some other japanese locations

4. 2D Anime style, text based story plugin

5. Full time Unity Developer

6. Excellent Anime artist who can do 2D and 3D work.



So anyway, I've been thinking a lot about making an Initial D style game with original story and characters. I'm gauging fan interest though. If I could get community behind this project, it would mean a great deal. I'd love to have fan input on story, characters, cars and environments. What do you guys think? Should I pull the trigger and start building it? Would anybody be willing to help test it or give input?

UPDATED NEWS and CURRENT PROGRESS:

We've begun a rudimentary build to do some basic testing. I currently have the AE-86 with the Panda colors just for fun. It'll make it in the game but with different colors. Should have a playable build to test on iPad shortly. Also, thanks for all the support, you guys have been great. Lets keep this going!

This post has been edited by Shiroboi on Jan 3 2015, 09:13 PM

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Count me in!

Of course man! I can do game testing on my iPhone 4 and Samsung GT-19205 (Android 4.2.2).

sounds good to me as long as it's a racing game, not like Perfect Shift on 3DS.

Many will hate, but I think a freemium model works well with cars and tracks. I think you shouldn't have it in such a way that forces players to pay to get faster cars but more towards aesthetics like aero parts or stickers.

I'd say focus more on core gameplay like Time Attack and online multiplayer. Story mode can come later as AIs and story scripts are cumbersome to program

I can test them on my iPhone 6 and iPad Mini if you put them on Test Flight Program in the App Store. I haven't programmed in Unity before, but it works with Windows as well right?

This post has been edited by RIT_ninja on Dec 8 2014, 08:42 PM

What exactly do you need?

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback! It would be a lot of fun to work on this together. Mainly, I don't want to assume that I know what the fans are looking for. If the community has input, the game will be all the better for it.

I'm a busy guy so I don't really have time to be writing in-depth stories and creating deep characters. I don't know if any fanfic writers may want to assist but I'd gladly talk to some people about the story.

RIT_ninja: Trying to obtain a decent Racing AI now, I do have one in my sights but haven't bought it yet. I already have a story generator module lined up though so that wouldn't weigh us down. Game engine would come first though before story.

To help fund development, I may produce this game in stages. So I may gather assets and do a simple drift parking game initially. That may also serve to help give people some ideas about where we could take the game next.

I'm always open to cool ideas. Just know that some things like "Create an open world MMO with thousands of players" is going to be off the radar, we're a small developer. However, if the game takes off, it will greatly help increase the chances of more time and effort going into the game.

As for monetization, I may go with an ad supported / light freemium model as we do with most of my games. The better the game does, the more the Freemium thing makes sense. An upgrade system could be a possiblity as a stretch goal but probably not right off the bat.

Below is just a test of a snow mountain scene I made with some low poly placeholder cars. At least its something to look at for now. I am actively trying to make the games look better so hopefully we'll have it look great by the time we get to build this game in the near future.

This post has been edited by Shiroboi on Dec 10 2014, 01:30 AM

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Bring it on. I would agree that I think you should focus on the racing more than a story, so to start off maybe time attack would be good.

I agree, Time Attack should definitely be a mode.

We can start there and add the AI later. Our new parking game should be out this Friday for iOS (The paid version) and several levels are timed but it's more Pass/Fail based on the time limit. It wouldn't be hard to do a time attack.

Just adding the time attack version with no AI and no story could be done very quickly. Still debating on buying some different packs as it may change the mechanics of the game.

Racing physics are something that's really important to me for games like this. It's going to take some time to get it right.

The other thing will be trying to get the back mountain roads to "feel" like driving through mountainous Japanese roads. It's something I've experienced before and it's something that Initial D gets very right.

I can be a game tester if you want. I have a htc one m8

@Shiroboi:
If you can make a demo of time attack with one car and a track (like Akina or something), I think you can get many feedbacks from people on how to adjust the gameplay and future implementations. Of course, we don't want to bog you down with endless feedbacks and opinions. That would take forever to finish making a game.

If there's some way people here can help with making cars or tracks, I think that would be really great. You can focus on making the game engine itself while people can submit car and track graphics

Man, this is starting to feel like IDW version of Project Cars haha

This post has been edited by RIT_ninja on Dec 11 2014, 06:26 PM

Yeah, we can definitely get a demo up of core gameplay and then do a testflight build. We'd probably test iOS first publically as its quicker to push out testflight builds that way. I will most likely test Android in house but maybe a wider test will be necessary closer to completion.

I actually had an offer from a local game studio yesterday who makes AAA quality games to help out. So I'll probably make up the initial game and may give it over to them to tweak it and make it more robust and high quality.


Fan Actions to help:

1. Story. I need help with a story. Although we may not add story right away, I do want to get started on characters and if there's a particular car or cars in the story, I'd try to obtain that first.

2. Research. I'd like this to be an original Initial-D inspired game, not just an Initial D rip off. Mt. Akina was directly taken from Mt. Haruka I believe. We could do the same thing with other mountains. If I can find an actual mountain, it might be possible to build a heightmap based on a real geographic location and we could build a real terrain. It would also help us model the environment correctly.

3. Suggestions. How can we make this game better than Arcade stage? I'm not just content to copy something but we should add some features too. I'm going to keep all art and actual modeling in house to maintain quality control but we'll welcome suggestions. Do you have an idea for a character, a car modification, a racing location or environment? Tell us! We'd love to hear it.

4. Music. I'd like some high energy Eurobeat type music if possible. If anybody has any contacts or leads on an independent music creator who might like to contribute to the game, I'd welcome it.

You, the fans, WILL have input into how this game turns out. The more you guys get involved, the more I'll personally invest into this project. If we get far enough, I might launch a kickstarter campaign mostly for publicity and help fund advanced features. If downloads go well enough, it will encourage updates and new cars and features.

1. I believe we have a large fanfic-base here at Initial D and at our sister site wmexpressway that would definitely love to give inputs on story

2. I think people would be most interested in Initial D-related mountain passes. But of course, there's also Kaido Battle (Tokyo Xtreme Racer) courses people would love to see. Gunma Cycle Sports Center would also be very popular due to Hot Version series. I would say this track would make the best "first stage" as it's not as difficult as actual touge/mountain tracks.

3. Aside from features in IDAS, I think a livery editor would be widely sought after. Sharing replays and/or uploading to youtube would also be good. Ghost battles (similar to Maximum Tune or Drivatar on Forza) would be cool too. Tuning should definitely be points based. It would also be cool to have a friends list. A feature that would be cool is to be able to click on your friend who also has the game and it will send them a notification that you would like to challenge them. If they click on the notification, they will jump into the game and battle with you. (Easier said than done, but would be a cool feature)

4. I do know that Ken Blast is occasionally on this forum. He posted about his new album not too long ago. His songs "The Top" and "When the sun goes down" were used in the anime and games. He also goes by Odyssey Eurobeat on youtube where he would post Ponybeat music (He's a brony). SCP Music may also be good to contact. Many of their songs have been in Initial D before like Ace, Pamsy, Fastway, Jager, Hot Blade, Lou Master, etc. Here's their channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/SCPofficialTUBE

This post has been edited by RIT_ninja on Dec 11 2014, 09:49 PM

RIT_ninja:

1. That would be great, maybe worth throwing up a cross promotion on that site and maybe we can get some people to submit ideas. I need solid story, characters and dialog more than I need descriptive narrative.

2. We have a lot more capability to build natural environments like mountain passes. I was a big fan of Tokyo Extreme Racer. Modeling a full beltway loop I think would be fairly cost prohibitive. I'm trying to keep 3D modeling in Max down to a bare minimum as a simple object can sometimes take a full day to model and texture. We can build stuff from scratch but its time consuming and pricey as a result. I'll be using as many premade 3D assets as possible to accelerate this game.

3. All of those are great suggestions. Some are more doable than others. A livery editor system could take months of development and would be out of reach for such as small team. Performance upgrades are not out of the question though. All driving physics variables are adjustible. The one thing I worry about though is that it takes a lot of tuning to get these cars to behave the way I'd like. Sometimes more power is a bad thing especially when it comes to drifting and being controllable.

One of our big challenges is getting the drifting aspect right. Drifting in real life is really hard. Couple that with non-analog controls on mobile and it's tricky to get right. Some arcade style games like Initial-D Arcade stage and Ridge racer let the car easily enter drift mode and once it's in drift mode, it sort of drives around like it was on rails. I don't know if I'll be able to make a custom arcade-style drift system. There will be drifting but it may not behave exactly like you'd expect from an arcade racer. It will probably be realistic and more difficult. Replays, sharing and friend challenges (even if it's just a time challenge) would be possible. We discussed multiplayer today. That could be a stretch goal.

4. I've seen Ken's profile on soundcloud. I'm honestly slightly hesitant about going to sources that have already been featured in Initial-D. Would be awesome to have some of those tracks though. Not sure about licensing on an indie budget but great leads, thanks. Will look into both. Getting tracks from either would definitely get fans more excited.

1. As RIT stated, there are a nice number of fanfic writers here to help with the story. Pretty sure if you gave a prompt of some sorts for everyone everyone on the forums could come up with something.

2. People here would help. Pretty sure we can look into the tracks and such, RIT's idea ain't bad.

3. Better then Arcade Stage? Well as the mod of said part of the stage...I would like to see some slight changes on it. Gonna make a list, but note this is MY wants, not the wants of the entire AS as a whole.

- Would like to see some more modern cars, with additions like the GT86/BRZ, R35, and Evo X...why not the newer Subaru Imprezas? Or the 370Z? There is too many older cars, not that it's a problem but...yeah.
- I would like to see a ranking system...that is completely offline. Since the recent AS the game requires you to race online to rank up...which I think is total BS.
- Like RIT stated, tuning should be point based and in such a way that points are not that huge of a chore to do. For example in AS 8 many tuning up to the fifth spec require no more then 3-4 plays, and third spec was available in 2 plays. Cosmetics can be bought with points, but make it so it's kinda generic in nature and the more 'cooler' ones cost some money (although this assumes that this is a freemium model).
- For time attacks, not sure if I need to say this though, you should be able to choose the location, daytime/nighttime, weather conditions, and uphill/downhill. Since AS6 onward, I think, the ability to race in the rain was removed from TA and only available when playing with others.
- IF possible, make sure the game is skill based. What I mean is that no matter the car that everyone has a equal chance to win. It should come down to skill rather then having the best car. Of course there could be some differences on car handling but nothing that would make people want to gravitate to a certain set of cars *coughcoughAE86everywherecoughcough*. That way more diversity is used within the game.

That's it for now, but feel free to PM me for some more ideas.

4. Pretty sure you can look around, not my department. But IF possible, make it so that if people don't like the standard BGM we can switch it up and stuff.

Totally agree with OkamiWind here on the skills aspect.

I spread the words on wmexpressway already, hopefully some will find themselves to contact you or see this thread.

I wasn't talking about the regular Tokyo Xtreme Racer. They have a DRIFT series where cars race on mountain courses like Haruna and Hakone. It's really worth taking a look. One game on the ps2 called Auto Modellista features cartoony graphics similar to 4th/5th stage is also worth looking at. The game felt indie and very fun for its era.

I'd say for indie budget, don't worry about acquiring music yet. Maybe if a fan would like to submit his work, that's fine, but music licensing can be more trouble than it's worth for now

Thanks for the feedback, It's very appreciated.

I was doing some google map searches and I found a nice downhill section of Mt. Akagi that would work well for a game like this. I don't know if it was used in Initial D or not. It would pack nice into a fairly small terrain. Check out the street view.

https://www.google.co.th/maps/@36.5415801,1...iq1dUDw!2e0

Bolt on parts like wheels and spoilers might be more of a possibility. I think changing car paint color could be done too. Anything that's a simple variable in Unity could be doable.

As for being better than Arcade stage, I know that's a tall order. Still, I'm going to set my goal to surpass rather than imitate. I may fail or fall short but at the very least, if I create something fun with original features I'd consider that a success. I can't honor every wish but ridiculous or not, I want to hear it. If everyone wants a certain thing, it merits looking into.

I totally agree about the cars though. initial D is very 90's. I love 90's Japanese cars but I do think its about time we grew up and moved into 2013. I'll probably have a mix of old and new. Will definitely have a new EVO, WRX, 370z, GT-R, probably as the higher classes. I have one manufacturer of high quality car models that are certified compatible with my physics engine. I can use other cars too but it depends on if I want to use car damage or not. Most cars are available though but I'll start out with a small selection first and see how it goes before adding more.

Gameplay balance is key. I have liked the class/point system in other games as it does keep things even. If you're racing against the computer, there's a lot more controllable options. Against another player, more balance is required.

All of my games do have an option to turn off music if it's not to the player's preference.

Rit_Nija: Thanks for getting the word out. I do recall AutoModelista but it got mixed reviews and I never played it. Didn't play the Tokyo Extreme Racer Drift Game either although it sounds cool. For Music, if an opportunity presents itself now, great but maybe we get further along the game to inspire a composer to jump onto the project. Need to get the bandwagon going first.


This post has been edited by Shiroboi on Dec 11 2014, 11:28 PM

The part you showed would be the first section of Akagi downhill in the Arcade Stage.

I'm not saying you should go full out with the body kits yet, get a good audience first before you do that. Wheels are good, spoilers are nice too. If you want to go the AS way have a generic GT wing in the mix along with other wings, but it's all up to you.

Hey, I would probably think such a task is rather high and mighty. But if you can get a game that can surpass AS 8, i'll probably would probably be attached to my phone more then ever. Again, best of luck and if you want to know some stuff from AS8 just PM me. I may not be the best but I'll give the best I can.

Car damage, AS does not have that and I personally (note: this is a personal thing) don't like car damage. Well i'm sure if you hit your car against the wall you'll slow down anyway.

Good to hear about the balance stuff.

You got my support and my input onto the game as IDW's Arcade Stage mod.

This post has been edited by OkamiWind on Dec 11 2014, 11:25 PM

Mt. Jizo is not used, but Akagi is right next door.

Akagi in both game and real life is a popular spot for car enthusiasts in Japan. There are speed bumps all over the hairpins (which is nonexistent in Initial D games). I think whatever makes a challenging course or fun course is good to put in.

If you want to head down original story with new mountain courses, I think that would definitely appeal to many fans. We can have half the courses new to bring challenge to veteran IDAS players who already memorize the courses and half the courses recognizable to the Initial D series.

As for drifting, remember it's a phone game. I'm not sure if this will be button-based or gyroscope-based controls, but doing any turns via gyroscopes, you can't have players spinning their phones/tablets to counter steer haha. I say 90 degree left and right turns are more logical.

Okami Wind, thank you. It's always nice to have official mod approval on a site.


I was going through google maps and couldn't help but feeling that Akagi felt very familiar. Maybe we'll keep looking around. Gunma prefecture seems ideal for mountain racing.

I have driven all around Mt. Fuji and recall the roads being excellent between Gotenba and Odawara areas. But it had more of a main road feel and less of a windy mountain backroad feel.

Any other location suggestions would be great. I have a feeling that if we set the story in Gunma prefecture we're going to be retreading on a lot of initial d stomping grounds. Any other alternate prefectures that are hot for illegal drift racing?

RitNinja, I think you can get away with gyroscope steering for linear games and GT style games but drifting I think would be too difficult with all the countersteering needed. Would go with digital controls. I am contemplating seeing if I could use the gyroscope tilt forward and back for shifting.

Shameless promotion: My first Unity 3D Truck game finally got released on iOS and Android today. If you play level 6, that probably gives the best example of high speed drifting using our physics engine. I'd tweak it obviously as this is an offroad truck. The cool thing is it's completely controllable and gives a pretty great feeling with the controls once you get used to them.

Android Version
IOS Paid Version (Free will be out in a week or so)

This post has been edited by Shiroboi on Dec 11 2014, 11:46 PM

Well maybe it's me, but just because you place the game in the Gunma prefecture isn't going to be rehashing Initial D itself. Start at a different area, not Akina...well for the story. But perhaps you could hold off on putting Akina first and put in something like Tsubaki Line or Happogara then ease into Akina or something.

Also just don't think about Japan prefectures for the game, look around the world for some roads. Sure you may need to add some scenery stuff, but that shouldn't be hard to do right? Have some fictional...location names based off real world passes that aren't in Japan.

Great article for inspiration:
http://jalopnik.com/5888002/ten-great-driv...never-heard-of/

that said, Irohazaka is a must

This post has been edited by RIT_ninja on Dec 11 2014, 11:48 PM

This would be a LOT easier and faster if I just made up the roads and made the environment look like Japan. I thought maybe the authenticity would hook people. But I think I can design some really cool racing environments on my own like you said by viewing some great roads around the world. May make the story easier as well.

Oh and we can definitely add rain and snow effects. So that's on the menu.

Have that freedom to do whatever you want with the tracks, open your world. Sure having Initial D style tracks would grab a few people's heads, but soon they'll think that this game is some Initial D fan fic made real. Having more unique tracks could keep the interest of people in the long run.

Hell, I'll even give you one that I thought up of in my fanfic Pressure Wings.

Glendora Mountain Road

In my fic I call this place Ushiroyama. So feel free to experiment, have that freedom.

Gran Turismo started with a lot of fictional tracks and slowly moved towards real world tracks. I think it's perfectly ok to start with fictional tracks. Polyphony didn't have the budget to license real tracks or have the equipment to analyze them either (not that licensing roads would be an issue here)

This is copy pasted off wme when RIT_Ninja posted a copy of this to WME:

I'm willing to give my plot / storyboard/characters for massive revisions for this project. COUNT ME IN.

To make the storyboard realistic, if there is say a story mode revolving around a plot character, not the player, they shouldn't be dominant and there should be a balance of gender with respects to reality - we don't need fan service (i.e. Suzumiya Haruhi in a Lamborghini Hurrican with Fujiwara Zone wings) - we need a mirror reflection of the real world's community, which we gained inspiration from so cast balance is a must too. There should be skill growth - don't throw in overly dominant characters from the very beginning - inferiority to superiority should be our keypoint in character ability development. Mine has a lot of foul ups here and there but I'm willing to make necessary revisions to it if you want, for the sake of this project of yours.

But the Idea I have in mind is starting with the Mugen Epilogue where the protagonist initially is someone else (in my plot's case, Kogure) in a touge-breed car where the introduction takes place on How-to-play, then the final part of the tutorial is where he faces off against his main rival (as a way of adapting to the basic movements of the game). Then traverse over to another protagonist (Tomo) for the rest of the story where he starts off with the same car but full bone stock and where he has to learn the ropes, etc.

This post has been edited by Gunma's 34 on Dec 12 2014, 03:43 AM