The Conduilt Impressing but Needs a Publisher

Socks were blown off when we saw the first video of The Conduit from High Voltage Games that showed off what the Wii is capable of in terms of graphical ability. The darker style game, aimed at a hardcore market on a console prides itself on anyone being able to play, will focus on alien cover-ups fuelled by government conspiracies. The game pushes the Wii to its limits with graphics gamers thought where impossible on the Nintendo system and utilises the Wii Remote to full capacity, but has one problem, it does not have a publisher.

The game takes place in modern day Washington DC as the player takes control of Secret Agent Ford who must find the truth about the Alien invasion. The First Person Shooter will put a variety of different firearms at Fords disposal and play in a similar fashion to games before it such as Medal of Honour and Halo 3. The game promises a high level of human like artificial intelligence and the ‘All Seeing Eye’ which "allows players to "reveal concealed objects and enemies, providing a deeper level of puzzle-solving."

The engine powering the game has been built by High Voltage Games from the ground up for the Wii and allows the console to create various graphical effects we have yet to see on the Wii. IGN have noted that ‘technical jargons’ included are "dynamic bump-mapping (via tangent space normals or embossing), reflection and refraction (via real-time cube or spherical environmental maps), light / shadow maps, projected texture lights, specular and Fresnel effects, emissive and iridescent materials, advanced alpha blends, light beams / shafts, gloss and detail mapping, seamless resource streaming, projected shadows, heat distortion and motion blur, interactive water with dual-wave channels and complex surface effects, animated textures, and more." While most readers won’t know what a ‘technical jargon’ is IGN made a note that many Wii developers don’t either.

CEO and founder of High Voltage Software, Kerry Ganofsky, said "We think it's a real shame that publishers and developers aren't taking advantage of the technical possibilities of the Wii platform. Most Wii games don't even look as good as the later day PS2 titles and that's a real slap in the face to consumers. We believe that third-party developers need to step up to the plate and deliver. The Wii platform is capable of a lot more than what consumers have seen so far. We're hoping to raise a new bar. Most of the games on the Wii look like crap.”

“We want to change that, so we've invested heavily in our Wii tech over the past year. We have real-time normal mapping, reflection and refraction, post process full screen effects, real-time shadows, projected lights and textures, specularity and fresnel effects, emissive and iridescent materials, interactive water, morphing, and much more all running with a rock solid frame rate on the Wii. Our goal is to be the most technically innovative Wii developer on the planet."

The game has been entirely self funded until this point as High Voltage Games now trying to prove to publishers that this game is well worth taking on.