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            THE VAGRANT’S „JOURNEY TO SUMERIA” REMAKE

                            by DUSTIE

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ABOUT THE ORIGINAL

This level is a remake of a level by The Vagrant called Journey to 
Sumeria for the Tomb Raider 3 engine. It was released in 2001 and 
featured very little gameplay. As stated in the original readme, the 
author ended up releasing it without completing his vision due to 
the workload it presented. It was made using TPascal’s DXTRe3D, the 
early unofficial editor for Tomb Raider levels, and it contained 
some graphical glitches.


ABOUT THE REMAKE

Back when I first discovered Tomb Raider custom levels sometime in 
2000 or 2001 I noticed Journey to Sumeria and really liked its 
visuals in the screenshots, though I was a bit disappointed by the 
short length of the level. Still, it made an impression on me and 
I have remembered it since. Recently I got the idea to remake the 
level for the Tomb Raider 4 engine. I didn’t find a way to reach out 
to The Vagrant and I believe he hasn’t participated in the Tomb 
Raider community since a very long time. I decided to go ahead with 
creating and releasing this remake despite having no permission from 
The Vagrant to do so. I knew from the very start that it could be a 
controversial decision, but my intention is not to take credit for 
someone else’s work – it is purely to bring this small level back 
and give present day players a chance to experience it, knowing they 
would have otherwise not attempt running a dated Tomb Raider 3
custom level.
 
I ended up recreating all rooms from from scratch instead of using 
the TR2PRJ tool for ripping level contents – initially I intended 
to do so, but The Vagrant actually performed some geometry changes 
on his level by editing the room models (yes, long before meta2tr it 
was already possible) which I suspect are making the ripping tool crash. 
Those modified parts I managed to recreate as objects by exporting room 
models and cutting out the customized sections. A lot of areas were 
modified slightly to improve the visuals. Textures are all lifted 
from the original level, I made a few modifications and added some 
tiles. Most of texturing is accurate to the original, but with 
corrections and some changes. Lighting was set up newly from scratch. 
Gameplay is completely new as well, I only used some reference with 
enemy placement, along with item placement. The remake uses resources 
from only the original Core WADs and levels, with some texture changes.

Overall, this level is very short and low on difficulty, and is meant 
as a quick and pleasant play. There are no intricate puzzles or traps, 
as I decided to work within the given level layout without much 
extensions or modifications. I hope it manages to do justice to the 
original and possibly bring attention to The Vagrant's original work.


BUGS AND ISSUES

The EXE for this level was patched using FLEP, so some anti-virus 
software might pick it up as malicious and block it or remove entirely 
for quarantine, which is a common problem with modified executables 
– in this case you will need to add it to exceptions in your 
anti-virus software settings.

This level uses Joey’s Automatic FOV plugin for bringing back the 
original Field Of View setting during gameplay, since TRNG widescreen 
implementation set the game camera FOV to much lower than it was in 
Tomb Raider games. It comes with a slight glitch – when you exit the 
inventory, the screen briefly changes back to the TRNG FOV, resulting 
in a rapid flash or skip of the screen. It does not seem to interfere 
with gameplay whatsoever, so it can be ignored and hopefully is not 
noticeable.

Occasionally some enemies end up walking into water where they should 
not be. Usually it’s possible to aim at them and kill them nevertheless.

There is a setup implemented to prevent a strange ending to the 
level in case enemies are not killed, but it is based on TRNG 
triggers and I can imagine it could fail in some borderline cases 
– that being said, it should still be possible to finish the level 
clearly, but to be certain it is better to kill all enemies throughout.

I have not encountered any critical issues, but due to simplicity of 
gameplay and being keen on releasing the level within dedicated 
timespan I could not lend the level for extensive beta testing. 
If you encounter any problems not mentioned here, please let me know 
and I will do my best to address them.



CREDITS

The Vagrant – for the original level itself

Baddy – Small Dino, Raptor enemies

GGCTUK(2005) – T-Rex enemy, originally by Tomo/EssGee

LoreTheGamer, SrDanielPonces - testing/feedback


