Indiana Jones

Written by John Scalzo  on November 30, 2006

Early Impressions: Indiana Jones 2007? That Holy Grail must really work!

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Indiana Jones has always been a man of mystery. It was only in the last few minutes of the third movie that we even learned his name. Nowadays, finding information on the mythical Indiana Jones IV is even more difficult. What will it be about? Will Sean Connery return? Will Indy fight Nazis in the 60s? Or will it be Communists? No one knows and I still hold out for an appearance by the dreaded Commie-Nazis. The same holds true for next year's new Indiana Jones game.

Indiana Jones 2007 (it's current working title) will be set in 1939 (after all of the movies) and it will feature the latest in bleeding edge game tech: Euphoria technology. Euphoria is a new physics engine that is designed to simulate movement in a variety of different characters and objects. So enemy characters will walk differently and they will all react differently when hit by one of Indy's punches. They will also react differently after being hit. Each enemy will land on the ground in a unique way, or possibly use a nearby object to rebalance themselves for a counterattack.

Of course, if they land on something that is prone to breakage, say a door or a fruit stand, the environmental physics will kick in and splitter the object in a distinctive way every time. Unlike the majority of current-gen games, there will be no pre-scripted animations. Basically, the entire game will be a one-of-a-kind experience every time through.

All of these new technologies collide in the sole piece of game footage LucasArts has revealed about Indiana Jones 2007: a brawl between Indy and all of Chinatown in San Francisco.

In this demo you can see Indy whipping guns out of the hands of would-be attackers. While they attempt to surround Indy, he pulls out his own gun and blows up a fireworks stand. The explosion causes a scaffolding to collapse, sending wood splitters in a hundred different directions. Indy then pulls an escape maneuver by hopping on top of a speeding trolley. This won't stop our intrepid Chinatown gang as they climb on after him. It's in this section of the demo that you can see the Euphoria engine really put to work. Enemies fly off of the trolley and land on the pavement with a sharp thud and broken bones. Others attempt to hang on and manage to contort their arms in, wait for it, unique ways.