By Jim Rossignol on January 2nd, 2008 at 1:53 pm.
Excellent news: the first episode of educational wolfpack simulator, WolfQuest, is now available to download. It’s 75mb or 4.6 Peggles. You’ll able to play the first installment of the single player game, in which you mark territory, scare off bears and steal their carrion, or hunt elk, and also the multiplayer game in which you can “work as a team to bring down a powerful bull elk”. It’s for your education, of course.
The servers are a bit slow at the moment as it seems every man and his dog is downloading this free edutainment taster. RPS Wolfpack, anyone? (Shame about that wacky camera system!)
02/01/2008 at 14:23 Andrew says:
This actually sounds great. I’ll have to take a look at this.
02/01/2008 at 14:28 dartt says:
Why not.
AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
02/01/2008 at 14:34 yns88 says:
Reminds me of an old wolf simulator I played back in the nineties, except that one was extremely difficult. Took several tries before I learned how to just keep my wolf from starving…
I can’t remember the name of that game for the life of me, though.
02/01/2008 at 14:38 Fat Zombie says:
Oooh. This looks very good; like that Endless Forest thingy, but with violence. Thus, intrinsically better.
Downloading!
02/01/2008 at 14:40 cliffski says:
great idea, hope it lives up to the possibilities …
02/01/2008 at 15:02 Piratepete says:
So is it now safe to conclude the Imperial Peggle = 16.304 mb?
Count me in for the RPS Wolfpack
02/01/2008 at 15:14 yns88 says:
Now, as for this game, I suppose it might be enjoyable, if only the controls weren’t so crappy.
02/01/2008 at 15:19 Incognito_gbg says:
“Reminds me of an old wolf simulator I played back in the nineties, except that one was extremely difficult. Took several tries before I learned how to just keep my wolf from starving…
I can’t remember the name of that game for the life of me, though.”
It was just called Wolf. :)
02/01/2008 at 16:03 cliffski says:
wow. they have zero bandwidth, Just cancelled my download. Why aren’t they using a dedicated file host?
02/01/2008 at 16:38 Lou says:
Nice, will try this – donwload is working fine here, at 400kb/s.
02/01/2008 at 16:45 cliffski says:
Yeah finally got it here too. I LOVE the idea, but zero complexity and a pretty poor 3D world means its a bit of a disappointment right now. If you can’t do a decent 3D world, you can expect everyone to get turned off by you doing a 3D game, that’s why i stick to 2D. Simple things like my wolf not kicking up any dust as I run, or more tree variety would have been something.
There’s no clue as to what those 3 indicators mean, and its lacking real depth. Do I need water? or just food, and do I need somewhere safe to sleep? The idea is great, the execution is poor :( I hope they keep improving it.
02/01/2008 at 16:53 Willem says:
The controls are impossible. And shit.
02/01/2008 at 17:06 Kieron Gillen says:
I got stuck in a Moose.
In its current incarnation, I suspect it’ll work best as an RPG wolfpack joke article. Inevitably, Alec and I will go for each other in the first three seconds.
KG
02/01/2008 at 17:27 Lou says:
I for one got stuck on an elk carcass, about 30 seconds into the game. Would have gnawed through it, but the “bite” key doesn’t seem to work.
I howled a bit, then quit.
02/01/2008 at 17:31 Theory says:
Even if this weren’t so basic, it’s hard to imagine how you’d make a realistic wolf simulator fun. The cool stuff doesn’t translate well into button presses at all.
02/01/2008 at 17:36 cliffski says:
oh sure you could. Man, I would LOVE to be the designer on it.
Firstly, you make it a stealth game like thief. You have to sneak up on your prey obviously. Secondly, you show in 3D a visual representation of the smells of other animals, like those people with synasthesia see (or whatever its called).
Thirdly you have a l33t day and night cycle, and tons of other animals all over the place. I can imagine a game where you are cranking the speakers up loud hoping to hear that distinctive sound of another wolf and place it in 3D.
It would r0xx0r.
Sadly, this attempt at it fails.
02/01/2008 at 17:38 Theory says:
That’s in the game, actually. Press V, but don’t expect Sam Fisher goggle-vision.
02/01/2008 at 17:45 Lou says:
Yeah, you could make an interesting game – claim and defend a territory, become the leader of a pack, hunt for food during different seasons (with, as mentioned, stealth mechanics), upgrade different stats, fight against other wild animals, flee from hunters, etc.
02/01/2008 at 17:45 The_B says:
Where do we p… err… “mark our territory?”
02/01/2008 at 18:02 Slappeh says:
The controls ruined it for me.
02/01/2008 at 18:11 malphigian says:
I think it could work if it was done more like a small scale RTS/Sim — grow your pack, manage your prey, expand territory, fight off rivals, etc. Maybe you could also “possess” (a la Dungeon Keeper) individual wolves to help in a hunt or whatever too.
02/01/2008 at 18:38 Visi says:
Would have been better if the camera wasn’t so awful. A slightly more varied gameworld would be good too, but camera and bugs come before that. Why do the controls go mad every time I see another moving creature? I’d spot a rabbit, and suddenly find myself able to do nothing but run in circles, while it just sat there and looked amused.
It could be a lot of fun if done right, though. Claim your own spot of land, find a nice cave to raise a pack in, defend it from other wolves and still bring in enough food to stop everyone from dying or wandering off.
02/01/2008 at 18:47 Matthew Gallant says:
What an interesting concept, I’ll try it once the servers aren’t being hammered by half the internets.
02/01/2008 at 20:45 Johnny Law says:
Ah, the traditional problem with betas raises its antlered head yet again.
02/01/2008 at 20:54 DigitalSignalX says:
I tried a game a few months back that centered around bird watching. Sneaking up, being able to spot, take photos of, record, and identifying birds for points. Much like Wolfquest, the idea had some fascinating potential but then when it came to execution, was rather disappointing, especially when you consider it’s target demographic won’t be hard core gamers who are used to getting around software glitches and interface eccentricities.
02/01/2008 at 20:59 cliffski says:
if you like this idea you should try that ‘venture africa’ game.
02/01/2008 at 21:07 Pace says:
Seriously? What’s next, “extreme stamp collecting” for the PS3?
02/01/2008 at 23:31 King Awesome says:
I believe that is id’s next project.
03/01/2008 at 03:24 malkav11 says:
Getting stuck in a moose is called realism, people. It happens to wolves all the time.
It’s the cause of the great Moose Wars of 1973.
03/01/2008 at 04:10 StolenName says:
Mmmm. I spent some time trying to get a copy to download and succeeded today. God awful fucking controls, lack of direction and a pretty poor, uninteresting world killed the game for me. Mostly the controls.
I love the idea of making edu-games on topics such as wolves, maybe even BEARS woulds be awesome, or an snake … but gah. What were they trying to accomplish in this game?
Did anyone make it far enough to actually begin marking territory? Did anyone find the fine young female wolf and begin with the humping? Did anyone find ANOTHER WOLF?
More wolf games, less suck would be nice.
03/01/2008 at 14:41 Willem says:
I found a wolf! It was a male, though, so after a rather shit mini-game (well, it looked like a mini-game. In truth, it was just some dialogue options which didn’t really work) I managed to chase him away. I don’t really know what I gained.
The other wolf said that I was the boss, though.
03/01/2008 at 16:37 Visi says:
Oh dear, something I just noticed that might amuse a few of you. I was stuck in an Elk at the time.
Find your elk and press V to go into greyscale mode, then press H to howl. Your wolf should raise his head back very slowly, displaying to you his teeth and eyeballs.
I did find a female, but she kept biting me.
03/01/2008 at 22:44 StolenName says:
@ Willem – congratulations dude on finding a wolf. Ugh, did you learn anything from that encounter other than if you were a wolf in Yellow Stone park you’d be the king bitch?
@ Visi – that vision mode was a little bit of fun and makes it a damn sight easier to track the other wolves. You can pick up the scent of the other wolves, coyote, dead elk and other things in it. The scent markings left by other wolves were left “Five Minutes Ago”, that’s all I learned!
This wolf game must have been downloaded by quite a number of people. It was posted here, Joystiq and Kotaku with quite a few comments for feedback. Was going to post it on my site but I’m glad I played it first because it’s something that should be recommended haha.
03/01/2008 at 23:41 Willem says:
I learned that wolves can talk to each other and that if I see a rabbit, I should run in circles really, really fast.
08/01/2008 at 06:29 Andrew B says:
God that was actually painful to play.
11/01/2008 at 18:06 Mr.Brand says:
Slaughtering elks? Jack Thompson will want to ban this sick filth!
15/01/2008 at 05:14 Jessica says:
The game would be a lot better if the controls were easier and there were more wolves! I found a ton a coyotes, a few elk the coyotes killed, two herds of elk, and three rabbits but no wolves anywhere!
18/01/2008 at 19:46 minsc_tdp says:
“Wolf” was the name of the old game, I used to do tech support for it at a tech support outsourcing firm in Colorado (I also supported DOOM and hundreds of other titles). I can’t remember the name of the developer, unfortunately, but it will probably randomly come back to me in the middle of the night.
It was a great game, I loved it a lot. It was extremely hard, yet you were always compelled to keep going, like some kind of survival instinct! It seemed almost impossible to stay on top in the game, to gain any kind of power – you were always starving, ALWAYS, always trying to feed your young, always on the move. One step forward, two steps back was the order of the day. Attacking humans got you shot on sight and was never successful. Apparently the intention of the developer was to help people really feel the desparation of the existence of such a creature – I wonder if this title captures it the same way that old title did.
19/01/2008 at 03:50 Morriganrane says:
I downloaded it, started it up for a while and quit in annoyance at the controls. I’ll try again later when I have more patience for it. I love the idea as an educational rpg, it has a lot of potential to be pretty cool …now if they could only do more with the controls and camera. Man, I couldn’t even pee! How sad is that? A little more depth with the interaction with other wolves would be great. There are many nuances of behavior in wolf packs, it’s a bit sad to see it dumbed down so much.
20/03/2008 at 18:09 lee watkins says:
were do i download it at
22/12/2008 at 01:17 Jack says:
I love this game! It’s the bomb!
07/01/2009 at 21:17 samantha says:
does anyone know what screen resolution your sopposed to use?
13/01/2010 at 07:52 RANDOMPERSONNNN says:
i don’t think it matters. I play it in window mode.
13/01/2010 at 07:50 RANDOMPERSONNNN says:
Actually, i think the controls are pretty easy.
The arrow keys for walking and the spacebar for biting. Q is for running.
V is scent vision, J is wag tail, H is howl, X is jump, P is Pee (Only in level 2), Though, the game
could use A LOT of improvement. The graphics are OK, but could be better.
The red bar is health. The green bar is stamina. Red paw prints tell your pups’ health (level 2 only),
Blue bar is how well behaved your pups are, or at least i think so (level 2 only), Yellow bar is how well
you are settled into your new den (level 2 only). Jeez, don’t you read the instructions in the beggining!? It only takes about 2 mins, lazy people. Hope this helped, if you still don’t get it, you’re hopeless.
Download the game at the WolfQuest website. You’re too lazy to even search. Now go play!