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In Somnia...
Posted By: PerseusSpartacusDate: 5/26/12 12:07 a.m.

Perplexed by the title? Try it on a latin translator. ;)

If you look at the PowerPathways Screenshot, you'll notice something odd. On the ground, there lies a dead Nightmare, green as usual. However, still flying around, there is what appears to be a blue Nightmare. You might think 'Oh, it must be a Greater Nightmare'. However, the blue here is darker and more rich in color, and the eyes are yellow like a regular Nightmare, not like a Greater Nightmare, which has red eyes.

What's so odd about this, you ask? Well, in all levels, the number of Monster types present is less than or equal to three. From what I can tell, the game can only have three kinds of monsters on a given level, period. So, assuming that the dead green Nightmare and the living blue Nightmare are two different 'types' of monster, that means we have:

1 - Nightmare
2 - Blue (greater?) Nightmare
3 - Ooze
4 - Ghoul

So we have four 'types' of monster on the same level. Technically, this is impossible given the engine limitations. So the green and blue Nightmares can't really be different kinds of monster, can they?

But wait, if they're the same kind of monster, why is one green and the other one blue? Note that one is dead and the other one is attacking. Maybe Nightmares were originally meant to change colors depending on what 'state' they were in? Keep in mind that this appears to be a screenshot of an early version of PiD, so it would make sense for some things to be different. Perhaps at first, the Nightmare turned blue when it was getting ready to attack.

That leaves the question of why this color-changing feature was removed. My first guess is that they thought it would be hard to tell what kind of Nightmare you were up against at first glance. In other words, the first time you see a Greater Nightmare, it immediately opens fire at you, and so it is blue. You think it's a regular Nightmare, but it's not. Thus, the color-changing feature is removed to avoid confusion. Either that, or Bungie was having trouble getting the color-change to look nice.

What would it have been like to meet a color-changing Nightmare up close? What would a conversation with a Nightmare been like back in the days of PiD v0.0? Oh, the questions.

Cheers,
PerseusSpartacus

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Replies:

In Somnia...PerseusSpartacus 5/26/12 12:07 a.m.
     Re: In Somnia...Godot 5/26/12 5:43 a.m.
           Re: In Somnia...PerseusSpartacus 5/26/12 11:07 a.m.
     Re: In Somnia... *LINK*Bob-B-Q 5/26/12 5:47 a.m.

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