Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri - Development

Development

Terra Nova was conceived in 1992, around the time that Looking Glass Technologies' first game, Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss, was completed. Company co-founder Paul Neurath wrote a design document for a tactical, squad-based game with a science fiction setting, and helped the team initiate its development. Artist Robb Waters created concept art. It was originally titled Freefall, because of the way the soldiers enter combat by dropping from aircraft. Development was initially led by a newly-hired programmer who envisioned the game as an exact simulation, in which every element was as realistic as possible. Programmer Dan Schmidt created the game's artificial intelligence, and attempted to make squadmates intelligently follow orders and provide assistance, rather than merely "staying out of your way". Schmidt hired Eric Brosius and Terri Brosius, then-members of the band Tribe, to compose the game's music, which was called "orchestrally flavored" by the Boston Herald. As with their 1995 video game Flight Unlimited, Looking Glass Technologies self-published Terra Nova.

The game began production alongside the company's second project, Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds, and remained in development after that game's 1993 release. It then continued through the creation of their titles System Shock (released in 1994) and Flight Unlimited. The game was subject to numerous delays, which Schmidt later attributed to its lack of a set deadline. He stated that the team was "trying to go with the same philosophy" as the company's earlier games, in that they would "develop the systems and the game would come out of it". However, the team's development priorities regularly changed, and the programmer who led the project left several years into production. According to Schmidt, his departure meant that "there was no-one left who was psyched about making this really simulation". Despite this fact, the team continued using the idea, even though serious difficulties were involved in achieving it. Schmidt said that the game's development status was uncertain after the programmer left, and that he inherited the role of lead programmer around that time merely because the position had to be filled. He later assumed the role of project leader. In January 1995, Looking Glass showed Terra Nova alongside Flight Unlimited at the Winter Consumer Electronics Show, under their "Immersive Reality" marketing label.

In the team's original plan, Terra Nova consisted of missions that were bookended by simplistic cutscenes, akin to those of the 1990 Origin Systems video game Wing Commander. However, in 1994, Origin released Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger, which features live-action full-motion video (FMV) cutscenes. This pressured Looking Glass into incorporating FMV into Terra Nova. Schmidt later said, "Lots of A-list games were including more and more FMV, and it was felt by management that if Terra Nova didn't have any, it would look second-rate." The decision to include it came when the game was already overdue, and a large portion of the game's funding was redirected toward cutscene production. A scriptwriter from outside the company was hired to write the cutscenes; because of the interplay between the cutscenes and missions, the script underwent numerous rewrites. The game's delays and large budget resulted in the removal of a planned online multiplayer component, and the FMV cutscenes, which were expensive to produce, increased the number of sales needed to recoup development costs. A patch was planned to add the online multiplayer functionality after release, but it did not materialize. Schmidt called the cutscenes a "giant distraction" for the team and himself as project leader, and later described them as "cheesier than most" of those in other games of the era, noting that "I wince a lot looking back on ". Schmidt believed that they were likely an error from a business standpoint, as they further increased the game's budget and production length, but ultimately did not increase sales.

Roughly a year before its release, the team concluded that Terra Nova's realistic, simulation-style gameplay was not enjoyable. However, Schmidt said that the game's already lengthy development meant that it had to be released; otherwise, he believed that it would be canceled, or that its high cost would bankrupt the company. Because of this, the game was completely redesigned to be "much more arcadey" only a few months before release. Schmidt said that, in the new game, "you were going around blowing people up" and "your enemies have brackets on them showing their health and it's very bright and glowy and green". He believed that these elements drastically increased the game's enjoyability. He summarized, "Six months before it shipped the game wasn't fun at all and we actually ended up shipping something that was at least somewhat enjoyable to play". The game was released on March 5, 1996; by this time, its graphical technology had been surpassed by other video games, according to Schmidt. Lead programmer Art Min later expressed dissatisfaction with the game; he believed that, while the team coalesced at the end of development, they shipped the game too soon because of "an overexcited VP of Product Development".