Thoughts On A Temple Remake

I talk about what I would add and change if I were to remake The Temple Of Elemental Evil today.

Here are two related videos:

[MythrilZenith]

Temple was my introduction to D&D and CRPGs. It's the weird twist of fate when your game ends up in a bargain bin - you become the easy access game for kids to grow up on. I never knew it was negatively received because I grew up on it and have massive nostalgia.

Expanding Nulb and the Temple itself would definitely be big, though. I have vague memories of beating the game as a teenager, but almost no memories of those two locations because I basically grabbed the quest to go to the Temple and walked straight through to the final boss. I have stronger memories of getting ambushed by a dozen ogres when trying to rest in the Temple than pretty much ANY of the quests inside the Temple.

[CircleOfTheSeptagram]

Platinum Games wanted to port one of their games, Wonderful 101, to PC from the WiiU. Nintendo was never going to pay for that, but they said that they could do it on their own dime. Platinum ran a Kickstarter for the project, it was wildly successful, and the port was completed with additional game content as stretch goals.

I understand Arcanum and Temple aren't your babies, but this might be an avenue worth pursuing. A publisher would basically be getting free PR for their IPs if they aren't expected to take on any risk.

Thanks for the vid!

[welovettrpgs]

TOEE was the first long campaign I DMed in the 80s. Then shortly before the release of your TOEE video game I barely survived a life threatening injury. Your game really helped me through that dark time. I've played it many times and still own my original copy. I intend on making a video n my channel about TOEE (which is how I found your channel.) Thanks!

[gilgamecha]

For the record I love the radial UI in TToEE. The part of the UI that killed me was spell memorisation. That took me literally days to figure out.

[marceror]

I played this game NUMEROUS times, and really enjoyed it. The Circle of Eight mod really expanded and enriched the experience. It also included some mysterious bug fixes (wink wink)!

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Tim. The remade version sounds like it would have been fantastic!

[DoobieDoctor]

I recently saw a video on Temple that said the modding community and projects are so extensive that it provides more game than the original game itself. Also I'm happy you got whatever it was in your eye out so quickly. ;) ;) Oh there it goes in my eye now!

[TripleFudgePacker]

Half a decade ago I had beaten Arcanum and really wanted more, so I looked up what other games you had made. Found ToEE among that list. The day I played it, I learned everything I know about DnD from it. I wish I had grown up with the game like I did Arcanum. Mods like Co8 and Temple+ really help keep it modern, especially because the base game itself was already fun with great customization.

The ideas in this video are great additions! Would love to see the content you come up with.

[elsecretopez]

I had a funny bug on my most recent playthrough. I had a ranger in the party with a bear as an animal companion. He fainted and I left him in the temple to die cause I didn't realy care about him. Sometimes later I came back to that level to find him with full HP, hostile and leading a gang gargoyles in some weird revenege story arc. And on top of that, a text apeared with his portrait next to it threatening me or something. That's the most bizzare and wonderful bug I have ever encountered.

[PatriceBoivin]

Please consider including Gary Gygax's story arc back in... The Temple of Elemental Evil is about the Elemental Evil God in the bottom level, an HP Lovecraft style monstrous deity akin to Tharizdun (but not the same). Beory created the elemental nodes to trap Zuggtmoy; Iuz had been trapped under Greyhawk by Zagyg. The Zuggtmoy thing is a bit of a diversion from the real story line. TSR and later WotC don't appear to have been fully aware that the ToEE wasn't really about Zuggtmoy... EGG didn't flesh out the lower level(s) because he asked Rob Kuntz to help him stimulate the PCs (including his daughter and her friends) who were playing in T1 and not venturing forth enough. Rob's Rabillar went in, quickly freed Zuggtmoy, then left again causing turmoil. EGG didn't detail the lower levels as his players never went down there. So when he gave TSR the 300 pages of notes, the upper levels were detailed but the lower levels not as much.

[ashleywilliams]

Love your thoughts on the vignettes, a Temple remake would probably go down well nowadays too in the wake of BG3.

I played Temple when I was 14 and I absolutely "borrowed" using party alignments for my D&D games as it helped a lot with party cohesion.

I also find it interesting you'd keep it as a 3.5e, an edition I have a ton of nostalgia for

[Endarire]

As a modder for ToEE, I'm eager to write for your ToEE remake! Thankee!

[Druuj]

Truthfully the radial menu was an improvement (over other UIs) at that point in time and IMO added to my enjoyment of the game. I am still in awe of the in game Help over the D&D rules which helped me plan my characters build. I really wish every game had that level of in-game help. It was an in-game wiki. The multiple alignment starts along with the different unique "quests" the party worked towards gave multiple playthroughs something to look forward to. I had trouble ( it took me 3 playthroughs) to figure out crafting but I am glad I finally did. I still have trouble understanding how to survive the 4 elemental bosses along with the last superboss without having a Fragarach (or its brother) user in the party. I guess I just have to git gud.
Overall, ToEE was a game I thoroughly enjoyed (along with VtMB, Arcanum) and I thank you Tim for not just making those games but also for keeping their memory going even now on 2023. God bless you.

[martydotzone]

Hey Tim, I played Temple of Elemental Evil with the fan patches that didn't have your involvement 🙂😉 and it was the only Troika game I managed to finish, although I liked Arcanum and Vampire. Those fan modders did an excellent job 🙂😉 and I have very warm memories of that game

[chedruid]

Hi Tim, ty for this video. As a tester of Temple+ mod (and a moder for my personal use) I found this video extremely interesting. You could definitely use a lot of the 3.5 edition's prestige classes and extra content, like items, gear etc for an enhanced version of the game.

If I had a wish it would be to make the updated version a little bit easier to mod, like CK3.

[bambi]

Everyone in gamedev and UX should be subbed to this man

[zbigniewwiecaw]

I love that game so much, there is something magical about entering Hommlet for the first time after the short introduction

[Hypnotoadtrance]

Temple was among the first computer DnD games I got into as a child from the recommendation of my father. I've seen this game grow in terms of its modding community and I do believe they have truly kept the game alive all this time - especially the work that was put into the Temple+ mod. Many of the things you would like to see added in a remake are already wholly or partially added in Circle of Eight and Temple+. I would absolutely love to hear your thoughts on these mods, if you have the time. :)

[waldoc]

Hey, Tim. As always, thanks for the video.

I was wondering if you had any insights into companion design. For instance, at what stage in development do companions tend to solidify, and what traits do you consider essential for a good companion? Again, thanks for your time.

[abelsalgadoromero]

Question (dear to me): any opinion on open source re-implementations? There's a movement precisely targeting QoL and modernization/preservation of games while keeping assets separated. You still need to buy the game to get them, so everything is legal unless reverse enginery is involved. Any thoughts? Would you be willing to write specification documents so others can do a re-implementation legally?

[Pedone_Rosso]

He said it, 27 seconds in the video!
"I thought I'd do a Temple remake".
It's official, straight from Timothy Cain's own mouth.
Recorded for posterity, legally binding.
(LOL!)

Thanks for your videos!