2003 April Fools - Behind the Scenes

[ This article was originally titled "Behind the Scenes of the Greatest April Fools Joke... of All Time!". ]

"Vehiculum Furtus Maximo" is kludgy Latin for "Maximum Theft of Vehicles," a play on "Grand Theft Auto." I thought it would be funny to combine Kain's love of Latin phrases with a game concept that many hardcore fans would see as a total selling-out of the series. Only mistressoftime at Nosgothic Realm was able to fully figure out what it was supposed to mean, to my knowledge =).

Willow graciously spent many hours creating the character art and logo for VFM. Personally I can't draw anything better than stick figures, so this one wouldn't have been possible without his skills.

I created the mock-up packaging based on Blood Omen 2. The PS2 version was the "hero prop" with additional detail (like its own UPC from a can of Amy's Organic Soup), but didn't appear in the joke because of an issue with the printing shop (see the SRSE section for details). There were supposed to be a whole bunch of the PS2 version, just like SRSE.

The stone wall on the cover is from Seattle's United First Methodist Church, which I photographed a few weeks ago in order to capture it before its demolition.

The full text on the back of the Vehiculum Furtus Maximo box reads:

Blood. Conquest. Graffiti.

Kain, the most evil character in videogame history is back to conquer Nosgoth once and for all. And this time, he's packing a can of spraypaint, six lieutenants, and an even badder attitude.

Steal carriages, tag buildings, and intimidate the populace
Raise six lieutenants, to fight on your side
Lightning-fast cel-shaded action
Explore the world of Nosgoth from an entirely new perspective

Soul Reaver: Special Edition is, of course, the game that hundreds of fans have asked for ever since the GIA first discovered unused audio on the Soul Reaver disc. Crystal Dynamics has repeatedly stated that they are more interested in making new stories than revisiting old ones, but that hasn't stopped people from bugging them repeatedly about it. I figured it would be fun to see what would happen if they got their wish.

The packaging is based on the design of Soul Reaver 2 and Blood Omen 2. The artwork is original promotional material from CrystalD/Eidos, and can be found on a variety of fan sites. The text is a mixture of a personal wishlist of features and Early Versions of The Story. It reads:

The Epic Adventure... As You're Never Seen it Before

I am Raziel. I stood with Kain at the dawn of the Empire. We prowled the twilight of purgatory building six legions of vampires to pillage Nosgoth. Now I stalk the ruins of this world seeking to destroy my creator.

The legendary Playstation game recreated for next-generation systems
A massive, detailed world to explore with no load times
Features abilities and areas cut from the original release
Battle your foes with seven Reaver upgrades and Glyphs
Over 75 hours of gameplay
Optional commentary by cast and crew
Unlockable bonus material
Play alpha and beta versions of the Playstation edition
Complete soundtrack in MP3 and Ogg Vorbis format

The "screenshots" are a combination of DVD screencaptures, image editing and unusual angles on the SR2 cinematics which I captured using Camera Control and [[SR2/Codes-Debug Menu]]. The bottom of this page has some of the source material if you'd like to buy it for your own viewing.

There weren't originally going to be so many mock-ups of SRSE, but the printing shop (whose name shall remain anonymous) accidentally printed 12 copies instead of 6 SRSEs and 6 VFMs. The printer I was working with was going to correct the issue, but one of his coworkers freaked out because of the fake copyright information I put on the inserts and wouldn't print any more until I obtained written permission from Crystal.

Soul Reaver 3 is the only one of the three games that is actually known to be under development and not a figment of my imagination. [ This article was written before Defiance was announced. ]

However, just because it's under development doesn't mean the public knows anything about it. The SR3 section contains a list of rumours and a few known facts, but they are sketchy at best.

On the plus side, this basically let me make up whatever I felt like for the plot and screenshots.

The "spectral" and "vampire" images are by Divine Shadow. The "spectral" image is based on part of the PC game American McGee's Alice, and the "vampire" shot is combined from several sources (including the Pillars room of SR2). Both screenshots have had their colour balance altered dramatically.

I created the the "far future Pillars" and "Gate" images. The Pillars image combines a capture from SR2 with part of a sky shot from Gladiator (the movie starring Russell Crowe). If you've played SR2 and BO2, it should be pretty obvious what the Gate is based on.

I didn't create a package mockup for Soul Reaver 3 because I couldn't think of a way to make it convincing enough.

There's more images included in 2003 April Fools - Explanation and Reaction.

[ Some additional images have been added here as part of the 2007 update. The most notable (although also the most crappy and least convincing) is the one depicting my original idea for the plot of Soul Reaver 3. It's supposed to depict Moebius having murdered Kain and burned the entombed bodies of his lieutenants as he was about to raise them. This was supposed to be the altered history that had ejected Kain and Raziel from the time stream after the events of Soul Reaver 2, with the objective of "Soul Reaver 3" being to restore the original timeline - the idea being that while the back story for the first Soul Reaver was brutal, Raziel would see that it was preferable to the alternative. At the time, I couldn't manage to make anything convincing, so the idea was dropped from the joke. ]

This hallway from The Dark Crystal become part of the Lake of the Dead screenshot

A screenshot from Labyrinth stood in for Turel's territory

The shoulders of The Rockbiter from The Neverending Story became a mountain

This SR2 screenshot became the Hylden Gate

Raziel charging up the Light Reaver from further away, with no cropping

A less dramatic version of Kain at the Pillars

This mock screenshot by Divine Shadow was not included with the original release

The very poorly-made "Moebius in the Tomb of the Sarafan" "art"-work

Download
File	Size	Version	Release Date	Author
Soul Reaver SE Case Inserts	10 MiB	1.0	2007-02-20	Ben Lincoln
To exactly replicate the inserts in the photos, have these PDFs printed on high-gloss paper.

Download
File	Size	Version	Release Date	Author
Vehiculum Furtus Maximo Case Inserts	8 MiB	1.0	2007-02-20	Willow Ayala and Ben Lincoln
To exactly replicate the inserts in the photos, have these PDFs printed on high-gloss paper.