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Alpha Team concept animation?


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I really don't know what to make of this.

Skip to 1:25. This guy worked at Digital Domain, the creators of Alpha Team, and the animation includes TeeVee and Ogel (who, unlike the rest of the characters, actually look like their finalized counterparts), so it's obviously Alpha Team related. That doesn't explain the Alpha Team members including a chef and one-man-band though.

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I remember hearing from numerous sources that LEGO Alpha Team was originally going to be called the Trans-International LEGO Team. I cannot help but wonder if this bizarre cast of characters was the Trans-International LEGO Team in question before it was redesigned into Alpha Team; given their very... err, diverse range personalities, I'd be willing to believe this. I'm very curious about this, and I hope that dougfranckwolf is still active enough on YouTube to answer our questions.

You know, this gives me a ton of ideas of a LEGO Universe pre-alpha parody about LEGO Alpha Team...

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  • 2 weeks later...

I agree with PeabodySam, this looks like it is from when the game was being developed as LEGO Logic (that was the working title, right?). I had no idea it went through such a drastic redesign, though. Looking at the attributes of each of the characters, here is a list of who I suspect to be their finalized counterparts:

Chef = Flex, since he uses a rope to fall down to the hot dog

Acrobat = Radia, as she is dodging lasers

Builder = Cam. Although the builder doesn't do anything related to motors, she uses wrenches to block the lasers, much like Cam in the cover art for the Alpha Team game.

Guy on a bike with a mustache = Dash, since he is supporting all of the others as a leader and had no specific talent (technically, Dash is the Motion Expert, but every team member is able to move just as he does)

That leaves the one-man band and the magician. Neither bear any distinct similarities to either Crunch or Charge, so far as I can tell.

The idea for this game seems to have been considerably well-developed, and they had to fairly sure they were going with it if they animated an opening movie. I would not be surprised at all to learn that the redesign was proposed by LEGO, in order to develop the game side-by-side with a new secret agent theme they wanted to do. That would explain why the Alpha Team game came out a year before the theme (given finalizing the theme took longer, as much of the game was already done), and why the Skeleton Drones in the sets have normal skeleton heads like the early designs for the game. They must have agreed on the standard head and then the game developers changed their minds at the last minute for some reason, giving us the very creepy swirly eye/giant grin face instead.

The one thing that we may never understand are the Skeleton Drone Explorien Robot Cowboy Bandit things that preceded the Skeleton Drones. :P

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  • 5 months later...

I remember hearing from numerous sources that LEGO Alpha Team was originally going to be called the Trans-International LEGO Team.

 

Judging by these file names, I believe this is true. TILT (Trans-International LEGO Team)

 

Very Interesting.

 

Trans-International%20LEGO%20Team.PNG

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lol username

Good find! Hm, I wonder if it might be possible to overhaul the game and bring back these early character designs, once the model and level formats are more understood...

Also, Doug did indeed reply to the comments on the video, lemme copypasta them over here:

jamessterV2 6 months ago

What's the animation that goes from 1:25 to 2:38? Looks like an animation for LEGO Alpha Team, but aside from Ogel and TeeVee the characters look almost nothing like their counterparts in the finalized game. Was this some early concept animation? Looks really well done. Got any more stuff like that? :D

Doug Wolf 6 months ago

You are correct! Well spotted. That is for the cut scene to the first incarnation of LEGO Team Alpha. I worked on it at Digital Domain with a team for about a month to get the whole thing done. Then it was sent to Lego corporate offices, who loved it, and then immediately said, "By the way.. We have changed all the characters and we wont be using it." Alas... but it will live on in my demo reel forever.

jamessterV2 6 months ago

Ah, ok. Really great animation, quite a shame it never got used... But hey, at least we can see it on YouTube now. :D I especially like the clip at 1:58.

Also, would you happen to have the original audio for this cutscene? It's not really that big of a deal, but I would like to hear the original sound for this as well if possible (though the music in this demo reel is pretty awesome too).

Doug Wolf 6 months ago

As far as I remember, the audio was never completed. That was the next stage to be done after the animation and renders were approved.

VezonWireless 6 months ago

Along with what jamessterV2 said, I recall hearing from various sources that the LEGO Alpha Team game was originally going to be called the Trans-International LEGO Team. I don't suppose whether or not you can confirm that this is true, and if it is, would 1:25 to 2:38 happen to be starring the cast of the original Trans-International LEGO Team?

Doug Wolf 6 months ago

I cant remember that name exactly, but it was something like that. It is the first cast of Lego Alpha Team. You can read the comment below for what happened at the time. ;(

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  • 1 year later...

Doug uploaded some demo reels for 2014, with a look at the minifigure model for his LEGO Logic/Alpha Team work at 1:27:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ej7yx3MS-6U

The LEGO Logic stuff also appears in this one, though it's cut up a bit and we've already seen the unedited animation in the original demo reel.

(Also, for those who haven't seen it already, check out >this topic for more on this early Alpha Team stuff.)

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Ha, funny, he put an image from the 2005 line in the background. I guess he must've just run a search for LEGO Alpha Team and found it to be the most suitable image.

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