And yes, it's already the 21th anniversary of Code Lyoko! Let's take a look at what's going on around the franchise!
OFFICIAL SIDE
For the time being, we have no news on a potential sequel to the Code Lyoko series. Evoked by Sophie Decroisette and Jérôme Mouscadet during 2023 and 2024, the desire to relaunch the franchise is apparently still on the drawing board, but it requires financing, interested channels or streaming services, and many other administrative and technical formalities to hope that the project will one day see the light of day and potentially go into production. Let's hope that certain sequels or successes will serve them well with financiers.
Indeed, we can take a brief tour of the industry and its aftermath to make a case for the ability of old franchises to be continued and/or revived:
The return of The Mysterious Cities of Gold in 2013, 30 years later.
On the other side of the Atlantic in 2024, the success of the return of X-Men 97
The continuation of the Totally Spies series in seasons 7 and 8 since 2022. The series was cancelled/ended in 2013.
The continuing success of Miraculous LadyBug (literally the *Code Lyoko* of the 2020s, whether in terms of its origin (France), its reach (International) or its teams (Code Lyoko talents can be found in its production)).
All the new Avatar Studios projects for the Avatar: The Last Airbender franchise
Batman: Caped Crusader in 2024, which is exactly the same aesthetic as the 90s animated series...
And many more.
We've been promised new information by the end of the summer, so we'll know where discussions stand.
FAN-PROJECT side
The IFSCL, which we'll continue to present since new fans stumble upon it over the last 14 years, is being endowed by yours truly with a new cycle, 47X, soon to be available. With the addition of a new chapter in its story mode and numerous features in the free mode, the code lyoko supercomputer interface simulator and life-simulator Jeremy is still growing in the hope of becoming the ultimate Code Lyoko fangame (at least, when it comes to not going on Lyoko!).
Worse still, we're told in the earpiece that a new LyokoWarrior was on the menu. Has the creator succumbed to a fan fantasy a little too easy, to the detriment of his story? Or is this just a diversion to cover up far more original surprises?
And finally, a more discreet member of the community, DarkGuillaume, has finished his Visual Novel project, started several years ago, a work of quality!
On the other hand, if you're looking to immerse yourself in Lyoko, SEJ Studio is there! Priority seems to be given to content variety, and we're betting that patches and improvements to game design and user experience will enable the fangame to assert itself as an action fangame in the same vein as the official games!
Yes, we've just reached 10 million visitors on a site that will soon be celebrating its 20th year. When we hit 5 million visitors, it was right in the middle of Code Lyoko Evolution's broadcast. Will the 10 million visitor milestone be synonymous with a new adventure within our favourite franchise...a continuation of the original series? Of the franchise? A reboot? ...Time will tell, but before we return in a few days with more details on this symbolic number with a little surprise, let's see what's been happening lately in the media landscape of the series.
A few months ago, we mentioned that the composer of A World Without Danger, Justine Sainte, wanted to celebrate the 20th anniversary with a special music album for the series. Justine started publishing several songs, including a reorchestration of the series opening theme. With versions in French, English and Spanish, the one and only Julien Lamassonne, the vocalist for the original French theme, provided his voice for Justine Sainte's reprise. You can now find these tracks on her YouTube channel.
Next Friday at 6pm on Solva's Twitch channel, there will be a new French interview with Sophie Decroisette and Jérôme Mouscadet, who need no introduction. We have it on good authority that one of the streamers present that evening is a huge fan of the series, which gives us hope that the questions asked will be very specific to the series. It's likely that viewers will also be able to ask questions during the livestream. So be there if you want to share your questions with the two series writers.
Update: the livestream is now available on YouTube with English subtitles!
Finally, a small note that Mediatoon has recently started uploading compilations of episodes from the original series on their YouTube channel. There's nothing new in these compilations aside from the fact that Mediatoon is obviously continuing to upload on this account in one way or another. Why? Only time can tell... (Translator's note: It is common for some YouTube channels based around TV shows to upload miscellaneous compilations. This may have something to do with attracting views and/or keeping the channel monetised. However, this is just speculation; we can't say for certain why Mediatoon has made the channels active again.)
Have a nice evening on Codelyoko.fr
02/19
IFSCL 4.6.X is playable!
Posted by Immu on 02/19/2024 at 12:30
(1 commentaires)
Hello everyone!
And it's the return of a Code Lyoko video game produced by a fan for fans! The IFSCL (Interfaces Fictionnelles Simulées de Code Lyoko) returned earlier this month with a new release cycle (4.6.X).
If the only cycle released in 2023 featured an overhaul of the first chapters of the story mode, it's now time for Chapter 5 to reveal itself.
Once again, the real-world graphics have been fine-tuned, and new locations in Kadic College and the sewers make for an even deeper immersion in the series' universe.
What would IFSCL be without a healthy dose of interactivity to slip into the skin of Jérémie?
In this cycle, the laboratory gains useful new gameplay elements, panels to dismantle in the floors to retrieve location chips, and a panel to interact with the underused hologram from the original series.
We can also mention the appearance of aelita's cocoon, a Xana attack that is now interactive in the real world, and a Xana guardian that is far more advanced than in the past (including through a dedicated window).
Take a look at PulseNeon's video, which describes many of these new features.
After three releases (460 to 462) and various patches, this cycle was considered stable enough to complete its post-release in less than a month.
This is an important milestone for the project; to put it into perspective, the last post-releases of cycle 4.4.X & 4.5.X took 6 months each to complete.
In fact, this is the fastest post-publication since the "Cycles" system began in 2018!
Cycle 47X is therefore already in production, this time focusing particularly on quality of life (QOL) improvements for the player, and of course, a new chapter for the story mode. More info here
01/02
A "new" world without danger?
Posted by Icer on 01/02/2024 at 15:00
(2 commentaires)
Hello everyone,
I'd like to share a few words with you after the liquid-hungry holidays. On the occasion of Code Lyoko's 20th anniversary last September, one of the two composers of the "Un monde sans danger" theme song Justine Sainte (then Franck Keller) announced a new project for the coming year, tweeting:
While there's no obvious link between this and the latest announcements (which were made after the fact, it should be noted), there are already some very concrete consequences: Justine Sainte has reported numerous abuses of rights concerning the cult song of our favorite series, which explains the multiple deletions of associated videos in recent weeks, including that of Julien Lamassonne, the vocalist himself!
This wave of strikes is ultimately the logical consequence of a certain abuse (not unique to the Code Lyoko community, of course) concerning remixes or covers that flourish on Youtube or Spotify, and which for some, serve to make (undue, in fact) money by not crediting the right composer.
This doesn't mean, of course, that it's impossible to cover all or part of the credits for our fan projects - proof of which is that some very current ones do so with her authorization - but it does mean that it's essential to respect copyright. It's always worth remembering.
Well, we'll just have to wait and see what happens in 2024. And happy new year!
____________________________________
Update on the 6th of January 2024: Yes, things move fast these days, and Justine Sainte has explained the topic further in a video by Code_Lyokofan_ which you can find on YouTube (in French).
She speaks on the aforementioned rights issue, reveals that an album is in thr works for the 20 year anniversary...and vaguely implies the eventual possibility (yes I was careful with my words there, did you notice?) of a link between what she's working on and the previous announcements from Mouscadet and Decroisette, as she seems to know more about what's going on, citing a "search for funding to do a cartoon."
10/24
The return of Code Lyoko?
Posted by Etienne, Icer, Shaka & Zephyr on 10/24/2023 at 18:16
(4 commentaires)
Greetings to all on this average day like any other. Except, perhaps it's not.
The deliberately sensationalist title of this news post can't hide the fact of the matter: Code Lyoko is 20 years old and ended over 15 years ago (we won't talk about CLE, on principle). This is why we first invite you to watch the video below (largely in a mix of English and French, all with Spanish subtitles), particularly the exchange that happens at [49:42]:
Hmmm.
Before we dig into it, we need to provide some context (and credit).
This video was published on the Spanish channel Tertulia Tiztazo, which is two months old and aims to cover various thematic subjects with each release (so nothing directly to do with Code Lyoko at its core), presented by José Tistazo. A new challenger in the now famous YouTube game has dropped a meteor on our modest little community. It may have flown under the radar...if our KaruzoHikari (known for his work on the Code Lyoko Sprite Game page) hasn't been on the alert for a non-extinction event!
So, back to the subject at hand: this huge bit of information (the potential return of Code Lyoko, no less) was first announced by French people speaking English with Spanish subtitles, on a channel with only two videos? I'm going to pre-empt the more suspicious among you: it sounds like it could be AI-generated, a fake. "Another one of X.A.N.A.'s tricks," as some members of the community would say.
But look, while nothing has been confirmed, the famous Sophie Decroisette (the former head writer) and Jérôme Mouscadet (the former director) have teased the future of the Code Lyoko licence. Despite being in franglish, their words are clear and apparently carefully weighed out.
Codelyoko.fr is committed to relaying information from media sources both prominent and independent, but we'll refrain from saying anything definitive: is this the first step in a series of promising news to come, or something that will never come to fruition, like the old MMORPG? Or worse yet, a project that does get finished, but ends up being pretty terrible? That part of the video never mentions CLE, which is already good news in and of itself, and something that lets us finish this news post on an encouraging note.
To be continued…on en.codelyoko.fr
09/03
Happy Birthday, Code Lyoko !
Posted by Icer on 09/03/2023 at 00:00
(1 commentaires)
"It's 2003 AD. France 3's entire children's programming schedule is filled with mediocre cartoons... All of it? No, because as the new school year gets underway, a new series populated by irreducible teenagers continues to resist X.A.N.A... "
Yes, okay, we've overstated the case a little, but the parallel with another famous French hit is apt for Code Lyoko, which was released 20 years ago to the day with the first broadcast of #1 Teddygodzilla !
10 years ago, in the midst of a boom in activity linked to the ongoing broadcast of Code Lyoko Évolution (remember, after the first 20 episodes were broadcast between January and May, the rest of the French broadcast had to wait until... December, giving ideas to a group of Hungarian raclette lovers) codelyoko.fr marked the occasion with a few news items, notably announcing in a rather racy way the completeness of the site...
Today, time has passed, and things are of course a little different. Code Lyoko Evolution has flopped, Moonscoop has collapsed almost at the same time, and Dargaud, which bought out its catalog, hasn't announced anything... but should we complain? Should we really be hoping for a sequel/reboot? Everyone will undoubtedly have their own opinion on the subject, but we can anticipate one thing: after so much time, things will necessarily be very different (already, when we see what Evolution has achieved...). The series as we discovered it 20 years ago will remain as it was 97 episodes ago. Perhaps that's no bad thing.
And while the mausoleum of quality writing, which after 10 years has reached a form of completeness, continues to stand proudly (no closure planned for codelyoko.fr à la Skyrock blogs, so this part of our childhood/adolescence will remain, until further notice, intact), the ever-active community has or will undoubtedly make its mark on its various channels. Let's take a look at just one of them, and not the least:
Code Lyoko : Virtual Frontiers
(An english subtitled version is yet to be announced)
The fruit of a year and a half's work by Evil Goat, this is nothing less than a sound fiction, with all that implies: scriptwriting, dubbing, sound, mixing and editing of course! Not to mention all the team management involved. Many projects of this human dimension have gone no further than the declarative... but not these!
The proof is in the pudding: to mark the company's 20th anniversary, their first episode, Revirtualisation, is being released with great fanfare. First episode? Well, yes, because this is just the beginning, and there will be more to come. The work continues for the team, and we can only encourage them.
The action takes place 16 years after season 4. In fact, since the original fans are all 20 years older today, you'll be delighted to meet up with the characters from your childhood... now grown up!
You can also find all their information their X which contains the link to their Discord server.
Well, on that note...
09/02
The fan projects are exploding !
Posted by Immu on 09/02/2023 at 12:00
(2 commentaires)
Tomorrow, the series celebrates its 20th anniversary!
20 years of a tight-knit community! 20 years ago, the Garage Kids project became Code Lyoko, and we can't thank Thomas Romain, Tania Palumbo and Carlo de Boutiny enough for all their hard work.
While the license continues to sleep wisely at Dargaud, no sequel, reboot or soft reboot of the license is to be deplored. And indeed, why produce more? The license continues to bring in new fans even as it stands! The wisest would say that this is probably for the best, after all, Code Lyoko is a product of its time, and even if its themes are more valid than ever (the subject of AI among others), its delightfully retro atmosphere (the Nokias!) cannot be reproduced.
The most incredible thing about this situation? The community has never been so active (apart from fan fiction)! In fact, the 20th anniversary is being celebrated by a host of projects, so don't hesitate to take a look around the Internets!
Frontière Virtuelles : Revirtualisation https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=QUVitO8s5jk This year's flagship project is, of course, Code Lyoko: Frontière Virtuelles (CLFV), a sound fiction project (the older generation will refer to it as an mp3 saga), completed in a year and a half. This is the first episode of a totally original story set several years after the destruction of Xana. The actors give their all to bring the Lyoko-Warriors back to life, through top-quality sound staging.
Such ambitious projects that follow through on their ideas are rare, requiring very good organization, and clearly the Audiodidact collective and this particular project, led by Evil Goat, are not on their first try! The icing on the cake for those who prefer to read, subtitles are also included in the upcoming video. No English version yet sadly...
IFSCL : (Simulated Fictional Interfaces of Code Lyoko)
The ultimate 3D fan-game that puts you in command of Jeremy in his everyday life as a Lyokowarrior and at the helm of the supercomputer interface is celebrating 13 years of development this year, and will be celebrating the last year with a live event, featuring live illustrations!
Chill atmosphere guaranteed with fans of the project!
Documentary: "Stronger After All: 20 Years Of Code Lyoko, A Tribute to the Fandom"
As successor to the "Lyoko Decoded" documentary produced in 2007 by TB3, Joseph Tafur is determined to present a new CL documentary. Will he succeed in transcending his illustrious predecessor?
At the time of writing, they have not announced any special events to mark the occasion, but we haven't forgotten the rest of the artists and content creators who make the community tick!
First of all, the first 3 chapters of the story mode will be redesigned (especially chapter 1, which has been extended and split into 2 chapters). As a reminder, more than twenty chapters are planned and should add up to several tens of hours of story that have been painstakingly prepared over the years. New places, improved real world graphics, new interactions, new characters... There is plenty to do.
But most importantly, this cycle introduces one of the most important features of the free mode 'interface' gameplay, namely the 'translation' (energyze in factories).
Season 4 of Code Lyoko introduced the ability for the genius of the gang to send Lyoko's heroes into the real world, more specifically, Xana's bases, in order to destroy its factories. If the previous cycles of the game have successively introduced the virtual submarine (Skid) allowing to dive into the network, then the Replikas, it will now be a matter of docking to the towers and energyzing Lyokowarriors. Will you send two warriors at the same time, like in the series? Or more? That's up to you.
But be aware that on the Replikas, Xana will act accordingly, and not keeping the Skid under surveillance would be a big mistake. Once in the factory, a new troop movement mode and new features will appear, and interactions with the different equipment in the base will be available. Moreover, the combat system will be slightly different, a variant of the classic system of hit points and actions.
For the moment, only one factory plan is available. But the system is evolving to provide more plans in the future. In the same way, if only the mountain type Replikas are still available for the moment, expect to see at least one new type appearing in the year.
Of course, we can't count the improvements of all kinds, the little details, the fixes, the bonus features and a whole lot of things too long to list that have been done in the last 8 months, so we refer you to the changelog for more details.
Now, here is the trailer:
The community is not left out, however, with an IRL meeting this weekend, same as the one held two years ago, again at the Cartoon Fair in Bourg la Reine, France.
On the program of this festival centered around cartoons, an IFSCL stand, animated by the creator of the game and some devoted members of the IFSCL community. The possibility to play in preview the new cycle of the game, not completely finished, otherwise it's not funny, and the possibility to talk about our favorite cartoon with other fans!
08/03
The Findings of Dude Dudu - 2022 Edition
Posted by Etienne on 08/03/2022 at 19:37
(2 commentaires)
Hello everyone,
Summer is here, almost all the borders are open again, and it's time to go out and explore! Or rather, take some time to read this news (or write it, depending on your point of view...).
Let's start by finishing our series on the Altaya magazines. For those who are new to this (as was mentioned on the hermitagefindings Instagram account while we were covering the Canadian DVDs), before the DVD box sets came out in France, the first episodes of Code Lyoko were released on DVD and VHS (yes, VHS) in groups of 4 episodes. Unfortunately, due to low sales, publishing stopped after 2 volumes. After that, in 2007 Altaya did a limited test run of a DVD collection with 3 episodes per disc, starting with season 1 and including a magazine full of all sorts of articles to do with the series (interviews, storyboards, bonus material, etc.). The client (Moonscoop) came to the publishing house (Altaya) and ordered 4 test issues. If they sold well and the client was satisfied, they would extend the contract to more seasons. Unfortunately (again), the collection couldn't find its audience and these magazines were only ever released in a select few cities rather than nationwide, so after the 4th issue was published, the (rare) people buying them realised it would be the last. And it's this 4th issue we present to you today: a high quality PDF that contains (in French): - A summary of each episode, storyboards from the episodes "End of Take," "Satellite" and "The Girl of the Dreams" - Articles on Aelita, Kankrelats and communication between the heroes - An article on mobile phones - An article on new animation studios - Three new "Rumours" articles: "Humour or bad faith?," "Mobile phones are essential..." and "A starlet at all costs" - A new games page (spot the difference, a riddle and a pattern puzzle)
And there you have it, that's all for the magazine collection that had remained a mystery for so long (because it was impossible to find) for most fans. But before we finish, here's a bonus. At the end of each issue, these sorts of magazines usually give a preview of the next issue (to incentivise the buyer). Except, as we've already said...only 4 issues were ordered. So, how are we going to create a fifth cover with a summary of content that will probably never exist...? Well it's simple, we fake it! Yeah! We take a DVD cover, we cleverly place it over the summary on the magazine cover, and we work the magic...
Yes it's true, do you doubt us? Well look what happens when we extract the preview of issue 5 from the PDF!
Oh! Isn't that a copy-paste of the summary from issue 1? :o
New article! On a new video game! Yeah yeah, I can already hear you saying, "As if, that's not possible. You've already redesigned the pages for the 2 DS games, and the Wii game...there were no other video games produced for the licence!" You'd think that, wouldn't you? Today we're talking about a little-known game released in Spain in 2011. Well it's more like a handheld console. And we're simply going to call it the "Code Lyoko sprite game console" ...a pretty clickbaity name perhaps...and you'd be right.
This console is rarely mentioned when the brand makes a list of official merchandise. (Although, considering how rare it is today...) To put it simply, it's a pretty..."bottom of the range" console, with very basic games that have nothing to do with Code Lyoko (racing, tennis, puzzles...). Plus, there are a bunch of extra games that have nothing to do with Code Lyoko BUT had Lyoko Warrior sprites added in, and that's where the magic is...it goes from being a basic console to a basic Code Lyoko console.
With a massive amount of help from KaruzoHikari who already did a recap of this on Reddit a few years ago, here's a brand new file taking an in-depth look at this console inside and out.
Now you lucky ducks, there's a huge update to the 2D backgrounds section now waiting for you. And there's something for everyone with 50 new background images (with more than 30 new ones!). Something to note is that all the backgrounds on the site (old and new) are in their natural, organic form! They haven't been upscaled or altered using a filter. We need to mention this because now that upscaling software has been greatly optimised and made easily accessible to the public, you may be led to doubt that what you're seeing is the real deal.
We begin with a little tour of Kadic - after waking up in the dorm rooms for Jeremy, Odd, Ulrich or even William, it'll be time for class. Be careful not to spend too much time in the boiler room, quad or park, otherwise you'll need to take a walk to the administration building.
After that, what could be better than wandering over to the Hermitage for a nice movie night with friends, and a nice walk in the city?
Ah, it seems an artificial intelligence would disagree with that idea, so it's time to head to the factory, come wind, rain or snow! (Special mention to the snow-covered backgrounds and the ruined scanners that only appeared once in the series.)
Virtualisation, teleportation. Let's finish this tour on the four corners of the world.
With that update, there are 180 unique backgrounds available on our site (at least...for now)!
As well as the magazines mentioned above, another section has been finished today: the series comics published in Code Lyoko 2.0 magazine. We've already updated our site with the comics from the first two issues, along with a behind-the-scenes look at all the necessary steps for creating these comics. Today, we continue with the publication of the last two comics: "The Best of Both Worlds" and "Yumi, Subdigital Fangirl" as well as some bonus material. (Small aside to also thank A_QueenOfFairys who did the English translation for these comics, as well as many other pages on the site.)
And we'll finish this long news post with the addition of a new album - not stickers this time but trading cards. E-Max, the company that published a few sticker albums in Spain, didn't stop there and continued to take advantage of the profitability of the Code Lyoko brand. After much brainstorming, they took 100 renders, made up a set of very...simple game rules, and...what more is there to say? Aside from how this collection has been added to the "Trading Card Game" page. This ought to jog the memory of the most avid collectors of Spanish merch!
Also, we spotted a few times the little alchemists fused two or more renders together... Look at this William card for example! I'll leave you to find the 2 original renders!
And there you have it, that's all for this year. As a reminder, the HermitageFindings Instagram account is still regularly publishing information on merchandise from the series. Feel free to take a look to find a few goodies not yet published on the site (they'll come eventually! Just as soon as we...create and update the appropriate pages...).
And that's all for this news, we hope you have a good summer and we'll see you soon for more!
06/09
A World Without Danger - The return!
Posted by Etienne on 06/09/2022 at 21:27
(5 commentaires)
Hello everyone,
Some short but sweet news, following the Code Lyoko-focused Cartoon Fair last year, Julien Lamassonne, who sang the French opening theme Un Monde Sans Danger, returned to do a new version of the theme in collaboration with Crystal Voices, which you can find below:
EDIT: There's also a video here giving a behind-the-scenes look
Hello everyone!
