Guys, I think it makes sense to spend some time discussing a possible patch/expansion to SCO that I would call a Director`s Cut (DC).
I think that it might even be sold rather than a free expansion|patch. So here are some ideas from me:
1) Make exploration more interesting. I have visited EVERY star and planet (save for Gas Giants) that are currently available in SCO. It is a bit boring to get the same modules every time after exploration of Ruins, Wrecks etc. So the idea is to add a bunch of, say, fuel tanks (and/or other modules) that all differ, you add different names to them and make sure that they can contain different amount of fuel, change color and/or pics that represent them. You can follow the same procedure for other modules (engines, scanners etc.). It will make exploration more interesting and shall be easy to implement.
2) Add more lines (even w/o voiceovers) that expand the lore. Old databanks, derelict ships` computers etc. with more info than 3-4 lines on species, events etc.
3) Go through all dialogs/descriptions/lines to make all more consistent. Add/remove things so that all dialogs/descriptions better reflect the current lore. Again, voiceovers are NOT a must.
4) It would be good to have some quests that involve one way or another all main species after your victory over Xraki (and i am not talking about Lexites quest line). A star where Xraki are trapped... so that you can still interact with them in some form or see line 6 below.
5) Add an ability to sell individual items in a group (like weapons etc.) rather than all of them. E.g. -1 forward cannon.
6) If possible add an ability to add @pocket@ universes. Age of Wonders Shadow Magic type of above and blow layers or HOMM3 underground level or Quasi space in SC2 (where you can actually have a system). So that we could make @pocket@ universe. Great for modding and various ideas.
7) Can we get a short story behind some of the artifacts that you find? Like talking to some alien and they say, oh, I see that you have an @orb@. Do you know that this @orb@ blah-blah. Just as an idea.
8) new game+ mode. Here you start your game from scratch - however your credits balance is the same like in your last save game, you have same equipment installed (save for quest items that get removed, like Pinthi spray or however that thing is called) and your cargohold is empty but you might retain the ships from the fleet. This will allow one to start the game from scratch in order to enjoy all the latest additions, get more immersed into the lore etc. w/o sorta grinding that you have to do in every game in the beginning. + Some more easter eggs just for the game+ mode can be added.
I am a lifetime founder. My main platform is Steam. But i additionally bought the game on GOG. I bought the game, expansion, soundtrack etc. again when TFB trying to remove it from sale. So I am sure that other people are still ready to support SCO and even pay a bit (if required) to get the Director`s Cut.
What are your thoughts on all that?
I would be interested in hearing what others would want.
Aside from point 6...I AGREE WITH ALL OF 'EM.
All those items sound good.
One of the topics that has come up on the discord is that we should focus on the lore. Certainly internally we have discussed some paths in regards to expanding existing aliens as opposed to introducing new aliens.
Look, it makes no sense to introduce aliens for the sake of introducing new aliens. More lore and new items are the easiest things to do in my opinion. Ask your writers, creative team to add more lines of text (but it shall be a good quality text), add a system, add a ruin, derelict etc. and here you go. No voiceovers, nothing. For the items it is the same. Instead of 4 fuel tanks, copy paste 20 and make one that adds 1200 fuel, another that gives you 1550, another, 1325 etc. Change their name. Use whatever program you use to change colors and enjoy a whole range of these items and just replace the loot from ruins with these ones. Easy. Light blue Kzanti ultratank giving 1222 etc. Same with other modules.
In terms of aliens - you have two type of aliens - the ones with full 3d animation (expensive and time consuming) and voiceovers (expensive and time consuming) and @minor aliens@ (just pictures, sometimes even w/o voiceovers). So add more minor aliens if you have to add some totally new aliens. Cheap and fast. Just make sure that the quality is not suffering. Good text and nice pictures will do just fine. And voiceovers are still required, why don`t you use a generic text to speech program for some of them with some twists on the voice. There can even be an explanation why they sound in such a way.
And game+ mode is important for the sake of replayability. I already forgot some plot twists, etc. I would like to start the game again to enjoy new features but run the game a bit faster.
Don`t forget SC2 initially had no voiceovers, a lot of text to read and pixel aliens/background (which I personally prefer to all 3d bells and whistles). There can be a special mode like @back to the roots@ where all 3d aliens related things are replaced with pixel backgrounds and pixel aliens. Might be cheaper and faster (I have no idea about how time consuming pixel graphics is, so this is just an assumption). Why not?
Some of my ideas may be stupid but i am trying to look at things a bit out of the box or from a different angle.
Interest shall be maintained. And for that you need more staff coming regularly and that has good quality. Why not add villains of SCO to GalcivIII? Add some crashed SCO ships into Offworld trading company etc.
I would personally love to see some easter egg like stuff across the Stardock selection of games like that. Easter eggs are my favourite thing in video games
As for the focus on lore being suggested. 100% backing that idea!!
So e good ideas there. But I’m not sure how you would sell it. Not really practical to create a new game scu and it would make for a pretty odd DLC. How much would people pay for it?
Ask people. Just be honest. Simply say that because of courts it is a bit risky to invest now but subject to so and so you can make it happen. Setup a fund on your main page and see. I can easily pay 20-30$ for good quality lore etc. But I love StarControl in all its forms save for SC3 and would like the franchise to develop. Some people can commit more, some less. I can pledge more. Just keep the momentum.
A lot of these suggestions feel more like sequel territory. I do think they are good though.
I agree that it would be awesome to improve upon the lore and story behind this new SC Universe as I love what Stardock has done with it. I think it would be a bit of a misnomer to call what you're proposing a "directors cut" and it would be more suited to a second eventual (hopeful) expansion.
1)I agree that exploration could be a bit more interesting, but things such as fuel tanks wouldn't really suffice imo. After all, once you get the Greater Fuel Tank and have access to the Precursor stations travel and fuel are almost negated unless you're out just surveying systems for the hell of it. Even then, getting to a station or a trader isn't that big of a deal. Doing colour swaps of fuel tanks and playing with variables really wouldn't be worth the Dev's time in any large way. Now perhaps if there were artifacts of importance with new lore significance that may be a possible incentive. Or perhaps even additional missions on the planets. A bit more work to be sure but they could be done in fewer quantity and would be more meaningful. Content for its own sake isn't always a good thing. Just look at No Man's Sky.
2)I think more lore text would be a great thing, they could be given to artifacts or ruins found while exploring and tie into the first point listed rather nicely.
3)Granted I'm not the most detail oriented person there is but I didn't find any inconsistencies in the existing lore. I think the Dev's efforts would be best served adding new content to expand upon the wonderful universe they've built rather than going back refining. It's effort that would probably go unnoticed by most.
4)Very much agreed on this. Then again something along those lines may be planned for in the future? I dunno. Perhaps a quest chain where a crashed Xraki's ships logs tell of an Xraki so insane that even other Xraki were afraid of it. Once tracked down and you meet them it turns out that by human standards they're actually quite sane! This could maybe lead to some kind of Xraki redemption arc where a small contingent who hid in our space after the Origin collapsed maybe join the human led Alliance? Just spit balling here.
5) That's a QOL Improvement that would be best suited for a regular patch rather than being tied to a paid DLC.
6) The idea of pocket universes or somehow traversing to the "above" and "below" or whatever colourwise is interesting, with more possibilities than I would even care to expand upon in this post. It is an idea, however, that once more would definitely be suited to an actual expansion rather than DLC labeled as a "directors cut" which connotationally tends to make people think that it just has a few minor bells and whistles added. This is meaty content. It would suck for the work to be put into it only for people not to buy it just because they gloss over it with a glance not realising that it was so rich in content.
7) This kind of ties into what I said in points 1 and 2. Lore, flavour text, whatever you wish to call it added to various ruins, artifacts, or ships that you find. It would both give more of a purpose for exploration after the main story line is done and flesh out the lore.
8) A new game+ is a pretty cool idea actually though not sure how much work it would take to implement. If it came between making this happen, or adding more content to the game proper, I'd always choose to have those programmer's hours going towards enriching the base game.
There are a lot of decent ideas here. As for as how it would be sold? I'd say similar to Earth Rising, as an Xpack or DLC. As for how much I'd pay for it? That of course would depend on how much content was in it! If it had most of what's listed here (i.e. the 'meatier' features) I'd definitely be willing to go 30$ on it. (I would say 40$ but it would be weird I think having an expansion cost as much as the base game? dunno).
Ok, we do not have to call it Director`s cut or something. It is just an idea, an umbrella term for a more fleshed out, expanded, user friendly game. My main points are:
1) New content shall come our regularly. Esp. if it pertains to lore. Some things are low hanging fruits so to say and can be easily implemented (I still think that adding fuel tanks etc. is a good idea that can be easily implemented, just add some variety on top of plain vanilla modules even though it is not lore related thing at all);
2) For me it ultimately does not matter if it is another season pass, expansion or something; Some things can be in free patches, some things cab be in paid expansions etc. Just keep it coming, expand, refine the game.
3) As long as the court hearings are ongoing it might be too risky to invest in a proper sequel now and this is understandable so the current game shall be used/modded/expanded to the max. At least this is the way I see it. + SCO can be inserted one way or another in other games - as easter eggs, as references, as modules, as maps, as visual and music assets etc. to maintain the interest in the franchise.
4) Game+ is just an idea to make replay of SCO worthwhile. I think that I finished the main game in 3-4 days after its initial release. So many quality of life things etc. were not available to me. But i see no point in running a new game now. But if i have more content, if I can skip some grinding in the beginning, if I can speed things up a bit, then I will definitely give it another try in some months.
And 2 more things - consoles might be a breakthrough (esp. in case of melee and if you can implement 4 players couch/online game). One can regularly get new ships as PAID expansion packs for melee (if it is successful) and keep the stream of cash going so that it can be reinvested in the main game, private jets for developers etc.
But I have no idea how to attract people to modding (for the main game at least). There can be a competition with some prize at the end. Again, we could establish a 3 month competition, prize fund (like guys contribute 5-10 USD to the fund and developers undertake to match it or something) for the best story mod etc. Just a random thought. i still think there is way more to modding than we currently see.
I see opportunity of Director Cut version of the game, if you have plan to port game to some other platform.
Then instead of just porting and adding new controls/UI specific to platform, you actually expand on what was in the game, and port those "expansions" back to PC version.
Divinity: Original Sin games are great example of this.
How about adding in item sets, so your choice isn't always directly focused on the largest/fastest/strongest?
I'd accept less fuel or shields if I got some interesting effect from having a set of items. As an example, if you had the Mastermind set you'd get a status effect on whatever weapon you have installed that would map your controls to the enemies for 0.2s, effectively disrupting their controls for a moment. You could get a lot more creative with things than this. ^^ GL ^
I think in some of these cases you're thinking of bundling (i.e. take the base game + DLC) versus an actual new SCU (an actual new product).
Most of what I see here are things that could be added via DLC and then later bundled together to create, for instance, Star Control: Origins - Definitive Edition which would be the base game + DLCs. The time to do that would be, as others suggested, when a console version is completed.
I got your point guys. Anyways, keep adding staff to SCO. Paid or free, in any form. Just maintain the quality and think out of the box (like text to speech thingy with some tweaks for voiceovers).
Are there any plans at all for an Android version, or is that just too complex due to technical reasons?
Please don't waste dev resources on a mobile game. Keep SCO on real platforms.
There are no plans for Android.
Honestly I like the ideas but have a suggestion...
Take those ideas and bundle them all into the console releases by default and make it a free patch for those who have Lifetime Founder / Earth Rising Season Pass as well as an optional Digital Deluxe Edition upgrade DLC set at $X for those with just the base game.
Now if it's all added, for those of us loading a pre patch save I'd suggest a small voiced video showing something akin to the following.
Lt Kerry: Sir! Something is on our sensors that we need to report immediately... charting an emergency return to Sol Station.
Starbase Commander: Captain! All of our sensors are going haywire and everything is falling apart, find out if any of our allies knows what's going...
<Wymdoo cuts in>
Wymdoo: Captain! Dock your ship and get planetside we don't know what this is but it feels dangerous!
<Observers cut in>
Observers: Greetings <Captain>, this is but one of the dangers we were warning you about, the danger approaching you caused the wall between dimensions to collapse causing two realities to merge into one... We were able to protect only you from the merger and urge you to revisit those around you to acclimate to the changes observable to your primitive human mind before attempting to proceed forward on whatever you were doing.
<Captain blacks out>
System Note: Due to the universe changing please wait while the universe rebuilds -- At this point the save files would be backed up and converted to the new data format potentially required for all the changes... maybe have some sprite graphics showing Wymdoo building Tywomia out of Legos while this is happening.
I hope that the next game follows more of a Carmack philosophy ( "when it's done" ) rather than a Nadella one ( "that enterprise release bricked your system? Software Assurance helps"). This game was released in an obvious beta condition that could have been more polished especially for main campaign issues. And before someone says Duke Nukem Forever or Star Citizen, Stardock and Frogboy don't have venture capitalist money to burn and are very financially incentivized to ship as well as realistic expectations of themselves and the community for a released product. Unless the engine is the same, the next game could do with a longer beta testing period. The feature that I would really like is for a future game to have a Star Control mission going awry and end up in the Gal Civ universe as a wildcard factor which would screw up Draginol's fate. This would allow the player character agency to work to either restore the timeline to the Gal Civ history that we know in Gal Civ III or "optimize" the timeline to one of the alignments.
I hope that the next game follows more of a Carmack philosophy ( "when it's done" ) rather than a Nadella one ( "that enterprise release bricked your system? Software Assurance helps"). This game was released in an obvious beta condition that could have been more polished especially for main campaign issues. And before someone says Duke Nukem Forever or Star Citizen, Stardock and Frogboy don't have venture capitalist money to burn and are very financially incentivized to ship as well as realistic expectations of themselves and the community for a released product. Unless the engine is the same, the next game could do with a longer beta testing period.
The feature that I would really like is for a future game to have a Star Control mission going awry and end up in the Gal Civ universe as a wildcard factor which would screw up Draginol's fate. This would allow the player character agency to work to either restore the timeline to the Gal Civ history that we know in Gal Civ III or "optimize" the timeline to one of the alignments.
I'm not sure what you were referring to. We were basically done with the game in July and spent the remaining time just polishing. There were plenty of reviews of the game and bugginess is not one of the issues.
If you have some specific example I'd love to hear about it.
"A patch is never late! Nor is it ever early. It arrives precisely when I mean it to do!"
https://forums.starcontrol.com/491130/spoiler-alert---bug-unidentified-object-is-noninteractive
https://forums.starcontrol.com/491220/extremely-low-fps-on-planet-scanning-screenplanet-surface
Referencing your kind response around Halloween and why I am and always will be a proud Stardock customer, especially for Founders Editions:
https://forums.starcontrol.com/491641/get;3731835
Well, there were breaking issues at the start, but the team and you were probably still heads down on the release and on patching the very serious ones that you probably stress forgot the release issues. Most of the system breaking issues were taken care of within a week or two (the extremely critical ones such as the graphics card one had a hotfix that day as I recalled), and the 1.1 cleaned up practically all of the other ones. I'm not particularly worried about the support attention, but I really think that the 1.1 patch should have been the 1.0 release status as many of the issues that 1.1 addressed were in the main playthrough that ought to have been caught beforehand.
I understand the reviewer's comment, but when you have companies like Paradox and EA out there that ship late alpha builds (Paradox is fairly infamous among its fanbase that its games are always works in progress), Stardock ships nuclear certified code by comparison. Also, most reviewers take the philosophy that bugs are not in the creator's intent and will be addressed forthwith unless they are structural issues (like EA's SimCity debacle).
Don't worry about me as a customer, I'm always willing for you to take my money, especially for Star Control. I just think that before public release for the next game, there should be a bit more firetesting either in Early Access. It was not possible at the 1.0 for me or some other people to go through the main campaign without having an involuntary sequence break with the computer, and I think a game should ideally be in that state for the 1.0 under reasonable circumstances (vanilla computer equipment, vanilla install, etc.).
With that, look forward to seeing the next games in the flagship series, this one and hopefully something for Gal Civ someday soon!
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