This is something I'm working on as a solo project that began a week ago. It is a 4x strategy game with a focus on resources, trading and combat. Space combat will be slow and tactical. I want combat to feel more like Star Trek and less like Star Wars. I got the world generator created for the most part and I'm working on the pathfinding system now. With the exception of the skybox, everything here so far I created. The system generation is in a rough prototype state. It generates the stars, asteroid rings, and planets with a small moon.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/s72i21y8wbh32vk/Space%204x.png
Anyways tell me what you think.
It looks like a great start so far, but I don't know if we're seeing enough to give much more feedback than that.
I think the solar systems are too small, there are only a few fields between planets.
I also think there are too many asteroids. Perhaps you can make only a few of those "real" and the rest "small" and just for show.
It's very hard to infer gameplay from a screenshot (especially one that doesn't show the user controls.)
Graphically, though
I think it looks great.
I hope you will consider the game that I'm about to suggest.
There are reasons why I thought Spore flopped. I thought the cell stage was fine. I thought there should have been fish in stage five. I thought the creature stage was fine except I thought that it should start on a random type of planets. I would like to option to make humans. I felt that creating animals that actually looked like aliens weren't there. I at least want more option to create aliens when I begin the Tribal stage. The alien options weren't enough. I would like to have the ability to create characteristics like they have on Greatest heavyweights or Boxing legends of the ring on Sega. I would like to see the Tribal stage to be more like Virtual village or the Prehistoric era on empire earth. I would like the clothing options to change with technology you research. Now we are really getting into the meat of the game. In the civilization stage I would like to see it more like Empire earth or Civworld. I really thought what spore did hear was lame. If we are going to customize I think it needs to change with technology meaning that the vehicle starts on foot. Technology will be decided on how you play. I understand that there will be different species with the same technologies, but the way to decide is on how you play. Also if you made peace instead of war with some of the species in the tribal stage then it carries into the next stage. In the space stage I'm visualizing something like sins of a solar empire. Except the ship building would work like in Galactic civilizations since they have the best customized ships I've seen. You could modify this, but this is my idea of the perfect game. A 4x version of Spore would probably work not the lame game they made. The reason the game didn't work because of how they played it not the concept. Please make this game.
Secondly I would like to see a game that combines civilization 5 with Galactic civilizations 2 Twilight of the Arnor.
I want to add I would like to see the requirements or the game change based on your system requirements. Things that would take full advantage of your graphic card. Utilizing all Your memory and Virtual memory. Things that you can predict that will change over the years the game would utilize no matter how it changes. This would even be better if you use the language instead of windows on this. This way you could better use the computer.
As far as the Ai I would like to see a learn mode this would have your hardest Ai except that you would catagorize as many variables that you could think of. Each catagorie would have as much variables that you could think of. When you would beat the Ai then it would start remembering what it did. It would start writching variables until the variables started doing the best against you.
I would add the the Ai with this it would remember how you played, and started playing like you whichever of the two methods worked better it would use on each variable.
Talking about the second game idea. I would like to see 83 factions. 4 leaders for each faction, and the leaders would interact like medieval total war. When two or more factions would communicate with each other then they could choose to join researching when they did that then the tech that they could research come from both trees. You could suggest a faction to research from each tree. I would like to choose from a selection of starting techs. I would like to see techs where if I pick one then it would eliminate others. 65 factions on the game at once.
Yeah, it's pretty rough. I mentioned it was a prototype I have the freedom of making whatever I want since I'm doing it as a hobby. I also don't want to create a GalCiv or MOO clone. I'm experimenting with different mechanics. I see too many games trying to clone a few different designs. Probably because they want money and I want to create something that is fun for me to play.
The stars can be dwarf, main sequence, super giant, or hyper giant. The bigger stars will take up multiple hexes. Larger stars can explode or in the case of hyper giants...create black holes. Don't worry I don't intend to make life miserable for a player. There will be a random timer chosen at the beginning, most of the time they won't go kaboom. If your tech level is high enough you might detect it before it happens giving you enough time to evac. However, once and if the timer is set that star will die on that specific turn. Reload all you want to save your heavy production planet if you put all your eggs in one basket that your problem. The chance will be rare and unless you have incredible bad luck 2 novas in one wont happen.
Combat, like I said, will be slow and tactical. I kinda want resources to be limited. Movement will likely 2-4 movement except a resource limited warp drive. You can use the warp to charge, retreat or get toa new location rapidly. However, once you expend your fuel you are limited to normal speed until you refuel at a planet with a refinery (or has transported fuel to an outpost or on a fuel transport.) There will be a plant faction that can park their ships near a star to slowyly recharge their fuel reserves.
Some random ideas with little explanation:
Blow up your moon for a chance of making a planetary ring. Asteroid Defense Outpose. Persistent flag ship between games. I want an XCOM feel to the ships. Historical events tracked for each ship.
Anyways, I'm making a game that I think is fun. I won't post too much on the forums out of respect for Stardock but I'll let everyone know how I'm doing.
Ok that was just wishful thinking. My first idea was more like a Rts version of spore. Most of it was about my second idea. The main thing I look for is Tech research. I hope it will be a big map. Good Ai. Lots of players in the game and factions to pick from. I will try it as long as there is tech research and it is a space game. Please make thihardware intensive.
You could use this post since you already started it.
It looks pretty good.I like how your goin' for the slower,submarine style combat of Star Trek.It looks good for a start,but seems alittle bland(then again its's in the early stages).May have some gas clouds,or twin suns.Any idea on how some of the starship'll look?
Terrible. I'm bad at 3d modelling.
I'll try and make a solid effort. I'm ok with a sketch pad and have some friends that are pretty good at modelling they may jump on. But don't expect too much. At least right away. The ships should have a theme though. To show their strengths. I think the player should be able to read the strengths of their ship from it's appearance..but right now it will be boxes verses circles
I will try and add as many effects to mix up the field though. Binary Stars are something on the if I have time. It's on my wants list. So are pulsars. My approach to game design docs is ... write a million ideas on paper, which is easy considering I have ADHD, and then break the list down into what I'm for sure going to include, what needs research to include, what I want to include, and what I won't include...but noted in case I change my mind.
I try and write my code so I can add and remove stuff as easily as possible.
For that alone you deserve a monument.
You can try Blender. It is rather easy to learn and use, and, what's important - free program. I used it quite extensively at work. And in hobbies.
Love to see the work on it. Don't feel bad at all--Stardock is intentionally generous with their forums for this sort of thing.
No matter what the outcome, you'll have some solid experince and learn a lot doing this. It's a good perosnal investment.
Well graphics isn't much its about playability and mechanics. I like the idea of turning Spore into a real time stradegy that actually does things like empire earth and distant worlds after the animal stage that someone came up with. I wish someone in this world would follow up on that idea, or I wish I could magically get the skills to make the game. P.S. I think the game sucks, but it was brimming with potential. I'm surprised with the lack of effort that electronic arts didn't put in it to make it work on the computer. Graphics should never be considered to decide how good the game is.
I like Spore. Actually, I created a rough very incomplete design document for a trading game that was kinda like Starfleet Command, Battle Star Galactica, Spore, and Anno 2070 put together. The plan was you had very limited resources and would have to run away from a larger alien race while collecting resources from remote locations that the AI bots would be on the lookout for. As I was working on it I decided to attempt a 4x game instead. I might end up creating a prototype of it anyways since the way the way I prototype is create small simulations or small games to see a theory in action instead of risking it's inclusion in the main project.
That's nice to hear I would like to see the prototype.
Maybeee lol. Anyways, communication has always been difficult for me. In an effort to overcome extreme shyness, I started posting on these forums and working jobs where I had to talk to people. I ran into an old friend that I worked with over 12 years ago and noticed how much I've improved from the kid who could barely maintain eye contact to the person I am now ... who gets funny looks when I tell people I am shy. Anyways, I want to post my progress on this project. I posted the prototype of a world generator I was working on this summer.
http://illauna.wordpress.com/
That seems like a good way to get over bein' shy.Since you said combat will be more like Trek,I have to ask if there'll be starfighters or not?
Sort of. The current plan, even though I might not add them at all, is that they will function like they fighters/bombers in civ5.
Fighters can be assigned CAP (intercept missile, boarding shuttles, fighters and bombers), Wild Weasel, recon and AA distraction missions.
Bombers can be assigned planetary bombardment, tactical strike vs cap ship missions. Bombers are the only unit that can always pinpoint target bombardment. Orbital bombardment will be completely random the turn it first moves into position. After after each round their weapon accuracy improves.
Small craft will have a high evasion chance against capital ship main weapons but PD, AA, flak and fighter weapons are very effective against them.
Basically, I'll be working on getting a simple 4x game together. Then after release I want to continue to add new features until I can't or it's no longer fun to work on. All in all this will be a hobby instead of a job. I want to challenge myself So I could have 100 features or 3 ...
Here i'd like to share some more of the ideas I have for fighters, bombers, and marine shuttles. Implementing these at somepoint will keep me busy for a long time. Nothing is set in stone. Right now I'm brain storming a lot of ideas.
Fighters/Bombers
Well I think shyness in a woman is attractive unless it is caused by a childhood trauma.
Here's a secret. I'm a guy.
History lesson. Illauna was a name I commonly used in MMOs. It originates from Icewind Dale where Ilauna is one of the mages that comes with the game. I liked how the name sounded in my head but the spelling confused me so I added an L.
Oops I will remember that. I feel sheepish.
Haha, no biggie. I'm used to it considering I have a very feminine name as my gamertag. Lol
The game looks great but if I were you changing the avatar photo might go a long way to stopping. insidious internet ID enigmas.
haha, I was joking earlier. It doesn't actually bother me too much.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:
Sign in or Create Account
