Captain Jameson received asteroid fields today, and I wasn’t immediately sure what they should look like. I started with the bright chalky colours shown in the middle of the picture here, but they just look right. Next I tried asteroids that look like, well, Asteroids, but surprisingly they didn’t fit either. I eventually settled with the style shown in the bottom right. It seemed weird drawing part of a CF game without a bright glowy border, but I think it fits quite well and suggests (correctly) that the asteroids are a background element.
Tomorrow I’ll make the asteroids spawn in interesting patterns. Right now they’re just sprayed randomly across the map.
<3 Farbs
By the look of the picture, it seems that the asteroids are layered, or can fall on the 3rd dimension. I can see this by the way one asteroid is on top of the other. How would we tell if we are (above/below) the asteroids? Or can the asteroids pass over each other and we just assume that we will always collide with them?
Ah, it’s the latter. I overlap them to make more interesting shapes, then colour them slightly differently ‘cos it’s prettier that way. If they were 3d they’d move at different speeds across the screen as you scrolled, which would give you a pretty good depth cue. Actually, that wouldn’t be very difficult. I’ll add it to the list of things I’d like to do but will almost certainly not have time for
“but I think it fits quite well and suggests (correctly) that the asteroids are a background element.”
so the asteroids are on a different plane than the the player? I thought they’d be there as a game play element. sort of a dynamic maze of ever preset crushing danger with always a way out if your quick enough, or powerful enough to blast through.
also the bottom right does look best.
They block movement & hence present a bit of a maze. They also add a little more strategy to ship building, since not all ships can get between them. I’d love to add crushing, but sadly it’s not something that box2d is particularly good at.
box2d is still fantastic though.
The following has NOTHING to do with asteroids, though I like the asteroids. Fair warning.
What if there were only one galaxy? One common play area, populated by all Captain Jameson players simultaneously…and the narrative wouldn’t need to be dynamically scripted as much as gradually released to the community at large. Players could track/hunt/ghost the most powerful/wealthy ships to try to pirate their tech (swipe the laser) or hijack resources. All it would take is creating an account management system integrated in real-time with the game space, and a server capable of handling the load of all Captain Jameson players.
Piece of cake, right?
@ J rob
That would be the most awesome thing ever for the captain series but I doubt it would be easy. not to mention how do you handle the grabbing of parts while several people are trying to grab the same object?
I had a question about the asteroid fields, I’m assuming they will be at certain points in the overall grid, and knowing that stuff in the Captain series is Randomly generated this place should change ever different game. My question involves the use of Comets travelling at high speeds in space, on a single course moving through space with the ability to cripple a ship it hits then continuing with its forward momentum in whatever direction it lands after hitting your ship. Also I read about the problem your program has with crushing and was wondering if you could introduce a mechanic whereby when an asteroid hits you it behaves like a spike although without the visual look this would allow the player to be damaged severely when slamming into an asteroid or being crushed between two opposing asteroids. Let me know what you think. I’ll be lurking
looks great =)
So who is playing Transformice? (http://www.transformice.com/en). It really makes me think about how awesome a multi-player CF would be.
kthx farbs. ;D
“They block movement & hence present a bit of a maze.” so they arnt really a background object since they restrict the player? That’s cool. i do like dice0oo0′s idea of just making any collision with an asteroid like hitting a ramming spike. though maybe make the damage scale with velocity rather than being all or nothing (which i think is how they act now?). Since the astroids are being used to form a maze then the code is already detecting collision on a part of your ship, would the ramming spike reaction be able to be slipped in there without to much effort or potential mishap with the box2d engine?
and by not a background object i mean they are an “environmental object” since they can be interacted with.
Thank you for rewording my statement Ryan, I was trying to say that but you made it more clear
I appreciate it.
@J Rob: I really wish it were that easy. I already have user accounts and some basic database stuff worked out, but replicating player and AI movement in realtime, handling conflicts (like Captain Darkshadow suggested), and keeping a persistent MP game balanced is all quite difficult. I hope to get there some day, but I’ll finish Jameson first.
@DiceOooO & ryan: I could definitely damage ships in response to collisions, but I figure there’s already some risk to flying around at high speed and I don’t want to create any further disincentive. Also if this were velocity based then it still wouldn’t provide crushing damage, since relative velocities in that case are actually very low. I COULD just destroy modules on collision, but then I’d have to consider doing that for all collisions, and I’m worried about the impact that would have on combat (since your most powerful weapon would likely be some scrap that you bolt to the front of your ship and use to ram others).
yea i seeh ow that can be a tough call since if your gonna do it in one place it would make sense to do it everywhere. I guess running out of air is danger enough for going through the fields.
One concern I have is that the asteroids might occupy too much space. Honestly, I would not enjoy having to navigate asteroids the entire time I am playing. I know you said that the asteroids are sprayed randomly across the map, but I hope the frequency is not too high. I don’t want to come out of an asteroid-populated area only to fly directly into another asteroid-populated area.
Also, the picture shows roughly 50% of the screen populated by very large asteroids. Would it be possible to make the asteroids smaller and spaced apart more? Think about what would happen if I built a very large ship and had to attempt to navigate through the above picture. It would be nearly impossible. A possible solution would be to vary the asteroid spacing/size with the number of attached modules. Or (I like this suggestion more), you could have asteroid regions on the grid, where each region is spaced differently. Obviously, smaller ships could enter the smaller-spaced regions, while larger ships (and smaller ones) could enter the larger-spaced regions.
So what can you do with these asteroids? Can they be mined? Colonized? Do some of them have oxygen that you can extract, with the right equipment?
Mostly they just get in the way
The majority of the gameworld won’t have asteroids, but they’ll occasionally present obstacles that you can either go around or, if you have a small ship and know a route, slip between. They don’t sound like an important game element, but I find they add a sense of place that’s otherwise a bit lacking. Skulking around between them also reminds me an awful lot of spelunking (caving), which I rather enjoy.
It’d be interesting to see the ability to mine them, or set up friendly colonies that would give you assistance every once in awhile. I don’t know though, that might be best left for a later game.