I missed this stuff completely...

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Original post by Wavinator
-Outfit / customize your rig. Trade speed for armor, or fuel for ammo.

-Different chassis that handle differently (like the cars in Grand Theft Auto)

-Different provinces, different routes. No map data for some parts of the country (lost after the Fall)

-Different laws in each province. Hallucinogenics are fine in the Republic of Texas, but outlawed in Calzonia.

-Each city has at least one unique commodity. Some cities have hidden commodities, and you have to do a mission or something before you get access to them.

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Yup all of the stuff that your use to in the traditional space trader... is in here. Only difference is that it''s land based.
The fun thing is going to be designing all the extra equipment for the rigs. Each city having at least one unique commodity is an absolute must! Geographic location will have an impact on what the commodity is as well as some history of the area.

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-Random maps

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Not sure about random maps... see my previous post.

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-Contracts that have time limits. You can check your map before you accept, though, to see if you even have a chance to get there on time. But it would be about how fast you could drive through over messed up terrain. There would be severe penalties for failure (maybe even physical, rather than financial, if dealing with the Syndicate )

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This is going to be the big part of the biz side of the game. Of course it can work itself into the driving part of the game as well. I can imagine a contract that last for a month and you have to deliver X ammount of gadgets... if you fail you have to pay the cost of the gadgets. And the computer AI is all the way trying to keep you from making the delivery

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I''d spend a lot of time thinking about competition, btw. How do you build a successful shipping company? How does the compeition respond to you? What are there ways to beat your competitors? What AI do they have? I say all this because a big part of the game will be competiting. You could even implement a kind of derby combat with opponent rigs, where you try to drive them off the road our outrace them before they reach a city you want to trade / sell at.

(This is a kick a$$ idea!)

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Good questions. All need to be worked out.


Dave "Dak Lozar"Loeser

on the note about other companies.....

You get a loan of X ammount, buy your rig.. and set off to make your fortune. As a loner, most people won''t regard you.. till you start stealing in on their trade lines. You have to compete.. you''ll work for less. You''ve gotta get to the rumor mill, find others who don''t like their jobs, and start getting them on your side. Networking.. power brokering.. hehe. Cept you''re on the front lines as well.
Perhaps as you move up.. you could change from driving a rig to driving a car. This would be your "office". You would drive to sites, meet contractors.. etc, and try to find out how you can get the contract.
If there''s been some raveging of the land.. then there''s likely no communications structure still remaining.. which would get rid of the "sit in the office" style gameplay. You''d hafta be out there, you''d have other officers perhaps.. who go meet and discuss contracts. One of them gets killed by a rival company.. and you hire some mercinaries on to go about killing these people. Or you might even allow the person to be a merc Start up a mercs-for-hire business. whee!

I deffinatley like the cars and trucks idea. That way you got the space freighter and the cool merc vehicle.. hehe You could even have a company called MERCedes hehe they make weapons and kick butt cars

On the slipstream idea. You realize that sound travels at ~650 mph, eh? 1200 mph vehicle is almost mach 2. As you break the sound barrier, you get a loud boom, and you get some seriously wicked wind. So perhaps you slipstream would have to be totally enclosed? Super-reinforced tunnels, basically. With on/off ramps which would decelerate you slowly. Now, airbags won''t protect you from hitting into a wall here.. hehe. You could bump people into the offramps, and have them collide with the wall where it goes back together. If they want to escape.. they have to exit, which slows them down.. a LOT.

Perhaps different levels of slipstream? Kinda like the internet. There''s no point in having something go 1000 mph in city limits, really. But there''s no reason not to go 1000 x 10 mph when going cross-country. You hit a major junction point, and get into an interstate system. Get a map and look how they work In tennessee, we''ve got tons of interstates meeting, branching, and whatnot.. so i''ve first hand experience with this. You see, as you''re driving along, you merely set which way you want to go. I can tell ya now, from NY, NY to Nashville, Tn you take 78W to 81S to 40W.. and 40W continues all the way to texas.. hehe. Nashville really grew up because it''s a hub point. Three interstates come through! So look at something like that, where slipstream has replaced all of the interstates that exist now.

Oh, and another thing.. cargo. I liked X-BTF''s way of handling this.. space compression. So you want to carry a huge load, yet get past those weigh stations? Compress the space a bit.. hehe just a thought..

J

Niphty,
I like your ideal of the slipstreams being interstates. That is what I intended to say... Your thoughts have provoked me to reevaluate what I have written so far in my design. I like the ability to have variable speeds in the slipstream... It would actually be just like the time compression in Frontier Elite II, can''t remember what that was called. Just need to figure out a way to work it into game play.

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Original Post by Niphty
As a loner, most people won''t regard you.. till you start stealing in on their trade lines.

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This sounds like X-BTF... the Valadi don''t really recognize you at all... I loved their monotone voices.


Maybe I need to move this out into another thread as the subject line on this thread doesn''t do it justice


Dave "Dak Lozar"Loeser

I know this thread is really old... but I stumbled over the Ports of Call web site about a month ago and wanted to put a link to it here

The original creators are currently working on a modern version of the game using 3d graphics and other improvements.

I also found a game titled World of Pirates which, is going to be an online game that looks like it has been completely desinged from the above mentioned Pirates! I''m going to follow this one closely...



Dave "Dak Lozar" Loeser

How about a post office sim. For the added action element, whenever you "went postal" it would be a FPS. Wouldnt that be great?

Yes, this thread will never die... muhahahahaha

I just wanted to post this link to a game on sourceforge that seems to fit in with some of the conversation that we were having here (oh so long ago).

Here''s the link:
City Scape



Dave "Dak Lozar" Loeser