I've been designing a space-based game that is meant to be like star trek the next generation. There will be a combat component, an exploration component, and an engineering component. There will be missions that focus on only one component, and missions that involve a combination. I was planning to make the game multiplayer (normal multiplayer) co-op, so that players could work together to complete missions and campaigns. I guess the players could be roughly broken up into those who would be science officers (exploration), engineers (engineering), and tactical officers (combat). In addition to missions, the players also can have deathmatch type combat with other human or AI controlled ships, and the players can have races between star systems (to see who can get to the finish point the fastest). While I think the combat component is well thought out and introduces good and innovative gameplay (better than a lot of similar games out there I think), the science and engineering components would be new. And the question is, would there be a market for these components? In the exploration component, a lot of the missions focus on moving the ship through space, which is more complicated than in some other space-based games. There are regions of space in which your engines don't work, regions in which your braking systems don't work, regions which contain radiation that is dangerous to the ship (requiring you to devote much power to shields or go around them). There are also all sorts of hazards like gravity wells that pull in and trap your ship if you get too close. There is ball plasma that you must steer to avoid or hit with the proper beam to neutralize. And there is also each system's solar weather to deal with, which throws your ship off-course and can affect certain ship's systems. There are also other hazards. A lot of the scenarios I've come up with are influenced by games like Mario 64, Zelda, and arcade games. The science officer would be the person who uses the sensors to get info about the surrounding space. He also doubles as the navigator, who plots the course the helmsman should try to follow (which appears on screen). The science officer looks at the sensor data and helps come up with a way to get through the hazard. At his (and everyone elses) disposal is the ship's library (like the datalinks in alpha centauri) in which he can easily look up anything he's picking up on sensors to help come up with a way to traverse the hazard to complete the mission. As I said lot of my inspiration for the game came from games like Mario 64, etc. And it will be the science officer's role to take the sensor data and figure out the analagous Mario 64 or real-life situation that the data represents. For example: Lets say the ship is moving through region of space in which you can only really go forwards and backwards. This is because if you go too far left, right, up, and down, you get into a region in which the engines can't work. And then you can't really accelerate, so you'd have to warp out of the system, come back, and try again. So it's like the ship is in a tunnel or corridor (like in metroid). While going down this corridor the ship detects that the corridor in which the ship is in ends just ahead. But the science officer's scan reveals that this end is just a gap in the corridor, and after this gap (in which the engines can't work), there is some more corridor that the engines can work in. So the science officer has to figure out that this region of space ahead in which the engines can't work, is analagous to a gap in a bridge. The captain may want to get to that other corridor, so the science officer can think of the situation as like a platform with a gap in the middle. And the way to get past it is similar to jumping, like in super mario. The science officer could then suggest that maybe the ship should back up a long way, to get a head start (like when long-jumping in mario 64 or in real life) and then hit full throttle to get enough speed to jump the gap and get into the other corridor. Then the mission could continue. The gameplay is very similar to other games out there. In Mario 64 you are often faced with situations like this. There might be a ledge a few meters upwards with a coin on it. You assess the situation, (the height of the ledge, the presence of any other routes to it, the presence of another ledge above it that can be jumped off of to reach the coin, etc.) then you assess your capabilities (how high can I get with a long jump, triple jump, double jump, how much of a head start would I need, are there any sprinboards I could use to up my jump capability), and based on that you make decisions try different approaches and may eventually get the coin or give up. In my game the science officer would assess the situation with sensors and come up with what the crew was dealing with, and the engineers would assess the ship's capabilities and maybe reconfigure and modify systems to increase the ship's chances of success. In some missions the tactical officer would use his knowledge of strategy to make sure the ship is in an advantageous position for attack. For example, lets say the ship is hunting a space creature that lives in space. Lets say there are two large regions of space (kind of like rooms) from which to await the monster's attack. Maybe one area has space that the ship can most easily accelerate in, and one room has space that the ship can accelerate in less easily. The monster also has the same limitations on acceleration as the ship in these areas. The science officer can assess the space situation, the engineers can assess the ship's engines' capabilities in each area scanned, and then the tactical officer can assess what kind of tactics would work best against the monster (ones that involve a lot of quick movement or ones that work better if the battle is more slow paced) to help decide in which area it is best to await the monster. The engineering component right now is complicated, and this gives this part of the game great depth. For example, if you had a fighting game in which two opponents stood in front of each other and all you could do is hit one button to block and hit one button to punch, the lack of complexity would make the game lack depth and strictly be a matter of reflexes. When I say the engineering game is complicated, I mean there are a lot of factors that can be adjusted to operate the ships systems to do what the engineer wants the ship to do. This part of the game is intentionally made to be accessible (no schooling or math required except for maybe elementary or middle school), but there's still a lot of stuff to know (all of which can be referenced at anytime in the game in the ship's library [which is designed so that things can be looked up quickly in a fast-paced environment]), especially since this part of the game is not based on the real world (which people have experience with) but was totally made up (is science fiction). But the engineering models are also created to be intuitive. The engineering game, during a mission, would be about maximizing the ship's capabilities as directed by the captain and required for the success of the mission. It would also include repairing any damage sustained, whether it is from combat or from the engineer over-working the ships systems. The engineer would also be responsible for managing the ship's energy supplies and seeing that the ship gets from point A to point B using warp travel. The more you overtax the ship's systems, the more maintenance is required. So if the ship doesn't have an engineer, the players have the choice of not overtaxing the systems and avoiding the need of an engineer on-line to maintain systems. If the ship does have an engineer on-line it can increase its capabilities while at the same time giving the engineers the resulting repairs and maintenance to do to have something to do. Just as the tactical players can play deathmatches, teams of engineers can compete in races. High speed warp travel is a complex venture, while just cruising is simple. Traveling the fastest speed possible involves managing energy supplies, ensuring warp containment, modifying and preventing the collapse of the warp bubble, putting the most power to the warp engines to accelerate, knowing what the ship experiences at different speeds, repairing damage that occurs from getting the most out of the systems, and eventually being able to safely decelerate to sublight speed without tearing the ship apart. The number of strategies and tactics that could be employed in races would be enough to write a book about. And good racing teams could compete in tournaments. The science component requires thinking, and the engineering component requires thinking and knowing the systems. The tactical component is more mainstream but still is primarily about tactics. Does anyone think there would be a market for a game like this? -- Scipio3

I'd play it, if that's what you're asking. It certainly sounds like a cool idea - perfect for LAN parties - with a bunch of players at their computers, each playing the role of an officer and taking orders from their commanding officers.

You'd have to design a large number of various types of missions to prevent the players from getting bored, and design the game engine to support the wide variety (which could be a challenge). But overall, it sounds great to me (although my tastes in gaming tend to differ from the majority).