Yeah... 1 and 4 really just don't work for me. Spore did PGC with body parts so well, any imitation attempt would end up being compared poorly with Spore, and contrived plot just makes me feel annoyed.

3 would likely function, but would also make the strategist in me cringe. An advanced alien survey team should have scouted all life within a ten mile radius of the landing site before transporting the away-team down.

2, should it be properly executed, would seem to be the best of the options. The ability to anticipate nearby alien activities before you make your away team land. It would allow you to strategically choose the best mining site/base camp location on the planet, while also allowing for successful PGC.

It seems to me that the gameplay should feel a little different, but should be fundamentally similar to the rest of the game. Even if you do make them substantially different, I shouldn't feel like I've stumbled into a different game. There should be a smooth transition, at least.

I would like to see some clever hybrid of #2 and #4, where players can be engaged on different levels of detail, depending on their taste and the circumstances. You would do most of the work in the gameboard interface, with the option of taking direct control of the mission in a #4 type driving game.

Failing that, I'm mostly for number #2 like everyone else, but try to make it flexible enough to make up for #4's absence. To convey that feeling of life, it needs to feel like there's more to it under the interface. Actually, it should do that anyway [smile]. The important thing is that the universe underneath both the planet-side and space travel segments feels continuous.

I like the idea of a "scanner" sort of interface to animal discovery, with the ability to discover unknown creatures and add them to a database. This would have to be easily skippable for people who don't like discovering new animals [sad].

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Original post by Wavinator I wince a bit when I hear immersion.

My apologies, I should have been more specific in what I meant and said 'player engagement' as opposed to immersion within a world.

Okay, thanks to the great input I've built an MDA mockup of #2, played a bit and have been rethinking this...


Somewhat Negative on Driving (Option #4):
Why is driving fun? In a 3d game you've got

• Navigation / Obstacle Avoidance (e.g., other cars in GTA or rocks / trees in an offroading game)
  
• Sight Seeing (this seems to have powered lots of the Mako love in Mass Effect)
  
• Immersion (the You Are There effect)
  
• ??? (car combat? racing? these are fun in the games that have it but not necessarily universal)
  

I'm a bit worried that without factors like elevation you can't really do navigation, and so what's to make up the bulk of your interactions moving from point A to B? Wouldn't driving over 2d tile maps, even really nice looking ones, get stale unless there was frequent combat or some other challenge? What do you do for planets that have no hostile life if you're trying to avoid making a traditional combat-only game?


Symbolic (#2) + Civ?
Since planets are made up of lots of tiles, what if most had at least one resource like in Civilization? Jungles could have the equivalent of silk or bananas, which in turn could be traded as luxuries or used as influence in some parts of the universe. Animals could really fill this role as well, providing the equivalent of meat or wool or ivory.

Extending this you might have animal to resource tile interactions that create tradeoffs. Maybe an alien spider monkey is a hot trade item but also vital to the growth of some valuable narcotic fruit. Or maybe one creature (like a wolf equivalent) thins out predators you really don't like but also may attack animals you're trying to farm.

Animals might also create status effects that could be answered with resources or animals found on other planets. Got a Rigelian rat infestation spreading disease and desertification on a planet? Well, try importing some Centaurian raptor-hawks, which just love feeding on small mammals.

Maybe not really all that scientific (unless you threw in some genetic engineering) but could lead to some interesting strategic situations involving nature.

I'm a big proponent of form following function. So the question is, how do you want alien lifeforms to affect the gameplay? Which game mechanics do they provide or contribute to?

To be honest, I have to say I like Option 4 the best, as it seems to provide the most potential for interaction. With that option, alien lifeforms can impede or advance your progress in many different ways. Plus the way you deal with different alien lifeforms can affect your reputation in the game (assuming you have that).

However, I realize that this option would also be the hardest to code for, and the complexity there might be a deal-breaker in the end.

If the point of landside gameplay is exploration, then driving would give it a personal touch. It would be fun seeing all the features of the planet up close. The problem is that there would need to be lots of features that are interesting up close. Every planet would have to be different, with its own fractal patterns of terrain. Throw in interactions with other animals (being attacked or inspected by them, and inspecting and attacking them), and I think the driving game would be fun. You might need to use it to find small-scale resources and things that can't be detected from orbit. You would have to be looking for something.

By the way, are you sure you can't just fake elevation with rules about where you can and can't drive on the map, and how hard it is? Even if you can't, having large obstacles like mountains mixed with things like rivers that need to be forded or sharp rocks to avoid could make navigation interesting.

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Original post by RobAU78 Which game mechanics do they provide or contribute to?

In truth I'm not 100% sure (hence the thread :P).

Trade items for sure. Occasional dangers as you're going from A to B in your terrain vehicle.

One big draw of a planet filled with alien creatures is the whole sci-fi mythos, that "strange new worlds" thing. But in gameplay terms I'm not sure I know what the heck that means.

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To be honest, I have to say I like Option 4 the best, as it seems to provide the most potential for interaction. With that option, alien lifeforms can impede or advance your progress in many different ways.

Even with all the limitations I mention in terms of it being a 2D game?

Being able to fly to a planet, land and rove around in an ATV does have a cool sound to it and would be consistent in terms of gameplay with what you had to do to get to the planet. But don't you think folks who traditionally like action gaming expect the graphics to be high caliber?

It seems to me the symbolic / game board approach has more of a chance of being forgiven its flaws. That said, racing away from some charging tentacled thing while firing your ATV's machine gun mount would be pretty awesome. :D

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Plus the way you deal with different alien lifeforms can affect your reputation in the game (assuming you have that).

Yes I'm planning for rep, and I was thinking that there's an interesting opportunity here to turn the "tragedy of the commons" into gameplay. If planets had an ecosystem and I took more of a Civilization approach I could give you options like whether or not to strip mine a site or wipe out a species to get a resources (shades of Avatar). Rep could be used to create troubles as a consequence of exploitative actions and that could be played against getting filthy rich (want to be wealthy and despised or poor and respected?)

Of course rep would have to be more functional than a kind of score or faction response mechanism. There should be some reward for being Noah and saving all the animals of a planet on your ship or being "Space Peace" and sabotaging company ships trying to exploit a world just as there would be rewards for being the exploiter.

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However, I realize that this option would also be the hardest to code for, and the complexity there might be a deal-breaker in the end.

At the moment it seems like an action approach would leave less options for interactivity. For instance, I can't give you the option to strip mine a site unless I'm willing to create all the gfx that allow you to explore the site, right?

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Original post by theOcelot If the point of landside gameplay is exploration, then driving would give it a personal touch. It would be fun seeing all the features of the planet up close. The problem is that there would need to be lots of features that are interesting up close.

Agreed. I can imagine creating environments which might still be interesting viewed top down. Bryce can create some pretty nice game tiles. Add to this particle effects for drifting sand, snow and even fog. I was even thinking about how feasible it is to do shading and simulate day and night effects.

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Every planet would have to be different, with its own fractal patterns of terrain.

Not using fractals (I grow features from "seeds" and apply rules based on what they are) but I can guarantee that there will be hundreds of different planets-- at least at the macro level.

The micro level is more of a problem. We're basically talking a tile-based game, though maybe things like rocks or pools of water can be scattered randomly as overlays.

So there's no way to avoid seeing the same rock on multiple planets. Tree canopies seen from above will begin to look the same. Even creatures with mix and match body parts will start looking the same after awhile because we're talking sprites rather than deformable 3d geometry.

So given that limitation, is it really worth it? Taking a page from Rogue-like games, where creatures have a huge set of abilities, it might be. But I have a sinking feeling that the action oriented gamer, who's in it for the immersion, isn't going to be immersed after awhile.

I think basically what I'm saying is that while the driving sounds really cool as the level of detail increases (from symbols to actual creatures) the expectations explode geometrically.

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By the way, are you sure you can't just fake elevation with rules about where you can and can't drive on the map, and how hard it is?

If I keep everything flat then maybe yes. Do you think it would work to make it slightly cartoony, say maybe in the same way that JRPG overworld maps are? You'd see your little Hot Wheels like vehicle roving the land but features like mountains, hills or dunes would be just as big or slightly bigger and impassible. (I'd need some cheesy techno to go with it as you drive. :P)

Mountains or hills alternately might be branching pathways which link together flat regions within the mountain, similar to how travel is done in in the old Baldur's Gate or Icewind Dale (with fades / paging to new regions).

Another possibility is to make mountains and hills out of cliff faces, like many indie RPGs that are done with pixel art. Something sort of like this:




Btw, shading could really make this look okay, but I've then got to strip shadows off of every shape so they can be composited over anything that travels into them, and I've got to manually specify collision zones for everything-- not fast or fun but doable.

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Even if you can't, having large obstacles like mountains mixed with things like rivers that need to be forded or sharp rocks to avoid could make navigation interesting.

I agree with you. I'd love to see things like cracking ice you have find a path around, or environments like swamps with bogs or canyons requiring bridge layers. Add to that flying, floating or charging creatures you have to deal with, not to mention competitor ATVs, pirate drones and the like and it could be really interesting. But definitely not worth it if the action oriented gamer is going to say, "2D? That's, like, so 1990s!!!!"

I'd like an on-ship ecology sub-game. Sophisticated planet ecology is wasted I think if it is only used to offer targets for a 2d rover to shoot at or run from. On the other hand, one only needs life form icons, explaining text and simple rules to simulate what happens when a space lion and ten space rabbits share a single pod (there are fewer space rabbits by the day but one gets to sell to a space zoo one couldn't before because the lion used to starve to death en route). The goal for the player would be to create self sustaining ecosystems that he doesn't need to bother with anymore.

Dealing with new life forms would involve either studying them CYOA style on-planet or adding them to existing pods and just waiting to see what happens, and if the alien eggs you recovered impregnate all your pets with chest bursting monsters that break out of their enclosure by secreting strong acids the pods' technology doesn't resist and kill everyone on board, you only need a message box to let the player know.

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Original post by Wavinator I think basically what I'm saying is that while the driving sounds really cool as the level of detail increases (from symbols to actual creatures) the expectations explode geometrically.

It does seem like art is the biggest obstacle. IMHO, a game as cool as yours sounds deserves a team capable of fulfilling those expectations, but I realize that might not be possible or practical for you. [sad]

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Quote: By the way, are you sure you can't just fake elevation with rules about where you can and can't drive on the map, and how hard it is? If I keep everything flat then maybe yes. Do you think it would work to make it slightly cartoony, say maybe in the same way that JRPG overworld maps are? You'd see your little Hot Wheels like vehicle roving the land but features like mountains, hills or dunes would be just as big or slightly bigger and impassible.

I wouldn't like that, at least not that example. It doesn't seem consistent with your generated-planets thing, either.

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Another possibility is to make mountains and hills out of cliff faces, like many indie RPGs that are done with pixel art. Something sort of like this...

That might work.

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I'd love to see things like cracking ice you have find a path around, or environments like swamps with bogs or canyons requiring bridge layers. Add to that flying, floating or charging creatures you have to deal with, not to mention competitor ATVs, pirate drones and the like and it could be really interesting. But definitely not worth it if the action oriented gamer is going to say, "2D? That's, like, so 1990s!!!!"

Actually, you might be able to integrate a lot of that kind of stuff into #2 by making it a hybrid strategy/navigation game. Mostly what I'm looking for is a sense of detail all the way down to the lowest levels. I personally might actually prefer to get that from a #2 type of game, if it gave a detailed view of the world while also giving me a chance to think about the decisions I make. If you can still incorporate a few action elements into it, it would be just about perfect for me.