I think I''ve said some of this before, don''t remember when though, anyway, please continue to read because I''m making a game and need a little feedback games like G-Police, Colony Wars, Starwars Starfighter, Starwars Jedi Starfighter, Blast Radius, Darklight Conflict, Star Trek Invasion, Tie Fighter vs X-wing, etc. Basically the ones where you fly around in 3d in space or in a vehicle that you can hover more so than fly(G-Police) and have various statistics up on the HUD and shoot stuff. Starwars Starfighter and probably Jedi Starfighter had a cool feature where you can zoom. This is a good thing and really brilliant. My problems 1) AIR(planes) in space, why is it the direction I face is the direction I shoot and the direction I move? why am I banking in space? why do I have wings in space? unless they''re holding weapons, engines, or thrusters that is. Also, how is it that I can stop faster than I can accelerate? 2)numbers, space is big, space is very big, space is large, unbelievably large, huge even. I think we can fit a few more fighters in there, don''t you? 3)radar, I like radar, it lets me know where the f*** everybody else is, if only I could understand it 4)gameplay, I have one tactic and one tactic only, follow the direction of the handy, built-in arrow that points in the direction of a locked onto enemy, I turn in that direction until I see him and then I blow him up and then I do it again, and again and again and again, this ties in with #6 5)excitement, have you seen Robotech? have you seen Top Gun? have you seen anything in which the enemy fire goes whizzing by the hero? for movies and stuff, I''ve never figured out how they have that much control over their movements to dodge missiles and bullets by inches, so maybe they don''t, but this is a game and I wanna do that, why haven''t I been able to do that yet? 6)difficulty, "why should the enemy pilots get smarter, we can simply make them harder to kill and the player easier to destroy" All that does is extend the time discussed in #4 of this post. 7)distance, again, space is big, in real life pilots can fire a missile and never see the planes they shoot down, so I oughta be able to hit them a little farther out than I do now(which is why I like that zoom thing), some games you have to be so close that you run through their explosion

quote:
1) AIR(planes) in space, why is it the direction I face is the direction I shoot and the direction I move? why am I banking in space? why do I have wings in space? unless they''re holding weapons, engines, or thrusters that is. Also, how is it that I can stop faster than I can accelerate?

So the players that happen to not be NASA trained shuttle pilots still be able to enjoy the game. Space sims are the classical example of fun vs. realism.

quote:
2)numbers, space is big, space is very big, space is large, unbelievably large, huge even. I think we can fit a few more fighters in there, don''t you?

Apart from system limitations, too large a universe will make the player completely unsignificant for the evolution of the game (story, mission victory conditions, etc.) Unless the players ship is very powerful compared to the many enemies and allies, in which case, the whole game design needs to change again. Fact remains that since you can only fight against one enemy at a time (#4), what difference would another 50K fighters swarming around make?

quote:
3)radar, I like radar, it lets me know where the f*** everybody else is, if only I could understand it

I liked the radar in Elite. I also liked the mission map in XWing or Tie Fighter.

quote:
4)gameplay, I have one tactic and one tactic only, follow the direction of the handy, built-in arrow that points in the direction of a locked onto enemy, I turn in that direction until I see him and then I blow him up and then I do it again, and again and again and again, this ties in with #6

IIRC there was more to Tie Fighter than that. Choosing when to use missiles or torpedoes, choosing targets, attack an enemy head on or avoid him and follow him, transfer energy between guns, shields and engines, keeping an eye on the mission objectives (like protecting a certain ship, or disabling another, all in a strict timeframe), giving orders to my wingmen. Some larger targets (frigates, cruisers, etc) required some more tactics. Choosing a path through minefields and around larger enemy ships. Lots of things to do.

quote:
5)excitement, have you seen Robotech? have you seen Top Gun? have you seen anything in which the enemy fire goes whizzing by the hero? for movies and stuff, I''ve never figured out how they have that much control over their movements to dodge missiles and bullets by inches, so maybe they don''t, but this is a game and I wanna do that, why haven''t I been able to do that yet?

Well, in a F16 you at least have a lot larger viewing field than the computer screen, so you have more knowledge of the battlefield. In Tie Fighter I was able to dodge missiles however, at least a single one. IIRC you could have easily selected the missile in the radar tracker (which also showed the distance to the missile). If you did a very sudden turn when the missile was just about to hit you (.10 distance or so), you could have fooled it.

quote:
6)difficulty, "why should the enemy pilots get smarter, we can simply make them harder to kill and the player easier to destroy" All that does is extend the time discussed in #4 of this post.

Again, IIRC, in Tie Fighter better computer controlled pilots really were better. Their aim improved for once, and they didn''t walk in a straight line as much as the less experienced ones, etc.

7)distance, again, space is big, in real life pilots can fire a missile and never see the planes they shoot down, so I oughta be able to hit them a little farther out than I do now(which is why I like that zoom thing), some games you have to be so close that you run through their explosion

I think this is fun vs. realism again. Long range missiles spoil all the fun of good ''ol dogfight.

#1 Independance War, Frontier (Elite 2) let you fly in a direction and look and shoot in another. Didn''t work too well in Frontier, but it was great in IW once you got the hang of it.

#2 Think about the fact that you also want those fighters to be halfway smart, and prhaps even use guided missiles. You have to compute all that. Anyway, both Freespace and Independance War had quite a large amount of fighters ~in the air~ at the same time.

#3 radars in space are difficult to implement, but I think quite a few games had it right.

#4 sorry to say that again : take a look at Independance Wars for script driven missions which don''t always revolve around shooting at waves of fighters (although it was an integral part of pretty much every mission I think Even Freespace (slightly belated note : I''m talking about the series here, not the individual titles) had a bit more than just find the next fighter and kill it.

#5 you lack the skill nah ... seriously, even if you did (and I''m pretty sure quit a few laser beams near-miss you in most space fight games) you wouldn''t notice it, except if you were using an outside view.

#6 I''m afraid I don''t understand what you mean. It makes sense in a career based game to have better pilots facing you. The better you get the more dangerous the enemies you face are bound to be. Reflecting this only in their equipment would make the game tedious, as it wouldn''t involve greater skills ... just more time.

#7 Because it''s the best way to make fighting exciting instead of just watching a a blip on your radar disappear. That''s also why WWI, WWII and Heli sims have such an appeal on customers. Sure ... it''s fun to fly a F18, but the skill goes into understanding and mastering the technology. In, for example IL2, the skill required to get a kill is a combination of mastering the aerodynamics AND to be able to come near enough to shoot.

1) fun

2) if your engine can handle it

3) there´s two kinds of "space radar" in use, the Wing Commander type which is consists of two circles and four quadrants (center circle= in front; 4 quadrants=left/right/above/below/; outer circle=behind you) and the ELite type, which consists of a a plane and fixes objects (including your ship) above or below it, with lines indicating how far above/below they are.

4) I challenge you to come up with something new.

5) Controls? see #4

6) effort = money

7) fun

quote:
Original post by Hase

3) there´s two kinds of "space radar" in use, the Wing Commander type which is consists of two circles and four quadrants (center circle= in front; 4 quadrants=left/right/above/below/; outer circle=behind you) and the ELite type, which consists of a a plane and fixes objects (including your ship) above or below it, with lines indicating how far above/below they are.

Thank you ! After all these years, and after extensive use of the Elite radar, I finally understand exactly what it means !!

Okay...heres some ideas...altho I think this would work best with a Descent (interior enviroments) type game...

Start with a simple interface...the mouse would control the rotation of the ship (like mouse view in a FPS)...the left mouse button would fire the guns...the right would fire the engine...simple and basic...could be extended by haveing "double left click" fire special weapons or some such...

The game could use newtonion physics...that is the player taps the right mouse button and moves forward..meenwhile the player can move the mouse around to shoot at different targets, but the ship is still traveling in the same direction (uneffected until the engines are fired again)

I imagine more of a action game then space sim...so the primary view would be 3rd person perspective of the players craft...radar could be presented as a transparent sphere that surrounds the players ship...this way the players eyes are always on the 3D action rather then constantly haveing to dart to the bottom/top of the screen trying to interpret a 2D radar display device...there are various ways this "radar sphere" could present data...closer objects could be presented as being larger for example...also the interior of the sphere (objects that are "in front" of the player) could be a different color then those behind...additionaly the sphere could include flashing segmets for "proximety alerts" and what not...

The really difficult thing about such space games is giving the impression of movement within such a large enviroment...which is why I stated that the interior enviroments like in Decent would work well for the game I described...or...put it in open space but fill it with thousands of objects so that relitive movement can be presented...Mmm...a full on 3D Asteroids could be fun

I just remembered something else
8) speed
I love large game environments, the problem is the speed sometimes, it's just that I should be moving a lot faster, the problem then becomes collision detection at some point,

9)

quote:
too large a universe will make the player completely unsignificant for the evolution of the game

So you wouldn't have liked to take part in the large space battles in Episode IV and VI and in Deep Space Nine?
Go to
http://www.dracova.com/hellfighter
this is a really cool game, I've gotten nearly a hundred ships onscreen with little slowdown on a slow by today's standards computer, and the history and the background and the intricacy and complexity of the gameworld is astounding,

Edit: download the old version for more ships-the new version introduces network play and game refinements, which is nice and all but because of the game refinements, some of the old ships are left out

quote:
IIRC there was more to Tie Fighter than that. Choosing when to use missiles or torpedoes, choosing targets, attack an enemy head on or avoid him and follow him, transfer energy between guns, shields and engines, keeping an eye on the mission objectives (like protecting a certain ship, or disabling another, all in a strict timeframe), giving orders to my wingmen. Some larger targets (frigates, cruisers, etc) required some more tactics. Choosing a path through minefields and around larger enemy ships. Lots of things to do.

You're right, I do do all those things while playing, I guess I'm so good I don't notice.

radar-the Elite style does work well, I think I have actually come up with something better, I'll just have to make the game and find out

radar sphere and asteroids 3d-hell yeah, just as soon as I can afford some LCD shutter glasses

#5/dodging/excitement- I can dodge better in the Twisted Metal series than in the space combat sims I've played

quote: #5 you lack the skill nah ... seriously, even if you did (and I'm pretty sure quit a few laser beams near-miss you in most space fight games) you wouldn't notice it, except if you were using an outside view.

Sammy70: #5, exactly my problem, it's no fun unless I'm being shot at and I can't tell I'm being shot at unless I see it,
this is one reason I'd like to get a GameCube and a copy of RogueSquadron(?), it looked really neat and with lasers everywhere and large environments

[edited by - RolandofGilead on March 30, 2002 4:46:24 PM]

quote:
So you wouldn''t have liked to take part in the large space battles in Episode IV and VI and in Deep Space Nine?
Go to
http://www.dracova.com/hellfighter
this is a really cool game, I''ve gotten nearly a hundred ships onscreen with little slowdown on a slow by today''s standards computer, and the history and the background and the intricacy and complexity of the gameworld is astounding,

Edit: download the old version for more ships-the new version introduces network play and game refinements, which is nice and all but because of the game refinements, some of the old ships are left out

I think having many ships can be cool, but it just wouldn''t work for some games. It wouldn''t necessarily make a game better.

I''ll try that game, although my old P233 could barely draw 100 elite-style ships with five polies each at once

quote: 1) AIR(planes) in space, why is it the direction I face is the direction I shoot and the direction I move? why am I banking in space?

I''ve been thinking about this recently, and it occurs to me that there is no reason why a ship''s computer couldn''t simulate an atmospheric flight model for the sake of simplicity. IIRC, Independence War gave the option of something like that, which you could turn off when you required a purely newtonian model. I was thinking about implementing something like this in a game where much of the time is spent flying close to the surface of large vessels and/or asteroids. In this context, an atmospheric flight model would make a lot of sense, because there is always a "down", and you would not need complete freedom to rotate the ship in every direction.

quote: 3)radar, I like radar, it lets me know where the f*** everybody else is, if only I could understand it

The only radar system that I ever found intuitive enough to be able to read it at a glance was that found in the X-Wing games. For those who haven''t seen it, there were two separate circular displays, one representing the front, the other the rear. These displays were basically just very wide angle (180 degree FOV) views, so that a dot right in the center of the front radar meant that the ship is directly in front of you. A dot right on the edge of one of the circles meant that the ship was 90 degrees off to the side, etc. The shade of the dots indicated distance. It was a very simple system, but the key was to seperate it into the two displays, rather than trying to cram everything into one.

for me that problem is that there is no sense of speed.

http://www.amiganr1.com