Paul was on Reddit last night, completely missed it undone by time zones and not checking emails.

Hey guys if you want to participate or check out the Reddit AMA here it is:

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1hdj4u/with_the_internet_and_4_years_i_made_a_game_paid/

Also using this update as proof of my identity.

As always thank you for your support and I'm so incredibly excited about the next 24 hours.

thanks!

Paul

 

Update for void destroyer

 

 

 

Hey guys - thought I'd toss a mini update with a video of a new ship (and sounds) thanks to your support. This is a repair corvette - so you should all expect something to repair in the near future - Beta 🙂

Speaking of Beta - I feel that we are on schedule for the promised - one month post Kickstarter's end date. Although I wish that were would be more new assets to show off and include. Even though money isn't a constraint as it once was, getting assets in is still challenging. Hoping for some more to enhance the gameplay/immersion before Beta.

Also - if you haven't voted for the project on Greenlight  - please do, ever since the end of the Kickstarter the traffic to it has nearly evaporated.  It is a bit of a pain to vote via the link so you can also search for it on the Greenlight page via your Steam client.

Thanks guys! Looking forward to the Beta and the future!

Paul

 

Beta coming soon.

Beta ETA:

For those at the Beta Backer or above levels - ETA on Beta - this week or right after the upcoming weekend. Beta will feature new content, ships, and the continuation of the story.

How will you get the Beta? 

You will get an email to your Kickstarter linked email address with further instructions.  In case you don't want to use your Kickstarter linked email address for this, send me a message via Kickstarter with the proper email address. But if your Kickstarter email is ok or "good enough" then keeping things as they are will save me clerical work.

If you submitted a name for the pilot names list - now is your chance to remove it before it goes into the Beta/demo version. If so then message me via Kickstarter. So keep this in mind or forever have that name fly in the void.  I'll be updating the list this week in prep, it is mostly complete, but there are a few more names to add via that email address that I set up (see first post Kickstarter update here on instructions on how to submit a name if you haven't already).

For those at the release level - a updated "demo" version will follow sometime after the Beta version hits. The demo will feature bug fixes and non-content related changes (eg: the unlock system and crash fixes). 

Looking forward to releasing the Beta - still a bunch of work to do, but the list is getting shorter for this upcoming release.

thanks!

Paul

 

Getting closer to the beta.

The distribution aspect of the The Beta isn't ready - the installer itself is "fingers crossed" ready. My contact at how we will distribute the Beta isn't around (not a big surprise since it is "tomorrow" morning right now - aka late at night).

So - I will email the build to him and hopefully in the morning we'll be closer. I'll keep you guys in the loop and I hope that Beta will be a reality tomorrow.

Going to keep this short since I'm about to pass out - lots has been done - many bugs obliterated and hopefully less added 🙂

 

Beta out now 170 meg download will have to try it out later on.

Update from Kickstarter.

Hey guys! I haven't "promoted/marketed" since Kickstarter... over 60 days I believe. With the recent 100 games being greenlit Void Destroyer jumped up in rankings, we are now in the top 100 (out of over 1300). So I'm devoting some time to get even higher in the rankings.

So - if you haven't yet - please vote for Void Destroyer making it into Steam - http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=146068036 (since voting via the web page is somewhat clumsy you can also find Void Destroyer via going to the Steam Client - then clicking Community - then choosing Greenlight and entering in "Void Destroyer" into the search). And if you'd be so kind as to bug your Steam (and other) friends to vote that would be incredibly helpful as well.

Here is an updated video of updates since Kickstarter:

There is an updated demo on the main site here: http://www.VoidDestroyer.com so you can check out the changes.

Here's a vid where I talk about the recent mouse changes and time dilation system:

Thank you!

Paul

New update from Kickstarter.

My goal is to put out iteration 18 in the next two weeks (hopefully sooner - but lets face it...). For the past week I've been working on putting in the formation system and about an hour of that was on the new SPROG fire mode.

Here's a very long video demonstrating:

 

 

 

Direct YouTube link - here.

Overall formations are nothing new to real time strategy games - their intended purpose is to better organize and manage fleet positions and movements - however there are some very unique (haven't seen them before) features - one allows you to customize formations (at around the 4:20 mark) and another is the new SPROG fire mode (7:25 mark) so be sure to check those out and let me know what you think.

Combining formations and the SPROG fire mode gives you the more firepower at your finger tips than any other game.

Iteration 18 will feature these additions (among other changes - check out the still WIP change log here) as well as new story content for the Beta backers.

Finally if you haven't voted for us to on Steam's Greenlight or if you haven't bugged all your friends - please do.

thanks!

Paul

 

Update and vid for void.

Hey guys, hoping to get Iteration 18 out - this coming week. I am a bit dissapointed at not having it ready. The new formation and rally systems have added complications across the board that need a good amount of play testing before you guys can reasonably enjoy the new version and report bugs, issues and give feedback. 

Here is a video update about what's been going on (recently) behind the scenes:

 

 

Hey guys! Iteration 18 is out - featuring many changes including formations, rally points and dust clouds

Here's a video showing off the new mine field generating stations:

For more info and to download the demo check out the main page: http://www.VoidDestroyer.com

thanks

Paul

Also has a glow test vid

Big update from Paul about adding some spit & polish to the game and Steam shenanigans.

Hey guys - first off I read all your great comments on the previous updates - thank you and I took them all into consideration.

The current goal is to change gears a bit and focus on overall polish and improvements to the game for Steam's Early access. The goal more broadly stated is to give as much value to the Early Access buyers as possible. So to do that I'm focusing on "making the game not look cheap" and small improvements to make the game easier to control and less frustrating. 

In the "not cheap" department - there is a lot of very awesome stuff happening in ship mode - for example camera/HUD shake, new visual effects, nearly complete HUD visual overhaul, including new cool HUD elements. Overall these are very tiny changes but they are going to make ship mode a lot more fun/interesting/engaging. Void Destroyer is a mix of space combat and RTS - so the danger is that it might become a crappy space sim and a crappy RTS (jack of all trades master of none type scenario) - but with these changes it will not be a crappy space sim.  I'm going to hold off on showing these updates to you guys until they are mostly complete - I'm looking forward to the big reveal. When you guys see the changes and go "wow" - don't forget that it is you that had a substantial part in making it happen via your support.

On the RTS side there's been a bunch of quality of life improvements and bug fixes. I'm trying to look at the game from a new player's perspective and just making things click. One of those ways is by adding a "floor" to tactical mode via a grid. This is a very simple change, but (hopefully) gives our human minds an easier grasp on moving around in tactical mode. There's a bunch of other changes so check out a video that I prepped below:

 

For a direct link: 

Delay etc: so I said getting on Steam would mean delays - but actually that statement is turning out mostly incorrect. Like I said above what is really happening is that the focus changed from new story content to overall polish - which would have been done a bit later anyway (pre the commercial release). 

On a bit of a "I knew it was going to happen" side - when a game is added on Steam's Early access it is no longer automatically displayed on the "New Releases" area in Steam's store page. This appears to be as a result of a lot of early access games not meeting quality standards. The free ride is over - this change means that Early Access games don't get an automatic - released twice - type position on Steam (once for Early and once for Release). So making the game stand out is even more important now and there is even less incentive to rush.

Still a lot of work needs to be done on the marketing side - prepping the Steam store front, meaning a new trailer, screen shots, probably updating Void Destroyer's main website (which is a bit cheap looking as well), things of that nature. It is a bit overwhelming - but at the same time very exciting - so exciting in fact that I go to sleep an hour later and wake up an hour earlier heh heh!

 

YES, I have seen this space sim with a RTS mode on

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1760753044/star-quest-2-united-galaxies-space-sim-rts-racing

YES, I have seen this space sim with a RTS mode on

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1760753044/star-quest-2-united-galaxies-space-sim-rts-racing

This one. http://spacesimcentral.com/ssc/topic/4011-star-quest-2-united-galaxies/

Just been wondering what going on with Void Destroyer, must try and remember to look at the blog.

A quick summary of what has been going on:

• PC upgrade - necessary due to not wanting less than 60fps video recording (for trailers/marketing) with full effects on.
• Game engine component upgrade - having one stable PC (old) and having one clean PC (new) it was a good time to upgrade all of the outside libraries that the game engine uses (eg: physics engine, rendering engine, gui engine). Some of which weren't updated in 3+ years. Meaning that they won't be updated right before or just after release - allowing more time to test for bugs. Also the development tool (Visual Studio) updated and the game project updated to accommodate it as well.
• Bunch of new visual effects (optional) - very excited! The game is looking like how I dreamed it would look 🙂
• Living "universe" - ore drone hangars now launch cargo pods, which are picked up by transport ships and ferried over to bases or transfer platforms. AI controlled bases do this automatically. This giving the player (and future pirate factions) opportunity for theft. Going to enhance the "feels real" of the game greatly. There will be activity beyond combat (though with obvious hooks to combat). This will also get us closer to when the player must use outside mines to gather resources (in later sections of the game) as well as get us closer to "sandbox/privateer" mode .
• Early game enhancements - (see above - opportunity for cargo pod theft - thus a reward of getting resources faster at the risk of combat) and a mini boss added 🙂 The game's setting - asteroid field - will be punched up - if you see an asteroid not part of an asteroid field - you'll soon know how it got there and in the later game you'll have an opportunity to influence that as well 🙂
• Still fighting for new GUI art.
• Bunch of new music tracks. The game retains its - music happens when something cool is happening - feel, but with less silence 🙂
• 5 new ships recently purchased.
• Fixed a crash bug that has made iter 18 very unstable (crash during save).
• Lots of small improvements (ship change - based on distance, and allows to jump back to previous ship) - target nearest - cycles through nearby targets.

So lots of stuff - the ETA is very dependent on art right now, since there is lots on that side (including "marketing" things like Steam's Store page needing "cover art") - I'm taking the time to work on as many aspects as I can before release.  Once the art is there I'll focus more on releasing rather than polish and additions.

My goal is basically to have an early access game that has the first 1/3-1/4 of the game at release quality. Hoping to show you guys some videos soon when the new art allows - I've been showing the game with unfinished assets for such a long time I'm looking forward to soon showing it with finished assets.

For those that don't care for Steam, there will still be a non-Steam version and most of the work is Steam independent.

Now that the game has been Greenlit - I feel thankful not having to worry getting Greenlit *shudders*

Kickstarter funds spending has ramped recently up - and this reminds me that without you guys most of the new cool (outside) things wouldn't have happened. Thank you!

Paul

PS: check out the change log:  http://voiddestroyer.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=720

PPS: check out the game's blog:  http://voiddestroyer.com/blog/  (have to be a bit more pro-active updating it - since I do KS updates it sometimes falls off the radar)

 

Update

Hey guys - here is what has been going on:

Work continues on polishing up the early game - this is so literal that - for the past 2 out of 3 weeks I've been focusing on the first 5 minutes of the game. The setting is being established and exploited to create immersion and give the universe a life of its own. I don't want to spoil this because I'm very happy and proud. I'm very certain that the unique setting of the game has been showcased well. 

Working on the early part of the game means looking at things in terms of - why would they do this - type questions. For example early in the game there is a pirate attack. Behind the scenes - in game development land - this is intended to be a in game tutorial. But the way it was presented in game the pirates basically throw themselves at a base without reason. So care has been taken to give the pirates a goal, and this leads to questions needing to be answered such as - what happens if they achieve it? Should I allow them to escape? What happens if they escape? What happens if the player follows them? It is sort of like pulling on a thread and ripping apart a shirt, but the end result is that the game world becomes much more real. A lot of modern AAA games have incredibly narrow paths - this makes things much simpler and cheaper - however Void Destroyer will have some branches that are dead ends (where it makes sense), and hopefully some more meaningful branches. We can do this because unlike AAA games a branch won't cost thousands of dollars - it will cost a day or so of scripting and coding.

I hope you don't become too alarmed at the - first 5 minutes of the game statement - because in Void Destroyer - every ship is pilot able - so ships that add to the life of the game world - will later on be essential for the player to support the fleet and war effort.

The bad news is that I'm still struggling getting art, though at the moment I'm not ready in terms of code and scripting so I can't blame any artist for slow downs (and even if I did the blame is always mine - so hopefully you won't catch me blaming others). What I have learned is a weakness of mine - I tend to engage too few artists at the same time. I really should try to grab more, I'm trying to correct this line of thinking. On the art side work is being done on the character portraits. The GUI has been re-done (so buttons, windows, text boxes etc - they look incredibly better than the old blue GUI, very happy about this). I really doubt that Tactical mode will get its overhaul before Early Access (however it did benefit greatly from the GUI re-work - it still looks too much like "windows"), and the HUD is a bit stalled - though strangely nearly finished.  Some new 3D models are hopefully on the way. A bunch of cool new music tracks and sound effects have made their way in.

So ETA? - I really hate giving these because I've missed every one of these. There is a double edged sword with the Holiday season - more time off (I have the Christmas week off) but also more time spent with family and friends - overall it should be a boost. I'm hoping for a "Steam Test" next week (closed Steam access to the Beta Backers) - and I'm hoping for Early Access in the very beginning of the new year (for all the backers) (even if it was ready before this - Christmas/New Year's week would be a bad time to release).

Once again guys - thank you for your support.

Paul

 

update

Hey guys! Happy Holidays and a happy New Year - best wishes! Check out the video update, it shows a bunch of updates to the project that I've been keeping under wraps in hope of showing you the completed versions - but decided to show the WIP versions since I don't want to keep you guys in the dark. Highlights - GUI face lift, HUD overhaul (about 80% complete), new visual effects.

 

 

What's on the horizon - Beta backer - Steam release Beta (hopefully.. this weekish). Steam Early Access (for all) hopefully very early January 2014. Going to keep this update short - again thank you for your support!

 

😎 😎

The Steam keys have been sent out, but I don't think the game is on Steam yet or I am I missing some thing here?.

Edit just worked out what I did wrong and just re downloaded the game through Steam should make any future updates easier.

Pnback - cool 🙂

The way things work - I can generate Steam keys for tests (or any purpouse really) though the game isn't officially avaiable for purchase through Steam itself (should happen soon though - will update).

Updates are a real pain made incredibly easy via Steam - but the danger is that I send out an update, it gets downloaded by everyone but its buggy and now everyone has a buggy client - new things to worry about. For right now that isn't a huge issue since one of the purpouses is to bug test, but when officially released...

Updates are the main reason I have gone with the Steam version of the game although I have a love/hate relationship with Steam itself I think this will be the best way to keep up-to date with Void.

Will be having a play later on.

Big news for Void Destroyer as it will be getting Steam early access on the 15, two days from now, so if you missed out now a chance to get in on it.

Hey guys - I've worked on so many things since the last update that I can't really remember any of the little details.  Void Destroyer is approved by Valve and scheduled for release on January 15th, it is a bit funny - because no matter what I do or don't do - the game will be automatically released on that day. It is a bit of a funny mix of nervousness and happiness. I feel fairly similar to how I felt during Kickstarter, can't sleep, I wake up early and yet I don't feel tired.

The two major things I've done over the past week and this weekend are two new trailers.

Check them out:

 

Update from Kickstarter.

During Kickstarter days I did a pod cast with Space Game Junkie - a website devoted to space games. Last Tuesday I did another pod cast - here it is -  if you think I ramble in typed word... well I guess that should prepare you for spoken ramblings as well.

For those waiting on the DRM free version - I keep optimistically thinking it is right around the corner, but there's more and more to do towards that goal. To be more specific I want to release the next leg in the story content along with that version to give you guys about an hour or so of play time in addition to the current. 

I just (tonight) did some work on the research system, to allow for new ships/stations to be researched in the new story content, and added support for bases that aren't carved into asteroids (yesterday), and added (few days ago) mining ships (versus the rock retrieval drones) to the game and a mechanism of how they deliver the ore back to your base (via those relatively un-used transfer platforms). Before that I updated turrets that are "physical objects" in game - before turrets were basically just a visual - you could fly right through them - in the case of small ship turrets this wasn't an issue, but there are now offensive and defensive turret platforms that are downright mega.

Also in some other news I (believe) that I improved flight mechanics - ships should "slow turning" in a more improved way, yet still obey their "physical" capabilities and limitations. Basically dog fighting in fighters should feel more responsive. I write "believe" because when play testing I can't quite nail down the change - but the code is improved and it "feels" better.

 

Fired Steam up over the weekend and noticed the Void did an update, so the updates are coming in fast.

Just played the game for the first time. Also did a recording of my impresions (+ webcam images so people can see my emotions).

They often say RTFM, which is imo a good advice. But I went against it and started a full game right away.

Lets say that my own equipment was more a limitation than the game itself. Controls were listed nicely on the right hand side of the screen. Objectives too. Question for the dev: It get the impression that you expected to have people playing the game who are like fuck RTFM, lets just blow stuff up. Am I correct in this?

Loving the mix of being able to control a ship and being able to do RTS mechanics. The graphics are lovely. Remind me a lot of the game which made me fall in love with RTS games: Homeworld. (I was before that a diehard turnbased player, except for rollercoaster tycoon and transport tycoon deluxe). Good memories.

I think the only downside so far is I was only able to play this awesome game for an hour. Might try to upload the video. But lots of awkward silence + derping up due to not remembering controls make me kinda unsure whether to upload it or not 😀

"It get the impression that you expected to have people playing the game who are like fuck RTFM, lets just blow stuff up"

Right - that was one of the goals. The "Tutorials" are fairly in depth, with tons of text and (I think) are fairly boring. Surprisingly players don't tend to call them that, so it looks like their goal of explaining in detail is working out well.

The "in story" tutorial - is there for players like you as well as for players who went through the tutorial yet still need a few reminders (which is pretty much everyone - let's face it - there are a lot of controls/keys/concepts).

If you are the type of player who will try everything (eg: I wonder if I can do this... let's try...), click every button - then you should be ok since I tried to design things to be fairly logical and unified.

Video - yeah! Post it - when I play I'm biased via having made the game so watcing the first videos is very helpful. I changed/teaked/fixed more than one issue via watching videos like these.

Thanks for supporting the project and for feedback!

It sounds like you are exactly the game's "niche" - aka RTS + space sim - so please consider posting a Review on steam 🙂

Posted a review.

But I am still a bit ashamed to upload the video file 😀 I can throw it on my home server which allows you to download it, if you'd like to.