Star Chasm

[lotekk]

[RPG ON]Hello everybody, I am new to this forum but I just received this alien transmission with my satellite TV dish:---Begin Transmission---Dear Earthlings,the Xorix Overmind, Alturb III, extends a welcoming hand to the inhabitants of earth in form of an invasion fleet... just kidding. We have no intention of using vast economic resources to build an invasion fleet that, by the time it reaches earth, will be completely outdated. Instead our great Xorix Overmind sends you peaceful greetings and the Alpha demo of the space adventure "Star Chasm".In game you will be a free trader flying through a 2,5D environment trying to make a buck by free trading, flying generic mission and succeeding in several scripted story missions. The game features a storyline in which course you earthlings will come to admire the sheer awesomeness of our Overmind Alturb III and his peaceful ambitions.Your in-game space ship can be equipped with various weapons as well as you can equip your in-game avatar with various space ships. With your ship you will encounter friendly characters as well as unfriendly ones (which you will probably have to shoot - but remember its all in the name of interstellar peace!). There will be dozens of star systems to explore which will feature space stations, asteroid fields and the already mentioned friendly and unfriendly characters.Our Overmind, in his tremendous wisdom, has decided to give you earthlings the power of control through the mouse and the keyboard.If you, after playing the game, feel the urgent need to obey orders from our insanely incredible Overmind Alturb III, please be assured that this is a perfectly normal side effect and nothing to worry about.You can have a first glimpse of "Star Chasm" here:[url]http://www.lo-tekk.de/files/starchasm_demo_681_setup.exe[/url] news and updates about "Star Chasm" is this your source:[url]http://www.moonworx.de/[/url] Transmission---I don't really know what to make of that transmission.[RPG OFF]This is a first alpha work in progress release of the demo, so be patient with us. Despite of this I encourage all, that are interested to share their thoughts and opinions regarding this game demo. You may also register with the forum at [url]http://www.lo-tekk.de/forum[/url] you and have a nice day.[EDIT] I found out, that there's a number of people who do not like the use of installers, so here is the demo provided as a zip archive: [url]http://www.lo-tekk.de/files/starchasm_demo_681.zip[/url] demo: [url]http://www.lo-tekk.de/files/ssc/starchasm-demo-setup-734.exe[/url] requirements for those who need this information:- WinXP/Vista/Win 7- 2 GHz CPU- 50 MB harddrive space- 64 MB RAM- 64 MB Directx7 compatible 3d graphics adapter

[IronHound]

Somebody let me know how this is. I would try it myself if it supported macs.Sounds interesting. The screenshots look quite polished, so its obvious you put time into this demo.

[sscadmin]

Playing it right now.First off lotekk welcome to SSC and you have done an excellent job on Star Chasm. For this being a alpha build it seems quite stable and very playable. I have been playing it for about 30mins and you did a nice job with the visuals and 2.5D display. Some things that are nice in the game so far that I have noticed:- Graphics. Well done for a game that is only like 40mb installed.- It seems that there is a large pool of quests available. Been doing them to build cash for my Ore Extractor.- The quests look like they range in difficulty from easy to hard. From simple go find this cargo to going to other sectors and attacking someone.- Menus are well done and easy to navigate.- Music is not over powering the game. Nice job.Some areas I think need some adjustments for optimum play (just my opinions):- On the 'Tab' key to bring up your choices or HUD style menu interface. I would like to be able to bind the tab key to my middle mouse button (mouse button 3). Is there a way to accomplish that? This way the user can do all of the functions from the mouse.- Thrusters. There is only two speeds stop and full. Can we use the scroll wheel to accel/deaccel the engines or use +/-?- Are there any plans to put in a commodity reporting system so you have an idea which stations are buying resources and for what price?- Will there be any HUD changes depending on the ship you have?Overall nice experience so far and I will continue to play to see what is in store when I can upg this ship enough and do some exploring. I am interested in how big sectors are? Do you hit a wall or can you go to what you see in the distance? I would try Star Chasm out you will be pretty impressed with the alpha build. I will add Star Chasm to SSC's link list.A few pics of the newb area:

[SolCommand]

This really looks like an awesome game to play ! I especially like that red* system.

[lotekk]

Thank you all for the kindly welcome. Darkone, I most appreciated your thoughtful comments and suggestions to the gameplay. There's still much work to do, so ideas and suggestions are always welcome. As the work goes on many aspects of the gameplay might change. The economy isn't fully implemented yet, the prizes for the various weaponry and equipment must be balanced etc.
Quote:
I would like to be able to bind the tab key to my middle mouse button...
This would be possible; currently the middle mouse button is being used to orbit the camera, the wheel zooms the camera sort of. Your request is reasonable and if nobody really needs the current camera control scheme I could change this.
Quote:
...plans to put in a commodity reporting system so you have an idea which stations are buying resources and for what price...
We have a simple economy in mind, where all stations produce something, that other stations need for their own production. Goods that are being exported by a particular station, have a (E) mark attached in the traders inventory. The prizes vary a little every time you visit a station, but you will always make some profit by buying export goods and sell them preferable to stations that need these goods.
Quote:
Will there be any HUD changes depending on the ship you have?
Currently there's no plan to add such feature, maybe in the feature.
Quote:
...seems that there is a large pool of quests available. Been doing them to build cash for my Ore Extractor.
Beside the main story line there will be a bunch of side quests made available that replace some of the current generic missions. For the Ore Extractor you should better fly mission "Missing Brother Julius Three". It's more fun to say the least.
Quote:
Do you hit a wall or can you go to what you see in the distance?
You are able to fly wherever you want. The sectors have no limit but in a distance of about 30.000 units from the central star, there's nothing to find than empty space. We will add some more spots of interest to the maps, so you might find something useful or a few fights.BTW while in space you can hit F1 for a short list of key bindings.I hope, I could answer a few questions and thank you again for your thoughts and comments.Cheers! lo-tekk

[sscadmin]

Thanks for the tips on gameplay lotekk. I am still in the first sector, when do you get story missions and will you have a journal or something to keep track of the story? Will probably have some more feedback when I progress further into the game.

[lotekk]

Bear with me ! I believe we have raised the expectations too high. By the time you have reached the Hemera star system, you might have seen nearly all star systems that make up the demo. The demo starts with the very first story mission "Rescue from Nemesis" leading you to the EOS star system. There you might be able to play two additional side-quests: "Do not burn the books" and "Missing Brother Julius Three". Beside of this there are a few generic missions available. These are some simple bounty hunt, pick up and delivery missions. Maybe we should better differentiate between generic missions and story / side missions.

[Pinback]

LOOKs good will have a look at it later on.

[Pinback]

OH NO!! unsupported video card,Nooooooooooo.

[lotekk]

PINBACK wrote:
OH NO!! unsupported video card,Nooooooooooo.
Hi PINBACK, it's the first time I encounter this. So would you be willing to provide me with information about your graphics adapter, driver version and OS being used ? Maybe it's a known behavior and we can find a way to circumvent this somehow. What was the message telling you that your video card is unsupported ?

[Pinback]

lotekk wrote:
What was the message telling you that your video card is unsupported ?
Hi Lotekk It actullay say unsupported video mode,as its only a net book and not ment for playing games onIt may be down to the screen res,is there anyway to change the screen mode before the game starts.

[lotekk]

Quote:
is there anyway to change the screen mode before the game starts
Try to locate the file default.cfg within the cfg folder. Open it with a text editor and find the following lines:
Code:
screen.width=res_1[1]screen.height=res_1[2]
Change these lines to match your desired screen resolution e.g.:
Code:
screen.width=800screen.height=600
I hope it works ! Please report back. Thank you

[Pinback]

Cheers Lotekk that did the trick.

[lotekk]

PINBACK wrote:
Cheers Lotekk that did the trick.
Hello PINBACK, have you been able to play the demo with your netbook ? Would be a quite interesting thing to know. And if so, could you give some tech specs about processor speed and graphics adapter used ? Thank you.

[Pinback]

lotekk wrote:
Hello PINBACK, have you been able to play the demo with your netbook ? Would be a quite interesting thing to know. And if so, could you give some tech specs about processor speed and graphics adapter used ? Thank you.
Its a Advent 4211 netbook with a n270 atom processor,with 1gb of memory running XP and hasintegrated grahics.Its always a bit of suprise when it run a game.I've not got far into the demo due not having any time,but I do keep getting killed by the ship which challenges you,although I think this may be due to the netbooks mousepad or its just down to me being useless.

[sscadmin]

C'mon you can do it Pinback . Hopefully lotekk doesn't have to add an option to the difficulty settings that say 'Pinback' :)That's pretty much the opening you need to get by to continue on in the game. I would use a mouse and not the touch pad. That might be where your going wrong.

[Pinback]

Darkone wrote:
C'mon you can do it Pinback . Hopefully lotekk doesn't have to add an option to the difficulty settings that say 'Pinback' .
I should go and buy a mouse,its not the first time the touch pad has caused problems.

[lotekk]

Thank you for the information PINBACK. I'm glad that it works for you. Regarding the merchant, you could lower the difficulty settings in the options menu accessable via ESC. You have a few power ups in the inventory: press F for shield injector, G for energy cell or H for armor kit.

[sscadmin]

Star Chasm webpage hasn't been updated since April. Is there any new developments Lotekk?

[lotekk]

Darkone wrote:
Star Chasm webpage hasn't been updated since April. Is there any new developments Lotekk?
Thank You for asking. This remembered me to give updates more often. Because of summer holidays we are a little bit distracted from intense work, so there are only small things to report. We are still reworking the missions, doing small updates to the commodities models, model some new fighters. We changed the mission selection screen to a sort of station BBS where news, stories and mission proposals are mixed together. And there are of course to iron out all these bugs that strangely arise from nothingness.Cheers