Endless Sky - trading & combat, similar to Escape Velocity

[zahni]

Hello SSC! I'm looking for beta testers for an open source space trading and combat game inspired by the classic Escape Velocity series. Even if all you have time to do is download it and let me know what OS you're using and whether the game runs, that would be a big help. (Mac OS X, 64-bit Windows, and Debian / Ubuntu Linux packages are available.) In Endless Sky, you start out in a tiny space ship and can work your way up to a massive warship or a fleet of freighters by carrying cargo or passengers, completing missions, or plundering pirates. You can install new engines and weapons, or save up to buy bigger ships or escorts. The main story line takes about 8-16 hours to play through, or you can ignore the story and treat it like a sandbox game. More screenshots, a gameplay video, and downloads are available on the website: http://endless-sky.github.io[/url]

[Pinback]

Welcome to the forums Zahni, I will have a look at the weekend and try get back to you about it and how big is the download?. Hopefully others will have a look.

[Guest]

Hi Zanhi ... I just download it and gave it a run with the first mission arch. I like the storyline so far and the whole interface is very intuitive. Since I only play the game for 30min. I'll let you know how it feels and if I run to any bugs along the way. @Pinback - the download for 64bit WIndow is only 34.5MB.

[Pinback]

@Pinback - the download for 64bit WIndow is only 34.5MB. Nice one Leondhay. :good:

[IronHound]

I LOVE ESCAPE VELOCITY Ahem. Gonna give this a try and report back. I lost waaaaaay to many hours of my life to EV Nova.

[IronHound]

Well I had a chance to play the tutorial, and I played EV Nova a few months back. Some thoughts on your product. Its already EXTREMELY playable and polished! Your writing is great, and helps flesh things out. The tutorial was as straightforward as I remember the old one, even with a similar old man! Very well done! I also noticed the UI was very clean, and had alot of the same elements of EV Nova, everything felt like I was playing the same game! Very nicely done. There aren't alot of games like this, and I have been sorely missing it. Transcendence and Naev aren't nearly as similar or complete, so this is like finding a gold mine! A few more sounds could help with the game, I.e. spooling up for a jump, etc. I do like all the little touches that I wouldn't expect from such a small game, the ships talking to each other and such. The game feels great! Being able to choose a starting ship is awesome too, as it gives more options for gameplay. I also really like not having to fly to the edge of a system to jump. Being able to do it near inhabited planets is awesome. Havn't been in any combat yet, but it seems to be fairly similar based on watching NPC's fight. Lastly, I do miss the Bar's from EV Nova, the flavor text, missions, and gambling where alot of fun. Its not a priority, but I think it would be nice in Endless Sky too. Overall, I am blown away! Great job!

[zahni]

Lastly, I do miss the Bar's from EV Nova, the flavor text, missions, and gambling where alot of fun. The "Space Port" is the equivalent of the Bar in EV - it has its own flavor text, and it's where special mission are usually offered. Coming up with clever flavor text for 180+ different bars seemed a lot harder than just describing the spaceport as a whole. When a mission is offered in a spaceport, sometimes the mission text says you're at a bar, and sometimes instead it describes a fancy cafe or a shopping center, depending on what sort of planet you're on. As for the sounds - yes, I know they're really tacky. That's the one part of the game I haven't put much work into yet, so the existing sounds are basically just placeholders. Anyways, thanks for your feedback!

[zahni]

After three months of beta testing, there is now a stable release of Endless Sky available: http://endless-sky.github.io[/url] Any feedback is still much appreciated. The new release includes plenty of bug fixes, and some improvements to the sprites for some ships and for the explosions: 

[IronHound]

Great news! Gonna give this some more play time here soon with the latest version! Thanks for all the hard work.

[Bouitaz]

Can't get it to work. "Unable to create OpenGL context." Endless Sky version 0.7.12 for windows 64-bit. Couldn't find out what the latest version is... Win 8 (64-bit), i7, GeForce GTX 670. Does it come bundled with the OpenGL/AL needed?I tried hunting down OpenGL drivers but that appears to be it's own messy labyrinth to navigate.Never had a problem with any OpenGL games before. I love Escape Velocity Nova and was really looking forward to try this out since NAEV fuddled up it's control-scheme.

[zahni]

Does it come bundled with the OpenGL/AL needed? The OpenGL library is part of your operating system, so it isn't bundled with the program. Endless Sky requires OpenGL 3.0 minimum. You can check what OpenGL version you have with this tool: http://www.realtech-vr.com/glview/[/url] Also, do you have multiple monitors? People have had trouble with that in the past. Updating your graphics drivers is probably your best bet, especially if you haven't done it in a while. The latest official Nvidia driver for your GeForce GTX 670 is this one: http://www.geforce.com/drivers/results/87783[/url]

[Bouitaz]

The OpenGL library is part of your operating system, so it isn't bundled with the program. Endless Sky requires OpenGL 3.0 minimum. You can check what OpenGL version you have with this tool: http://www.realtech-vr.com/glview/[/url] Also, do you have multiple monitors? People have had trouble with that in the past. Updating your graphics drivers is probably your best bet, especially if you haven't done it in a while. The latest official Nvidia driver for your GeForce GTX 670 is this one: http://www.geforce.com/drivers/results/87783[/url] First of all, thanks for the quick reply and help ,) That GLview page seems dodgy as heck..and the download page doesn't work either.GPU Caps Viewer say that I have OpenGL version 4.3. Yes, dual monitors, One CRT (Main) and one LED. I am extremely wary of updating my Nvidia graphics driver because they inevitably break my (Older) games.I don't really play modern games (except indie) so updating these will be the last extreme I do.I'm currently using version 9.18.13.1106.

[zahni]

Yes, dual monitors, One CRT (Main) and one LED. One thing you could try is disconnecting one of the monitors and seeing if it runs. If your bit depth is set to something other than 32-bit, you could try changing that, too. This is a long shot, but with only one monitor connected, you could also try editing this file: $USERAppDataRoamingendless-skypreferences.txt and modifying the line that reads: fullscreen 0 to instead read: fullscreen 1 Or, if the file does not exist, create it and just put the one line "fullscreen 1" in it. (That is, maybe letting Endless Sky take over the whole screen will help.) Other than that, if you don't want to change your drivers, I'm not sure what else you could try. If you usually play old games, it's possible they are all written for the old OpenGL API (version 2) rather than the new API introduced in OpenGL 3, which might explain why other games work.

[Bouitaz]

One thing you could try is disconnecting one of the monitors and seeing if it runs. If your bit depth is set to something other than 32-bit, you could try changing that, too. This is a long shot, but with only one monitor connected, you could also try editing this file: $USERAppDataRoamingendless-skypreferences.txt and modifying the line that reads: fullscreen 0 to instead read: fullscreen 1 Or, if the file does not exist, create it and just put the one line "fullscreen 1" in it. (That is, maybe letting Endless Sky take over the whole screen will help.) Other than that, if you don't want to change your drivers, I'm not sure what else you could try. If you usually play old games, it's possible they are all written for the old OpenGL API (version 2) rather than the new API introduced in OpenGL 3, which might explain why other games work. I disconnected the secondary LED screen but had no luck getting the game started.The preferences did not exist so I created it but it still didn't work.I can't even view my bit depth (damn win 8..grmbl) so I couldn't change that. I might possibly update my drivers sometime in the future and I will let you know if it works then but for now it's too much of a hassle. Sorry.Thanks for trying to help out though. The game seems awesome and I wish you luck with it.

[IronHound]

Hey! Everybody! This is on Steam! If you liked EV NOVA get this naow! Its free! http://store.steampowered.com/app/404410/[/url]

[IronHound]

You all keep following your pretty graphics games and your.. planetary landing, but guess what? Other games have had planetary landing long before E:D. Of course I'm talking about Escape Velocity Nova! Its spiritual successor Endless Sky is coming along nicely. Here's some patch notes as the game is currently about to unleash a new patch! Stable release 0.8.9All sound effects have been redone, with better volume balance. You can jettison cargo in the info panel, to make room for plunder. The map view can be zoomed in and out. "Keys" are shown explaining the colors used in all the map panels. Many new ship names, hail messages, and commodity names have been added. Woot! Great little game, give it a try, after all its FREE! You might be suprised how much time you spend with it. Oh, and its tough. Be warned.

[Pinback]

Combined the threads.

[McAule]

Deleted my thread. Didn't see it was already created.

[spaceship-buran]

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