Alliance Space Guard (a 3D spacesim with orbits and ship avionics!)

[D.C.Elington]

Posted by: @pinback
That looks like some complex crew simulation going on their and I don't think I have seen anything like it before in this type of game.

Hello Pinback! Over the week-end the testers were worrying about their crew getting tired or wondering why they were feeling too hot, so far so good!
More seriously I hope this does not feel too "Sims"-ish, but on the other hand I think it was important to try to convey the fact that a manned ship requires special care. A related feature that should come soon is the management of the crew's radiation dose over time. This one will not vanish after a few hours in a station's spa so it should become an important factor to consider when going pedal to the metal on the reactor power. The more connections there are between the different components the richer the gameplay hopefully.

[Pinback]

You may want to think about an option to automate it or scale it back for new player of the game, given that the game is going to have a steep learning curve. 

[D.C.Elington]

Yes scaling certainly, that's what's in place for the wear and tear. Also the design goal with these tunable systems is that they should work with their default settings, and then it's possible to optimize their output if wanting to do so. For that matter most testers are making a much more efficient use of the ship than I do! But the fact is I'm only flying test rides these days, not really playing ‍

[D.C.Elington]

Hello SSC
Here's the latest mail package from the ASG systems (no FTL comms in there, delivery by ship required! ^^).
Still working on the life support systems: water, food and supplies this time. Gameplay wise the endurance concerns were previously focused on the power plant. This adds the crew's needs on top, requiring a bit more planning.

Hopefully the next update should be the last on the topic, and focusing on the radiation protection systems ‍
Fly safe!

[Pinback]

Awesome as always Dc.
Any plans to have a shuttle resupply or rendezvous in case their are no nearby planets with any stock?. 

[D.C.Elington]

Hello @pinback, yes that will certainly fit as one of the rescue mission types. Related to this, "orbital drops" would let the ship deorbit resupply packages to ground teams. That would involve exactly the same complex maneuvering as an orbital "bombardment" but fits much better in the game's intended background!

[sscadmin]

Woah what detail.... so many games this whole process you put into your game is one button press. This video really makes you think if I was going to do this for real this is what I would have to take into account to do this long haul mission. And Pinback has a good point that maybe if people like me eat and drink too much that I don't starve to death in space
I cannot even imagine the logic behind all of these systems. Nice work as always @d-c-elington.

[D.C.Elington]

@sscadmin Hello D1, thanks for watching!
Under the hood the front section runs on an hybrid of the systems simulator for the equipment (already in-use for the power plant) and of a simpler, more abstract layer to manage the higher-level resources (water, food, supplies, crew metabolism I/Os etc). But that's an incremental process all that stuff was implemented one element at a time ‍
From the feedback I get from the testers, having to plan for food is definitely an important point for us humans indeed ^^ And I just added the hygiene related parts, showers do seem to matter too (They are related to the navigation because the ship must be under acceleration for a sufficient time for them to happen - that's to be able to recover the water easily).
Hopefully all that stuff will provide more choices and interconnected trade-offs to operate for the player depending on the situation. Planning for a few days patrolling around a central world is obviously not the same as one month crossing remote parts of the galaxy. In that sense the difficulty should go with distance, which I think fits such a sim's context.

[D.C.Elington]

Hello SSC! ‍
New update about the game, this time about ionizing radiations both from the ship's reactor and celestial sources.
Gameplay wise that requires to be more careful when handling the reactor's power. And that also differentiates planets with some additional "terrain" features. Typically you would not park on an orbit that lies right in the middle of some highly radioactive region for instance.
There won't be any risk to badly hurt the crew but the absorbed dose is more like a variable to monitor on the long run - and could serve as a rating in the career too (marker of good management).

This time the work on the ship's "civilian" parts is close to completion, and so I should be able to work on the operations soon.
Fly safe
David

[Pinback]

Awesome video as ever DC
If my understanding of the video is right, will this space weather (for want of a better term) have any effect on the sensors or weapons as well as the crew.
Will for example a pirate ship choses to hide in high radiation arear of space.

[D.C.Elington]

Hi @pinback thanks for watching.

"Space weather" is the right term, although in the game solar storms will wait for a later update I think. Right now the "winds" are possibly strong, but steady

I have not done the math about the sensors yet but supposing that the areas of high radiations may mess with them sounds perfectly valid. Probably not enough to hide but possibly to prevent identification for instance. That's a matter of frequency bands: these regions are not active in the infrared so ships will still be detectable, however the parasitic radio emissions may possibly make the analysis of their power plant signals much more difficult.

[sscadmin]

Damn @d-c-elington you are really diving into the technicals of space travel You are definitely doing your research and putting this into your game. You may need to have a disclaimer when you start the game that your going to 'die a lot' until you have read the manual I remember playing AH-64 Longbow many many years ago and that came with like 400pg manual. So will be interested on how you tackle instructing the non-technical gamer on how to play.
But as always your videos are very informative and I am in Aww in how all this is coming together, so many mechanics are running on this consoles simple wow. Keep up the grind.

[D.C.Elington]

Hello D1 @sscadmin thanks for the feedback
All these systems certainly do look complicated! However all the related operations are assisted by interactive checklists that point at the controls to use and also explain the underlying process. From what the new testers report it's still possible to learn while playing without a 400 page manual... albeit with a little help from veteran captains here and there of course. And that's very good because I don't intend to write one!
Generally speaking the ship is meant to be plainly operational and so is fitted with all the necessary support systems and automation. I mean that dealing with the space environment is part of the every day job, although seasoned captains will manage that more efficiently of course. Incidentally in a few weeks the dev should shift from "flying" the ship to "using" it to perform its missions. At long last!

[D.C.Elington]

Hello SSC, docking in for the quarterly ops report! ‍
This time the vid is about the game layer basics rather than the underlying simulation at long last (i.e. career elements and progression rewards).

From now on I'll be working on the missions' system itself but I wanted some context first.
Safe stars

[Cody]

Hey DC - is it ten years now?

[D.C.Elington]

Posted by: @cody
Hey DC - is it ten years now?

Hello captain! Yes the game has an FTL jump but personally I'm traveling the Infinite Coding Universe in a row boat ‍

[Pinback]

Awesome work as ever DC, look forward to seeing the finished game.

[classyk]

I love what I'm seeing! Have you considered setting up a steam page? It can look intimidating but is worth it if you are releasing it on PC. The earlier a page gets put up the longer it has to accumulate wishlists (which are really useful when you launch), even if you're years away from release.

[D.C.Elington]

@classyk I'll have to inquire about this indeed. One topic in particular is whether I can do this as an individual and then transfer it to the company I'll need to set up for the release

[D.C.Elington]

Hello SSC!
Here's the latest dev log featuring the missions' system and the associated UI:

To sum-up the goal is to have an internal module generating "orbital police" tasks as a base for the career progression, and also to enable more complex missions and campaigns to be designed externally and then imported into the game.
Fly safe