SpaceSimCentral

Hello all,Here's a short description of the game I'm working on. It's basically an EFS (Emperor of the Fading Suns) inspired game, with some things mixed in.
Quote:
PPB is a 4X strategy about civilization. It’s heavily inspired by Civilization and Emperor of the Fading suns. It has a time range from prehistoric times till the distant future. As such, players will firstly be confined to their continent. Then to the planet. Once they manage to invent space flight, the race for exploring space will begin. Players will have to establish colonies on the moons and planets of their solar system, and try to find the most prized resource in the home system: Element 150. Only a few deposits of it exist. Once found, interstellar travel will be entirely feasible, and the race for the galaxy can begin. There's a single planet in the galaxy which will keep producing Element 150, causing it to become a center of warfare.The galaxy is not the easiest place to survive though... Resources will eventually deplete, forcing you to expand or use the power of science to invent strange contraptions which can produce resources. Speaking of science, the entire mechanic of science in games like these is changed. Also, the cities concept is removed, making way for a much more elegant system. Anything can be designed, ranging from structures, to troops, to spacecraft and more!The intention of the game is to provide a rich 4X universe within a single match, where you’re forced to think about your decisions, as making a severe error could easily put you out of the game. The game will be 100% multiplayer oriented, with a singleplayer version later in mind. Graphics will be 2D. I intend to sell the game commercially for max. 3 years, and then open source it.
What do you think of this concept and idea? And if this were a commercial game, how much would you be willing to pay for it? I myself am looking to sell it around $10,-o7Robske

Definitely a nice concept, and have a few questions...- You mentioned that it would be multiplayer only at first with a single player version/patch later. With knowing that, how long do you estimate a match would be? Personally in the past I have always had a hard time playing any MP game that lasted over an hour and most of the time people drop out at the sign of them loosing - Would a bot take over for players that drop out of the game?- Are you keeping the game universe in our solar system? And if not how random will the game be for position and layout of land and outer space?- Will there be nukes or very destructible weapons? - Do you play on porting this to tablets? Because I think this sort of game will go over well on them and depending on the avg game session it could be great for the platform.- Are you using a homemade engine or UDK, Unity, etc...?On the cost of the game itself, $10 seems fair to me with the description that you gave.

DarkOne wrote:
Definitely a nice concept, and have a few questions...1. - You mentioned that it would be multiplayer only at first with a single player version/patch later. With knowing that, how long do you estimate a match would be? Personally in the past I have always had a hard time playing any MP game that lasted over an hour and most of the time people drop out at the sign of them loosing :)2. - Would a bot take over for players that drop out of the game?3. - Are you keeping the game universe in our solar system? And if not how random will the game be for position and layout of land and outer space?4. - Will there be nukes or very destructible weapons? :twisted:5. - Do you play on porting this to tablets? Because I think this sort of game will go over well on them and depending on the avg game session it could be great for the platform.6. - Are you using a homemade engine or UDK, Unity, etc...?On the cost of the game itself, $10 seems fair to me with the description that you gave.
I added numbers to your questions, to make answers easier to add to them.1. Multiplayer would be handled in a fashion of Space Empires IV and Stars!, so it's a sort of PBEM. So it's a sort of game you can pick up for 10 minutes, play your turn, submit the turn and leave it to rest for the rest of the day. There will be an API for services like Stars! Autohost and SEIV-PBW, allowing for automated games.2. I'm really bad at writing AI's, so I might make a rudimentary one, but I will make an API which allows players to easily write their own AI's, with endless possibilities. Ranging from evolutionary self-learning AI's to the standard scripted AI's and everything in between. It can all be made with the API.3. It won't be in our solar system, but you'll start on a fictional Earth, which has a semi-realistical landscape. And the solar systems would be random generated. The starting solar system would contain sufficient moons & planets to make it able for most civilizations to become self-sustainable in outer space.4. I'm still considering these options, but I think there would definately be a death-star like thing.5. The game will be written in C#/.NET 2.0 with SDL or SFML, still doubting which one of the 2 to use. Should be able to run on androids, macs, linux and windows.6. homemade Thanks for giving feedback! If you've got more questions, feel free to ask them.