quote: Original post by dwarfsoft

Damn, that is soooo true.. And why do all the races look humanoid?

Originally seeded by a common ancestor. Should we start a Trek Q&A in the lounge?

(Sorry, can''t help it, I''m rewatching dozens of old TNG\DS9 episodes... )



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Just waiting for the mothership...

Sorry, I didn´t want to step on any trekkie-toes there... (they can get SO mad SO fast..) I´m sure you got what I meant to say (that there are a lot of unexplored technical options/possibilites in so many sf-creations).

I just used st-examples to illustrate my point, I didn´t want to start a "Why Star Trek sucks"-thread....

Now, let´s get back on topic....

Of course you can (have to?) take some sort of artistic license, or it might just be plain boring. But IMHO most of the tv-shows (since when were we talking about tv-shows? but it´s the same for games) overdo it. At least for my taste of whats ok...

BTW: for a really good laugh watch Wing Commander the movie, i think nothing more needs to be said.

This might belong to the "best space game ever"-thread but I want to know your opinion in regards to realism:

In a space shooter (á la Wing Commander), would you find it ok to have "realistic" sounds, ie. you hear nothing but your own ship (engine sounds, weapons fire, getting hit), all the other stuff around you completely silent?

Exactly Hase... That is why we DON''T want realism... Unless you explain it by the intercom interference when there is any electrical discharge (laser fire, and explosions ).

Anyway... About trek... I only watch Voyager, occassionally. There is a bit of a resemblance between Lara Croft and 7 of 9... Not in the face though What a nice suit for a borg

-Chris Bennett of Dwarfsoft - Site:"The Philosophers'' Stone of Programming Alchemy" - IOL
The future of RPGs - Thanks to all the goblins over in our little Game Design Corner niche
          

I didn´t mean to say that no space -sfx would be bad.... Actually it might be quite interesting for a change...

I think especially multiplayerwise this could work well. Then you´d have a lot of comm-chatter and could add intereference(..) to that. Besides, if the sounds of the own spaceship were done really well it would be enough (i guess), different engine sounds, weapons fire, getting hit (or hearing little bits and pieces of debris from a big explosions clink against the cockpit canopy...)
And a silent explosion in space is very beautiful indeed...

Yeah, well, the suit is nice ... you can stop drooling now, dwarf

I think that Comm chatter would actually be really good. And the only way to know that you have been hit, is to feel the bump when you are hit. None of this ''aarrgghhh, I heard a shot fired.. better dodge'' for you mister

Oh, and I am not drooling. But I will now place my hand back on the desk ... Only joking

-Chris Bennett of Dwarfsoft - Site:"The Philosophers'' Stone of Programming Alchemy" - IOL
The future of RPGs - Thanks to all the goblins over in our little Game Design Corner niche
          

(I realize that this might also go into the best space game ever thread but i´ll put it here regardless)

while we´re at space games, what about interia (not full blown realistic, but sort of, like in I-War)? It is true that you take some of the fast-paced action away, but would it be equally interesting if you had to maneuver around for a while until you got into the position of a good shot (maybe have a kind of weapons lock-on time, so you have to keep him in your sights for a while), with bigger ships this could get more interesting...

After all, how many Kilrathi/TIE-fighters/whatever can you blast in 60 seconds? Does that number sound realistic? hardly.
If you make hitting an enemy much harder then disabling or actually killing him will become much more of an achievement.

[Battle statistics: Confirmed kills: 1 Confirmed hits: 5 Disabled: 1]

and you might want to let the badguy drift on, after you´ve taken out his engines (yes, specific damage), and mark him for salvage (after all, a space fighter must cost a lot)..

I always liked the idea of intertia. I proposed that in the Flowing Fighting System thread . Anyway... If you could manouver a fighter into place, then you could do cool things, like pop out of behind an obstacle... Basically, by flying parallel to the obstacle, you start to turn and do a reverse thrust. You finish your reverse thrust as you just appear out from behind the object... Fire a few rounds, and quickly duck back behind cover... Mmmm... Inertia

-Chris Bennett of Dwarfsoft - Site:"The Philosophers'' Stone of Programming Alchemy" - IOL
The future of RPGs - Thanks to all the goblins over in our little Game Design Corner niche
          

I''d be very careful with inertia, though. Seems to work fine for top down Asteroid-like games, and, to some extent, I-War, but if you want to see the worst way to do it go find a copy of Elite II or III. Ugh!!! It''s like fighting with lances on ice-skates (hey, an new game idea??? )

You go flailing past your enemy often, and, of course, since they''re CPU''s they calculate approach vectors and velocity perfectly. The result? You die alot, and combat is NO FUN.

If you want to make such a demand on the player, it''s only fair that they get comp systems like NASA. But then the game devolves into sim of checking and reading systems.

For further corroboration, find a copy of Microsoft Space Simulator... It''s hell to get ANYWHERE when under realistic navigational constraints.


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Just waiting for the mothership...

Yeah, the inertia thingy is only usable in a very limited way... But i think I-War did quite ok. You´re right, Elite II+III went waaay too far... You couldn´t even call that space combat any more (cf."best space game ever")..

In I-war those problems were avoided, mainly because the battle areas were not THAT big, and also because there was a cap on acceleration (you could override that, but then there was the possibility that you´d overshoot).

But the complete lack of intertia (as in most space shooters) is a bit boring...

One game that used this on a limited basis was X: The Frontier, there your speed would directly affect your turning capabilites ,which basically means that you had to waste your opponent on the first run (because turning around just took to long) or staying put (not moving at all), taking the fire and shooting him down because you could aim better... (really sucked, no fun at all).