Roadmaps, Donuts, and Lua Features
When I built the EV Galaxy Generator, initially I just thought of it as a tool for myself, to help me build Orion Skies more efficiently. It was only partway through the process of creating it that I realized that, by adding a few Settings options, I could release it publicly for other people, for whom it could be just as useful in their TC projects.
Over the past few weeks, I've been thinking about the path ahead to building Orion Skies, and trying to identify what other tools & sub-plug-ins I can release along the way. This thinking has ultimately led to the creation of a tentative road-map from now to Orion Skies, with a variety of smaller releases along the way.
This thinking will inevitably change over time, in part because I don't yet fully know what will be possible on the Cosmic Frontier engine, and in part because my ideas will shift as I give more thought to all of this. With that said, below is a quick summary of where my thinking currently stands:
3D Work
As I wait for Cosmic Frontier to release, I am focusing on 3D work. I'll need a number of assets for Orion Skies -- ships, outfits, planets, landing graphics, etc.
Currently I am working my way through a number of Blender tutorials. I had dabbled in Strata3D many years ago for an Ares project, but my skills were quite limited. So, before I start creating actual assets, I want to develop a strong skills foundation on a modern 3D platform.
Here's a short donut video I made recently in Blender:
Once I feel like my skills are ready, I'll start working on graphics -- first, "natural" space graphics designed to fit with the Galaxy Generator's galaxies, and then the ships and other "human" space graphics for the Orion Skies scenario.Galaxy Generator
The first major milestone I am targeting is twin updates of the Galaxy Generator, to greatly streamline its use for plug-in makers:
- A graphics pack including space graphics and landing graphics for every sort of planet, star, moon, asteroid, and comet that the Galaxy Generator creates.
- A new Output tab that creates KDL code for the galaxy, which can then be loaded directly into Cosmic Frontier.
This will make it possible for TC developers to literally download the graphics pack, then download a galaxy in KDL format, and immediately launch the galaxy in-game. If they decide they don't like something about that galaxy, or if they have a new idea for how they want it laid out, they can quickly download another one and load that instead.
I'm hoping that having the Galaxy Generator developed to this level will dramatically streamline the process of creating Total Conversion plug-ins – and also streamline galaxy-expansion plug-ins, as the Galaxy Generator has Settings options designed to facilitate creating added regions of space for an existing galaxy.
Ares Adaptation
Once the Galaxy Generator is complete, I hope to create an adaptation of the classic Ambrosia game Ares on the Cosmic Frontier engine; the work for this will primarily consist of creating new game features to enable Ares-like gameplay.
For those that aren't familiar, Ares is a top-down 2D space game with similar space mechanics to the Escape Velocity series. The difference is, Ares is a tactical combat game. It has the player completing a series of combat missions to fight alien enemies and ultimately save the Earth. It focuses on dog-fighting, fleet command, utilization of key locations within each star system, and managing resources.
One of the major advances the Cosmic Frontier engine will have over the classic EV games, is the ability for modders to create new game features in a scripting language called Lua. It's impossible to know the limitations of it yet, but I am hopeful that it will be possible to use Lua to approximate many of the core Ares features, such as:
- ships that visibly land on planets, and launch from them
- asteroids arranged in actual asteroid belts, that you can bump into and interact with
- a zoom-out feature
- various AI updates, including situational awareness, dogfighting skills, and a focus on tactical objectives
- the ability to swap control with your escorts/allied ships mid-flight
- new mission-scripting options – so you could, for example, have a mission to destroy some pirate ships that have disabled a passenger liner, then rescue the crew from the liner's escape pods, then have a tractor-beam ship arrive to tow the disabled liner to a hypergate, and need to protect the tow-ship from a newly-arriving enemy force until it is able to escape with the liner – all in one flight, without landing
All of these are features that I am hoping to use in Orion Skies; as such, the bulk of the work involved in making an Ares adaptation will go directly into Orion Skies as well.
As I build these Lua features, I'll aim to release them as stand-alone plug-ins as well, for use with the Override scenario or in other modders' plug-ins.
Lua Mods for Override
There are also several stand-alone Lua game-feature mods that I am hoping to release for the Override scenario; these will also be included as part of Orion Skies.
It's possible that some of these features may end up being already built into the Cosmic Frontier engine itself by its developer snijj, in which case I won't have to build them myself; we'll see! :)
As stated previously, it's impossible to know the limitations of the Lua system yet, but here are some of the new features I would like to create if possible:
- Automatic display of outfit stats, such as weapons' damage per shot and rate of fire, or the amount of additional armor you'll get if you buy a Dospect Armor addition, etc.
- The ability to render aid to disabled vessels, if desired, rather than plundering them.
- Automated ship variants. This would simulate the AI ship captains having customized their vessels in much the same way as the player does, while also giving the player a wider variety of enemies to go up against.
Comments
Post a Comment