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Development & Discussion / Re: [Progress - 5th August] Tactical Operations First Look

« on: August 21, 2016, 10:51:49 AM »

I do like the pulsing idea, but this "radar" is real-time (it doesn't update with pulses) so I don't think the pulsing animation would fit.

I might darken the green to make it easier to read.

Thanks man!

I personally definitely prefer the green radar, over the black/blue. It just stands out a lot more imo, saving valuable microseconds in the heat of battle.

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Development & Discussion / Re: [Progress - 5th August] Tactical Operations First Look

« on: August 21, 2016, 10:47:19 AM »

• How did you envision the relationship between the Operatives and the Tactical Officer? Is the TO their commander? This is basically a question on how the UNION's stellar navy is structured.
  Yeah the Tactical Officer is the commander of the Operative teams, as the Chief Engineer is the commander of the Technician teams.
• Do we have a navy and an army?
  The focus of the game is on the navy, but the army will exist in the background.
• Are the Operatives a part of the navy or the army?
  Navy.
• How heavily armed are the Operatives or how heavily armed can they be?
  They are armed like a navy seal team, they are geared for covert action (rescue, sabotage, kidnapping, assassination, etc.).
• If the navy is the one flying space ships, what's the army doing? Are they the infantry on conquests, like in Starship Troopers?
  There are few habitable worlds in the Centauri system, a lot of the population live on stations of one kind or another. For that reason the army plays a support role to the navy. The navy conquers space, and the army moves in to secure help it. During the game you may have to escort army troop transports, but that is the extent of the army involvement in the game at this point.
• What about the relationship between the Operatives and the rest of the bridge crew?
  The Operatives answer directly to the Tactical Ops, though obviously the TO gets his/her orders from the Captain.
• Would some ships have additional marine platoons aboard that can be used to board other entities?
  Warships are like submarines, they are not designed with space for transporting people or cargo. However warships do regularly escort transport ships.
• How much people are there aboard a spaceship? I know it would be different per each ship, but you can probably give a rough estimate. We should have at least 2 officers for each bridge officer. The main and the night shift, so to speak. There's also the medical personnel, the cook, and what-not. Just how big are the ships, anyway?
  Frigates, which are the smallest playable ships in the game at the moment, range from 150 to 250 meters in length.
  Their compliment is usually around 15 officers, and up to 190 enlisted personnel.
  
• Are we calling the ships spaceships or starships?
  I have always gone with spaceship, to me it fits the tone of the game better. However starship is perfectly valid too.
  

Thanks for the questions, I really did enjoy answering them.

Please tell me if I'm wrong here are you saying there could be up to 150 rl players on a ship? Probably wrong its been a long week and only got back the morning.

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Development & Discussion / Re: [Progress - 3rd August] Engineering UI Completion

« on: August 21, 2016, 10:41:39 AM »

A friend has just seen the Wheel, and the first feedback he gave is as follows (translated from Croatian):
Looks complicated, but also modern. I have a feeling that some elements may be too small, so it might be bothersome trying to click on them while panicking.

Is your friend interested in space sims, was he interested in playing this game after seeing the UI?

All clickable elements are large and spaced enough for finger touches, also on larger screens everything is scaled up. I will tweak these things if play-testing shows that they are too small though.

Thanks!

Hi Mark, are you planning to allow some sort of customisation of the screens for personal preference? Perhaps re-sizeable or positional configurations? Just an Idea may be hard to implement, I am no programmer, just a game nut

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Development & Discussion / Re: Hallo! Also quick question

« on: August 21, 2016, 10:35:16 AM »

Hi all, sorry for the absence, it is festival season and I work in events so busiest time of the year for me. Love the idea of touch screen support, feel sad that I literally just sold my laptop that had a touchscreen.

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Development & Discussion / Re: Feed Back and Questions from newcomer.

« on: July 27, 2016, 05:12:51 PM »

The more you say the more excited I get for this. I will spread the word as much as I can. Feel free to bounce any ideas off me you like. Whatever content you put in I know will be for the good of the game. I will be keeping a close eye on the progress. I really cannot wait.

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Development & Discussion / Re: Feed Back and Questions from newcomer.

« on: July 26, 2016, 09:33:00 PM »

Thank you for answering my barrage of questions here is a barrage of responses.

Doing his thesis to aid the game development is dedication, shows more proof of the potential of this game due to the team.

I love the sound of the pausing mechanic, it sounds perfect. Every player is different you will never be able to cater to everybody and by giving each session the choice you have given the different play styles the game they want.

Seeing what some games modding communities have made in the past the is completely the right choice, some games modding community have made games survive decades. Not being threatened by what other can modify with your creation is the main block for some developers but knowing a different point of view will always spring knew ideas, this is how your game came about is it not? With the playing of Bridge Simulator? This is how we develop as a species. Tangent aside, very smart choice with the way you are developing this.

I cannot wait to see more artwork, I have the last my desktop already. The design of ships are stunning looking highly probable to what they could look like in the future, in my head at least.

We have created a hard sci fi universe, hard in that it is a future that is entirely possible (no fantastical elements). No aliens at this point, but perhaps in the future.
Perfect.

The universe was created long before the game, for a table top rpg I ran for friends. Pádraig has really helped to flesh it out, we have a lot of history and detail for it.
Apart from the page on the other thread will you be releasing all the lore?

The campaign will be set in the Centauri solar system, with its stars and planets.
Will there be planetary landings? If so will they be like Freelancer, where it would be through a gate type mechanic and a video (loading screen). Or will there be atmospheric entry, I think I know the answer to this already just by what I have seen already about your ambitions for this game, that is if you have planetary landings.
 
Yes, there will be two primary factions, UNION and the Centauri Alliance, plus a slew of others who can be allies, enemies or neutral. We want to create that feeling of being on a submarine during WW2, where contacts on your sensors could be anyone (not just an ally or enemy).
I can feel the suspense already, arriving at a new location to see an anomaly on the scanners, is it a friendly? Is it an enemy or is it The Heart of Gold just about to jump away with Infinite Improbability Drive?
I can remember playing Silent hunter on my Uncles PC when I was younger I loved even though I only had a vague Idea of what I was doing, I was quite young and tutorials were not really a thing.

No, players will interface with the ship through the ship's interfaces. Including the ability to walk around the ship would dramatically increase the scope of the game, and force us to simplify many elements of our design.
I am not saying that I am not disappointed that we will not be able to walk around insides of the what I can only imagine would be the most stunning, detailed and immersive ships I would have the pleasure of seeing. I can completely agree with your point of view, and this way the mechanics and the game as a whole can be so much more detailed and that makes me happy.

The Tactical Officer will have a number of away teams. These are sent on missions to achieve different goals, like gathering intelligence on a particular faction, or as part of a mission like finding out what happened to the crew of an abandoned ship. During these missions the Tactical Officer is presented with choices on how to proceed, it is part of the procedural storytelling in Universe or Nothing. We have discussed being able to use these teams as boarding parties, but we have not decided on it yet.
I did not expect this is what you meant but now that you have said it WOW, so much can be done with that. Again perfect, more a more I want this game.

Your promises to do your best is so encouraging, you have so much passion for this that every time I have called this project a game I feel like I am diminishing what you are working on.

I really appreciate all of the nice things you've been saying about UoN, we will do our best to live up to, and hopefully exceed, your expectations.
You are more than welcome the more I can do to help this game the better. Anything I can do to help please let me know.

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Development & Discussion / Re: Feed Back and Questions from newcomer.

« on: July 26, 2016, 02:47:54 PM »

On second looks I hope I have not hounded you Mark, with lots of questions, just got all excited.
Thank you for the welcome Blaze.

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Development & Discussion / Feed Back and Questions from newcomer.

« on: July 26, 2016, 01:58:35 PM »

Hi Mark and everyone.

New to the forum, having found this game and falling in love at first sight, had to come over to the forum and read every page. 

Firstly apologies if any of this has been said or asked before, if it has I could not see it.
A few bits of feedback from reading the forum.
Every image I have seen has been spectacular. The amount of polish you have already is outstanding, most of this feedback I have sent to mark on his Youtube channel.

The single player aspect looks very promising, this will have to be done well though, Pulsar is a great game in development but ruined for the single players by useless AI. I believe you can do it from what I have seen and this means not having to find a full crew for the lonely gamers out there (cough not me cough). 

In multiplayer I believe that pausing is essential and again needs to be done well, the voting between captains is a great idea, however in battle it could be abused, perhaps a voting system when not in (code red) battle. But still normal pause for single player, one of the greatest aspects of FTL is the pausing to work out your strategy.

I love the idea of the modular ship designs. This will allow the community to create some amazing designs. Something I didn't mention was how much I loved the rotating thrusters.

Integrating the modding scene in from the beginning is one of the best things you can do, IMO. The way you are going about it seems perfect too, having a base game and allowing modders to take from that. This will gain you a huge following.

The Press release looks amazing, really drew me in from the first. If you can create the artwork to go with it it will draw the world in.
Speaking of artwork the Kite Artwork looks sublime (running out of adjectives), so I don't see it being an issue.

A few questions.

What are your plans for the universe?
Will there be planets, different solar systems, different galaxies?
Will there be different factions?
Will there be a story? Whether going on in the background or the players taking part?
Will players be able to walk around the ships? If so will there be other things to consider such as player needs, food/drink? This could add a need for ship supplies and possible emergency planetary or station landing to find food or drink or meds etc.
You mentioned about away teams, will there be boarding parties onto other ships whether NPC or Other Crewed.?

Again sorry if any of this has been spoken of before.

Everything about this game has drawn me in from the get go, I cannot wait to get my hands on this. I saw you mentioned a possible crowd funder, If you do, you have one firm backer here!

I will do everything I can to help this game, I will be spreading the word everywhere I go. Please keep up the good work and I can't wait to see what comes next.

Laslon (Jon)