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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

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Author Topic: Hyperspace  (Read 54130 times)

sdmike1

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #30 on: July 26, 2013, 09:09:34 PM »

cant wait to see this in action! very cool, carry on.

phyrex

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #31 on: July 26, 2013, 10:24:24 PM »

I like the idea of a hullmod that allows slow movement if out of fuel. It would be expensive in OP and not something that is automatically tossed on, like an ITU. The Bussard Ramjet or a Solar Sail springs to mind.

there should be a hullmod that allow you to burn your personnel into fuel !
...
What ?! i dont care about those monkeys, my ship is more important. Decompose them into atoms and make fuel with it  ;D
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Darloth

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #32 on: July 27, 2013, 01:43:13 AM »

I like the way gravity wells look on the map in hyperspace. The background should be some kind of funky color though :)

Purple not funky enough for you? :)

I interpreted that comment as meaning the background (where currently you can see stars and nebulae) rather than the swirly stuff around the jump portals themselves.  The portals look great to me, but I must admit I also think the rest of the screenshots so far don't really look like they're in some extra-dimensional space.

Perhaps it looks better in motion, but if you can arrange some sort of slight purple haze that fills everywhere -except- the middle of the jump portals back to realspace, that would look good too. (I am aware this is just flat out matching what Star Control 2 did, but I didn't have any better ideas...)
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Gotcha!

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #33 on: July 27, 2013, 02:30:09 AM »

@Darloth: Alex clearly mentions that the background is a placeholder.

@Phyrex: I doubt future spaceships would run on charred flesh, burned bones and ashes. ^_^'
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DelicateTask

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #34 on: July 27, 2013, 05:58:11 AM »

the last suggestion I'd make is something EV had: if all else failed and you were really stranded, you could self-destruct your ship and launch an escape pod.  Instead of a game over, you just ended up at a non-hostile shipyard, short all of your cargo and fleet, but with a brand new shuttlecraft and your accumulated credits intact.
Hmmm... As a self-serving and slimy captain, I personally love the idea of being able to strand my fleet to save my hide. Even better if the fleet begins to explode behind me like when losing a battle.

taking your chances on who, exactly, answers the call would be very entertaining. 

For example, placing a call to lure in Pirates would be very amusing, if we were allowed to do so at will; it'd be even funnier if a friendly showed up and said something like, "Hey, you guys already have plenty of fuel... why am I here, exactly?" and if a military fleet answered the call (they usually shouldn't, imo, unless there's nobody else around) and the player has fuel, then they should be pretty suspicious, perhaps even knock down player rep a bit.  After all, that kind of behavior is what a pirate would do, and it would feel appropriate to the setting.
This would be a great tie-in to the currently unused (under-used?) reputation system. Especially since the loss in reputation could be funny, a mild setback, or even result in a war depending on how strained your current relations are. Additionally, this game needs LOTS of pirate options should the player make that choice, so using distress signals at will to lure in fleets is so very pirate-y.

Building off of that, perhaps having a 'scientific' vessel such as the Apogee with its advanced sensor suite could detect if the incoming fleet is hostile, like in FTL. Also similarly good for when the situation is reversed and the player responds to a distress call, potentially preventing falling into a trap. Although this could be toned down to keep some of the risk, maybe just showing the fleet size so you know if it's less risky to approach.

there should be a hullmod that allow you to burn your personnel into fuel !
...
What ?! i dont care about those monkeys, my ship is more important. Decompose them into atoms and make fuel with it  ;D
I loved how disposable goons were in S.P.A.Z., and I hereby officially support this stupid and unlikely idea. Heck, we could create an entire in-game economy based around, er, renewable fuel.
New from the makers of Soylent Green, Mähnpower Biofuel! Have too many crewmembers? Turn the unused manpower into useful Mähnpower with our quick and easy biofuel generators. Entirely renewable!*
*Renewable resources require food, habitation, and several years wait.

If we ever get an option to split our fleet, that could provide another nice option during a fuel crisis. Leave your main fleet behind and take a single frigate to the nearest resupply station. Come back with tankers.
For the owner of a big fleet it would be a nice throwback to the beginnings of a game to have your survival depend on a single little ship once more.
The early stages of the game are so much fun, so being able to go back, even for a limited period would be refreshing. The added thrill of knowing that my fleet is on the line would help create that feeling of urgency that is so often falsely manufactured by game developers but is so much more rewarding when it occurs spontaneously out of a situation.

I really hope there is going to be a "fuel gauge" somewhere on the screen. It would get old quickly to have to check your fuel levels in the fleet screen constantly.
Same for supplies. Once we're having to keep an eye on both of those, opening the menu every three seconds is going to get old. (It already is, but running out of supplies is only mildly risky compared to the threat of an imminent crisping, which I personally imagine to be far more severe than piffling CR loss.)
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Doom101

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #35 on: July 27, 2013, 07:28:31 AM »


I really hope there is going to be a "fuel gauge" somewhere on the screen. It would get old quickly to have to check your fuel levels in the fleet screen constantly.
Same for supplies. Once we're having to keep an eye on both of those, opening the menu every three seconds is going to get old. (It already is, but running out of supplies is only mildly risky compared to the threat of an imminent crisping, which I personally imagine to be far more severe than piffling CR loss.)

i agree with the fuel gauge, although knowing how much supply you have left is solvable with just some very simple math, since the game gives you your supplies/day consumption rate just figure out how many days you have, and then just watch the days go by in the top left corner, and whenever you come out of a particularly costly fight, (as in you'll need to remax your CR, or make repairs) just check the new rate. You don't even have to be super accurate just a ballpark estimate is usually good enough.
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xenoargh

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #36 on: July 27, 2013, 07:35:08 AM »

Quote
Same for supplies. Once we're having to keep an eye on both of those, opening the menu every three seconds is going to get old. (It already is, but running out of supplies is only mildly risky compared to the threat of an imminent crisping, which I personally imagine to be far more severe than piffling CR loss.)
I agree with this, although it might be more appropriate to simply have a C.R. monitor; C.R. loss might have many causes (are your crews upset because they haven't had leave in 90 days, are they mutinous because you've just declared war on a Faction you previously had an alliance with?  Can't wait for crew to not just be disposable sources of, er, juice, but the valuable button-pushers that they're supposed to be).
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DatonKallandor

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #37 on: July 27, 2013, 09:20:20 AM »

I think optimally there'd be a way to gather your own fuel from a Star. Not stock on every ship mind you, then there'd be no danger - but either a (unlockable?) hull modifier or as a special ability for certain ship types (solar-sail-equipped fuel processors? all or some of the tanker role ships?). Hell even as a buildable structure - sort of a solar refinery that slowly produces fuel. That would also nicely start the player off in the sector economy direction - if he decides to sell his fuel.
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DelicateTask

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #38 on: July 27, 2013, 09:20:56 AM »

the game gives you your supplies/day consumption rate just figure out how many days you have, and then just watch the days go by in the top left corner, and whenever you come out of a particularly costly fight, (as in you'll need to remax your CR, or make repairs) just check the new rate. You don't even have to be super accurate just a ballpark estimate is usually good enough.
Yeah, but after a battle, you're using like 20x the usual supplies per day until everything's fixed, then the estimate changes. Also, I'm usually too busy dancing around pirate fleets to watch the calendar in the corner.

Quote from: xenoargh
it might be more appropriate to simply have a C.R. monitor; C.R. loss might have many causes
I'm pretty sure that Alex said that there would be an average CR gauge or something.
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HELMUT

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #39 on: July 27, 2013, 10:42:54 AM »

For the idea of distress call. The idea of Xenoargh seems very interesting. Its is quite a bit like the FTL system, if you ran out of fuel, you just have to activate your distress bacon and wait for someone to come. The closest one can answer the call, or not if they are busy with something else.

Then the consequences will depend on who responded to your signal.

A bunch of friendly miner giving you some free fuel to continue your journey? Traders that can sell you fuel for an absurdly high price? Pirates on the prow for some prey? Maybe the Try tachyons or the Hegemony who will react according to their relation with you (would suck to be rescued by the Hegemony SDF when you are at war with them...). Cthulhu looking for some fresh souls?

Of course, as Xeno said, you could also settle traps with fake distress signals.

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Alex

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #40 on: July 27, 2013, 11:06:01 AM »

Will there be a sort of "map" for hyperspace (by pressing TAB), or will you have no idea where you are?

There's a map.

If we ever get an option to split our fleet, that could provide another nice option during a fuel crisis. Leave your main fleet behind and take a single frigate to the nearest resupply station. Come back with tankers.
For the owner of a big fleet it would be a nice throwback to the beginnings of a game to have your survival depend on a single little ship once more.
The early stages of the game are so much fun, so being able to go back, even for a limited period would be refreshing. The added thrill of knowing that my fleet is on the line would help create that feeling of urgency that is so often falsely manufactured by game developers but is so much more rewarding when it occurs spontaneously out of a situation.

I like the sound of that.


2nd Question, can multiple hyperspace regions be created (Quasispace needs to be added as another hyperspace)?

Fairly certain you could do that, though there's only one "hyperspace", but there's not much inherently special about it.


Re: fuel, supply gauges:
Working on some campaign UI changes, actually, those'll be there.

Background:
One thing you can't see in the screenshot is it's animated - the background is slowly warping. The graphic itself is a placeholder, though; all in all not quite "done" yet.

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Silver Silence

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #41 on: July 27, 2013, 11:36:52 AM »

Warping background. I expect it to be like travelling through some sort of fluidspace where celestial entities are twisted and misshapen and lurch around at random in a sickening fashion. Kinda like everytime you enter hyperspace, your entire crew and yourself all start taking massive overdoses of LSD and everything just trips out until you leave space.

Or it could be a more boring transition thing like Mass Effect 2 where travelling from system to system while within a nebula is just a cool-looking warping transition, complete with red and blueshift.
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Kregoth

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #42 on: July 28, 2013, 11:09:43 AM »

I am sure you already thought of this, but what about being able to answer distress calls in hyperspace? It would be awesome to have the chance to save someone, or be led into a trap! It also help make hyperspace more than just moving between systems, but another avenue for things a player fleet can do.
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Reapy

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #43 on: July 28, 2013, 05:05:59 PM »

Will there be a way to estimate ranges for your fleet with the current fuel you have or will you just sort of have to watch the rate it dips as you travel? Would seem to make sense for travel between busy sectors that you would be able to factor how much fuel you need ahead of time.

Also, it might not be worth it to put too much into the out of fuel scenario. I don't see players good enough to build a large fleet making a simple mistake like not taking enough fuel for a trip. I honestly don't see it occuring too much short of your first few trips and exposure to the mechanic. It might come up if you get caught up in a chase and aren't paying attention maybe, but I see tense explorers doubling back when they are past their halfway point.

Well maybe again if you can get attacked and lose fuel tankers or something that might leave you out in the woods, but yeah, I just don't see it as something that is going to catch players often, not that it won't add tension to exploration, just the fail case probably won't happen too often.
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CrashToDesktop

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Re: Hyperspace
« Reply #44 on: July 28, 2013, 05:13:05 PM »

well, Alex did say one lightyear is about 2000 pixels on the map.  So you could plan it that way?  No idea. :P
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