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A guilty pleasure request: Engine noises. Sooooo cool it would be to fly a small fighter off the flatdeck into battle, drop trou and turn back- all the while hearing ships passing by with full doppler as a low rumble quietly starts in the background, becomming overpowering as you fly by the engines of the carrier.
Deep regrets for the grammar... Not feeling well.
I was just looking at that same segement in the nova bible and saw something which gave me another wish:
For the sake of all that is good, raise the max shots on screen to something reasonable. Heck Ares which is older than Nova can do 512 on screen at once...
Now I've got to go make a "fun" weapon compromise for Aftermath...
Ragashingo, on Feb 4 2006, 05:11 PM, said:
Yeah, and Ships in system and the max escorts as well.
In general the EV3 engine supports a- to our modern eyes- ridiculously low max numbers of anything. Compared to the first two engines, yes it is superlative. The ideal engine would not have max numbers, I think. Of anything.
I got an idea. A new resource: the stän resource, or stellar object animation. It would handle animated stellars, smoke and sparks (if sparks and smoke for damaged vessels is implemented), weapon exit points, weapon sprites, shield glows (stellars would have armor and shields just like ships), etc. for spöbs.
Oh yeah, and sound for systems, like planets in EVN. You could have simple background noise, or music.
This post has been edited by The CrimpMaster : 05 February 2006 - 01:50 AM
Hmm let's see:
Escorts can "disable" targeted ships.
Offer assist when player boards a disabled ship. This way you are not always doing something bad when you board a ship. Infact it may raise brownie points if you "offer assist" to crippled government ships.
Escorts can repair a player's ship when disabled.
Spöb behaving ships (perhaps tag it on to përs resource). AI ships when hailed or boarded can sell outfit items, commodities, or have an available mission computer.
Star streak option in the preference. This makes starscape streak when a player's ship enters warp.
Dimensional jump ability. Instead of animation of ships warping, it animates ships folding into space. Ideal for whoever wants to make a Robotech TC.
Support for animation in every aspect of the game.
A banking system (I'm sure many would love that).
Alternate profile pics in ship hailing dialogs.
Real retrothrusters for once. Something that you would experience when playing Ares.
Sub-spöbs (maybe it's a bit too much work to create additional resources for it).
Forced events and triggers when player is disabled and boarded. These can range to anything like activating missions, or other resource types.
Random malfunction when player sustain heavy damage, kind of like the way the player's ship behaved in Lunatic Fringe, but maybe not too extreme.
Players can organize fleet/squdron formation.
Add armor repair in plunder dialog box.
Allow përs ships to be more involved in missions rather than just offering them when boarded or hailed.
Players can disable any outfits they have installed in their ships.
Escort management and possibly other things can be done while being on the planet. (i.e. I can opt to sell my escort while I'm on the planet)
Have 2nd triggered weapons be assigned up to ten keyboard buttons. Defaults like most FPS games would be arranged from Keypad 0 through Keypad 9.
Support speech recognition for escort command, if possible.
Outfits that repair ships when disabled may require "Materials" of sort to work with inorder to make the repair job. It's much like certain weapons requiring ammos to fire.
If mission involves only one ship, prompt a search for a particular ship in the shďp resource rather than having to waste a düde resource just for that.
Settings for auxilary dudes and main dudes in missions should be equal.
Add more anomolies rather than just asteroids, such as comets that come and streak in a system, or solar flares. And that all anomolies have the option to whether or not damage any ships in the system.
Players can call for fleet back-up wherever available.
More flexible changes with düde ships and spöbs when mission triggers changes bits.
Player does not lose brownie points with government when using an escape pod after losing a ship.
Habited spöbs doesn't require a mission computer to be present all the time.
Customize greetings of spöbs for each government, much like ships have.
Uninhabited spöbs can trigger missions (if that hasn't been done so)
Transparency support for interface designs. (i.e. shield bars can overlap armor bars)
Organizing missions in MissionBBS computers, players can organize them via names, payment, what government works for, etc.
Sets of different warp sounds.
Escort ships can take off before players do, just like EV: Override.
Derelict vessels have 33% or 10% armor left instead of 100% shield.
Derelict vessels can be captured for escort.
Have governments that do not capture ships for escorts.
Events other than escort leaving due to lack of money can also be triggered while in space flight, such as mission pop-ups. (though mission pop-ups could be annoying like in the internet LOL)
Players can leave mission-related cargo items in ships, and not just in spöbs. (good for wanting to transfer things to other ships)
Players can sell outfit items directly to other ships, or trade things, instead of having to do it at any given spöbs.
Make anomolies collidable.
Anomolies can be affected by spöb gravity, even collide into them, and perhaps cause damage as well.
Triggers that can force players to land on spöbs.
A jettison dialog box for players to dump more things than just items in cargo hold.
Weapons can also affected by gravitational forces.
An outfit service that allows a player to change the name of their ship
A downgrade option
Color code certain information in interfaces and dialog boxes. (i.e. active spöbs can be labelled in blue, or red depending upon the player's record, uninhabited spöbs are in grey, and hostile spöbs are labelled in dark grey)
"Extra Outfit" dialog box is organized in a similar fashion as one would see in a real outfitter dialog box at any given spöbs.
Support for styles in desc resource such as bold, italics, underline, etc. and maybe even color
Spöbs whether uninhabited or not, can become invisible, both in radar and in the map registry.
Escorts equipped with mining outfits can help player scoop up asteroid debris.
Escorts with warship and interceptor A.I. should at least contribute cargo space just as freighters do.
Systems can have background images, like any galactic maps. (i.e. just as a galactic maps can include images of nebulas, the system can have the same ability, if one wanted to have a sun in the background.)
Cargo hold and mass tonage are more organized in the interface. (it would allow players to know offhand the amount of cargo space they have amongst the fleet of escorts.)
Support pop-up menus through all aspects of the game.
Automatic map route charter. How the routes are planned are based on many variables the player can choose from.
A search engine for specific spöbs, which would then point to whatever system it's located in.
Players can replay mission descs at any given time.
A visual mission timer. Also, timing is activated or disabled when a player boards a mission-related ship, or lands at designated destination spöb.
Sub-sprite animations (ideal for making side-winding missiles)
Gross cargo space and mass tonnage when looking up ship stats in shipyards.
Healing beam.
Spöbs that can actually cloak if provoked.
Spöb sprites that can face targets when attacking it.
Background in systems can change color at random. (cool if you wanna make the player think they're on acid )
Background ambient sounds in systems.
Players can make offer to other ships when in distress, not just AIs.
Ships themselves can collide, possibly even cause damages.
Add medium dots in radar to represent medium-sized vessel. Also include more than one shapes to represent types of ships, just like in Ares.
Add streaking animation effects to ships when warping/folding in or out of systems.
Wormhole animation triggers when player's ship approaches its vicinity, not just having to invoke it manually.
A button in outfitters to "Sell All" outfit items and weapons all at once, as well as a "Buy All" button of certain individual items the player is able to get a hold of.
Repairing ship missions can show ships active instead of disabled.
Bring back ship AI's ability to retain disabled fighters, and allow ships to capture fighters to add to their fighter bays.
Players can actually disengage warp drive, or space folding. (I always wanted to do that)
Overheating bar can serve to make weapons lose damage effect, or make outfit item less effective overtime. Possibly some may cause the ship to even explode.
Outfit items that can make a player's ship repulse or attract other ships and/or anomolies in space.
Arrows could be implimented in radar and visual screen to point the player to the distant targeted vessels or spöbs.
Government radar mode. A mode switch in radar visual that displays government icons of ships.
Various target blip animation in radar similar to Ares to indicate a vessel's condition.
Shield and armor hitpoint graphic bars displayed in ship targeting system interface.
A setting to designate ships as organic creatures.
Weapon fire shoots right through targets.
Projectiles will seek out another nearby hostile target if initial target gets destroyed.
Ships will not drift waiting for its target to completely explode.
Captured escort fighters can be stored in a corresponding bay when a player buys one.
Weapons that can shoot out visual decoy to fool AI ships, just like in Ares.
Fighter bays can launch infinite fighters.
Factory outfits to produce ammos or fighters.
Outfits to disguise your own ship in all manners.
Leech weapons to extract various things like, shield, armor, or fuel.
Include damaging animation including sounds, such as smoke eletrical lighting, sparks, and fire to spew out of ships. You could even make ships bleed.
Like Terran buildings from Starcraft, severely damaged ships and spöbs can lose hitpoint overtime until it dies.
Color code numbers for hitpoints, energy level, ammo stash, and other places that could be needed.
Add a "put in kart" feature when buying things so players can make out estimate of costs.
Captured përs ships retain all settings when used as escorts or as the player's ship. In trading ship during capture, original player's ship will retain all of its settings as well.
Weapons do not invoke targeted ships.
Spellcasting weapons.
Escorts can "protect" mission-related ships. (OMG I made it to 100 )
Weapon fire can cause ricochette splash damage. (i.e. Mutalisk attacks from Starcraft)
AI ships of all types, can jettison cargos as well.
Disabling weapon can affect other functions of ships not just in maneuverability. Things like a ship's firing rate and radar systems. (think of those parasitic globs from Ares)
Contageous disease, meaning one ship gets close to an infected ship, it will begin to have similar symtopms.
AI ships can no longer warp into directions where hyperlinks do not exist.
Spöbs and system can classify information from player's map (even when landing on those spöbs) unless given a declassifying outfit item.
Hostile invoker, so players can have AI ships attack them. Good for taking hits for mission-related ships, or if you don't want the ship you intend to plunder to leave the system.
Shield and armor are partially restored when landing on spöbs. How much is restored depends which spöbs are landed upon. Some may even charge for the repair service as well.
Add various shapes to represent certain conditions of systems in the galaxy map.
Systems that can be reached only via warp, dimensional folding, or accepting mission that wisks them there.
Calculated stats of various things in the galaxy map when planning a route.
A detailed layout information of player's income and debt. (Possibly this information would be integrated in the banking system.)
Spöb does not always become hostile when released from servitude.
Spöb can be renamed when dominated, but retains its original name when released from servitude.
Inhabited spöbs can be landed as though they were uninhabited. This feature can be also be used when a mission requires the player to land in a hostile spöb.
When retrieving items from more than one disabled ships in missions, the total amount increases gradually when players goes from one ship to another.
Players can target themselves and see in the ship's targeting system to see how other AI ships view them.
Players can choose which government label to wear in their ship's transponder based on whatever rank is available given to them.
Wormhole ships and weapon.
AI ships can repair their escorts.
Government ships will not shoot freighter AI ships of enemy governments.They will also ignore disabled AI ships of enemy government, nor will they make them primary targets.
Ships will offer assistance to disabled player, and also to other ships. This can also be used to trigger missions and events as well.
Hyperjump fuel can be issued as a reward for completing missions.
Stellar sprites (or parts of) that can overlap all ships.
Spöbs that can only be boarded and not landed upon.
Ships can park over uninhabited spöbs.
Ships disappear when entering spöbs.
Outfits that allow players to land on hostile environmental or unstable spöbs.
Escape pods can be affected by system variables like gravitational pull or anomolies. They can be destroyed by ships and spöbs. Finally, they can be subjected to events and mission triggers.
Randomize chances that a player (or a ship) is killed when setting off self-destruct mechanisms of disabled vessels.
Mission-related ships whos behavior settings are set to "normal", "attack player", and "protect player" will always jump in any system if following the player, but never in the initial system.
Tractor beams that can pull players to spöbs or ships, while repulsor beams can push players from targets as well.
Ships recoil when firing weapon (has this been done before?)
Anomolies and spöbs can travel or drift into wormholes.
A map showing all hypergate routes.
Spöbs can also be affected by gravity.
A secondary klaxxon to alert player when their ship is coming close to being disabled or destroyed.
When selecting an outfit a player has on their ship, it could show on the map where they are sold.
Add icons or somekind of visual graphics in the rank dialog box.
More weapon side-effects not just ionization, such as slowing firing rate, hamper sensors, gradually eat away hitpoints of shields and armor. Side-effects may even have their own custom sprites not just colorizing targeted ships.
More mini-games at available spaceport bars.
Spöbs can have more than one weapon in their arsenal, and limited ammo.
When jumping into systems, not all ships will have 100% shield and armor all the time, this goes for spöbs as well.
Mission reward or failure can damage a player's ship when given certain conditions.
An outfit that allows better chance to board the ship without having the trouble just to align parallel to it.
Spöbs or ship blips that blink in radar, indicating that it might be mission related or w/e, same for systems in the galaxy map.
Shields that can actually reflect off weapon fire and projectiles.
When retrieving items from (or leaving them in) mission-related ships, players can dock with it instead of disabling it.
Missions are available when a player has or hasn't explored a particular system or has or has not landed on a particular spöb.
Mission-related cargo can affect a player's ship's performance, such as maneuverability, shield recharge rate, or any outfitting-function side-effects. (150 and still going)
Running lights can alternate or phase in a pattern like Cylon lights, so one wouldn't have to create those effects the hardway.
Plug-in extension manager.
Quick control preference panel during game play.
More hot-keys for variable preference changes such as volume and brightness.
Players can exit to main menu while their ship explodes, and also if they are on a spöb.
Auxilary commodities (junk resources) are also listed in the galaxy map dialog box, including spaceport bars, and mission computers.
Landing charges are labelled in spöb hailing dialog box.
Foreground nebula clouds.
Systems can have random clusters of stars in the background, ranging from having no stars to big friggin clusters of stars.
Ships can beg for mercy from players when hailing them or being hailed by them (a feaure that was disabled in the first 2 EV games).
Players can tow ships to spöbs or to other ships and vice versa.
Outfit items that can hide illegal cargo holds or other items and weapons. (has this been done before?)
Missions that can make players revive mission-related derelict or disabled ships, or even spöbs for that matter.
Ships can be disabled via hailing or "docking" with it.
Përs ships that offer to transfer cargo items in offering mission may require to dock with the player's ship to transfer the cargo, instead of having to say in the accepted desc that they "sent pods to transfer the cargo to <PN>'s ship".
Background images in the galaxy map can be affected by visbits.
Players can plunder spöbs, and perhaps vice versa.
Have more negative values be applied throughout the aspect of the game. (i.e. landing charges can actually pay players to land on their spöbs.)
Alternate pics for spöb hailing dialog box.
Escorts can trigger missions and events.
Spöbs can be assigned as escorts.
Spöbs can be dominated, released from servitude, or be destroyed through missions.
Spöbs can gain independence from player's dominance at any given time.
Players can land on hostile spöbs, but are denied access to certain places and services.
A spöb's status can trigger missions and events, even if a player does not land on them.
Systems have their own gravitational well settings.
Ships can plunder player's mission-related cargo holds.
Mission can partially or over reward or punish players depending if that player has brought partially the amount of designated cargo items, or exceeded the amount.
Random inflation and deflation of all things purchasable in the game.
Players can sell/buy/lease escorts (ships or spöbs) to other ships or spöbs.
Quick pause during game play.
Some weapons may not disappear from indicator and may play an empty-trigger sound effect when it runs out of ammo. Players could then choose to have that weapon disabled from the choice menu list.
Make two versions of defense mode in the escort commands. The offense mode is the current command used in Nova. The defense mode is similar, only the difference is that when a hostile unit approaches the vicinity of the player's ship, the escorts will not utilize all their weaons in their arsenals, instead they will use weapons that they will normally use in "formation mode". This feature could be applied to "protect target" mode as well.
Escorts can help capture targeted ships or spöbs for player, and can also assigned as sub-escorts. Players can have the ability to sell sub-escorts or have it released with the escort when selling or releasing that escort ship.
Escort ships can repair other escorts, or can be commanded to do so.
Escorts can go out on an all-out suicide mode (or commanded to do so) if player is disabled.
Escort menu has it's own dialog box of commands and is integrated in the main player dialog box.
Players can command individual escorts to dump certain cargo holds.
Escorts can retrieve player's escape pod.
Escorts may choose to remain with the player if the player escapes in a fighter.
A buy-out offer option in escort dialog box, and is negotiable. Buyouts can include giving or taking commodities, outfits, and such, not just in credits.
Released escorts can retain its original transponder label or inherit one of the player's based on available ranks the player has.
Solo-missions can detain escorts until player meets certain conditions stated by the mission parameter.
Players can be forced to fly a certain ship for certain missions and may regain their original ship when meeting certain conditions stated by the mission parameter.
Outfits that offer weapon and outfit upgrades for whatever is currently owned by the player.
Add charity for players to donate funds to. The results could trigger events and missions.
Mining anomolies can add fuel or energy to the player's ship.
Ships can be seen jettison things at random behavior (like jettison garbage before warping out. Jettisoned items can be salvaged by the player, their escorts, or other ships or spöbs.
Certain items, weapons, or conditions in player's ship may produce waste. Waste can also lead to variable side-effects as well.
Jettisoned waste or cargo items can trigger events and missions. (OMG, I hit the 200 mark!)
More to come, when I can think of some more.
This post has been edited by Coraxus : 21 February 2006 - 06:38 PM
Paired weapons. This would be a field in the wëap resource that would contain the RID of a second weapon that will be fired whenever the first one is fired (or created via submunition). The number of times this little feature would have allowed me to create some really great weapons, as well as work-arounds to bugs, is rather incredible.
As other people have mentioned, control over basic game constants would be nice. Simply do for them in EV4 what EV3 did for almost all of the fundamental game strings: move them out of the engine, and into a seperate, editable resource.
And, of course, a single format for Mac and Windows , for all files.
Hudson, on Feb 4 2006, 08:38 AM, said:
I wish it to be noted that with a clearly defined brief and with the right developers, there is little that can not be achieved by a 3D game engine.View Post
Yes, but you can't do it with ClarisWorks, and for some things, it takes a very good developer (read: someone who is unlikely to be available for your project) to create the proper effect. At least leave sprite-based graphics support in the game.
Qaanol, on Feb 4 2006, 08:27 AM, said:
Incidentally, Edwards, when you changed that one thing, did you check to see whether that other thing was still a part of the thing you changed?View Post
Yes. I believe I told you in the other other thing. :ninja:
Edwards
Thread Outcome Prediction: (Mat Burch) says: Then write the god-damn game yourself!
Edwards, on Feb 4 2006, 08:38 PM, said:
And, of course, a single format for Mac and Windows , for all files. View Post
coughmpqandstormcough
Breaking away from the resource fork idea would probably be a very good idea. Not only, as said before because of file size issues, but you could do some interesting things with a new format. Dropping the "indexing starts at 128" deal comes to mind. And also...
Imagine a system on the borders of two hostile governments, constantly taken and retaken by both, and sometimes in complete anarchy. Just for those states, you need three or more resources for that one system.
Instead of making three seperate resources, set up the engine and format to allow you to make one system, and then, in that one system, add states with switches to toggle them on/off. For the example above you'd have the default/base state with one gov, then another state containing data that would overwrite corresponding fields in default when it's "on", and a third doing the same for the anarchy state.
Do the same for most, if not all resources, and the "significant planets ignored" mission problem can be convieniently obliterated, because you wouldn't ever need multiple ID numbers for one planet.
Ship classes would work nearly the same way. The starbridge could be collapsed into one resource with a default state, and each class/modification would overwrite the relevant portions of the base data, including name and graphics. Never have to go hunting for every class of a ship to make a basic change. For ships at least, relative stats come to mind as well. Instead of entering new absolute values for a more (or less) powerful class, instead enter the difference. If you ever change the base class, any dependant classes include that change in their data as well.
All of this would react nicely with a scripting capabilty, because you could reference each very simply with some sort of combination of dot or array notation. Especially since the OnEvent notation seems inadequate for this. For example: ship(85).subtype(0) would be the 86th the ship model in the game and the default stats. syst(2).subtype(2) would be the third system and the third state.
Scripting could be given read-only access though that method to the data behind the ships. (Probably don't want to give it write access, unless pilot files want to store the entire universe.)
Yes, but you can't do it with ClarisWorks, and for some things, it takes a very good developer (read: someone who is unlikely to be available for your project) to create the proper effect. At least leave sprite-based graphics support in the game. View Post
Seconded. Though, 2D graphics would stand out like a red-headed stepchild in a sea of default scenario 3D. You'd have the same problem as now with scenario graphics being such a high quality that any sort of TC would be forced to match or exceed them to even begin to look decent.
Actually, that'd probably be true regardless.
Solution: EV$ graphics use, uh... SNES quality stuff. Yeah. (edit: misspelling EV4 as EV$: priceless )
Yes. I believe I told you in the other other thing. :ninja: View Post
za...?
This post has been edited by Artanis : 05 February 2006 - 02:24 AM
omg multiplayer?
orcaloverbri9, on Feb 2 2006, 04:09 PM, said:
- If you say multiplayer or 3D, I will eat you. I'm serious. View Post
I'll take that chance. All these ideas are wonderful, but and ev4 that is not 3d and multiplayer will be a major dissappointment. Sorry that is the fact. All these small little improvements can't even come close to those two behemoths. So at the risk of being eaten ( :ninja: ) I will post it.
Other requests: In planet mode actually shops and such. Real landing. And yes a bank option would be nice. Perhaps an in ship mode as well.
Puts on repellent at off wall requests
Gets out numb chucks
Okay I'm ready.
This post has been edited by Swithich : 05 February 2006 - 05:58 AM
Swithich, on Feb 5 2006, 04:57 AM, said:
Okay I'm ready. View Post
An EV4 that is 3D and multiplayer is no EV4.
yeah, if you made EV 3D, it wouldn't be EV, it would be Wing Commander: Privateer.
A multiplayer mode- as in players connected over a network playing the game hosted on one machine, a la mulciplayer Warcraft or Starcraft I can see being worthwhile, effectively a very expansive duel mode. Perhaps special multiplayer missions could be written, custom levels etc, but when you start going on to the MMORPG trip is when it stops being EV.
3D I still see no reason for. Perhaps various scales of renders but not true 3d.
Makin it 3D would definately make it lose some of its feel. It would make it seem too complex. The EV series has a nice simplicity in gameplay mostly because it's just 2D. Making it 3D would just make it like any other modern game.
THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR MULTIPLAYER
The only multiplayer I really want is the ability to just fight other players. I could care less about the rest of the game being multiplayer.
How about reanbling the ability to steal ammo for weapons you don't own? It makes sense that you could just nab a few missles and dump them in your cargo bay or something.
Also, in the outfitters, when an outfit uses cargo space, display that just like the mass requirements.
Say for the Mass Retool...
Mass: -10 tons Free: 30 tons Cargo: 12 tons Free: 15 tons
ThrawnRocks, on Feb 5 2006, 01:02 PM, said:
Makin it 3D would definately make it lose some of its feel. It would make it seem too complex. The EV series has a nice simplicity in gameplay mostly because it's just 2D. Making it 3D would just make it like any other modern game. View Post
I'd still like to see it with a 3D engine instead of sprites. Take RTS's. they used to be sprite based (look at Age of Kings, fun game) but now use 3D engines (C&C, Emprie at War etc.
True. Using a 3D engine while making sure the game is not true 3D could be good.
Ditch Resource Forks. Completely. This isn't 1984; we can do better. XML would be a start
Other requests: In planet mode actually shops and such. Real landing. And yes a bank option would be nice. Perhaps an in ship mode as well. View Post
This would have to be my no. 1 request -- having a separate "game mode" where you move your character around and do stuff, basically turning into an RPG-like interface whenever you landed (or on your ship, say, like when you board or get boarded).
Certainly this would be difficult to implement well, and would take a lot of work. And yes, it's definitely something you (I) should program yourself (myself). But it would just make the game that much more immersive, and really give developers a lot more possibilities for plot development.
Also, about that whole idea of using 3D to render ships -- I don't think I've ever seen that done particularly well. Perhaps it's just because the instances I've seen are terrible (has anyone played Starports GE?), but it seems to me that you get issues with the fact that you have to render stuff in realtime so you take a hit in the number of polygons a ship model can have. But maybe it is just me.
Firebird, on Feb 5 2006, 12:20 PM, said:
That would be a lot of work for developers. If that is done, it should be optional. Even then, I wouldn't like it for standard Nova. I just wouldn't be EV anymore, to me.