Bay 12 Games Forum

Wow!  This is really interesting

Nick and I are just on the train back from a skull kissing ritual with Valve, but I wanted to comment on some of this, regarding our current plans regarding the systems you're discussing, and maybe some opportunities here.

First, regarding the genesis for the idea, it's so awesome that you guys can help us solve our problems like this.  I love game development.

We had actually *loosely* settled on a pretty nice, simple solution to the problem that is easy to implement but adds depth to the game, whereby the amount of work demanded by overseers (aka artisans, foremen, etc) of work crews is a function of the overseer's personalities.  Lazier (or more aloof, or more distracted) overseers demand less time, and so forth.  It aligns with one of the philosophies that's interesting to us with the game that the characters' personalities affect the way the game is played.  If your boss joins a cult and never shows up to work, most people will slowly stop working, except those who themselves have good work ethics, et cetera.

Regarding technology, I love the idea of creating a system where circumstances can inform characters to develop new technologies, and if we can think of a clean, simple, and robust way to actually code that, I can't see us NOT trying it, but i'm always wary of systems where we need to hand-craft the circumstances in order to make it feel reasonable from the perspective of the fiction.  We might not have to, but we'll think on it for a while

We don't have any plans for a "tech tree", because that sort of mechanism is usually an arbitrary illusion of choice in the first place, and it wouldn't really serve a function in CE that is interesting: it'd just be grindy.  Our current representation of such an idea is that somewhat random, somewhat ordained circumstances will present the player with opportunities to invest in the analysis of artifacts that the empire (or whomever) sends you, or that you dig up, or perhaps just building 800 buildings gives someone an "idea", and an event happens, sort of like a quest, with some criteria, that if completed will have some outcome on your game.

Such a system could potentially be used to perform some of the concepts that you have been discussing, but right now it's all hand-written, and thus the depth isn't really there right now (there are like 3 events), but the overhead for us to create these things might be low enough to just put in so many that you'll have an interesting time regardless... We'll just have to try it and find out

[Edit: removed]

Well, we're releasing a "thing" (not playable) within a month, and our standing plan is to do some sort of closed alpha as soon as it "feels like a game", which we're very close to, but is probably at minimum 6 weeks away. 

Hopefully that's a bit better at managing expectations than "soon"! (I can't believe I said that, I HATE it when people say that!  What have we become?!)

Puzzlemaker: Yeah, that's the idea.  The rules get complicated when you have buildings with "nodes" that are connected, as there are more cases than you'd think there would be for merging large pyramidal sections.

Sounds good guys, I'll post em up

Most recent one was an art post about our experiments with particles:

http://www.gaslampgames.com/2013/09/25/how-many-particles-can-dance-on-the-tooth-of-a-sawblade/

We will seriously consider Rezzed, but that's all I can promise.  Thanks for asking though, I love the UK, and I think I owe Introversion Mark a beer still

Also yes, vehicles are in the design phase now but I think it's likely (though not certain) that we will have some form of armored cannon vehicle.

All of our internal design notes at this point are considering a waypoint system for groups of units that are not tied to specific buildings, perhaps with timed locks to minimize the capacity for micro-management (though this is still in discussion).  I find it really interesting just how much interest the concept of "minimalism" when applied to military units is getting.  I suspect this is one of those things that we think is a great idea and we have a well-defined plan for, but until you get to play with it a bit, the idea of trusting a flawed (by-design) commander with the immediate tasks of a squad isn't something people are used to.  As ever, the game is about people and their interactions with each other and the world, and not a military strategy game.  Maybe for the next game

There will be defensive structures, and I guarantee you I have seen at least half of all the pictures of starforts that exist on the internet in doing research for the military structures in the game   That said, the benefits of star forts to repel cannon fire may or may not be pertinent, and they have some very difficult configurations from a simple logistics perspective.  If we can make them "feel right", we'll have them.  The Victorian era really straddles a strange time in terms of military tactics and composition, and of course given the setting we will be taking some creative license to it.

As mentioned I believe in the comments on the post of last week, units *will* have inventories, we're just trying to mitigate the amount of management that players require.  The old sierra games have been discussed, and we like the simulation aspects of having to create all the items, but again, ease of use comes into play here. 

We're heavily prioritizing a pull vs push -based economic system where a high level order will initiate a bunch of lower level functions, so you don't have to designate each of the 37 steps required to create a unit, while still having some smithy make the guns and some miner harvest the ore.  It's in accomplishing (or not) these minute tasks that really make the characters interesting.  There will be some capacity for a player to facilitate the ancillary tasks on their own, but that won't be the focus. 

This may also be a good time to let you guys know that the UI will be moddable.  It's all in XML files, and there will be an API for pulling data from the game.  I want the game to be easy to play for beginners.  You guys are not beginners.  If you actually want to rebuild a DF style interface over the game, barring some obvious fundamental differences in the mechanisms involved, you could probably get close.  If, on the other hand, as I suspect, you have a specific desire for some other organizational method involving a gigantic data dump on the screen, you can do that too. 

And finally, about trees: they will grow back.  In fact, our initial design involving deteriorating soil fertility given enough harvesting is still on the books, it's just a lower priority than some of the more immediate requirements. 


I've skipped over a few questions about the terrain because as soon as we got some semblance of "biome objects" into the game, we started drilling in other bits of the framework, intending to get a fully playable, emaciated, bare-bones game together before we start fleshing it out.  I could spend years simulating natural terrain, and given the chance... maybe I would.  Alas, we also need to feed our pets, they rely on us.  We are doing our best to prioritize parts of this game that further the goal of making the game about the stories the characters tell.  For now you might just have to wait and see what happens

If it has vertex shaders, you *should* be okay.