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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#31
So, finally got a chance to view the update (lots of work today so I couldn't see it earlier).

First, I understand what the others mean by jumping through the UI pretty fast, but I actually had no problem following it.

I loved seeing the economy come alive. The graphs more in-tune with what I see on the stock market. I enjoyed the improvement.

Seeing ships interact with each other on more than a rudimentary level? Awesome!

Graphics of course were superb. :thumbup:

Oh and, I noticed the eugenics hidden in there (Sorry little guy, you're ugly <kaboom>). :lol:
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Early Spring - 1055: Well, I made it to Boatmurdered, and my initial impressions can be set forth in three words: What. The. F*ck.
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#36
JoshParnell wrote:
Groufac wrote:But on another side, I found the update really hard to follow, especially visually since the interface was popping several windows 10 times a second :shock:
:oops: Sorry...that UI is very fast to use when you learn it :geek: Hopefully it will be a good thing for the player (but not for viewers :ghost: )
On this note...

I was actually thinking while I was watching all that fast navigation that it would be kind of neat if upper menus got stacked behind the main view the deeper you got into a directory. Like, either the windows could get pushed to the corner and stacked in a 2D way... OR going after a 3D look, they could fall into the background and off to the side, as if our camera is moving backwards through a doughnut shaped tunnel. Then when we go back up the directory, we zoom back into the past menus, bringing them into focus.

Just some friendly suggestions~
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#38
Amazing update Josh! Just a little thing that I noticed. For the ask/bid interface, when it's complete, will we be able to type in amounts, instead of having to press buttons to increase the ask/bid amounts? I know it's a small thing, but it seems more convenient that way.
Brian makes Art! Check out http://bk-creations.deviantart.com/ for more information! Suggestions are appreciated!

In Josh we trust.
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#39
First watch complete... oh, yeah. :)

IT LIVES.

It is fantastic watching NPCs moving about, doing things, and doing them because they have a goal, they know generally how to achieve that goal, but they're able to respond to dynamically changing conditions in the world to adapt and find different ways to achieve their goal.

One thing I didn't notice ("that was the curious thing") was no mention of executives outside the working area, deciding what the worker NPCs should do. I wonder what they might be getting up to...?

The shinies were shinier, and that is excellent. :) The new station looks more stationish, certainly. And it did look like the stars were less blinky, which I appreciate.

If I had anything like a concern, it would be that project seem to be designed to fall into specific categories (research, mine, piracy, etc.), rather than being free-form. I understand this will be extended; it's more a question of why there are hard categories of project at all, rather than using tags. Will players be able to define their own kinds of projects?

Just some early thoughts -- overall, this update video is another wonderful leap forward.
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#40
CodeDecoded wrote:Amazing update Josh! Just a little thing that I noticed. For the ask/bid interface, when it's complete, will we be able to type in amounts, instead of having to press buttons to increase the ask/bid amounts? I know it's a small thing, but it seems more convenient that way.
Of course, that's why I noted that it was a really rough developer menu. When you see things like that that are obviously extremely inconvenient, you should just assume that they are not going to be left that way ;) :D
Flatfingers wrote:First watch complete... oh, yeah. :)

IT LIVES.

It is fantastic watching NPCs moving about, doing things, and doing them because they have a goal, they know generally how to achieve that goal, but they're able to respond to dynamically changing conditions in the world to adapt and find different ways to achieve their goal.

One thing I didn't notice ("that was the curious thing") was no mention of executives outside the working area, deciding what the worker NPCs should do. I wonder what they might be getting up to...?

The shinies were shinier, and that is excellent. :) The new station looks more stationish, certainly. And it did look like the stars were less blinky, which I appreciate.

If I had anything like a concern, it would be that project seem to be designed to fall into specific categories (research, mine, piracy, etc.), rather than being free-form. I understand this will be extended; it's more a question of why there are hard categories of project at all, rather than using tags. Will players be able to define their own kinds of projects?

Just some early thoughts -- overall, this update video is another wonderful leap forward.
Yayy :clap:

AI players are now able to allocate their own ships to projects, unlike in the last video - so this time the 'executives' are working alongside the workers. Most of the executives were in bigger ships.

Projects are organized into hard categories because there is a one-to-one mapping between a type of project, a major gameplay mechanic, and an AI implementation of a task. So you can't create a new type of project, because that would require creating a new game mechanic as well as implementing the AI for it. E.g., "Farming" is not a project that we can create because there is no way to cultivate crops in LT at the moment, nor does the AI understand that concept :ghost: It is certainly possible to customize the parameters of a project to your liking, as well as to create groups of projects that work together as a composite to achieve a complex goal. Still, at the end of the day everything needs to be broken down into existing units of gameplay :)

But I'm curious what you had in mind in terms of 'free-form' project?
“Whether you think you can, or you think you can't--you're right.” ~ Henry Ford
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#41
JoshParnell wrote: Projects are organized into hard categories because there is a one-to-one mapping between a type of project, a major gameplay mechanic, and an AI implementation of a task. So you can't create a new type of project, because that would require creating a new game mechanic as well as implementing the AI for it. E.g., "Farming" is not a project that we can create because there is no way to cultivate crops in LT at the moment, nor does the AI understand that concept :ghost: It is certainly possible to customize the parameters of a project to your liking, as well as to create groups of projects that work together as a composite to achieve a complex goal. Still, at the end of the day everything needs to be broken down into existing units of gameplay :)

But I'm curious what you had in mind in terms of 'free-form' project?
I'm going to guess that he means that in order for the player to assign any thinkable task to the AI certain commands need to be available. For instance, if we had the following commands to apply to the NPCs that we own, I think we would be able to create free-form projects for the AI to execute.

The list of commands are transport, attack, defend, build, follow, mine, siphon, and patrol. These commands could be defined and matched together so that the user would be able to achieve free form projects of varying complexity.
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#42
BFett wrote:The list of commands are transport, attack, defend, build, follow, mine, siphon, and patrol. These commands could be defined and matched together so that the user would be able to achieve free form projects of varying complexity.
Not sure that's what he means...as those are already represented as project types :think: How would it be different?

"Matched together" suggests that you either want to perform multiple actions in parallel with different units (which is equivalent to what already exists), or perform multiple actions in serial. Does it really make sense to do the latter, though? I don't see a use case for being able to define a sequence of high-level operations to be performed by the same unit. IMO it makes more sense for every unit to be allocated 'atomically' to a particular high-level task, and to create multi-stage operations, we use multiple units allocated to different projects.
“Whether you think you can, or you think you can't--you're right.” ~ Henry Ford
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#43
JoshParnell wrote:"Matched together" suggests that you either want to perform multiple actions in parallel with different units (which is equivalent to what already exists), or perform multiple actions in serial. Does it really make sense to do the latter, though?
I hope we can still serially chain relatively low-level actions, though, as in Command Stacking. This would be necessary if, as Flatfingers proposes, I wasn't able to maintain instantaneous communication with my subordinates, or if I wanted them to pull off some complex task without me having to constantly monitor them.
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#44
ThymineC wrote:
JoshParnell wrote:"Matched together" suggests that you either want to perform multiple actions in parallel with different units (which is equivalent to what already exists), or perform multiple actions in serial. Does it really make sense to do the latter, though?
I hope we can still serially chain relatively low-level actions, though, as in Command Stacking. This would be necessary if, as Flatfingers proposes, I wasn't able to maintain instantaneous communication with my subordinates, or if I wanted them to pull off some complex task without me having to constantly monitor them.
Yes, absolutely. But I consider this different from a project allocation - it is not a continuous high-level task, just a traditional series of commands. Definitely still something you can do :)
“Whether you think you can, or you think you can't--you're right.” ~ Henry Ford
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Re: Development Update #16: April 2014

#45
JoshParnell wrote:
ThymineC wrote:
JoshParnell wrote:"Matched together" suggests that you either want to perform multiple actions in parallel with different units (which is equivalent to what already exists), or perform multiple actions in serial. Does it really make sense to do the latter, though?
I hope we can still serially chain relatively low-level actions, though, as in Command Stacking. This would be necessary if, as Flatfingers proposes, I wasn't able to maintain instantaneous communication with my subordinates, or if I wanted them to pull off some complex task without me having to constantly monitor them.
Yes, absolutely. But I consider this different from a project allocation - it is not a continuous high-level task, just a traditional series of commands. Definitely still something you can do :)
Awesome. :thumbup:

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