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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#17
LindseyReid wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 9:32 pm
So we went with the option that allows for the most diversity in appearance and ease of gameplay, which is hand-wavy-technobabble-this-just-has-gravity-somehow gravity :D
That's also the option that's the most Freelancer-like. :D A correct decision, I would say.
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#18
Talvieno wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 9:47 pm
LindseyReid wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 9:32 pm
So we went with the option that allows for the most diversity in appearance and ease of gameplay, which is hand-wavy-technobabble-this-just-has-gravity-somehow gravity :D
That's also the option that's the most Freelancer-like. :D A correct decision, I would say.
You'll get no criticism from me concerning any decisions made which give me a Freelancer-like experience, Lindsey.

:shifty: Although I'm hoping that stations and ships will be much more awesome in LT. :angel:
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#19
I think your updates will become my favourite Lindsey, as they will have more visible progress to people who don't understand code or the math behind the game/engine (I'm one of those people.) :cry: I love reading Josh and Adam's updates, (and Talv does a great job of simplifying and summarising those for the non-coders such as myself,) but a lot of the time even with pictures, I have no idea what it is I'm looking at, or what they've actually accomplished in their updates. I mostly just trust it's all for the greater-LT-good.

To now have devlogs about art and visual things such as generating space stations, ships, textures, and greebles (which I've now looked up because it sounded funny) is super exciting!

I'll still not understand how you have come to create such cool, unique, and fascinating shapes, structures, and objects using only code, as that is well beyond my intelligence and skill, but I will sure appreciate the pictures more. :thumbup:

I do have one concern/question though when it comes to procedural art in games. I noticed when I first played the game Starbound, I was jumping around from planet to planet, exploring things and checking out the different biomes, aliens, and trees. The first few planets were awesome, everything was different each time and beautiful, but over time that was also what took away from the magic of it all. Everything was different so nothing was really unique in a sense. There was initially no common creature, tree, dirt colour, background, or light colour that could be used as a kind of baseline. It takes some of the magic away. Is there a way to combat that? Will there be super dull stations/ships that newer factions/cultures resort to because they are efficient and easy to build early on that will give that baseline look to the galaxy which then allows more complex stations/ships (maybe higher tech level?) to shine and be appreciated? Will tech level or some other variable be associated with the appearance of complexity in design?

I eagerly look forward to seeing and hearing more! :clap:
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#20
Looks great! Can't wait to see more!

2 things that will always be on my space station list:

Docking points. (extended ports or hangars......Of course you could transfer cargo with drones and not need to dock? Keeping the space station design simpler?)
Lights . ( internal and external.....Having lights will IMHO bring a touch of life to the station. Someone/thing is home.)
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#21
RedDwarfMining wrote:
Sat Oct 28, 2017 7:01 am
Docking points. (extended ports or hangars......Of course you could transfer cargo with drones and not need to dock? Keeping the space station design simpler?)
Lights . ( internal and external.....Having lights will IMHO bring a touch of life to the station. Someone/thing is home.)
Docking ports will absolutely be a thing - however, being able to fly into them and dock manually will likely not be a thing, and was never part of the planned scope of LT. You may very well be able to see docked ships, though. It worked that way in the prototype, so I see no reason why it wouldn't in the final game. :)

As to lights: I strongly agree with you here. Lights are very important. I would consider windows important too - even if the windows are only a texturing with little square lights atop it. I'm hoping we see some of that in the future, but Josh seems to have had mixed feelings about it in the past.
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#22
I'm one who would like to see lights (and windows) to give the impression that these are working structures. One of the problems in many games is the feeling you get that you are somewhat isolated in what should be busy parts of the game. It has been addressed in games like Skyrim by the addition of mods which make towns, villages, and roads more thriving with life. This has also been identified in SC where many bodies are being added to the areas which appear to be too sparsely populated. IMO It's unfortunate that LT will lack this feature but it still makes sense to give the appearance that places which should be teeming with life do not disappoint the player visitor.

I like lights, both in real life and in games. :)

As for docking, although I was happy enough with the mechanic used in the LTP I hope that in future LT games we will see something more akin to real docking. I'm going to miss docking rings for planets though. I'm aware that many won't share that feeling. :angel:
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#23
First off, well done on your first public devlog! I want to say that I'm actually quite happy with this format you guys have arrived at, of the bullet point summary with an in-depth explanation of one or two points in the list that you find most interesting or important :thumbup: Now, if you guys could be on a regular schedule of [Adam] Mondays, [Lindsey] Wednesdays and [Josh] Fridays? That would be something amazing dipped in awesomesauce :geek: ;) (As a forum note, now that there are 3 devs with their own log, it might be a good idea to sticky the latest from each, rather than just the latest)

You're off to an amazing start Lindsey, its definitely a monumental and nebulous task, but if this is your starting point, I cant wait to see where you'll bring us in 3 months, or a year, or 5! I think you're absolutely right in beginning with a library of basic primitive shapes. I'd also include Cones, Bells, Icosahedrons, Dodecahedrons, onion domes, and this. Also, you might find this pintrest board helpful too :)

In regards to lights and interiors, I definitely agree with others here, in that they will be critical at some point. For some ideas on fake interiors and parallax mapping, take a look at this thread, this article, and this video I found. Maybe Graphics Josh could take a swing at it to release the monkey for a couple hours :D


Edit: Just saw this post by silver and couldnt agree more
Silverware wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 3:13 pm
LindseyReid wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 1:27 pm
It is 100% my goal to make amazing stations and ships, but as Talv said, I'm writing everything from scratch, so there won't be anything amazing picture-wise this week! Just some basic shapes, joints, doodles, and lots of words. It'll probably be at least a few weeks before cool stations start happening. I'll talk more about the process and how it's all going to come together in the dev log that I'm working on. :)
You should do what Josh doesn't.
Make a Imgur Gallery (or equivalent) and upload random screenshots of your station and ship attempts. Especially the bad ones, those are always hilarious :3
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#24
Hyperion wrote:
Sun Oct 29, 2017 3:04 am
First off, well done on your first public devlog! I want to say that I'm actually quite happy with this format you guys have arrived at, of the bullet point summary with an in-depth explanation of one or two points in the list that you find most interesting or important Now, if you guys could be on a regular schedule of [Adam] Mondays, [Lindsey] Wednesdays and [Josh] Fridays? That would be something amazing dipped in awesomesauce
This is highly unlikely to happen. It's better to just have the person that has the most to talk about say something each week, rather than all of them focus on making something to show all the time. And of course, Josh will likely have more to say than the rest. It's his project, after all. :)
Hyperion wrote:
Sun Oct 29, 2017 3:04 am
(As a forum note, now that there are 3 devs with their own log, it might be a good idea to sticky the latest from each, rather than just the latest)
This would work if you had three a week - which, as stated above, almost certainly won't happen. :)

Victor Tombs wrote:
Sat Oct 28, 2017 9:02 am
I'm one who would like to see lights (and windows) to give the impression that these are working structures. One of the problems in many games is the feeling you get that you are somewhat isolated in what should be busy parts of the game.
I absolutely agree here, Victor. Lights and windows ought to be something that's considered absolutely essential - and not only because of the points you listed, but also because they impart a sense of scale you simply can't achieve through any other method.
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#25
LindseyReid wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 9:32 pm
Yes, good point! We decided early on that ships & stations in LT have artificial gravity. Requiring rotation for gravity limits the kinds of shapes we can create, and not having gravity at all makes creating realistic docking setups harder. So we went with the option that allows for the most diversity in appearance and ease of gameplay, which is hand-wavy-technobabble-this-just-has-gravity-somehow gravity :D
Far and away a better idea than Elite Dangerous' stupid mail-slot-with-a-toaster-cage docking arrangement, that's for sure.
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Re: [Lindsey] Friday, October 27, 2017

#30
Ateerix wrote:
Sat Oct 28, 2017 2:08 am
I do have one concern/question though when it comes to procedural art in games. I noticed when I first played the game Starbound, I was jumping around from planet to planet, exploring things and checking out the different biomes, aliens, and trees. The first few planets were awesome, everything was different each time and beautiful, but over time that was also what took away from the magic of it all. Everything was different so nothing was really unique in a sense. There was initially no common creature, tree, dirt colour, background, or light colour that could be used as a kind of baseline. It takes some of the magic away. Is there a way to combat that? Will there be super dull stations/ships that newer factions/cultures resort to because they are efficient and easy to build early on that will give that baseline look to the galaxy which then allows more complex stations/ships (maybe higher tech level?) to shine and be appreciated? Will tech level or some other variable be associated with the appearance of complexity in design?

I eagerly look forward to seeing and hearing more! :clap:
Firstly, thank you for the kind words, Ateerix :333 This is a great question. Any game leveraging PCG has to strike a balance between recognizability and same-ness. As you suggested, yes, the size, tech advancement, and personality of each faction will inform how their ships and stations look, which will be a big part of our strategy for combating the ship aesthetic being 'too' random.

Hyperion wrote:
Sun Oct 29, 2017 3:04 am
You're off to an amazing start Lindsey, its definitely a monumental and nebulous task, but if this is your starting point, I cant wait to see where you'll bring us in 3 months, or a year, or 5! I think you're absolutely right in beginning with a library of basic primitive shapes. I'd also include Cones, Bells, Icosahedrons, Dodecahedrons, onion domes, and this. Also, you might find this pintrest board helpful too :)
I like those primitive shape suggestions; I had also considered the 'hedrons. We'll see about the one I can't pronounce, though XD And thank you for the Pinterest link :0

Silverware wrote:
Fri Oct 27, 2017 3:13 pm
Make a Imgur Gallery (or equivalent) and upload random screenshots of your station and ship attempts. Especially the bad ones, those are always hilarious :3
Aight, y'all are gonna get a bonus gallery with devlogs titled "especially the bad ones" whenever I collect enough outtakes :p



Thank you to everybody for letting me know how hyped you are!! I'm really excited. I'll try to continue with posting every 2 weeks, and we'll see how that feels. It'll depend on 1) how much material I have for a devlog in 2 weeks, in both pictures and things to talk about and 2) how long it takes me to write up that material.

PS, I pop into the IRC a few times a week, so feel free to reach me there or via PM if you have any more questions, or just pictures of pretty space ships (or your cat) to send me :)
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