Scratch

Oops... I lost the message with the email address. Can someone tell me what it was?

problem with stamping 3-D, as it has been siad, is it gets really slow. really, REALLY slow.
(EX: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/antimonyarsenide/1490357 )

kamesh wrote:

I think we should start of with  2D , then if it is successful, we try to make it 3D.  Agree/Disagree?

Seems like a lot of extra work if we do end up doing both; but sure, we can do it in 2D. Let's do that! 

(After all, gameplay is what's really important...)

kamesh wrote:

Either way, Blob, we need a list

Indeed. Well, expanding my original post, with a view to doing it in 2D:

In terms of a clone, I was thinking of cloning the game mechanics - the trading and everything. Switching the game to 2D shouldn't really hurt it too much.

We need to make up our own planets, goods to trade, etc.

There are a few main parts we need to make:

=====

* The flying-the-spaceship part itself. 2D should be kinda okay for this -- and  allow us better graphics and easier coding, etc.

The physics for the spaceship should be Asteroids-like, I feel. I'm sure you can do that, but ask me if not. 

An infinitely scrolling background of stars would be great - preferably with parallax, too.


* There are other spaceships, that appear randomly: friendly passenger ships that you can attack and steal from, and some pirate ships that attack you. You encounter these when flying around the star system.

We need sprites for the different kind of ships (browse the Elite wiki for inspiration). They need to have AI, too.


* We need a radar to show nearby ships that are off screen.


* We need a space station that you have to dock with in order to trade and upgrade your ship. Docking with it is quite tricky -- you have to be careful not to crash into the space station... 


* A trading system, with a list of goods. There's a lot of UI that needs to be made for this, probably using lists. We need to keep track of the inventory on the ship, too.

You can only access this from the space station. Buying the good is always slightly more expensive than the price you get for selling the good on any one planet. The price and supply of each good vary from planet to planet -- so a planet with more supply will buy and sell the good for less. And, for example, an "agricultural" planet has a greater supply of food, and there are "industrial" planets and so on.

You can also buy upgrades for the ship, such as weapons, shields, fuel for the hyperdrive, more cargo space, an automated docking system...

So: a little icon for each good would be nice, as well as buttons for "buy", "sell", etc. Someone could start trying to code up the UI for this, too -- although I think it might be quite difficult.


* There's a map of nearby stars. Each star has a single planet orbiting it. Your spaceship has a hyperdrive to jump between star systems, but it only works some way out from the planet, and its range is limited by how much fuel you have. You use the map to select which star system to jump to.

We need a cool hyperspace effect, too 

=====

There's a bunch of other stuff, like missiles that can lock onto enemy ships, and a rating system (which gives the game the name "Elite") -- but have a look on Wikipedia for this -- or, better still, play the actual game. 

Has anyone managed to play the game yet...?

Last edited by blob8108 (2011-11-08 11:35:59)

dasbloekendeschaf wrote:

Yay! I managed to get into our dropbox!    Did you think about sound effects yet? I have many good ones, that I found in the files of another retro science fiction game. Can I upload them to the dropbox?

Absolutely!    Can I ask what game they're from?

A note on Dropbox: we have enough space to upload as much as we want, so don't worry about that. We can always delete things if we do need more space, though I doubt will need to anytime soon.

Dropbox does keep track of versions, and it's usually possible to recover deleted files, but I think that's only within a certain time frame.

Lastly -- this is important -- when you update a file (as opposed to uploading a new file) let us know here that you have, so we can keep track of who made the change. Thanks! 

Do we also need laser gun sounds or something like that?

dasbloekendeschaf wrote:

Do we also need laser gun sounds or something like that?

Yes. I think there's a weapon like that. Or at least, there should be. 

ads98 wrote:

dasbloekendeschaf wrote:

Cool. They are from "Star Wars X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter", but can be used in other games as well. BTW: Awesome trailer, but I think we should wait a bit until we upload it.

Thanks! Yes, I agree too; We do need to wait a while. However, someone needs to start on the artwork that will be teastured at the end of the trailer. I know it may not seem important, but we shouldn't wait until the last minute to do it. This is the last time I will say this: Someone needs to at least say they are doing the artwork. If nobody is interested in doing artwork, I will do it.

What do you mean by artwork? The game graphics or cover picture?

blob8108 wrote:

ads98 wrote:

...someone needs to start on the artwork that will be teastured at the end of the trailer. I know it may not seem important, but we shouldn't wait until the last minute to do it. This is the last time I will say this: Someone needs to at least say they are doing the artwork. If nobody is interested in doing artwork, I will do it.

I don't understand what you mean either. When we make the trailer, we'll be in the process of making the game, so we should have stuff we can use.

I don't think we should worry about the trailer any more for now, though, until we have at the very least something playable.

Back to my question. Do we need laser cannon sounds?

blob8108 wrote:

kamesh wrote:

I think we should start of with  2D , then if it is successful, we try to make it 3D.  Agree/Disagree?

Seems like a lot of extra work if we do end up doing both; but sure, we can do it in 2D. Let's do that! 

(After all, gameplay is what's really important...)

kamesh wrote:

Either way, Blob, we need a list

Indeed. Well, expanding my original post, with a view to doing it in 2D:

In terms of a clone, I was thinking of cloning the game mechanics - the trading and everything. Switching the game to 2D shouldn't really hurt it too much.

We need to make up our own planets, goods to trade, etc.

There are a few main parts we need to make:

=====

* The flying-the-spaceship part itself. 2D should be kinda okay for this -- and  allow us better graphics and easier coding, etc.

The physics for the spaceship should be Asteroids-like, I feel. I'm sure you can do that, but ask me if not. 

An infinitely scrolling background of stars would be great - preferably with parallax, too.


* There are other spaceships, that appear randomly: friendly passenger ships that you can attack and steal from, and some pirate ships that attack you. You encounter these when flying around the star system.

We need sprites for the different kind of ships (browse the Elite wiki for inspiration). They need to have AI, too.


* We need a radar to show nearby ships that are off screen.


* We need a space station that you have to dock with in order to trade and upgrade your ship. Docking with it is quite tricky -- you have to be careful not to crash into the space station... 


* A trading system, with a list of goods. There's a lot of UI that needs to be made for this, probably using lists. We need to keep track of the inventory on the ship, too.

You can only access this from the space station. Buying the good is always slightly more expensive than the price you get for selling the good on any one planet. The price and supply of each good vary from planet to planet -- so a planet with more supply will buy and sell the good for less. And, for example, an "agricultural" planet has a greater supply of food, and there are "industrial" planets and so on.

You can also buy upgrades for the ship, such as weapons, shields, fuel for the hyperdrive, more cargo space, an automated docking system...

So: a little icon for each good would be nice, as well as buttons for "buy", "sell", etc. Someone could start trying to code up the UI for this, too -- although I think it might be quite difficult.


* There's a map of nearby stars. Each star has a single planet orbiting it. Your spaceship has a hyperdrive to jump between star systems, but it only works some way out from the planet, and its range is limited by how much fuel you have. You use the map to select which star system to jump to.

We need a cool hyperspace effect, too 

=====

There's a bunch of other stuff, like missiles that can lock onto enemy ships, and a rating system (which gives the game the name "Elite") -- but have a look on Wikipedia for this -- or, better still, play the actual game. 

Has anyone managed to play the game yet...?

Alright, now that we know what to do, we should have everyone try to come up with prototype projects for each individual aspect. Then, instead of merging all of them together, we can have someone copy all the Scipio into one compiled project

I can make the trade system prototype and the docking prototype.

Last edited by Dinoclor (2011-11-08 20:35:26)

I made an asteroids-like sngine a while back
here it is


http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/infinite_minus_zero/1083275

dasbloekendeschaf wrote:

A short question: Can i make the main menu (Start game/ Credits/ Options /etc.)? I'd really like to. And as soon as we have a simple menu, we can start modifying it/adding the interface, graphics and more. I don't know how other Scratchers usually start their projects, but this is my way.

That's a great idea!

Well, since everyone has a job, I might as well start making (a) 3ds Max spaceship model(s) to give to Blob.

Thrystor wrote:

I could do the store program, but somebody's doing that already. I could make the map, the radar, and the space gameplay as one. Or I could do the space docking. I would be fine with just making the sprites though, if all of those have been taken. By the way, I intend to play Elite tomorrow or as soon as possible. Oh, and I REALLY screwed up with the Dropbox thing. I thought I had memorized the password so I deleted the message. Then it turns out I had the password wrong and I still can't get on. Can you send the password to the same address?

I think you should pick ONE thing and work on it, so everyone has a chance to participate. Also, it will be of better quality. Would  you be fine with doing the map? (Just a suggestion, you can pick whatever). Also, for the password, ask Blob to  send it to you again.