Good evening or afternoon, gentlemen
I've got a rather long term goal of developing a multiplayer Mech sim, that focuses heavily on tactical and realistic features, like ballistics, bipedal movement capabilities, shared sensor info, armor and locational damage.
It's intended for a market between Mechwarrior fans and hard-core sim fans, offering complex features, but with a simple interface and fantasy setting. I've always enjoyed the incredible depth, immersion and replay value in simulators, though, unfortunately, adherence to realism often runs contrary to fun game mechanics, or over-complicates the interface.
I'd likely transition to a game engine like Torque or C4, or perhaps a C# engine, once I've gotten the hang of programming, though I've got a lot to learn before starting any proper development.
I'm interested in any opinions you might have on this plan; anything at all about the practicality of someone attempting such a project, or anything suggestions about the design. I'm sure many of you have been down this road before! I've got an early draft of a design doc, and of course my baby steps in programming in Irrlicht.
Early Design Doc: http://members.shaw.ca/evilgryphon2/ss/design.htm
Irrlicht Prototype: http://members.shaw.ca/evilgryphon1/mechWander.rar
And my website, because I do some nifty 3D art and animation:
http://members.shaw.ca/evilgryphon4/por ... deling.htm
MechWander: The Spaghetti Wars
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rogerborg
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I'll check out the design later, but I wanted to congratulate you on the superb progress that you've made already. As I recall, you were answering questions by your 14th post, which is a good sign that you're on the success vector.
Please upload candidate patches to the tracker.
Need help now? IRC to #irrlicht on irc.freenode.net
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
Need help now? IRC to #irrlicht on irc.freenode.net
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
Yeah you seem to be doing pretty well with your learning, you've accomplished a fairly good demo of the game already and you seem to be approaching the project very sensibly.
You've realised it's a long term goal, do you know quite how long it will take you? It seems to be a very ambitious project but it's achievable, just depends how long you're willing to plug away at it.
Art is something which is very hard to get hold of for hobby games... Are you a modeller at all? Do you know anyone who can make models for you? You won't be able to achieve any sort of decent project without having some decent source of models and art, and i don't mean a website like turbo squid! I mean real people working with you to make the models. Though of course the art side of it isn't 100% necessary at this point in development, you should be able to complete all the programming side of things with just simple placeholder models and then bring in the decent models later when you have time or find someone willing to do so. Often modellers won't work for you if they don't see promise in your project and what better way to show promise than a practically finished game?
You've realised it's a long term goal, do you know quite how long it will take you? It seems to be a very ambitious project but it's achievable, just depends how long you're willing to plug away at it.
Art is something which is very hard to get hold of for hobby games... Are you a modeller at all? Do you know anyone who can make models for you? You won't be able to achieve any sort of decent project without having some decent source of models and art, and i don't mean a website like turbo squid! I mean real people working with you to make the models. Though of course the art side of it isn't 100% necessary at this point in development, you should be able to complete all the programming side of things with just simple placeholder models and then bring in the decent models later when you have time or find someone willing to do so. Often modellers won't work for you if they don't see promise in your project and what better way to show promise than a practically finished game?
I'm shooting for a year of education and design changes followed by a 1-2 years of production, to develop a simplified version of the game with minimal units, maps and feature set, playable online with 8-16 players, and some kind of server browser. And some AI bots, not because I want to, but would be necessary if I wanted to sell it.You've realised it's a long term goal, do you know quite how long it will take you?
Just to write it scares me, but it seems there are other individuals doing more than this in less time. And others failing seemingly because they get way out of hand with impractical amounts of content.
I'm a part time modeler who makes mostly military stuff for flight sims, which suits the theme of the game. But I'm neglecting art design until I've figured out the major programming hurdles, core features, multiplay, etc.Are you a modeller at all?
I've got some pics here, in case anyone decides to try and hit me up for models. http://members.shaw.ca/evilgryphon4/por ... deling.htm
I suppose I could look for programming help, but it seems more efficient to try it myself, first. Most likely, when I've got a more impressive demo, I'll approach programmers in other (floundering) indie mech-related projects.