[Ace]

Some of those ships are pretty good, others are well no comment

I have a couple of questions about the engine, I'll post here with them later.

Mainly it relates to whether or not it can support things like overexposure, normal maps, and shaders. Also how good the netcode is.

[kv1at3485]

In the ship editor, is there a way to delete ship types?

How about the editor making a blank template for you if you press, say, a 'New' button?

I haven't downloaded your game, but is there an equivilent to the FS techroom with vessel descriptions?  If so, you may wish to include a way to change the techroom description.

(My poor example can be found here.)

[Black Wolf]

If you're charging, this'd better be an old screeny... It's one thing to Use [V]s textures for a free mod, completely another for a commercial game.

[Turnsky]

Blackwolf's got a point. changing those textures would be a good idea, copyright and all that.

[Black Wolf]

Originally posted by YU_Skywalker
Well I have good news!
I have contacted guys from
http://www.astralprime.co.uk/
(just look at their models!)
and they are willing to make models for my game!

Now imagine my game with those models.
It's gonna rule!
Would it justify price then???
 

Missed this earlier.

Anyway, First off, those models are cool (though I hope there's more than two of them ).

As for justifying the price, I don't know. There's lots of other stuff that determines game quality - the other effects (including weapons, backgrounds etc), the quality of the story (something I've been able to find almost nothing about from the website), the ease of use of the interface, the modability etc. etc.

The price of a game is a fairly complex thing to figure out. You need to strike a balance between what people will pay for your game, and what you need to cover your costs. I appreciate you want to make some cash off this, but in this state, I really doubt you will. To be honest, I reckon your best bet would be to make it either free or really cheap, and open it up to become a community effort (which would involve massive advertising, but ultimately would probably result in a better game. FS2 had dozens of people working on it), and then put it in your CV and apply for a job at a gaming company.

[TrashMan]

Those editors look nice...

So I'm willing to help you (have allready tons of models that are done..jsut need to convert them do .X), but that means that I will need the ship editor too (how the hell am I gonna set the weapon/engine sfuff otherwise).

You should put the editor for download, so people can start converting their FS2 ships and give them to you for use....

[YU_Skywalker]

That screen shot is very old.
I need to improve editor a bit, then I will release it.
And I still need to extend file format.

[TrashMan]

Thse second you release a editor, I'm you're man!

Come to think of it, I cna try to convert soe of my models right away...I have several converters so one of them should have a .X option...hehehe

[Carl]

Okay, I downloaded the demo, and here is my opinion:

Gameplay wise, it's actually pretty fun. It definitely feels like a space sim. however, i wuold really like some joystick support. there is no way you can expect a space sim to do well without it, as that's what most people are going to use.

Graphically, it could use of work. don't just use tiled textures. make some ship specific ones, and get an artist to make them. The current textures look like they were made in MS Paint. Higher polygon models would also be nice, and then all that other frilly stuff like specular highlights and reflections, but those are not really as necissary as the textures and higher poly models.

[YU_Skywalker]

It have joystick support, couldn't you play with joystick?

[Carl]

no. Is there a configuration menu anywhere?

[ShadowPuppet]

The stick worked for me...but only in terms of up/down/left.right. Fire was annoyingly not on the stick, but the Spacebar, and also the throttle slider didn't work for engines.

What is needed is a key-binding / joystick setup option, so you can configure how the game is played. Essential!

On the graphics front, the polygon count is REALLY going to hold things back. Look at games like 'X2 the Threat' for an idea of where the current commercial games market is expecting. Then, look at the FS Open standard. I know the plan is for lots of ships in a battle, but realistically, how many cap-ships are ever going to be in a single mission?

Taking the flight-sim world for comparison ( coz I know it better ) ...

There is an inevitable trade off between detailed planes and lots of planes. Careful control of levels of detail helps a lot here, with higher detail models for up close. You have to reach a balance, but there should be a point at which you can get high FPS and good enough detail. The trade off may be smaller battles.

Might end up raising the minimum spec for the PC requried to play...

Either way, you need to get this thing looking better to attract buyers, and make the mod possibility more enticing for those who might want to buy a 'sandbox' game.

p.s. ....PLEASE.... correct the text on the website! If you want, I will happily edit that for you Commercial products need a commercially polished presentation.

[TrashMan]

So I have converted a few of my models to .X and have the textures allso..

Erm..say, do you use LOD's?
I only converted LOD0 since I didn't know if others are nedded yet..

And...your'e e-mail?

[YU_Skywalker]

Game loads one LOD then try to generate lover.
My email: [email protected]

[TrashMan]

2 ships sent...

Say, do your ships have turrets?
Judging by the screenshots I would say no, but I could be wrong....

[Flipside]

Some of the Capships do

My only real complaint about the game is that it seems to use bounding-box collision detection, which means you bounce away from the capitalships when you are still quite a distance from them, or at least, that what it seems to be.

[YU_Skywalker]

No it is not bounding box it is spherical shield, once shield drop below 25% you can colide with, hull (triangle to triangle collision).
This ships looks great TrashMan, Im adding them to game now!

[Flipside]

Ah right! Ok, sorry 'bout that, didn't realise

[TrashMan]

So how do the turrets work?

I have several capships and I have to know how to make the turrets work by you before I can convert them and send them to you....

I allso have some stations & fighters and stuff...

[YU_Skywalker]

Im having dificulties with your models, I had to convert it to 3ds and then scale and rotate it, but I lost texture coord in that converting.

You don't need to model turrets on the model.
Turrets are added from the ship editor.

Can you send me .3ds format mesh with texture coordinates?