[Snail]

One thing I personally think would be cool other than having something besides fur balls for multi player (like the combat engagements from XVT), would be to have something like the challenges they use in Call of Duty for the different craft/missions in the game.

Mmm, yes that would be a good idea.

[chief1983]

One thing I personally think would be cool other than having something besides fur balls for multi player (like the combat engagements from XVT), would be to have something like the challenges they use in Call of Duty for the different craft/missions in the game.

Bonuses might be able to work like that, they could be mission specific or even accomplishable throughout a campaign via campaign variable storage and the existing pilot file stats.

There will almost certainly be more than your basic furball for multi, but I fully expect the hardcore players to demand a basic 2v2 Furball for tournament style play just like XvT.  Unless a new type of tournament mission arises.

[WOLF_Angel]

If you put achievements/challenges in that are specific to the "combat engagement" scenarios you would be more likely to get people to want to play them especially if you add things to unlock on any of the achievements.  Such as a paint job, type of missile, type of ship.  The achievements can be a combination of mission specific (furball and combat), and general such as kill X number of TIE/in with a Y-Wing.

The similar systems in the Call of Duty franchise and in World of Warcraft have people salivating just to get rack up getting them done for very little in game reward by comparison.  Call of Duty would be a closer model to FotG though.

[WOLF_Angel]

If you set that up with the challenges you would already have a database for that type of tracking.  It would not be a far stretch to move it another level and have something that does what www.battlestats.com does for tracking the Week of War and other such events internally with in the game.  The hardest part would be having someone to set up the event start and end dates.

[wuu]

What I want to see hmm.. That you really get the felling to fly a X wing or Tie fighter specially when you get hit, it is reasonable that the X wing sub system get repaired but not for fighters without r2 or r3 units and that the subs system at a critical point stop to function (is it possible?). 

This would give it a realistic felling.

[Thaeris]

How about team CAP? This might be comparable to Unreal Tournament's "survival mode" where the given team or teams have to survive for either a certain amount of time while fending off consistantly larger and more agressive opponets (such as TIE or Assault Gunboat squads) OR survive long enough to protect a certain asset while it is in transist (such as a cruiser or transport).

Placing an escort mission in an asteroid belt would be good fun as well. If the entry time for each enemy squad varies (so arrival cannot be predicted) while the players have the added challenge of protecting their ship from rocks and debris, the game would prove to be different every time, even when just facing off against the computer. Perhaps there is a hidden TIE hangar(s) in the field. The players (if they can find it) might destroy it, but then they run the risk of letting the ship become heavily damaged due to neglegence/enemy fighters.

Come to think of it, such a mission is very similar to single player missions found in X-wing and/or FreeSpace. I'd have good fun with that for sure...

-Thaeris

[Aardwolf]

Sounds a bit like the Terran/Vasudan/Shivan gauntlet missions of FS1 + FS2 (focusing on multi in FS2)

[badmotivator]

Hi, I just found out about this project.  I read the first few pages, and here are my thoughts:

While it's important not to get too locked into what the original X-Wing games brought us and not look to simply clone them. . . it's important to look at what they got right and wrong.  This is all my opinion of course.

Right:

• The original X-Wing's cockpit.   You get all your system read outs built in.  The computer is low tech as well.   To me this is one of the most important things to get right.  
• In the original versions of the games, the Imuse system does the music wonderfully.  It ramps up and down with action, and some of the music was completely original.  They took this out in the windows 95 version, which isn't cool at all.
• in the original X-Wing- the responsive R2 unit
• in the original X-Wing, the squadron assignment screen where you could assign other created pilots to fly the mission with you.  It wasn't perfectly implemented, but it was the closest you got to knowing the other pilots.  In subsequent games, that relationship between pilots is lost.  The caring over whether a pilot lives, dies, or is captured.  
• the power management, targeting system, and speed system in the original X-Wing.  Sure you want to make the speeds more true to canon, but the importance of speed and power management should still be there
• TIE Fighter- the sense of dialogue in mission briefings and debriefings.  Getting to talk to different characters

Wrong:

• 2 fighters against a star destroyer?  Two X-Wings could easily tackle a Star Destroyer in the game X-Wing.  One X-Wing could easily take out the shield gens by himself.  Now TIE Fighters may be a problem, but the other X-Wing could usually handle it.  I think this was partially because of the AI.  In the game if ordered to attack, the AI wouldn't know to dumb fire warheads or to target the shield gens first. Which then would often leave the player to do the dirty work of taking out the shields and have the rest of the squadron do most of the hull damage.  Now I'm not saying it should be impossible for two X-Wings to take down an ISD, or even one. . . but it should be nearly impossible.
• anachronisms- your squadron should start out in a nebulon b frigate or a modified freighter, not immediately in the Independence, Defiance, Liberty, or Home One.  Go through the Ackbar rescue and then later have the fleet built.  To me the building of the fleet is what I really want to see in a space combat sim.  I want to see it in its infancy all the way up to it actually becoming a force
• the HUD in X-Wing Alliance.  What a mess.  What's the point of a 3d cockpit if you've got all the stuff on an overlay?
• in X-Wing Alliance the two concurrent plotlines.  It was a mess.  Going back and forth between family and rebel alliance missions.  Once I join the Rebel Alliance, screw Aeron, Emon, and Anton and their moneymaking schemes.  I don't really care about them.
• X-Wing Alliance also stumbled in having Emkay be your personal robot friend.  I want an astromech droid.  I don't care if I can't understand him, give him subtitles or something.  This also is blatantly missing when you're in an X-Wing or Y-Wing in the game.  I want a little R2 freaking out when I get hit, trying to fix things and such.  
• the whole concept of following a certain pilot's story.  This is most evident in X-Wing Alliance, but in X-Wing, I'm not whoever I name myself. . . I'm Keyan Farlander.  I don't like that.  I'd really like to forge my own story.  If I complete a bonus objective, I don't really care about points.  I want to know it added a bit of difference.  Linearity = not ideal.  
• there's not much point in closing your S-Foils
• ignoring vectors at hyperspace points in XWA.  In the original, you had to escape along a certain vector, which could be blocked by a capital ship.  In XWA, vector was unimportant, and your nav computer never checks to prevent you from hitting an ISD on the way out.  
• lack of a squadron identity.  In one mission you're flying an A-Wing as Green 4 and in another you're Red 2 in X-Wing and in another Gold 3 in a Y-Wing.  
• lack of further customization.  All X-Wings have the same astromech droid, the same paint pattern, etc.  I see in your models section that you had custom X-Wings, so  
• death star missions- awful.  Just leave them out, or have the pilot play a support role in them.  They aren't as fun in execution as they look in the movie.  And they often take far, far too long in the game that they're reduced to a boring tedium. Also, I'm not Luke Skywalker, Wedge Antilles, or Lando Calrissian.  
• closing your S-Foils is meaningless

[jr2]

[badmotivator]

One thing I'd like to see compared to the TG games is much less emphasis on energy management. I've been playing XWA again recently and one of things I remembering is how much of your time in game is taken up with managing your power systems, it really detracts from the fun in my view. Also the number of occasions that you end up using ridiculous power tricks like doubling your speed by dumping to engines.

That's not to say I think power management should be removed entirely. For example, I think the way that energy management was handled in Freespace 2 was much better. It took more of a sideline role, you could use power to your advantage but also you could largely ignore it if you wanted.

I think the focus on power management in the TG games also added to their "slow" feel. Killing a shielded fighter in those games was a case of gradually wearing it down. Whereas the impression I always got from the films was that a good rapid fire burst was enough to overload a fighter's shields and take them down. Having someone on your tail was dangerous, whether you had shields or not.

I don't think power management slowed the game down so much as shields.  I liked having to dump shields and lasers to go full speed on recon missions, when evading TIEs, etc.   When you take that extra risk for that added speed / maneuverability, it makes you feel like an ace pilot. 

I think a lot of the problems with the X-Wing games comes down to map design, and they never really really train you to fly risky.  And they never put you in enough situations where that's a must.

I wouldn't do away with power management, but make the game be more speed oriented and less shield oriented. 

As for the movies, I always assumed that they weren't at full shields.  The battles they were in were so massive that they reached the point where speed is far more important than shields.  If you sacrificed speed, you'd just get hit far too often and your shields would be useless.  So it is more of a pre-battle thing.  Plus very often I'd assume all power would go to the most vulnerable side, whether front or back deflector shields.  They switch power to front deflector shields, but the TIE fighters get them from behind in. 

[swashmebuckle]

Hi badmotivator, I can address some of your suggestions here.

-Though cockpits are probably not going to be a part of the first release, they will eventually be included and will be based on what you see in the movies, though probably with some concessions made for the sake of gameplay.

-Although FSO's dynamic music system isn't as nuanced as I'd like it to be, it does provide for music that changes between combat and non-combat situations, as well as giving musical cues for ship arrivals and different mission outcomes.  All of the music in FotG will be completely original in order to help us avoid getting shut down, though it borrows heavily in terms of style and instrumentation from the original trilogy soundtrack.

-Most of what you're talking about regarding squadron assignments can probably be achieved using FRED's advanced team loadout features and a thoughtfully laid out campaign.

-FSO already has a great power management system, which we are using, and it is customized on a ship-by-ship basis.

-While there's not really any framework I know of for something like talking to the Emperor's secret operative dude like in TIE fighter, debriefings (and the following briefings in the case of campaigns) can change based on your performance and be made to give you recommendations on how to improve on the things you did wrong.

-The cap ships will not be pushovers.  If you take two fighters against a Star Destroyer, you will barely be able to scratch it, and it will most likely kill you at some point with a lucky turbolaser shot or two.

[starlord]

I once remember you mentionned a super star destroyer named the allegiance class... I know nothing of it: could you describe? Is it still going to be present?

[brandx0]

The Allegiance is a type of Star Destroyer shown in Dark Empire, it's bigger than an Imperial Star Destroyer, but nothing close to the scale of the Executor (I don't remember off the top of my head, but I believe it's about 2-3km long)

Anyways, it's a good mid-step between the ISD and the Executor, and also a fairly close size match to Home One

Aha, here we go

http://www.theforce.net/swtc/dagger.html#allegiance

That article says it's 2.2km long, the wookie says either <3.2km or 3.8-5.2km, depending on the article -_-

Anyways, it's a long way away till we get it in, so it's entirely possible we could scrap it by that time, but I'd still like to see it make it in

[Black Wolf]

As I understand it, the next Star Destroyer planned is the vidicator/Interdictor class, then perhaps the victory, and then maybe less well known ones

[starlord]

Well the allegiance is a good choice, and I would love to see it ingame...

However, you certainly have several ships falling in that category, such as giel's flagship, jerec's vengeance, or even the interdictor SD (not the interdictor cruiser, but the 2 bridge SD with gravity wells)...

actually, giel's ship and the vengeance would be closer to the "middle" of the scale between an ISD and an executor...

[TopAce]

Well the allegiance is a good choice, and I would love to see it ingame...

After I don't know how many years of development, I would be satisfied with seeing a working, textured and POFfed Imperial Star Destroyer in-game. 

[starlord]

well there are still those uncompleted mod vids made by metal in which star destroyers look quite interesting me thinks... Not to mention the vengeance or the executor which were pure beauties...

[Topgun]

well there are still those uncompleted mod vids made by metal in which star destroyers look quite interesting me thinks... Not to mention the vengeance or the executor which were pure beauties...

O MY GOD its Jar Jar.

[chief1983]

Aside from a few specific campaigns I'm not sure we'll need anything bigger than an ISD any time soon.

[brandx0]

Exactly, this is all stuff for the far off future.

And I chose the Allegiance (or Imperial-class Super Star Destroyer, if you wanna go by the wookie, ugh...) because all the other mentioned SSDs are only seen as one of a kind, while the Allegiance is shown to be very, very mass produced