Hi there, while the development goes on with the Orbital Traffic Control system (“OTC”) here’s a little video about the updated external view and the newly added radio chatter.
A proper model of the player’s ship now replaces the engineering schematic in the external view. And at the moment it features animations for the maneuvering thrusters, radiators and main engine plasma plume. The latter may change in the future as it might look a bit too “chemical in atmosphere” rather than “plasma in vacuum”! However the primary goal of the update was to display its power and how dangerous it is.
While they are still safely docked at their home station the NPC ships now regularly attempt to “talk” to each other. The conversations happen on the “Spacefarers Band (SB)” (as a reference to the “Citizens Band (CB)”). The system is a remnant of the good-old analog radio times, and kept alive by the space crews to fight boredom and loneliness during the long space flights!
Technically the messages use the regular transport layer and so it’s necessary to use a comms slot to listen to them, and they follow all the modeled physics (LOS, propagation delay and attenuation etc…). Each ship is assigned a little bank of messages with the same “voice”. Also they will engage in short “conversations” with nearby crews.
Can’t wait for more updates! hope all is going according to plan, would love to see this project become reality!
Thanks! 🙂
The next update will be about the Orbital Traffic Control system, that was on the path to have the NPC ships start to fly around!
This is fantastic, I can’t wait to get my hands on this! Is there an early access version planned?
Thanks! 🙂
At the moment the plan is to release the game “when it’s ready”, that is with the intended initial set of features (possibly late 2022). I’m sorry development is always too slow, for me too I can assure you! And so I’m reporting regularly here so everyone can monitor the progress. 👨🏽🔧
Love everything you’re doing. Used to play rogue system, I’m sure you’ve heard of it, and ever since it was abandoned have been looking for something equivalent. Your project looks like it will fill that void in my soul perfectly! Keep up the great work, I can’t wait to see your future progress, and am waiting in line with cash in-hand on the hour that you release your baby to the world.
Thank you for your encouragements! 😊
I just recently found this project, and it looks almost exactly what I’ve been looking for in a game for a long time. The video showcases are so cool! Honestly, I can’t wait to see what you have in store for the future.
One thing though – I feel like I don’t have enough information to fully follow the videos. I generally understand what each video is about, but I don’t really understand what any moment-to-moment action does or why you do it, even after reading about the ship and the systems on this website. Would you consider doing an “assume no prior knowledge”-style very basic video overview of the systems (like “this is the x system panel, you might use it when you want to do y” kind of thing) sometime in the future? Or would that spoil/take the fun out of figuring it out myself?
Thanks!
Ah yes you’re right a tour of the ship’s controls and systems would definitely be helpful thanks! 😊
On the TODO list for the OTC update in a couple of weeks!