 |
Submitted by , posted on 02 January 2002
|
 |
Image Description, by
This is a montage of screenshots from a game is called 'The Colony 3 Chronicles'
that I have been developing.
I have allways wanted to see a strategy game that combined the four major combat
environments. So, about a year ago I set out to write the game that I would like
to play. So here I am a year (and I dont know how many thousands of hours later)
and I have now got my game to the beta testing stage. It takes place in space,
air land and sea. The game engine supports : 24 hour daylight profile editor.
Sun moon cycles, animated clouds and water, specularity and shadow, alpha
blending, blurring. Powerful AI and Motion dynamics for underwater craft,
surface craft on land and water, air craft, space craft and fixed defensive
turrets. Flexible camera options allow the player to set up optimal zoom and
FOV, Cameral modes include Tower, Target, Chase, Tactical, Pilot, and Padlock
views. Weapon dynamics cater for bullets, shells, lasers and missiles to be
assigned to any of the four craft. Upgrades for fuel capacity, damage, speed and
strike points. Proviion is made for up to 8 sides with a maximum of 100 'units'
per side. A maximum of 1000 objects can be brought into the game although, it
must be stated that a 16 frame explosion effect uses 16 objects. Not all objects
are displayed simultaneously. Usualy there are about 50 or so objects in the
field of view at any given time. There are 16 combat unit types. 4 sea (sub,
ptb, cruiser, destroyer) , 4 land (soldier, truck, apc, artilery) , 4 air
(fighter, chopper, bomber, transall) and 4 space (fighter, corvette, destroyer,
shuttle). Each combat unit has a maximum of 16 loadout slots. It is on to
these that the weapon systems and craft accesories are attached. and this is
where the fun comes in. There are a variety of weapon systems that can be
'bolted' on to each craft, and upgrades for each. Example, The machine gun is
fixed. Then it can be upgraded to a tracking gun, then to predictive targeting
and then you can upgrade the firing rate and the damage points.
The game
scenario setting is AD2550, when a group of colonists upset a bunch of baddies
and all hell breaks loose. The battle takes place in space, on two colony
planets, Mars, the Moon and Earth. The result of a hyperspace jump from the
outer colony worlds back to earth is a negative time shift and the battles
around earth occur 10 000 years in the past. The screenshots below are from the
Atlantis scenario. The process of creating 'maps' is very easy and i'm sure that
players will start creating their own worlds real soon. The game engine will be
liscenced will sell for about $10, but I am going to make all the artwork
public domain. I estimate that I will be releasing the game in about June
2002. The game is written in Visual Basic, using direct X8. The models were
created in 3D Studio Max, the 2D Artwork was done with Paint Shop Pro 5. My
development system is a P3 733, 128 Meg ram, Riva TNT2 Pro. The Compiled game
engine .ExE is 2.4 Megs and the total directory size with all artwork, meshes
and audio files is 1.25 Gig. . For more info, you are welcome to visit my site
www.cybermike.za.net or u can mail me . Pop in for
a visit or a chat.
Best regards,
Cybermike.
|
|