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Space Colonization game #369738
05/06/11 17:13
05/06/11 17:13
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Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
E
Ercoles Offline OP
Junior Member
Space Colonization game

You can download the game from here:

http://spacesimcentral.com/downloads/Solar_System_Colonization/Solars2.zip

For people having problems with saving and loading use this executable with the above download:

http://spacesimcentral.com/downloads/Solar_System_Colonization/SolarLite.zip

Please leave comment and/or details of any bugs found.

Update History:

6-May-2011: First Beta release
8-May-2011: Included Game option menu (press "o" key).
Included Space Ship location menu (press "s" key).
9-May-2011: Bug fixes.
10-May-2011: Added new features to production section + duplicate minerals bug fix. Also fixed attack bug and made attacks more frequent. Fixed Habitat bug (now each habitat gives population space as told in research screen). Also fixed bug in research section where one could research item beyond 100%.
11-May-2011: Fixed bug in loading routine. Also bug in Research and Production screens when changing planet has been fixed.
11-May-2011 2nd update: More bug fixes and now added resources panel view also in production section and when colonized planet is clicked. Also in production menu it show energy available for production.
13-May-2011 Added New Game option and fixed some bugs in Save/Load Game option and the defence section.
14-May-2011 Made a number of improvements in defence section. Also planet and asteroid resources are now randomized at game start.
15-May-2011 Fixed some bugs and added pirate raid event. Also added choice to choose filename for saving and loading.
16-May-2011 Bug fixes in hanger section and save section.
21-May-2011 Various bug fixes and enhancements + first attack now takes longer to occur.
22-May-2011 Fixed bug in combat section. Added planet list panel.
31-May-2011 Fixed bug in Production section and planet panel.
2-June-2011 Added Asteroid panel + bug fixes.
3-June-2011 Bug Fixes.
4-June-2011 Fixed bug in grazer mining. Added Colony menu.

Information about the Game:

This is a space colonization game of our own solar system. The player starts on Earth and has to colonize the planets to get resources in order to expand his space empire. Here is a quick tutorial:

By keeping the right mouse button pressed and moving the mouse you can pan the camera view up, down, left & right.
By keeping the third mouse button pressed and moving horizontally you can rotate the camera.
By moving the mouse cursor to the edges of the screen you move camera forward, backward, left and right respectively.
By using the mouse wheel you can zoom in and out when in planet view or map view.
By pressing "m" you switch to map view and by pressing "n" you switch to normal view.
By pressing "o" you bring up the Options Menu to save game, etc
By pressing "s" key you get the spaceship menu to easily hold track or spaceships.
By pressing "p" key you get the planet list menu to easily find a planet or moon.
By pressing "a" key you get the asteroid list menu to easily manage asteroid mining.
By pressing "c" key you get the colonized planets menu to easily manage colonies.

You interact with the game by clicking on planets or moons with left mouse button. At first the only colonized planet is Earth, if you click on it you will get a panel with 8 buttons. Clicking the buttons will open the respective screen to interact with. You should start by researching the MK I solar panel, then produce it in the production menu and later activate it in the energy menu. To build items you will need resources, there are 15 resources which are mined from the planets and moons. However to mine resources you need 20MW of energy. At first you get 50 tons of the first 5 resources, you should use these to built 2 solar panels MK I which will give you 20MW. You can then start the mining of materials. Built silos to get more storage space on the planet or moon. You will also need habitats to increase your population, this is necessary to man spaceships, etc. You should then start building a probe. Launch it from the hanger menu and move it to a planet or moon. You move it by left clicking on it and then right clicking on the planet or moon you want to send it to. Once the probe is on the planet, go to research and research the probe data. You should then be able to see what resources that the planet or moon produces by left clicking on the planet or moon. You colonize the planet by building a colonizer and sending it on the planet. There are 3 types of colonizer ships. The Normal Colonizer ship can colonize most planets except those having extreme temperatures like Venus, Mercury, Pluto, etc. For these there is a special temperature resistant colonizer ship. Also Gas giants need a special pressure resistant Colonizer.

You will notice that you will be missing resources to build some structures, for these you will need to use a grazer to mine resources from the ten asteroids orbiting the sun between Mars and Jupiter orbits. You can mine resources from asteroids by deploying a grazer on an asteroid and then after mining the asteroid send it back to earth or any colonized planet.

You should also research defence items as you may face attack and if you are not well prepared your colony may be wiped out. You should have a fighter to defend the planet. You can also built bunkers where your people may take refuge in case you get attacked,etc. When there is an attack you will receive an alarm and you are given the option to go there or ignore it. If you press go there, this will take you to the planet being attacked, you should then press the defence button to start defending your planet. If you ignore it the attack will still occur and most of the population on the planet will be killed. If the population reaches zero, you will need to transfer some of the crew on any spaceships you may have in space in order to start a new population for that planet.
Last edited by Ercoles; 07/24/11 18:03.
15 Comments
Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Ercoles] #369739
05/06/11 17:15
05/06/11 17:15
Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 2,252
Hummel Offline
Expert
Hummel  Offline
Expert

Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 2,252
I´ll not download something to find out what it actually is.
Please give some information about your project.

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Hummel] #369746
05/06/11 18:28
05/06/11 18:28
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
E
Ercoles Offline OP
Junior Member
Ercoles  Offline OP
Junior Member
E

Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
This is a space colonization game of our own solar system. The player starts on Earth and has to colonize the planets to get resources in order to expand his space empire. Here is a quick tutorial:

By keeping the right mouse button pressed and moving the mouse you can pan the camera view up, down, left & right.
By keeping the third mouse button pressed and moving horizontally you can rotate the camera.
By moving the mouse cursor to the edges of the screen you move camera forward, backward, left and right.
By using the mouse wheel you can zoom in and out when in planet view or map view.
By pressing "m" you switch to map view and by pressing "n" you switch to normal view.

You interact with the game by clicking on planets or moons with left mouse button. At first the only colonized planet is Earth, if you click on it you will get a panel with 8 buttons. Clicking the buttons will open the respective screen to interact with. You should start by researching the MK I solar panel, then produce it in the production menu and later activate it in the energy menu. To build items you will need resources, there are 15 resources which are mined from the planets and moons. However to mine resources you need 20MW of energy. At first you get 50 tons of the first 5 resources, you should use these to built 2 solar panels MK I which will give you 20MW. You can then start the mining of materials. Built silos to get more storage space on the planet or moon. You will also need habitats to increase your population, this is necessary to man spaceships, etc. You should then start building a probe. Launch it from the hanger menu and move it to a planet or moon. You move it by left clicking on it and then right clicking on the planet or moon you want to send it to. Once the probe is on the planet, go to research and research the probe data. You should then be able to see what resources that the planet or moon produces by left clicking on the planet or moon. You colonize the planet by building a colonizer and sending it on the planet.

You will notice that you will be missing resources to build some structures, for these you will need to use a grazer to mine resources from the ten asteroids orbiting the sun between Mars and Jupiter orbits. You can mine resources from asteroids by deploying a grazer on an asteroid and then after mining the asteroid send it back to earth.

You should also research defence items as you may face attack and if you are not well prepared your colony may be wiped out. You should have a fighter to defend the planet. You can also built bunkers where your people may take refuge in case you get attacked,etc

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Ercoles] #369767
05/06/11 21:38
05/06/11 21:38
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 1,852
A
alpha_strike Offline
Serious User
alpha_strike  Offline
Serious User
A

Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 1,852
please post a video

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: alpha_strike] #369770
05/06/11 22:19
05/06/11 22:19
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
Germanunkol Offline
Expert
Germanunkol  Offline
Expert

Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
I like the general idea of the game. Controls work fine, the camera takes a little getting used to (maybe move with WASD?)

By how much you had to explain you can see what the main problem in the game currently is: It's not yet intuitive. You don't need to start off with a tutorial yet, since this is still in development, but try to think of the things that you know and new players don't. For example, I was really confused cause I don't know what resources I have (and clicking on 'resources' seems to do something different).

I get a crash when clicking on "next" in earth's production panel.
Also, check out some planet shaders. They're a good start but could benefit from some atmospheric scattering etc. Maybe there's one on the gamestudio wiki that works?

Good start on this one, and it looks like you've gotten the game mechanics down. Well done, now start polishing it and you have a nice game.


~"I never let school interfere with my education"~
-Mark Twain
Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Germanunkol] #369859
05/08/11 02:03
05/08/11 02:03
Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 135
Myrkling Offline
Member
Myrkling  Offline
Member

Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 135
In my opinion the graphical interface needs improvement. As this is an interface-heavy game, the interface should be clear and comfortable to use. The current interface doesn't meet these requirements, yet.

Much information is not easily accessible, for example the amount of resources. The interface also doesn't give enough feedback where it would be required or at least preferable. When I click "Start" in the production panel for example, just nothing happens if I don't have enough resources or energy. The game doesn't tell me, though. I can see how many resources the production requires, but I can't see how many resources I have left.

Is the "Activate New" button really needed? Perhaps I miss something, but I can't think of a reason for not clicking it. Couldn't the activation just be done automatically after the production is finished instead?

It's pretty difficult to find a little probe in space. A list of probes (and other objects like colonized planets) would be useful. By clicking into the list, the camera could move to the clicked object.

The map mode is useful, but in my opinion it should be more schematic, so that all objects can be seen easily. Asteroids for example are difficult to detect at the moment. Also pressing M to activate and N to deactive the map mode seems to be somewhat inconvenient. Why not just using M to switch the map mode on and off?

As far as I can tell, the camera controls are too slow to travel through space, especially because the planets also move quite fast.


It all sounds so negative, but as Germanunkol, I like the idea of the game and would like to see this continued and enhanced. You've done a good job after all. With a more accessible interface, this could become a really interesting project. Games of this genre are rare on these forums.

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Myrkling] #369865
05/08/11 07:55
05/08/11 07:55
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
E
Ercoles Offline OP
Junior Member
Ercoles  Offline OP
Junior Member
E

Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
I noted your comments and am glad that the project interests you. I intend to continue upgrading the game and will take your comments in consideration.

Some points about you comments:

Everyone is telling me that he cannot know how much resources one has. This function is already there, all you have to do is go to the mining section and then there click the Resources button. I think that the mis-understanding is that there is another resources button on the main pannel which is there to transfer resources from the space ships to & from the planet.

The activate button at present is a nauseance I know but I do not know if you noticed yet that sometimes you get attacked and activated pannels could get destroyed, so some people would like to produce pannels and leave them inactive in case they are attacked and all their pannels are destroyed.

A list of probes, etc is a good idea. I will try to implement it in future upgrades.

The map mode can be zoomed by mouse scroll wheel to see small objects like asteroids.

The m & n buttons spring from the fact that gamestudio seems to intercept key presses multiple times and this causes problems to use the same key.

Could you give more suggestions on the camera controls?

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Ercoles] #369867
05/08/11 09:27
05/08/11 09:27
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
Germanunkol Offline
Expert
Germanunkol  Offline
Expert

Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
Quote:
Everyone is telling me that he cannot know how much resources one has. This function is already there, all you have to do is go to the mining section and then there click the Resources button. I think that the mis-understanding is that there is another resources button on the main pannel which is there to transfer resources from the space ships to & from the planet.

The problem isn't that the information isn't there, it's that it's not always visible. I don't think I've ever played a rts game which doesn't always show the resources somewhere.

If you have the problem that the resources change depending on which planet you're at, simply always display resources only when you're close to a planet and then only display the resources of the closest planet.

But having to click something to see the resources is inconvenient...

Last edited by Germanunkol; 05/08/11 09:27.
Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Germanunkol] #369937
05/09/11 16:31
05/09/11 16:31
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
E
Ercoles Offline OP
Junior Member
Ercoles  Offline OP
Junior Member
E

Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 75
Malta
The thing is that this game has several resources (15 in all) and usually rts games who have several resources do not display them all the time on the screen(as this would cram the screen), take for instance games such as The Settlers, Civ IV Colonization or Cultures who also have plenty of resources they never display them all the time but are displayed only in designated areas. I think that the best would be to make the resources screen more accessible from other places like the production screen.

Re: Space Colonization game [Re: Ercoles] #369940
05/09/11 17:00
05/09/11 17:00
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
Germanunkol Offline
Expert
Germanunkol  Offline
Expert

Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,640
Earth
Well but in all the games you've mentioned whenever you produce something or need to spend resources, they're there to see.

And I think making the resources only show up when you're on that planet would work. It does take up a bit of space, but you've got enough free space on the right and on the bottom...


~"I never let school interfere with my education"~
-Mark Twain
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