Orion's End (tuxdb.com)

A long overdue update on the games progress.

Hi everyone. Its been quite a while since Ive posted anything,anywhereabout Orions End and I think I owe you an explanation. At the beginning of the year, I was sick for a while and had a short break from programming. When I was feeling better, I returned to Orions End and discovered something horrible. The basic gameplay of the game just wasnt fun. Space travel was tedious after doing it a few times and ground combat was too imprecise. My initial idea was to base the gameplay elements on classic games from the 80s, and I think I was heading in the right direction, but I found that having a vibe of the 80s was great, but having the same level of controls and mechanics just didnt work for the game I wanted to make. It wasnt good enough. So, I decided to go silent for a little while until I had a plan of how to proceed. I didnt expect this to be longer than a week or two. I looked at different changes I could make to the basic game: on land and in space. A experimented with side on 2d platforming rather than top down, old school Asteroids style space flight instead of the Spy Hunter inspired spaceflight I currently had. That wasnt right though. I loved the top down perspective and the Asteroid style space flight had been done in lots of games already and was being done a lot better than what I was going to do. Time dragged on and I didnt have an answer, but I always felt just a few days away from having the answer, so I didnt want to say anything about the changes until I knew what those changes were going to be. And it was only a couple of more days, right? Wrong! Months later and I still didnt have a plan to go forward. I didnt want to abandon the project, but I didnt want to keep working on it in its current direction. I thought many times about providing an update, but I really didnt have anything insightful to say. I realise this was a bad decision, and I should have said something anything. So my apologies for remaining silent for so long. What was going to be just a week or two, turned into six months. Future Direction I think I may have a direction to proceed with now, though. I have been experimenting with a completely revamped space travel that I am quite happy with so far. Ive spent the past two weeks solidly working on it, and now I have the bare skeleton to build upon. I will be sharing some screen capture of this in the near future. I have also been thinking about what I wanted from the game. Realistically, I dont expect Orions End to be a best seller. I think the person who will play the game the most will probably be me, so I have asked myself what it is that I want from the game that I am planning on spending hundreds of hours playing (and many more programming), and that would mean changing the game quite a bit. Or more precisely, adding a lot more to it. The game I wanted would need to allow me to explore extensively and be surprised by what I found. So that meant I needed to use procedural generation to create a lot more planets to explore. But I also wanted to make friends with NPCs in the game and have a home base that I could always return to revisit my friends. So, that meant my original idea of having the hand crafted settlements and stations could remain. I wanted to have satisfying combat both in space and on land, so I needed to totally revamp those systems. I also wanted to discover unexpected missions and stories, so procedural generation would need to be used in the mission system also. But procedural missions could never replace a well crafted story, so that would need to be there too. So that means introducing a few very substantial elements, and the completion date would have to be extended by quite a bit too. (I was very unrealistic with my expectations concerning a release date anyway). And, Im okay with that. If I am going to spend so long making a game, I want the game to be a game that I'll be happy to show others and happy to play myself. So, thanks for your patience and once again I am so sorry for being so silent for so long. I hope to have more to tell you and more to show in the near future. Dave

[ 2023-07-19 09:32:37 CET ] [ Original post ]

Orion's End
Southfog Games

Developer

Southfog Games

Publisher

Coming soon

Release

Casual RPG Simulation Singleplayer

SPACEWARD HO

There are twenty systems to travel to. Each one with its own economy and risk level. Warp between systems and traverse the sometimes dangerous path to the systems space port - which can be either planetside or on a space station orbiting a less hospitable planet. Prepare to defend yourself against pirates, especially in the riskier but more lucrative systems. On the other hand, if you engage in piracy yourself, prepare to have the added challenge of the local police ships who will happily put an end to your illegal activities. Additionally, most systems also have an asteroid belt that needs to be successfully navigated through (never tell me the odds).

PLANETSIDE

While on the planets or on board the space stations, you can buy and sell commodities, refuel, or repair and upgrade your ship. But there's more to do than that. There are many residents who have their own stories to be explored. You can talk to them, do quests for them, or give them gifts - all of which will progress (or perhaps regress) your relationships with the characters. You might even make a special friend - or maybe even one in every port. It's up to you.

Each settlement has unique activities to undertake. You might be able to buy rare goods, or engage in gambling, or did someone say "cat racing"?

There are also some additional locations on some planets, giving you an opportunity to have further adventures: old ruins, bandit camps, etc. You need to learn about these locations through talking to residents, doing quests or exploring the space ports.

HOME IS WHERE YOUR SHIP IS

Your ship is your home. You can upgrade some of the systems to get better combat performance, or speed, but it is your only ship. You wouldn't trade it for all the coffee on Ryser. However, you have your living quarters on board, which you can customise to suit your style. Collect various decorations and artefacts, or a new bed. Make your home the comfiest place for you.

ECONOMY

The economy within the system is simple but dynamic. Events beyond your control can have a temporary impact on the prices in a system. A pandemic on one planet may cause a increased demand for medical supplies, while a recession on a high tech planet could cause cheap prices for their manufactured medical supplies. You can take advantage of the situation and ferry supplies between these two planets. But these conditions are only temporary so you need to act fast.

THE OUTER REGIONS

The outer regions of each system are worth exploring too, but it is a gamble. You might find valuable resources to mine, or an old wreckage of a cruiser to explore, but be casreful, because you could just easily find yourself in an ambush by pirates.

CHARACTER CUSTOMISATION

The player character is completely customisable, with their custom portrait appearing during dialogue sequences in the game. You can customise their face, skin, hair, nose, mouth, eyes and other features.

GAMEPLAY

The gameplay in Orion's End is designed to be very diverse but uncomplicated, incorporating gameplay from retro games but with with more modern influences. Shoot 'em up gameplay in space, and shoot outs on planets. Minigames at settlements, and life sim social encounters with the local residents. All of the mechanics are designed to be simple enough to just pick up and play. There's no steep learning curves or complicated systems. There are lots of things to do, but not all of them are necessary to enjoy the game. Do what you enjoy doing most.

MINIMAL SETUPOS: Linux Mint 20.3
Processor: Intel Pentium Dual T3200Memory: 4 GB RAM
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: Intel Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics

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