Starting to think about location ideas, if we're going to have a handmade world at some point. Normally this is the kind of thing I would just put in some local notes on my computer or something, but meh. Same goes for last entry.
I need one or more central hub areas of varying sizes for characters to hang out in. We've already established that hailing is a thing, so conversation could as easily take place in space, but having them happen in interior areas for the most part is more appealing. Mechanically, these don't need to serve any specific purpose, as there aren't currently any mechanics that require that sort of thing. But that doesn't really matter to me. There might at some point be a reason to go, but I just want them to be places to go because it's somewhere to go, no other motivation required.
It occurs to me that an open world is something that may need to exist for a purpose? As in, what are the actual game systems that make use of or support it? For example, a metroidvania uses gating to gradually provide access to a linear story. Sim/management games a la Harvest Moon usually rely on the passage of time to give the world meaning or advance a narrative. Mainstream sandbox games simply have linear story missions selected by travelling to their start points.
I don't want to do any of those things, really, but something that sort of combines all three, while throwing out some elements of each. There could be some gating, but this is generally intended to be more free roaming than a metroidvania. I don't want to incorporate any time pressure, though I suppose there could at least be a calendar (day/night cycles are irrelevant in this setting). If it's most similar to any of the three touchstones, it would be the mainstream sandbox, but I also don't want to use a mission-based system.
Essentially, this is slice-of-life in space. Given the need for game progression, that is probably going to mean having currency. No time pressure, this isn't meant to be the sort of thing that would stress me out, as a player. It's just a place to exist in. But there is some implicit pressure to earn money, and various ways of doing so (most of which involve shooting things in your starfighter, because that's what you do). So what are the potential jobs that a pilot in an asteroid field might take on?
Asteroid clearing, bounty hunting, "mining", delivery boy, racing, etc. Other types of mercenary work. It occurs to me that there will be a need to think about failure states for some of these. Typically, the idea is that if you die, you simply respawn in the current area (probably with no fuel, and some credits subtracted from your account). However if, for example, you're on a mercenary contract to help clear some enemies out of an area, does dying fail the contract? Does it reset it, or is it simply gone? No idea.
If we're going to have a coherent space, and elements of 'life sim', then it seems that the player will also need a home base of some sort. Low rent apartment, or squatting in an abandoned mine? Perhaps both. First the apartment, later the mine. And if we have currency, we need things for the player to buy, so a place to live and things to put in it make sense. If they are so inclined, as this won't be a stated goal (there will be no stated goals).
Eventually, the game could open with the player buying the ship from the hobbyist who built it, probably with all of his savings from working as a miner. The PC is a veteran pilot already, so the mechanic feels okay about selling to him. PC wants to go to work for himself rather than someone else, essentially, and make use of his actual skillset.
Something I plan to add soon is a fast food joint object. I think I even had a name for it. Oh yeah, Grub Grub. It's a small, stationary building that you can stop at, and order food, and the food gives you ship additional health for some reason (which gives your ship an outline with a different color based on the how much additional health you have. When the extra health is gone, the outline disappears). If we ever head into big game territory like I've bee n talking about, this could eventually be tied into a food and hunger system. This would probably just start you in each area with some additional health based on how sated your character is. It makes zero sense for your ship to be more durable because you just ate a hamburger, but it's fun so who cares.
It occurs to me that if I'm going to go full-on sim with this, then I could also incorporate the repair gameplay that I was talking about for a different project. Just a way of tuning your ship at home, using a graphical representation of the ship and different parts of it. Probably would not be very skill-based, just some pleasant busy work. Depending on what you do or work on, fixing or replacing certain parts could have effects like boosting ship acceleration or damage output. Or improving a ship component could start your ship with a powerup to that system as soon as you spawn (i.e. starting with an improved blaster fire rate, or a death ray upgrade for the rail gun). Parts would probably break down over time, or degrade each time you die in-game (another penalty that ties into the respawn system).
You eat the spacecrabmeat. It tastes like the void.
Note to self: add spacecrabs to the game. Just little purple crabs that drift around, maybe stopping near asteroids. They do nothing and serve no purpose for now. Maybe eventually you'll be able to collect them with your ramscoop and sell them to the local spacecrab cannery. And then of course, spacecrabmeat is one of the many things you can buy from stores. Gives you some additional health, as previously discussed.
Eventually, I'll want there to be a faction reputation system. Just a simple, pre-faction wanted level, with two levels. Just determines whether members of the faction are hostile or not. It's mostly to know whether police cars should aggro for now, but I will eventually want to have one for the company ships, as well. They should be neutral by default, which means they would only fire back if attacked. However, if you're infamous enough with them, they will attack you on sight. This is probably more difficult to trigger than police wanted level, which will be gained and lost more easily.
On a whim, I added the space crabs to the game. They do nothing except bounce off of stuff and run away from the player. Soon, I'm going to add the ability to pick them up and eat them for extra health.
It wasn't too difficult to make them give the player some extra health when picked up, and then create an outline around the player when he has extra health. I'll want probably three different colors of outline to denote how much extra health: green, yellow, orange. The outline should probably be darker, so it's a bit more subtle. I'm debating whether to use the motion_add function for the space crabs. Right now, they actually have no acceleration; they can just instantly change direction at maximum speed. This makes picking them up an exercise in controlling your angle of approach, so they don't turn in a direction and outmaneuver you. It's doable, but pretty annoying. On the other hand, it's kind of funny like this. Once that stuff is solved, I just need a sound effect or two, and some onscreen text.
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