This blog has moved!

The Future of Real-Time Strategy
http://rtsconcept.wordpress.com

So go check it out!

[EDIT: The TA Bugfix all-in-one pack (BFTAx) can still be downloaded here. The current Hamachi pass to play online is: casadelphilosophy. Enjoy!]

Demigod

Well, with the news and initial murmurings about Supcom 2 passing softly if cryptically past us and the first inklings of a warm new spring emerging; I thought I’d take 15mins out of my work day and post something to my blog (it’s been some time!). I have been thinking a lot about Demigod and the future of the Supcom franchise – and its incredible engine, custom-built from the ground-up specially for it. Demigod will after all be using that very same core engine.

Units (part II)

Finally I get around to part two! I’ve had a number of thoughts lately, perhaps inspired by the recent announcement about a possible 2010 release of Supreme Commander 2, to do with RTS games – more specifically; units, command management / control, and user interface. I’ll continue my rant about units in this post but try to tie in the other aspects as I go along.

Upon reflection, what most strikes me and sort of disappoints me about units in Supcom, as opposed to say, TA, is how ‘light’ and unsubstantial they feel. They appear to slide about the terrain as if skating across ice (yes, especially the hover units but not only those) and don’t bump into one another in the manner you’d expect giant metal tanks and robots to do – it’s all soft and bouncy and well… it just doesn’t feel right.

Supreme Commander 2!!!

It’s just been announced. I shit thee not. Looks like a 2010 release.

http://www.custompc.co.uk/news/605175/supreme-commander-2-announced-by-square-enix.html

http://www.supcomuniverse.com/forum/showthread.php?p=56162#post56162

Perhaps Chris (“RTS God”) Taylor has been stopping in looking at my world-famous RTS Concept? *Ahem*. OK maybe not. This is good news though. I can’t wait.

Ideas?

I’m back, and this time, it’s personal.

So I finally received my new graphics card and have since started up Supreme Commander again, so keep posted because I’ll be blogging again more often about RTS-related topics. Sorry for the short absence.

Classic Article

This classic Gamasutra article grabbed my attention again recently whilst pondering some UI issues with my RTS concept. The article is entitled “Too Many Clicks! Unit-Based Interfaces Considered Harmful“.

From the introduction:

“Computer games traditionally have a player control one or more units on the screen. In early games, each player controlled one unit. As CPU power grew, players controlled more and more units. Today, a player might have hundreds of units, each one of which they must control individually. The unit-based user interface (UI) is no longer sufficient. This article will suggest a different way of thinking about UIs, and will discuss how to compare one UI to another, or one UI to the theoretical maximally efficient UI, to tell if your game can be improved. I’ll use examples primarily from strategy games, but it applies to UIs for programs of all kinds.”

Enjoy.

Rethinking RTS Commands & U.I

Well it has been some time since I last posted something on this blog. My time has been spent on my OU studies, work and various hobbies. RTS and game/UI design never really leaves my mind for more than a day or two at a time, however.

One of the issues surrounding around RTS games as they rapidly evolve is how to deal with their ever increasing complexity and scale. Many RTS’ have chosen simply to stick to old tried and tested formulas, tweaking the graphics and interface here and there but generally sticking to the same old boring micromanagement formulae. Supreme Commander is certainly different in this regard but there have been other attempts to reshape RTS gaming. Homeworld was one of the first to attempt to forge a totally new direction, for example.

Units (part I)

Traditionally, RTS units are non de-constructible. What I mean is that the actual units themselves, in almost all RTS games I’ve played, live a short ‘0 / 1′ alive/dead existence, with a certain amount of damage points (shown as health-bars) to represent damage in a fairly abstract way. Most RTS games display diminishing health/damage of a given unit with some kind of cute preset animation. For example, in Total Annihilation the units billow an ever greater amount of smoke. Upon actual death they possess a variety of explosion animations to represent their demise, such as breaking apart or full blown explosions with flying debris!

In Supreme Commander we see pretty much the same system but with fancier deaths or damage animations. The experimental units in particular go out with a real bang. I’m going to propose a more modern and importantly, more fun system in terms of actual gameplay mechanics. It is also, I think, a more realistic way of doing things and fits in with my RTS concept.

The Single-Resource Model

Those of you brave enough to browse my scrappy notes may have noticed that I was brainstorming a resource system for my futuristic RTS concept. I am still adamant that the more logical option, despite being a HUGE fan of T.A and Supreme Commander, is the single, not dual (energy/metal) resource system. The main reason for this is that it fits in with my ideas for linking the expansion of ones empire very directly to resource income in order to promote (but not insist upon) continuing growth.

This single resource which could be regarded as ‘energy’ or ‘finances’ etc, then links into two main areas of the game; research and production. Research is centered around the classical turn-based Space Empires-esq ‘tech tree’ system. Production is of course, anything to do with the actual building, maintenance, repair or reclamation of items within ones empire.

As much as I love T.A, I want to get away from its reliance on good eco-management skills and make RTS even more action packed and strategy/movement centered. The building of energy-metal converters and so on is a fine concept but it does detract slightly from the core notion of warfare and expansion of empire.

Changes

I’ve changed the name and direction of this blog to something more appropriate. The T.A-Bugfix community has once again gone into inactivity/hibernation, although games are occasionally being played so newcomers are still welcome to get in touch for a game and grab the files (top right!).

I’ll be focusing on one of my mental hobbies – thinking about the application of true strategy in video game design, particularly RTS games but not exclusively. At some point soon I *WILL* update the concept page with something readable!!!