Oolite Development and Beyond

[Killer Wolf]

multi lasers are available to NPCs so it shouldn't unbalance that much. multiguns sh/would only be available (IMO) to OXP'd ships like the Diamondback etc, so it wouldn't be a case of buying an extra gun for a Cobra III. Also, again IMO :-
- multigun ships should be at least twice the price of a normal one,
- the power would draw double the amount from your banks when firing
- cooling would remain level, each gun heating up as normal
- fitting for the gun/power source/coolants etc should impact on the cargo space available
- guns should be damageable, and the repair costs reflective of the advantage you gain by having them.

[Kaks]

Thinking about it, I really didn't mean multiple lasers! A few people have mentioned it would be really nice (& Elite-ish) if ships could be set up so that you'd see 2 laser beams coming from your ship.

How the concept would best work is still slightly unclear: the option I'd go for is to have each of the 'half beams' do only half the damage of the weapon installed.
That way getting a twin laser ship it will mean changing tactics (it'd get easier to at least 'half hit' enemies, but more difficult to fully hit them) as well as 'looking cool'

Edit: having each shot use twice the energy, & heating up twice as fast is also an option!

[Micha]

If we add better solar system generation, I'd like to see gas-giant-refuelling as part of Core.

Also, if we vamp up the systems themselves to go away from single-planet-single-sun, why not vamp up the galaxy map as well? I believe someone mentioned that the maps are set in stone and would not be revised.

Planetary landings I'm personally not so keen on - but if it does go into core I think only some ships should be suitable for deep atmosphere and planetary landings (Adder, Transporter, Moray, etc come to mind), although then there should be some significant benefits for landing on a planet and putting up with a restricted ship choice as well.


All up I'm in a bit of two minds over this - on the one hand, I want to have an Oolite with most (all) of the additions already mentioned.
On the other, Oolite is essentially supposed to be Elite, and what we have already, nevermind what's possibly coming, is already quite a step beyond that goal and as we continue it will be less and less like Elite.

Possibly as someone already mentioned it might be for the best to stabilise Oolite then branch it to incorporate the new features. This way we preserve Elite in the current Oolite, but aren't restricted for future features in the new one, especially as it will become more and more difficult to maintain 'strict' mode.

Of course there would then be the danger that we split the commoonity - those that prefer to stick closer to Elite, and those who prefer the new features. And that would be a shame.

[Kaks]

Interesting concepts there, hopefully not commoonity-splitting ones!

Some of the things I mentioned might or might not end up in a future post-MNSR Oolite, but I thought I'd mention them regardless, just to fully answer 'there doesn't seem to be a lot more that needs to be done'.

From where I'm standing, a few people - and a few threads on this forum - seemed to have a different opinion on the amount of stuff that still needs doing!

[Ganelon]

First off, Oolite is an excellent and highly playable game as it is. Other than advances in graphics and sound capability, or tweaks to keep it compatible with evolving operating systems, I feel the "strict mode" should stay right about where it is. Advances and changes should be made by making things available for OXP development, so that the core game can remain stable while expansion pack options can explore things that were not possible or perhaps never thought of in the original Elite game.

That being said, there are some areas where it would be fun to see more development.

- More development of the cultures of different planets and regions of space
- More depth to economies and cargo
- Better and more varied game AI
- More interactive NPCs to facilitate development of storylines within the game
- Ever increasing potential for eye and ear candy.
- Some system of checks and balances on ships and weapons
- More Ooniverse

While the original Elite was novel enough to seem diverse with the random seed planet descriptions and such, it'd be nice to see some of it, or have it have more impact on gameplay. For a very simple example, if a planet is ravaged by deadly disease, then medicines (narcotics) food and etc should be in high demand there. A less simple example would be political interactions based on system type and/or species to give more of a feel of the Ooniverse being "real".

The cargo list, while ok for a beginner and good in the day of the original Elite, is very limited. Logically things like medicines would be important, and at present one sort of has to work "the game in your head" to think of antibiotics, vaccines, and surgical supplies as falling under "narcotics" and being harshly regulated by Galcop for their own economic advantage or something. The "127 unit limit" doesn't really make a lot of sense. Planets with higher populations could absorb more products without unbalancing their economy, for example.

The game AI is more than a bit one-dimensional as a fighter. Logically, many AI ships could be poor fighters, but every now and then one should run into one that is brilliant and lethal. Sort of the game's equivalent to a player of "Elite" status, for example. Some OXPs add in some "dialog" from the AI opponents, and that is a promising direction for making them seem a bit more like real opponents.

NPC development in general is necessary to add personalities and potential storylines or missions into the game. The seeds are already there. An NPC could be shown as a picture, voice clips are possible, multiple choice menus to allow players to choose actions offered by NPCs are already used to some degree. It doesn't have to be "movie grade" to get the player caught up in a unique and personal adventure in the Ooniverse. But anything that adds potentials for *more* may help keep such adventures from becoming stale at some future point.

Oolite already has some great eye and ear candy. And it is one of the things that brings in new players, over and over. People see a clip on youtube or whatever, and they want in. Happens all the time that someone new shows up and asks what OXPs to add in to have what they just saw or they ask what "the best OXPs for a beginner" are. Eye and ear candy are the interface with the player's senses. Graphics will keep getting better, but more could be done with stereo or 3d sound potentials.

Ships do need some checks and balances. For a ship to have a lot of weapons or shields, it needs a lot of energy banks. A lot of energy banks implies a lot of power generation and/or storage. That should result in a bigger ship. Carrying a lot of cargo also needs a bigger ship. Bigger ships should be easier to hit, and maybe need more fuel. A ship of a model known to have a big cargo bay should attract more pirates or more police, if the player isn't "clean", since why would they have a big cargo bay if they weren't running *lots* of contraband? I'm not suggesting a super-rigid system, but a lot could be done by making all equipment weigh heavily on the energy banks and making number of energy banks or cargo space a function of ship size.

So there's 8 galaxies with a finite number of star systems each.. Is that all we get? Nothing left to explore or discover, it's all been done and the "final frontier" was already extinct before our players characters were born? No systems that were maybe missed in the initial exploration and development, or edges of known galaxies where new regions and systems are being discovered? Why? How does that make this a better game?

Back when Elite was written, personal computing resources were much more limited, but there's no reason for that to remain an absolute barrier now. Regions could be added that open up off edges of the known maps and new stars could be explored and eventually developed to the same degree as ones in the current Ooniverse.

Lastly, we need more media/fiction/story. There are some great stories already, and they can deepen the playing experience for new or established players. When I was first trying Oolite, I stumbled across the fiction section. The first story I read there was El Viejo's "Coyote", and it really "set the hook" for getting me into the game and playing to see how much the game could be like the story. Over the next couple weeks I read everything available in the fiction section of the forum. LOL But how about movies? There are short movies coming out like Sintel, where they were done by open source community and are pretty amazing. Maybe there are people here with the necessary skills and ideas, I don't know. But I know I'd watch an Oolite movie or series if they existed. Songs or music specific to the Ooniverse maybe? How about something like a radioplay that could be added as an OXP with soundclips so people would hear the events gradually unfold over their communications channels while playing? They could be anything from high adventure to a space soap opera. Might have important clues for an OXP mission.

I am not saying that there isn't already ongoing development in many of the areas I listed. What I am saying is that they are the sort of things I'm always hoping to find when I am looking at new or revised OXPs or news about the core engine. The things that I, as a player, am always kind of hoping for and sometimes find a bit of.

One last comment..If multiple simultaneous lasers are such an unbalancing element, then why do we allow them on NPC ships? If they're bad, then surely it would be better for "game balance" if we take them away from the NPCs too? LOL

[Commander McLane]

So there's 8 galaxies with a finite number of star systems each.. Is that all we get? Nothing left to explore or discover, it's all been done and the "final frontier" was already extinct before our players characters were born? No systems that were maybe missed in the initial exploration and development, or edges of known galaxies where new regions and systems are being discovered? Why? How does that make this a better game?

Eight galaxies with a total of 2048 systems is already way more than other games offer, I think. In the days of Elite it was simply mind-boggling.

But let's face it, essentially systems in Oolite are very much alike. There are no big surprises. So for me the question is, how would more of the same make this a better game?

Lastly, we need more media/fiction/story. There are some great stories already, and they can deepen the playing experience for new or established players. When I was first trying Oolite, I stumbled across the fiction section. The first story I read there was El Viejo's "Coyote", and it really "set the hook" for getting me into the game and playing to see how much the game could be like the story. Over the next couple weeks I read everything available in the fiction section of the forum. LOL But how about movies? There are short movies coming out like Sintel, where they were done by open source community and are pretty amazing. Maybe there are people here with the necessary skills and ideas, I don't know. But I know I'd watch an Oolite movie or series if they existed. Songs or music specific to the Ooniverse maybe? How about something like a radioplay that could be added as an OXP with soundclips so people would hear the events gradually unfold over their communications channels while playing? They could be anything from high adventure to a space soap opera. Might have important clues for an OXP mission.

I like the idea of Oolite becoming more multi-media.

Perhaps we need a better entry-point for fiction. Does every Oolite installation come with Status Quo, or at least with A Virtuous Misfortune? If not yet, then make it so in the future. I still think these should be the first stories a player gets offered to read.

One last comment..If multiple simultaneous lasers are such an unbalancing element, then why do we allow them on NPC ships?

Because they look cool. And they add to the feeling that you can't be the king of the Ooniverse, that there's always someone more powerful than you. Even I with my iron-ass Imperial Courier and all my fighting experience, and not thinking that I would need multiple forward lasers or plasma turrets to win my fights, do get more focused and alarmed if there's a Basilisk or Hydra around. And I think that's a healthy feeling for a game.

[Micha]

On the topic of more storyline - that is one thing I really hope does NOT become part of the core. It's what set Elite apart when it was first written and is still very very rare to find in any game these days - completely open-ended with nothing pushing the player into a particular direction.

Adding enablers for storylines - definitely!

The reason is simple: Replayability. If every time I start a new game I wade through the same storyline, it gets very old very quickly. Whereas if the storyline depends on my imagination and/or combination of OXPs which are installed, then it always remains fresh with each replaying.



As for 2048 systems being 'too much' already - I disagree. As Ganelon said having this limit really removes the thrill of exploration, of going beyond the boundaries, of being somewhere first. Whether or not there's a -point- to it, who cares as long as it's all procedurally generated, and apart from the GalCop worlds, there wouldn't be anything much out there. But it does allow for random exploration for no good reason. And it would give OXPers a completely fresh canvas to paint on.
Perhaps switch the map view from 'GalCop Registered Systems View' and 'Galaxy View', the former being the 2D maps we all know and love (which is an abstract view, kinda like a Tube Map), the second being a more realistic 3D view?


Anyway, it's definitely interesting to have some green-fields thoughts about the future, and what various people think would be nice

[Disembodied]

On the topic of more storyline - that is one thing I really hope does NOT become part of the core. It's what set Elite apart when it was first written and is still very very rare to find in any game these days - completely open-ended with nothing pushing the player into a particular direction.

Definitely! Story-driven games generally make for a) bad stories and b) bad games. What we want (and what Oolite give us, by and large) is an open and interesting game-universe where we can make our own stories.

As for 2048 systems being 'too much' already - I disagree. As Ganelon said having this limit really removes the thrill of exploration, of going beyond the boundaries, of being somewhere first. Whether or not there's a -point- to it, who cares as long as it's all procedurally generated, and apart from the GalCop worlds, there wouldn't be anything much out there. But it does allow for random exploration for no good reason. And it would give OXPers a completely fresh canvas to paint on.
Perhaps switch the map view from 'GalCop Registered Systems View' and 'Galaxy View', the former being the 2D maps we all know and love (which is an abstract view, kinda like a Tube Map), the second being a more realistic 3D view?

Opening up the sandbox would be great. Allowing OXP writers to stake out claims to a chunk of otherwise empty procedurally-generated space somewhere and write their own set of systems would be fantastic – something close to the moddability of Escape Velocity, where the core game mechanics (flying, fighting, docking, trading) support a system where modders can build their own pocket empires ... God knows how hard it would be to do this ... would be nice, though!

[Darkbee]

Let's not turn this into an Oolite wish-list thread people, that wasn't my original intention. Nor is it an Oolite 2 thread either. Ships named after snakes are out. Forget canon, think outside the Coriolis.

To stick with Oolite for just a brief moment and to add further to the whole "there isn't a lot that needs to be done", I think perhaps it would be more accurate to say that there are more features that people would like to see added to Oolite and wouldn't feel like they take detract from the Elite feel.

As far as the OE project goes, perhaps I misunderstand the project but it seems like it's just Oolite with a ton of OXPs built-in, no?

Now, as far as a new game goes, I think Ganelon was going in the right direction i.e. evolving, expanding universe (notice I didn't say "Ooniverse" ) where planet circumstances can change to effect things such as economic/trading conditions. On going wars, political upheaval can all add to the dynamicism of the game universe.

One of my other criticisms of Elite is that although the game-play is somewhat open-ended the net effect is still the same: you kills things, and potentially buy and sell things. In the end this leads to a rather linear game experience. So, I would like to see more true career options like perhaps joining the navy and undertaking (Yes, I know there's an OXP for that). Or if you were bounty hunter/Pirate some kind of reputation system so that you could rise from relative obscurity to the most feared in the galaxy/universe.

All of this dynamicism and evolution of game-play would be hard to do as a single player, in some ways it's easier if you have a persistent multi-player universe. I know I've said this before, and to some people it sounds really lame but essentially what I envision is a space role-playing simulation. I guess a sort of Diablo 2 meets Sims 3 meets Sim City/Transport Tycoon. The scope is vast I know and perhaps trying to be all things to all people is impossible, but the bottom line is that as a kid I was able to immerse myself in Elite and truly believe if only for a brief moment that I was out there in space, making my way, fighting ships, trading and exploring. Today, my adult imagination while still enthralled by Oolite tends to fill in the gaps less and so I'd be looking for a virtual universe essentially to do in as I please.

I'm not saying all this is easy (far from it), if it were then it would have already been done (well). However you don't get big results with small ideas (often). Maybe this whole thread is a bit too radical... I'll get back in my box.

[Eric Walch]

Bigger ships should be easier to hit, and maybe need more fuel.

That bigger ships are easier to hit is already part of the game for a long time.

That bigger ships consume more fuel is also coded up in the source by Kaks. Filling up a tank of a big ship will costs more credits than a small ship. This code part is just not activated yet during compilation.

[Ganelon]

But let's face it, essentially systems in Oolite are very much alike. There are no big surprises. So for me the question is, how would more of the same make this a better game?

Well, yeah. If it was always just more of the same, then it wouldn't make any difference. But if systems were developed out a bit more, like if there was something like the Gem Market of Erlage or the Platinum Buyers of Tionis, so there were places with unique stations where there might be better than normal prices on specific items.. Or maybe furs and liquors are only at really good prices in some ag systems at certain times of the year, or some ship upgrades were only available at a very few specific places.

Factors that would affect economies of known systems could affect the gameplay of known systems, and so I think it might meet with less resistance to place systems with unique features in "new or little known" places. That could be the reason why the established player hadn't heard of them before and why they weren't a part of the original Elite.

"I'll let you in on a little secret, boy.. If you ever find yourself in G4, there's a region of space there they call "The Razor's Edge". Rough sort of a place, so wait until you've iron-assed your ship out and gotten plenty of fighting experience under your belt. But if you go to the Laerzaes system in the Razor's Edge, there's a little world that you can only see from there that's not on any of the official charts. Now it's a real backwater sort of place. They don't even have a proper station, you have to land on the planet itself. But the planet is rich in gems. They'll practically give them away for any kind of a computer or modern luxury. Oh, you don't believe me? Well, that's your business. But if you were as smart in the head as you are in your mouth, and you really wanted one of those big fancy ships you've been talking about, then you might check into it yourself some day. I have to warn you though, if you ever do try, it's a dangerous sort of place. Hmm? Pirates? No, they won't be your big problem in getting in and out. Neither will police. Let's just say that it's a very unusual system and an even more unusual planet. No, I won't say any more about it. You don't believe me anyway. Good bye and good luck.. Commander."

I like the idea of Oolite becoming more multi-media.

Perhaps we need a better entry-point for fiction. Does every Oolite installation come with Status Quo, or at least with A Virtuous Misfortune? If not yet, then make it so in the future. I still think these should be the first stories a player gets offered to read.

Considering it can be hard to get a player who's eager to try out a new game to read the manual or even a readme file, I'm not sure that including stories with the game would work any miracles. Couldn't hurt, though.

But the more fiction and media we have out there, the better the chances of someone running across the game as a result of it.

Because they look cool. And they add to the feeling that you can't be the king of the Ooniverse, that there's always someone more powerful than you. Even I with my iron-ass Imperial Courier and all my fighting experience, and not thinking that I would need multiple forward lasers or plasma turrets to win my fights, do get more focused and alarmed if there's a Basilisk or Hydra around. And I think that's a healthy feeling for a game.

Oh, I agree that there should be forces and ships out there somewhere where even an Elite ranked player in an iron-assed whatever had better be wearing their lucky socks even to just get away alive. But I feel that having a weapons disparity that is so obvious even on the visual levels to a beginner is a pretty cheap way of accomplishing it. It makes no sense that a weapon that is easily available to an NPC in a common type of ship wouldn't be available also to the player. It also doesn't make much sense that the old Elite had twin beams on the player ship and Oolite doesn't, if being faithful to the original for the core/strict is such a prioroty.

Multiple lasers also wouldn't be that much of an advantage, unless one is firing on a large ship. How often do *all* the beams from a multiple-beam equipped NPC seem to hit you? If the beams are parallel and you're shooting at a small target, often one of the beams would miss anyway.

[Kaks]

That bigger ships consume more fuel is also coded up in the source by Kaks. Filling up a tank of a big ship will costs more credits than a small ship. This code part is just not activated yet during compilation.

90% of that code was done by DS, I just did some tweaking...

Edit:

a weapon that is easily available to an NPC in a common type of ship

I never thought they were that common / easily available... I also thought you had specifically to get an oxp to even see one npc with twin lasers!

In any case, this thread seems to be moving away from 'nothing left to do with the basic Oolite engine' concept already...

If I may say so, it looks a bit more like 'tons still to do with the basic Oolite engine'!

As far as the OE project goes, perhaps I misunderstand the project but it seems like it's just Oolite with a ton of OXPs built-in, no?

Well it kind of started that way - well, it started by trying to add sensible prices to all Oolite ships, native & oxp (for a given definition of sensible), but its scope - and objective - has gone beyond that, as far as I understand it: you can buy stations for example, on your way of building an empire...

[Darkbee]

If I may say so, it looks a bit more like 'tons still to do with the basic Oolite engine'!

That isn't necessarily a bad thing.

[Kaks]

It kind of is for your sim city/oolite dream game, unless you manage to find a few developers (4 or 5, at a guess) who share your vision!

[Disembodied]

In any case, this thread seems to be moving away from 'nothing left to do with the basic Oolite engine' concept already...

If I may say so, it looks a bit more like 'tons still to do with the basic Oolite engine'!

I'm not sure ... a lot of these adjustments would probably break the game. A better trading model, for example: this would be great, and could have all sorts of unique products on offer. Instead of individual commodities, each basic commodity could be a market in its own right, e.g. the Liquor and Wines market, the Minerals market, the Machinery market and so on. There could be different ways of trading: a barter system, various types of auction (English, Dutch, inch of candle, etc.) and so on.

However, this would likely have a drastic effect on other parts of the game. Oolite's money system isn't geared up to cope with players making either big profits or taking big losses. To counteract the first we'd need some serious money-sinks (much higher fuel, maintenance and equipment costs, for example), and to counteract the second we'd need a borrowing system and debt. It's very difficult to tweak something like the in-game economy without affecting everything else.

Oolite as it stands is really, really close to as good as it can ever get. The only things I can think of which can be adjusted without running the risk of breaking everything are the occasional minor almost-bugs inherited from Elite, e.g. the witchdrive malfunction. In vanilla Oolite, this can, through no fault of your own, plunge you into an epic fight which – even if you win – can still leave you stranded. No game should ever say, "Hey player! Here's a really tough, but just about doable, challenge! Okay, you won – but too bad, you're screwed anyway, you might as well not have bothered." My preferred fix would be something like after the last Thargoid dies, their witchspace disruptor hoojimaflip dies with them and your wormhole reopens, giving you 90 seconds to get down it.

Oolite needs a very little final sanding and polishing, and there's always the inevitable fiddling here and there that can be done (I really like the idea of easy, medium and difficult starting option, too). But any significant change to the game mechanics would risk destabilising other bits of the game, which would then have to be rebalanced, throwing something else out of whack ... and so on, resulting eventually in either madness or Oolite 2. Or both.