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[autumnspark]

Hello ladies and gents, I'm working on a game called Sol-Ark with some people I met online that were nice enough to let me help create it. We're an international team making Sol-Ark: a 2D deep space adventure game with some elements akin to Dwarf Fortress, FTL and Laser Squad, to name a few. It's a celestial celebration of exploration, ship construction/management, fighting, questing, robots, aliens, tyrannical monarchies, outlaws, miners, traders, severed limbs and probably some curse words here and there. It's being developed in good old Actionscript and we put out lists of most bugs we have to kill. I'll put some neat/annoying ones in the comments as they crop up. My favorite so far relates to an NPC operating a powered up exoskeleton and having an existential meltdown over a path-finding issue.

A small ship and a big sun.

What pew pew pew looks like up close.

A few things that make our game niffty:

Crew Morale: The player manages the crew who can be in different states of 4 distinct moods. A happy crew member might refuel an engine in half the normal time, while a depressed one may jettison itself out an airlock. It's influenced by stuff like how long since you've given the NPCs leg room to walk around other stations and food monotony. Don't feed 'em soy beans over and over again and not expect them to give your position away to an enemy or take a rocket launcher to your cockpit.

Random Events: We've got a few in the game so far and are planning for a bunch more. There are different classes, like celestial phenomenon, encounters with pirates, traders, miners, factions, on board malfunctions, crew sicknesses, etc. The ship can get severed in two by a naturally occurring space maser or have its electronics fried by a magnetar, while some events will do stuff like boost insect farm production and crew wound healing.

Ship Sandbox: So you can build your ship in any shape you want. I made a comment about making a giant cat head, and as you can see below, it was easily done (although lacking in the weapon and defense arena). I think this is cool though because the player can set up the compartments and technic systems and subsystems in the arrangement and organization that works best for them. We're not going to tell anyone what's best.

Me-ow-ch!

In the spirit of not telling players everything they need to do:
I'll refrain from subjecting your eyes to more gifs and images and descriptions of every facet of the game. If you think Sol-Ark is looking cool you can find out everything there is to know through our websites, the links below and probably the comments here. We're working hard on a demo and you can bet your starry backsides we'll put up a link when she's a void hardened program of black hole inducing awe and wonder (hopefully).

Sol-Ark Main Webpage
Sol-Ark Devlogs
IndieDB Page

Videos:






Customization & Expansion

[AlexMartial]

Hello, everyone! Today we are among top-70 on IndieDB. I know, that rank is floating but this is still cool!

[autumnspark]

Definitely feeling a little cracked out right now. Couldn't be happier the weekend has arrived. Our team has been busy implementing automated defense turrets (rocket, laser, and machine gun projectiles) which intercept enemy shells and torpedoes. We've also got the code in for kinetic shields that will deflect physical ammunition but not lasers. We're still working on the the visualization of it though, but this image shows two shield generators overlapping like a smooth, blue electromagnetic field of enemy halting badassery.

We also just made a new video showcasing the variety of ways that NPCs can throw their lives away into the harsh cold reality of simulated deep space. My favorite might be number one on the list, which I'll show you below. Video is here:

Here is our latest devlog that covers some bugs we killed and features we put in. We added new sprites for our power loader exoskeletons, medic and engineering space suits, and a bunch of other cool stuff. Devlog is here: http://solarkindiegame.blogspot.com/

[autumnspark]

After a weekend of failed attempts to use a rope swing to avert the dangers of marsh laden oyster beds I guess I can post some new stuff:



This is a minor alien infestation, but shows some cool stuff we've fixed/ implemented

• Firstly we have a new asteroid type that's been inserted into the game. They look like giant boulders of star hardened coal. Each type of asteroid will have different resources that can be excavated.
• There are 3 asteroid belt layers which means cruising through solar systems is going to look awesome.
• The player can only interact with asteroids in one layer, so the other two are there to show depth and speed and just look cool. They have different properties for size, spin and speed and are affected by the orbital calculations each planet, ship, moon, etc. are governed by.
• Aliens. These are a basic infestation type we'e calling space cockroaches at the moment. Our NPC's used to be a little lacking in the tracking department, or even picking up a weapon when commanded. Hopefully they'll hold their own a wee bit better now.

We spent a good amount of time plotting out events, actions, dialogue and messages that will be in our demo/beginning of the game. So far everyone's been on board with my...interesting ideas (and by interesting I mean, weird, a little F'ed up, and maybe cannibalistic). Let's just say you're not going to want to step out the airlock to ride the space ponies without donning a suit first.

More deets about feature implementation and bugs can be found here.

[autumnspark]

Right now we have every map level in place except for the galactic map. We need to update the look of the ship as you zoom out, probably give the solar panels some nice sparkles and the shields a nice flashy sheen. As of now the shields don't totally deflect incoming projectiles, they just slow them down so they do less damage. A interesting effect we didn't necessarily see coming was that when a missile/torpedo is launched from the ship it's speed is decreased until it exists the shield, which looks kinda neat.

[GroZZleR]

Looks really cool so far mate.

Is there an overall objective or is it pure sandbox?  Can you board other vessels?

[autumnspark]

Why yes, you most certainly can board other vessels, be it an enemy ship, occupied/derelict stations, asteroids, stuff like that. Likewise, vessels can board you. We're working on logic for enemy ship encounters. There's a chance you may board what seems to be a dead ship and actually get ambushed by pirates or aliens or robots. You will be able to use the same technique though (which could make for some awkward encounters if both you and an enemy were playing dead).

There is an overall objective, with a full blooded main story line and side quests. You'll be able to try some of it out around April when we put our demo out. We do realize it might be hard to really capitalize on sandbox creativity while worrying about missions and resource allocation, shit like that, so we are thinking about including different modes which would let you just drift around and make crazy stuff if you wanted. No promises yet though.

Here's a pic of some boarding action (enemy sprites are just tinted red at the moment)

 This one is of a Sol Ark that has docked with an enemy ship, a derelict station, and an asteroid before getting severed in half 

[autumnspark]

We've been doing some optimization and sending background calculations through the GPU to speed stuff up a little.
Explosions are so smooth right now they seamlessly blow astronaut organs into strawberry jam.
Whole devlog is right hurrrrrrr.

[autumnspark]

Did a write up for how indirect crew management works.
It's kind of like how Mother issues directives and sets task priority for the Nostromo's crew.



You select NPCs that specialize in the task that needs to be completed (if you want) and highlight what area the action should be performed in. In the gif we've highlighted where new frames need to be built and asteroid resources harvested and hollowed out. The crew may or may not do a good job for a number of reasons, but we're trying to make their failures rewarding to behold. The NPCs have been programmed to do things like auto-repair damage to systems and ship architecture, but you can override this in their priority list. An example of this would be setting the ship's Pilot to put out fires in the V.I. system module compartment instead of, you know, flying the ship.
You can check out some more examples and explanation here at IndieDB, or you can just check out the gif and call it a day 

[autumnspark]

We put in a bunch of new defense features and got them all working correctly. The red flares are thermal decoys that misguide enemy rockets, and what we're calling "dusty veils" deflect lasers. The sprite for the veil will be updated soon so it's not so, well, dust bunny-ish. But we finally got attack drones up and running in proper circle formations. They orbit the player's ship and will shift to an enemy ship if you're so inclined. I'm excited for the next few weeks, as we'll have dialogue boxes up and running and start inserting the narrative, warp animations, and ship/station templates for the demo's story line. Yeehaw, space cowboys & cowgirls.

Oh, and due to a user comment over on IndieDB we're discussing how best to turn asteroids into engine guided suicidal battering rams of unfathomable death and destruction. That will be interesting to watch...

Devlog Update

[autumnspark]

We've done a bunch of optimization over the past week instead of trying to cram all of the systems we want into the game. Even so, I finally got to see what lasers will look like when deflected. Zig zag.





I'm looking forward to implementing some good old narrative and scripting out some challenging encounters this week. I'm hoping it won't suck. Anyway, I'll drop a video link with some prolonged space battles with every offensive/defensive system we've put into place so far.

.

[autumnspark]

So I think short circuits just became my favorite random event. Though, that might change if we put razor back Johnny Number 5 in the game. I did a write up of a bunch of random events and how they kinda work. Space is dangerous, folks.

[autumnspark]

So I am making it a tradition to drink a beer outside, wearing as few clothes as possible, every time we update the look of our sun. Will post pictures upon request...   Also I'm getting quite excited about some of the tracks that are getting reworked. I might post a few to show what the progression has been like for their iterations, as I think it's really interesting to see what layers were added or changed to give the track the right sound.

Link to vid with new sun and pretty sick music.

[autumnspark]

I did a runthrough of what we have of our demo so far today. It feels good to look back and see how builds of features and mechanics in a freeroaming environment can come together in a more streamlined and crafted experience.I just hope some of the shit I've written comes across as funny and cool.

Devlog stuff: added a bunch of planets, warp lensing effects, and added objects to help with scripted events.

[autumnspark]

These are the finaglings of our programmer for last week. He is a very busy math Wizard.
Here is the devlog with cool gifs and images.

Fixed Bugs:

With incorrect change of path traversing status for tiles during the separation of a location;
Error with activation of quest timer for the gravity brakes;
Critical error with visualization for the micromanagement map level of one location, when opening the micromanagement map level of another location;
With incorrect curvature of sprites inside the lens effect;
With incorrect task finding by a NPC which is a member of a squad;
With incorrect searching for task type “to treat”;
With incorrect searching for task type “to build technics”;
With extra calculations for a NPC’s pathfinding;
With the incorrect checking of a target technic’s availability for a NPC;
With incorrect calculation of rotation axis for a location;
With cancelation during a search for a map area with oxygen while moving through a door;
With incorrect visualization effect for exit from warp;

Curvature of sprites inside the lens effect was corrected;
Connection scheme between a NPC and its target technical object was corrected;
Checking scheme was modified for technic objects, NPCs, items, light sources, environment objects, which are all located on a tile;
Algorithm of oxygen consumption was added for NPCs without spacesuits;
Logic behavior was added for NPCs without spacesuits, they avoid map areas with low oxygen levels;
Algorithm was added for flames burning oxygen, as well as fire dampening when the oxygen level is too low;
Additional program was created for easier generation of a background’s textures;
Warp background on the local space map level was changed;
New textures were added for the ship’s visualization on the local space map level;
Backlight was added for NPCs which are a part of the selected squad;
Algorithm optimization was performed for location separations and for deleting all technics from a location;
Optimization was performed on calculations for sprite coordinates, which are visualized by the GPU;
Correction was added for task finding by NPCs which are part of a squad;
Skeletal animation was added for running technics like “3D-printer”;
For technic objects and NPCs we added a parameter - “quest object”, as well as a connection between those objects and their appropriate quests;
New class of objects - “quest points” - was added, as well as the connection between those objects and their appropriate quests;
A system of containers for a few types of technics were modified;
Ability to save quest points and quest parameters into the ship’s template was added;
New types of triggers for mission performance were added;
Work continues on the first official project's teaser;
Work continues on storyline and gameplay of the technical demo;

Our Warp animation is coming along nicely as well 

[autumnspark]

Most of our sprites consist of around 18-20 layers that we pose in frames for the animation cycle. 25 different frames is about the norm for most of our NPC sprite animations.

You can hear my nerdy voice go over it more here.

[autumnspark]

Devlog with a bunch of stuff going on. Oxygen management has got an update and is vented out of the airlock and replenished now. I'm looking forward to asphyxiating pirates trying to board my ship. Anyway, I'll post a link to more screens and gifs from the week as well.

Moar Pics and Gifs Plz

These bugs are fixed:
With incorrect placement of layers for the 3D-printer sprite;
With incorrect calculation of required movement speed for ship while connecting to a location;
With extra redrawing of location’s sprites during their generation on the local space map level;
With the ability to destroy incoming meteoroids directed at the ship;
With orbit visualization above planets;
With incorrect direction choice made by the ship for avoiding obstacles;
With incorrect window operations for selecting a locus while connecting to a location;
With incorrect resource consumption during autorepair;
With incorrect oxygen level change on technic objects;
With incorrect operating functions for selecting technic objects around a set point;
With deleting/adding unnecessary/necessary mouse actions during a shift from one map level to another;
With the GPU loading unnecessary sprites;
With explosion distribution on a space’s tile;
With critical error in 3D-printer animation;
With uploading unnecessary temporary images from the buffer;
With incorrect setting for first point of torpedo’s exhaust on the local space map level;
With NPC “freezing” during the performance of a suicide task;
Other bugs;
Algorithm was added for ship avoidance of obstacles on the local space map level;
New triggers were added for checking quest performance;
Location algorithm template saving was modified with new parameters;
Work is being performed on the appearance of dialogue windows;
Ability to gain oxygen from hydroponic platforms was added;
Slot with fuel was deleted from the gas collector structure; from now on it deposits fuel directly into barrels;
New templates were made for pirate ships, which now gives them the ability to randomly appear;
Location creation was optimized for object type “asteroid”;
A new operating slot was added for VI objects - “auto control of doors”;
A window was created for selecting operating modifications for some types of technics;
New events were added, connected with quest points;
Algorithm of NPC’s behavior was added for suicide action like “jump into deep space”;
New object for container type “О2 balloon” was added;
New operating modifications were added for the gas collector, such as “collect O2 in balloons” and “oxygen supply from balloons”;
We created a window for editing parameters of technic objects and NPCs;
Work continues on our technical demo and the location template for it;
Work continues on first official teaser of the game;
Work continues on the main storyline and polishing our GDD;A few new music tracks were created;

[AlexMartial]

Hello, everyone!

We are updating our thread with new video and the latest devlog.

Take a look how Sol-Ark evolves right before your eyes.









Check Sol-Ark's page on IndieDB website and our blog with devlogs to know more. Join us on Sol-Ark's official website to stay tuned.

[AlexMartial]

Hello, everyone! We are publishing the ninth article from a series about main Sol-Ark's features of gameplay - Crew Morale



Astronauts today are heralded as some of the bravest and most noble members of our species. In the future some space explorers are emotionally volatile sacks of skin that need you to be their baby sitter and make sure they behave. In Sol-Ark you will have to monitor the crew’s morale, which can range from different levels of happiness, anger, depression and aloofness.



A crew members morale will dictate certain aspects of their behavior, especially when given a task to perform. If you ask an agitated and angered NPC to fix a power transmitter they may damage it, themselves, or even cause it to short circuit and zap any crew in the vicinity. Scrubbing electrically popped astronaut guts off your space ship floor is not how you want to spend your time, trust me.



Read full article on Sol-Ark's IndieDB page

Join us on our website to know more

[AlexMartial]

Hello, friends!

We are updating Sol-Ark's page by new devlog (14/04/2015 CheckPoint) and new gameplay video.

All graphics and gameplay features are a work in progress.

Look, how Sol-Ark evolves right before your eyes!









Check Sol-Ark's page on IndieDB website and our blog with devlogs to know more. Join us on Sol-Ark's official website to stay tuned.