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[Lazycow]

screenshots

trailer video:


free download: http://lazycow.itch.io/nanovoid
(Windows, Mac, Linux)

[Gainsworthy]

Zero Replies? For shame.

This is pretty damn awesome. A little barebones, and rather difficult, but very fun. The presentation's slick, the controls are simple and smooth, and I see a lot of potential in the idea. Also, coming against nicely organised squadrons of fighters is a great feeling.

Though, I really think the Ship needs some extras, to make it all a little survivable. A boost, maybe a few missiles. Something like that. Currently, if I'm not totally careful, death is swift and unpleasant. Not that it stops me, mind you.

As for graphics? They're great. The turn animation flows really well, and I've always been a big fan of the whole pseudo 3D old style RTS kind of look. Sounds effects are fine. Crunchy.

I'm rather excited to hear that you've got Four races planned. I hope the ships will be sufficiently different, as that's always fun. Will you be able to choose your race/ship, or will you be a freelancer?

The freespace ideas - asteroid belts, dark clouds, moon orbits and etc sound great. Could be good to have a relaxed explore around, maybe discover som secrets?

Anyways, keep us all posted on this! Looking great so far.

And one more thing: Why is it called Nanovoid? I mean, as a Nanotech student and general pedant, I don't see anything Nano about it. 

 

[george]

Hey, I just tried this and it was a lot of fun. I'm really looking forward to dogfights among some big hulky ships! One thing that was a little odd at first was turning and the main thrusters flaming while firing with the LMB; it made sense after a second, but I wonder if the ship should only fire attitudinal (is that the right word?) jets when the LMB is clicked, to change direction, and use the main thrusters only when the RMB is clicked; I think that would make movement more intuitive for me.

[agj]

Ah--a mouse-controlled Time Pilot! Nice. Though way too hard, and probably a big cause of that is the lack of responsiveness of the control. It should be snappier. Other than that, it is totally slick.

[Loren Schmidt]

That's a very enticing little demo. As others have mentioned, there's something very alluring about the style. I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this.

...lack of responsiveness of the control. It should be snappier.

The ship doesn't seem to turn right away- sometimes if you try to do a 180 it takes almost a half second to respond.

Is there rotational inertia in the game? If so that's neat, but I think the current settings are hurting your responsiveness. I'm not really sold on the control scheme to be honest, but the game certainly has a lot of potential!

My favorite part was blowing up transports and stealing space butter.

[Lazycow]

a freespace sector
(ideas for more sectors: asteroid field, dark cloud, moon orbits, hyperspace)


A dogfight scene. The fleet of the Humanoid Empire. (four further empires will follow)

@Gainsworthy: The "space butter"   remnants of the transport ship are a first test for powerups. Additionally, it is planned that you can control at least one craft of each alien fleet by "capturing" it, but you start with Humanoids. Maybe you will have to do this to defeat the empire's boss-vessel. (own empire + 4 alien empires = 5 empires) Hey, I like that "relaxing zone" idea. What could you do while relaxing? Maybe docking at the space station? And yes, there really should be a "Nanovoid" in the game. (actually that name is the result of finding a name for a space game that hasn't been used, yet)

@george: The mouse control is indeed designed to be as simple as possible. That was done on purpose, because there could be an iphone version of the game. A RMB-move and LMB-attack scheme would also be possible, but then the craft had to turn away from the move-vector to fire which made it more sloppy. Shooting not in the mouse direction just "feels" unnatural. (my personal opinion, though) The 2nd attack method I had in mind would be "clicking" at an enemy vessel to fire a homing missile. What about that? Also, it is planned to control 5 different types of crafts where it is likely that each of them has a different control scheme to make each craft unique.

@agj: How did you know that I played Time Pilot that last few weeks?  

@Sparky: About the style: I wish I could squeeze a bit more realism out of the raytracer. When crafts are rotating, they accellerate and then they deaccellerate (that's why you see these little rotation thrusters). You are right, there are 0.25 second delays after mouse moves and such a little fighter should react faster. Good point, I should fix that!

Thanks for the inspiring comments!

[YamROCK]

[Lazycow]

Here are some selected crafts, which I have pimped up with AC3D recently. (rendered with povray) What do you think about the models? Are they readable? Yes, they have no textures, yet. If you have an idea what colors or materials would look cool, feel free to drop a comment here.

[William Broom]

Those models look pretty good. I might just say that the 'Spore' looks quite ill-defined... it's just a sort of blob. But if that's what it's meant to be, then no problem.

EDIT: OK, so now I actually played the game, and it's really fun! A few things:

-The big boss ships with their homing missiles seem really hard to kill. I certainly never managed to get one of them.

-It seems a little unfair that sometimes you will get hit several times in a row without being able to escape because of the long spinning animation. Perhaps you could make the player invincible during that time?

-Sometimes I would shoot an enemy, and they would disappear without an explosion. Or, I would collect a space butter and it wouldn't make any sound.

[Loren Schmidt]

That's funny- I was just about to post and say I like that one the best .

It goes to show how subjective these things are. I like the range of shapes, and you're seriously making me want to play the full game.

If I were to make a suggestion, I'd say that these tend to have good large scale forms, but there aren't enough small and mid-sized elements in some of these. The Stargate is a good example of how including all different sizes of elements can make an object more interesting. Does that make sense? I think I could have said that more clearly...

What's the polygon count on these?

[Lazycow]

Yeah, the spore is just a blob. All models do not have much detail, maybe I should put some work in there. Some of the objects have to be shrunk down a bit, because the game area is only 480x320.

About the demo: You have discovered the "missing explosion bug", well done.  Seems like I wasn't able to fix it, yet. Is the difficulty level too tough? The "space butter" is just a placeholder for power-ups and energy-fill-ups, etc. Hopefully, equipped with some extras you could master it. But I agree, the player could need some seconds invincibility after death, good point!


(vertices: 138 - surfaces:157)

What about that detail level? Maybe a bit more.

[Loren Schmidt]

I like the little engines you've added, those are ace.

I really like how clean the lines of your original model were. I wonder if there is a way to add detail in a way that compliments the original shape, rather than making it busier.

I'm sure whatever you come up with will be great, I really like the look of the demo. Here's looking forward to the game!

[Lazycow]

I have pimped up some graphics: Asteroids for the asteroid field. (procedurally generated with povray) The complete Humanoid Fleet. (now recolored to blue metal) The Fanatics Fleet. (crafts of the Fanatics are mostly build out of crystals)

[increpare]

The Fanatics Fleet. (crafts of the Fanatics are mostly build out of crystals)

I like the others, but I think you should consider messing about with the texturing of the fanatics a bit more?

[Craig Stern]

The Fanatics Fleet. (crafts of the Fanatics are mostly build out of crystals)

I like the others, but I think you should consider messing about with the texturing of the fanatics a bit more?

I agree. I like the models quite a lot, though, and the texturing for the humanoid ships is perfect.

[Melly]

Tried the demo a bit and had fun playing it, though I agree that the mild lack of responsiveness and sluggish ship make it really hard.

Good job though, I'll be wathcing for a release.

[Loren Schmidt]

Yay, an update! I'm excited about this game. All those tiny little ships and space objects really appeal to me in a toylike way. I want to collect them all, and see them engaged in epic space battles.

Looking good, Mr. Cow.

[Lazycow]

Finally, I finished all 20 "vessels"...

• The Humanoid Fleet: Old versions of these crafts are used in the demo. Equipped with ion-cannons, torpedos and space-mines.
• The Reptiloid Fleet: Can use a special kamikaze attack and 3 fighters can join to increase mobility.
• The Fanatic Fleet. Build partly out of crystals. The Laserstar and Incarnation (the two big guys) cannot move themselves and have to be dragged around. But they have deadly lasers.
• The Android Fleet. Build out of Modules. The big cube operates functional, even if over 50% of its modules gets destroyed. Small drones can detach and try to intercept enemy ships.
• The Symbiont Fleet. They grow in space when their energy increases. Equipped with space-jelly guns and tentacles.

Hope you like them... 

[Eclipse]

wow awesome!

when i saw the first post i thought "seems a very nice game but those ships are pretty lowres\old skool", mainly because the evident 8\16 bit color with dithering look...
 now i need to say those models are very nice!

i love the ones in the second row and the first row is pretty nice too for the humans, i think the others should be ok for some wacky alien race, i'd blast 'em with fun  :D


oh, and don't forget to support alpha trasparency for their antialiased outlines .

[Loren Schmidt]

These are really yummy.

I especially like the design of the green ones.