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RetroNeo Games
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« on: August 03, 2015, 11:34:24 AM »



Sons of SolĀ®
This game is "Asteroids meets Wing Commander meets Xcom". When you battle it's a top down space shooter with Newtonian physics where you fly with wingmen and support ships to try and complete your objective. This mode takes inspiration from games like X-Wing and Wing Commander.
Then, when you win or lose the battle, you return to a map of the solar system and continue to manage your Private Military Company, growing your fleet and winning security contracts from miners and civilians who are threatened by local pirate activity.

Please note, in early design pitches, "Asteroids meets Total War" was used, but as the game became more focused on your squadron of pilots, not a grand army, we felt "Xcom" was a better description.

Genre:
Space sim, Action, Strategy

Single or Multiplayer:
Single player systems-driven campaign. Light story.
Local Co-op or dogfighting a possibility, but not currently planned.

Developer:
RetroNeo Games

Social & Media Links:
Website
Press Kit
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
YouTube Gaming (development livestreams)
Twitch (development livestreams)
Mixer (development livestreams)

Livestream times:
Mondays at 3pm, Irish Time
Thursdays at 8pm Irish Time

Development is no longer regularly livestreamed.

Team:
Kevin Murphy - Leader Developer.
Fred Mangan - Artist.
Steve Gregan - composer/audio.

Platforms:
Windows PC.
This game works very well on controller so PS4 and XB1 are all possible too.
This will not come to mobile as it's a skill based shooter that requires several input buttons.

Start Date:
1st of May, 2015

Projected Release Date:
Q1 2018 When it's done. Development is now part-time.

Current Demo: v0.2.8 (combat demo)
Build Date: May 22nd, 2017
Available here for PC

I'll post here with regular updates throughout the process.
All feedback would be very very much appreciated, not matter how big, small, good or bad. Thank you.


Videos




Latest GIFs and Screenshots













« Last Edit: July 22, 2018, 11:09:46 AM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
RetroNeo Games
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« Reply #1 on: August 03, 2015, 12:09:46 PM »

So I'm just over 3 months into development and was convinced by Colm (from Guild of Dungeoneering) to do a dev log here. His one looks great and I hope to make my journey just as interesting for you folks.

I won't take much time to sum up the last three months but briefly; All the work you can see in the demo was done in those 3 months, and I've been forming the company, building the website (still under construction. Looks like I'm doing it myself now though as the web dev got too busy to take me on), getting logos together and looking for team members.

My first major target is to have a vertical slice of the game (strategy as well as combat modes) ready by Halloween. With that in mind, last week I set out a 13 week roadmap.

Last week's work involved setting up a basic strategy map of the (as yet unnamed) solar system that the game is entirely set in. You can see in the GIF below what it looks like currently. I've just white circles representing planets and moons and green shields and stars representing PMC (you are a Private Military Company in the game) bases and fleets.



This week, as well as working on the site and my blog and other things, I'm working on a menu system for the strategy map. There's actually a lot of on-paper game design I've yet to do for the strategy layer, but with 12 weeks remaining for my Halloween deadline I'm forcing myself to dive right in. It'll be a very iterative process.
I used to write more songs and music and also produce a burlesque show. My style was usually to go 75% of the way with what you feel ("from the heart" per se) and then make the last 25% polish. Those numbers are totally arbitrary by the way.

For the strategy menus, the interface through which you control your entire war machine, I'm looking towards the X-Com Enemy Unknown interface for inspiration, though since I'm not doing a 3D rendered 'ant hill' it may come out looking more like 1994's X-Com. We shall see.

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 12:56:53 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #2 on: August 04, 2015, 12:26:56 PM »

Been working on where to put the menus, the currency, and the timer display. As I said, I've taken inspiration from Xcom Enemy Unknown, but I also looked to Xenonauts and Empire at War to remember how they did it. Xenonauts actually said they didn't like their UI but I thought it was very tidy. Maybe I shouldn't be left in charge of this, then, ultimately. This is what I laid out so far.

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 12:42:04 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #3 on: August 04, 2015, 06:22:20 PM »

I was sold on  "Asteroids meets Total War".  If I wasn't working on two games myself I might have volunteered to be your artist. The UI looks fins for now, although I've wrestled with UI and have nightmares about it myself. 

Looking forward to some sort of closed alpha or something where folks can test the game out!
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« Reply #4 on: August 05, 2015, 01:27:29 AM »

If I wasn't working on two games myself I might have volunteered to be your artist.
Well it looks like I'm doing the art myself for the vertical slice and if people like that slice I'll continue and get an artist before/after Christmas time. Do you have a link to your portfolio? I'll bookmark it and get in touch later. Maybe you'd be finished then.

Quote
Looking forward to some sort of closed alpha or something where folks can test the game out!
Glad you like it. Before Halloween I'll get the demo out and look for a lot of feedback but you can play what's there currently at this address http://www.kevinmurphygames.com/sos-private-demo
Or download PC version from that page also.
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« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2015, 04:01:42 PM »

Who would have thought that designing and prototyping a whole strategy layer in just a week would be an unrealistic goal? Well, maybe I just need to narrow the scope of the strategy layer for now. On Monday I'll have to move on to the mission planning screen or fall behind. Hopefully I can catch up a little over the weekend, but to populate my menus for the vertical slice I'll have to get menus in place for 13 different systems. Some of these will need to be functional but others (like the 'base building' mechanic) can be just a concept sketch for now.
But even concept sketches take man hours, something I'm quickly realising that one man only has 24 x 1 of per day. An artist on the team would have been great at this stage as we'd have 48 man hours per day between us (yes I sleep. In fact I only work 8-12 hours per day, 6 days per week, roughly. Is that a small amount for a solo indie dev?). Again, if you know any artists, please show them this dev log and maybe they'd like to get in touch.

My 13 menus that I want to get done over the weekend (though I'm out all Saturday at a game design workshop) are:
  • Spies menu
  • Full intel report
  • Counter Intelligence section
  • Activity Log
  • Mange Flagship (base building)
  • Requisitions (buying ammo/upgrades)
  • Pilots
  • Troopers
  • 1st Fleet (managing the support ships in the fleet who are available on missions)
  • Defensive Platforms (a bit like Xcom's hangars, set up near allies for their defense)
  • Recon Drones (like satellites, but in space)
  • Profit & Loss report
  • Contracts (you're a Private Military Company so you get offered contracts and bonuses for protection work)

These all fall under the 5 headings you can see in the screenshot above this post. They should cover everything I need but it's an iterative design process and I may be able to do without some or find that I need to add to them. Either way, prototyping them all in less than two days seems a daunting task, and if I don't then I'm behind schedule. To work!
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« Reply #6 on: August 10, 2015, 12:30:12 AM »

I try not to do too much work on the weekend, because it's a real good way to burn out, and to lose your social life, but I worked right through the weekend to try and get those 13 systems up and I only got half way there. There's some good infrastructure in place for me now though and I did a lot of design that needed looking at, but I didn't finish and I hope I get back to it before my vertical slice deadline. Right now half the menus just give a "not implemented yet" message

This week's task is to create some sort of mission generation screen. When civilian convoys need to take a trip to or from a mining area, you'll be contracted to protect them and have to divert some of your ships to fly escort for them.

I need an interface to decide which ships these will be (also I realise I've only two types of working ship in the game, really. Bummer) but I also need to design exactly how much freedom and control you get over this process.

I'm fast learning that the nebulous ideas you have on your head are not simple to program into a game engine. They need a solid "paper" form before you have anything to work from. What many people (myself included) think of as one job, is in fact two.
« Last Edit: August 10, 2015, 12:54:35 AM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #7 on: August 16, 2015, 10:30:42 AM »

I've been having something of a crisis of faith in the game this week. Not that I don't believe it's fun or that I can't bring it about, but in trying to design the way in which missions bring themselves to you, I overthought everything, deviated from my written plan, and wound up travelling back in time to when everything was a possibility. I re-thought through all the approaches I could take and was too fearful to design the one I had already decided on, because I couldn't see every aspect of it.

The end result was that I wasted more time not building anything than I would have building one wrong thing and redoing it later.
I suppose this is the danger of being a (so far) one man team. There's nobody to keep you grounded and nobody to hold you accountable for your mistakes.

I must learn from this. Next week I'm meant to design a tactical map for the combat layer, but I haven't yet managed to interface a way into the combat layer from the strategy layer.

In the meantime, here's a few screens of menus.



« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 12:55:00 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #8 on: August 21, 2015, 09:24:36 AM »

After some redesign I admitted I was on slightly the wrong track with the strategy map in the last post. I know what I'm at now but I had to leave it unfinished and move on to the tactical map for within the battles. People have said that the radar is too small and doesn't let you see the battlefield well enough. I've known this to be true and for a long time I've wanted to introduce something reminiscent of the maps from Xwing or Tie Fighter in the 90s. This would be important for the feel of game that I'm trying to evoke (in people who played those games, naturally). For others it's just important to have a map.

Here's one from X-wing (1993), my first ever game with my first PC. I was 7 when we got it in 94.



And here's what I've gotten today. Looks are similar. Not sure what colour to go with for the lines (please let me know), or whether to include the background from the level or leave it more technical and bare-bones like you see here.

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:05:15 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #9 on: August 21, 2015, 02:35:06 PM »

This looks promising! Reminds me of games I used to play when I was a kid like Star Hammer and Solar Winds. :-)
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Siddhartha Barnhoorn
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Award winning composer

Composed music for the games Antichamber, Out There, The Stanley Parable, Planet Alpha...

Website:
http://www.sidbarnhoorn.com
Bandcamp:
https://siddharthabarnhoorn.bandcamp.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/SidBarnhoorn
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« Reply #10 on: August 28, 2015, 02:39:12 AM »

Last night I finally got the camera set up the way I want it for mouse, and some decent controller support too. I can drag with left click, hold right click to pan, or move the mouse to the edges to pan and all at different zoom levels. That last part was the kicker. For anyone interested in the code to make it drag perfectly at different zoom levels, see here:

      //FOR LEFT-CLICK DRAGGING
      if(Input.GetMouseButtonDown(0))
      {
         PosOnClick = transform.position; //of the camera object, not the mouse
         xPosOnClick = Input.mousePosition.x; //of the mouse when clicked
         yPosOnClick = Input.mousePosition.y;
      }

      if(Input.GetMouseButton(0))
      {
         float xPos = (Input.mousePosition.x - xPosOnClick)*cameraToControl.orthographicSize*2/Screen.height;
         float yPos = (Input.mousePosition.y - yPosOnClick)*cameraToControl.orthographicSize*2/Screen.height;

         transform.position = new Vector3 (PosOnClick.x - xPos, PosOnClick.y - yPos, -50);
      }

It's the "orthographicSize *2 / Screen.height" that was so important. Even after solving for zoom level I was still getting perfect dragging speeds, then I'd go full screen and lose it. At least now I won't have to reinvent the wheel when working with strategy game style cameras in future.

I've been busy with government grant stuff too. I applied for Enterprise Ireland's New Frontiers program today, and got accepted to Ireland's Best Young Entrepreneur program which I applied for last month. All with this game idea. Maybe the government is finally starting to get their head around the games industry.

I'm continuing work on the tactical map and game design. At this stage it doesn't result in many screenshots for you, sadly, but work proceeds apiece, as they say (somebody say that..).
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« Reply #11 on: September 01, 2015, 06:58:21 AM »

My update at the moment is more company related than game related.

I've finally refactored my website from a personal portfolio into more of a company one. The www.kevinmurphygames.com url will now take you to www.retroneogames.com. Hope you like the new logo.



I've done a few changes to text, colours and layout on the site but nothing major. If anybody spots a problem I'd love to hear about it, as I had to use some custom CSS (which I'm not used to doing) and while it looks fine on my devices, I don't have all browsers and I've currently no Apple products.

The game has been a bit slow these past few days and will be for the next few days as I've been preparing entries to grant competitions and Enterprise Ireland programs. I got one of 7 places offered locally for round 1 of a business competition and so this Friday and Saturday I'll be busy with that, further reducing time on getting the vertical slice going.

The elephant in the room is also the Phantom Pain release later today, which I'm sure will eat some time, but I'll try be good. Smiley

I do have some progress to show, though. I'm working on fixing an issue with Unity UI and showing long lists, but when I have that (or get sick of it) I'll post up a video of the tactical map as it is currently. Hopefully later today..
« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:08:20 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #12 on: September 17, 2015, 06:08:31 AM »

Two weeks have gone by since an update. Sorry about that. I do confess to playing a lot of MGS V in that time but my main concern has been business competitions. I'm a Wicklow finalist for Ireland's Best Young Entrepreneur competition and I've done an interview to get on the New Frontiers program as well. Both of these programs offer a useful level of funding if successful and would be a huge boost to the game's development as it wouldn't have to be just me any more.
The downside of being a one man time is that when other distractions arise, like the setting up and running of an actual business, then nobody is developing the games any more.

I am looking for an artist for the game. Preferably one who knows Unity. Do please get in touch if you are interested or if you know anybody suitable.

Photo of the Wicklow entrepreneurs in the paper. Not that you care Tongue

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:09:21 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #13 on: September 25, 2015, 03:58:29 AM »

You haven't lived until you've done up a business plan, let me tell you! I didn't get into one program but I've another presentation on Tuesday so we'll see how that goes.

Game-wise, I'm currently trying to decide how I really want missions to go. Whether I want to allow them to be able to be really unbalanced like Star Wars Empire at War or Total War, or whether I want more of a wave system like Xwing or Wing Commander games kind of gave you.

Tied into that decision is whether or not to allow health to regenerate, or make you keep the hull damage you suffer. I would like a reason for the player to flee the battle early or risk staying. This could be accomplished with ammo, but not as well as with health, I feel. I'd appreciate any opinions on this one, though!
« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:09:05 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #14 on: October 02, 2015, 05:06:52 AM »

Doing a bit of redesigning to the strategy/campaign structure of the game, and that must include how it's represented. What I had before was based more on the Xcom or Xenonauts Geoscape and my newer idea is more node based like in Star Wars Empire at War. Both games (and Total War) are inspirations for aspects.

What do people like the look/idea of? A or B?

Pic A: existing version (posted previously).



Pic B: potential new node-based version. Please note it's very quickly mocked up, just for an idea, not real art.

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:10:41 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #15 on: October 07, 2015, 12:10:04 PM »

On the RetroNeo Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/retroneogames) There were a few votes in favour of the solar system layout above. Anybody have opinions here?

To anyone who's played the demo (link at top of page), you'll have found it very silent, I'm sure. 'pew pew' laser sounds were some of the only noises in so far and they're very annoying too. I've done a heap of new sounds today and it's amazing how much the game is coming alive.

There's now wingmen responding to all sorts of things and a woman back at command telling you if you can have reinforcements or not. The voices are from an asset package so they're not custom yet, but they add a lot. The ships guns now sounds like gattling guns and I also finally got in some engine noises!

The tactical map is looking decent, if a bit bare. I'll update the map and have a new combat demo out in a few days. I wasn't going to do another demo but the sounds and recent changes add so much to it that I want something better out before the vertical slice (with strategy layer) comes along.

Talk soon. Do leave feedback on which of the above strategy maps you like the look of. Thanks! - Kevin
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« Reply #16 on: October 14, 2015, 03:58:24 PM »

Development proceeds on the latest demo. It will be basically the gameplay of the last demo, but with a whole lot more polish (mainly audio) making it come alive. I'll have it by the end of the week and I hope you'll give me your feedback at that stage.

For now, I've given the player ship (centre) a few extra stripes as people said they found it hard to know which ship they were when the ships all start milling around together.

Do you think this is the right way to approach standing out the player character?

« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 01:11:31 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #17 on: October 16, 2015, 09:27:48 AM »

New combat demo is up! This is the last demo but with a whole lot of new polish. Link at the top of the page now points to that, or you can get it here. http://www.retroneogames.com/sos-demo.
There you can download a PC version or play in a non-Chrome browser.

Feedback would be super appreciated. I've done a lot to implement suggestions from different people and tried some tweaks myself.

CHANGES INCLUDE:
* A whole host of new audio including many voices, new gunshots, engine noises, new 'Dodge' noise, and more!
* Player craft now looks different to the wingmen to help see which you are when the screen gets crowded.
* DYNAMIC MUSIC! Thanks to Darren Lowe.
* Tactical Map (still a work in progress). Press M, Tab, or Back on controller to bring it up.
* When ships dodge they now get 'closer' to the camera do they dodge "over" things.
* Asteroid damage: Used to be based on collision speed and the mass of the asteroid. There also used to be a 10% chance that the player would take no damage and pass through (when they weren't "dodging") but that looked like a collision bug so I removed it. Now the player always takes damage if they're not dodging and hit an asteroid, but the speed of collision doesn't matter. Bigger asteroids do more damage, but none of them can kill you immediately if you had full health.
The AI still behave the same with asteroids. If they hit one, they have a chance to dodge, take damage, or pass by unscathed.
* Feedback Questionnaire questions have been reduced so it's easier to leave some feedback through the game.
* Arrows pointing to wingmen now stay within a circle near the middle of the screen instead of going right into the screen corners.
* Various bug fixes.

Do have fun if you try it out. It's still a simple mission and you can't actually fail unless you die at this stage, but this is more representative of what combat in the game would be like, and I'd love to hear your thoughts. The strategy map part of the game is still on the way. Thank you.
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« Reply #18 on: October 22, 2015, 11:14:46 AM »

I've my first gameplay video up on YouTube on a new RetroNeo channel. The folks say "like and subscribe". Please do  Wink
I'm adding the video to the first post in this devlog too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ucn3T5r7cDg&feature=youtu.be
« Last Edit: February 13, 2016, 02:17:23 PM by RetroNeo Games » Logged
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« Reply #19 on: October 25, 2015, 04:51:12 PM »

I won't be updating for the next few weeks as I'll be away. To that end, I've scheduled four posts on the design of Crow's Nest on my blog on the RetroNeo Games site.

Part 1 was up today and focussed on the pitch "Asteroids meets Total War" and what I mean by that.
http://www.retroneogames.com/blog/makingcrowsnestpt1

Parts 2-4 will be posted over the next 3 Sundays.
Follow me for notifications when they go up.

Twitter: @retroneogames https://twitter.com/retroneogames
Facebook: https://facebook.com/retroneogames
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