Plan for Phil Carlisle

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Prairie Games   (Dec 01, 2003 at 01:00 GMT)

The hardest part of being your own boss is telling yourself what to do.

Jay Barnson   (Dec 01, 2003 at 03:08 GMT)

Tell me about it!

I wonder if part of the reason for the dearth of major commercial space games lately has been partly because it's so hard to make them look good. That, and getting multiplayer to actually be fun is a major pain. Think about it: In vacuum, zero gravity, it's pretty much just point and shoot if you are being "realistic", no?

Nauris Krauze   (Dec 01, 2003 at 08:11 GMT)

Hey Phil, dont go nuts. Given the time, most problems will be solved anyway, so no need for panic...no...need...for PANIC!

I think the main problem with open space that basically, human mind is not comfortable with it. Pure darkness terrifies us and so does emptiness.
I really liked how Freelancer (otherwise pretty much a dissapointment) handled it: there are always some kind space rubble around (generated on the fly, I suspect) to catch the human eye and not let is wander around aimlessly. From asteroid belts to ancient space battlefields filled with bits of exploded ships.
Also, they exploited colors quite a lot - space rarely was pure black, there was always some red nova or blue giant "bedlamp" looming somewhere.
And fog. The only fights which were worth remembering were in "frozen systems" where deep frost fog covered almost everything and you never new when enemy or frozen asteroid will jump on you.

Realistic? Most likely no. Pretty? Hell, yes. And dont believe in fans who say they prefer realism over everything else. The odds are - they dont really know what they want anyway :)

Phil Carlisle   (Dec 01, 2003 at 08:53 GMT)

@Josh: Sure is. Not something I'm used to yet.

@Jay: I'm not sure gameplay is going to be that hard. I'm essentially aiming for something akin to Tie Fighter, or in a modern reference, something like the Battle Of Britain Mod for Battlefield.

I think the reason no-one has done space games recently (and you cant count freelancer because that took so long to develop that its hardly recent) is that basically, there's not enough market for it AND most developers think that to make a space game it has to be some huge epic thing (usually that pretends to be something like elite).

@Nauris: Its surprising how hard it is to create an environment that works. Ok, empty black box with some dots on is the usual thing, but thats not exactly how I see space. My imagination tells me that space is in fact full of colour in places.. I want to capture that..

Edward Smith   (Dec 01, 2003 at 12:52 GMT)

I liked Tie Fighter, but it had that black ness and a few plants which i would try to get closer to and after a while work out that I'm as close as I can be :-(. And then try to get back, but got lost alot with the black and white dots :-(.

I just thought of something, do your ships when they blow up do they fade away? image a game where the parts would stay there and float around like real space, you would hit in to them all the time and your computer would be a wreak! so realistic things aren't always good.

Space is full of colour, and movement, its an amazing place.

Sounds like your going to really make a nice game, with all the fussing :-).

Just out of thought, are there any games in space which are other our system, and contain our 'stars'? or haven't I noticed?

Gareth Davies   (Dec 01, 2003 at 13:15 GMT)

@Edward: Yeah but any 'explosion' in space would send the debris scattering at such a speed you'd never see it anyway ;) I think haegemonia had 'persistent' debris for the large space stations. And it looks great. The explosions were awesome as well.

@Phil: I think this is a common problem we all face at some point. I think it helps to have a clear plan of what you're aiming to achieve. An example from my game is I just finished my character animation exporter (from motion builder). And they look quite good. However I don't have the money to get decent voice acting so I was going to use text (and save the download size). However it's creates a really obvious disparity in the quality. The models look like they should talk, and when they don't it's just rips you out of the game. If i'd planned and thought about this before hand, I could have saved weeks of effort. Hindsight rocks huh? ;)

A major skill in indie development seems to be planning your time and resources for the most bang per buck. 3 months for an amazing dynamic space field, or 3 months for complete alpha gameplay? Err not a hard choice is it?

You know I thought indie devlopment would remove the problem of my boss being an idiot ;)

Phil Carlisle   (Dec 01, 2003 at 13:37 GMT)

@Gareth: Actually, voice acting sounds like one of the things indies CAN do right. I mean, its not THAT hard to get someone to talk a bunch of sentances is it? Its just a matter of finding the right voice.

I'm definitely going to be trying to get some voice into my game (after the homeworld female computer voice, you simply cant not do it).

I'm sure its not THAT expensive to get it done anyway. It does add so much.

youre right though, its definitely a case of picking your battles.

Whats motion builder by the way?

Eric Forhan   (Dec 01, 2003 at 15:53 GMT)

Thankfully, Trajectory Zone's voice acting (comdedic outtakes) was done by two friends of one of our modelers, Mike Morrison(www.singleflame.com. One was a DJ, and the other a professional voice actor.
Mike has also been in audio production for over ten years.

I think it took them several hours to get through the list of sayings, then whatever time it took for him to actualy produce it to make it sound clean and professional. Each sound byte had to be formatted for length and size. It was all done in Mike's recording studio.

I don't know the value of this service, but I'm sure it wouldn't have been cheap.

I'll give Mike a head's up and maybe he can shed better light on the subject than I. :-)

-Eric

Phil Carlisle   (Dec 01, 2003 at 16:21 GMT)

Bah! it ate my post again.

At least we DO have a damn voice to speak with. We can actually do the grunt work and get someone to re-voice over it later.

I'm definitely going to have my own voice all over the place when its ready :)

Jay Barnson   (Dec 01, 2003 at 16:36 GMT)

Question Phil - you keep invoking comments like fleet tactics and Homeworld. Is your game more of a Wing Commander-esque shooter, or more of a Homeworld-style battle simulator? Or something in-between, like Starshatter?

Phil Carlisle   (Dec 01, 2003 at 16:48 GMT)

@Jay: Its essentially tie fighter, so more of the wing-commander style I believe. You play the part of a single fighter in a large scale space battle.

There are many AI ships in the battle as well though (obviously they balance the game, so they will be removed as more players join).

Depending on the scenario, the conflict will be based around a given objective, or will just be fairly random combat ( think of the battle of the line in Babylon 5 ).

I think the intensity of being actually IN the conflict is what I'm after more than anything else. I envision a truly hectic environment with dozens of ships engaged in combat, much in the style of World War 2 dogfights.

I'll post some design documentation which might clarify on the website soon:

www.deepspacelegends.com

Gareth Davies   (Dec 01, 2003 at 17:26 GMT)

@Phil: Motion Builder (www.motionbuilder.com) is essentially a character animation app. Think something like 3dsmax then make it character animation only. Seriously powerful stuff. Even I can do some interesting things with it. It just has a 'interesting' bone structure I had to sort out. www.3dbuzz.com has some "VTM's" that explain it really well. Plus they had an indy deal a while back where you could get it for $100 when it retailed at $3,500 ;)

Voice acting i've found is one of those things that you think you can do well, but can't. There also seems to be a world of difference in price between an amateur job and a professional one. Obviously it depends on your game on the required quality. The average space sim bark shouldn't be a problem (since it probably has a healthy dose of static anyway). When you have a load of 'cut-scene' esque dialogue it's incredibly difficult. Somewhere like soundrangers.com has some worthwhile interface sounds / canned speech. My guess for even a semi pro job for your typical RPG would be ~$20k. Obviously it CAN be done cheaper, but bad voice acting will kill even a masterwork of a script... and I don't have one of those either ;)

@Eric: Thanks those outakes were funny, the sound quality is awesome as well. Mike did a fantasic job. During my investigation hiring a studio isn't too expensive, but finding a pro that knows what they're doing with it really is. I've also found there's a massive gulf between what the books tell you to do, and what you should be doing. I seriously doubt any of that work would have been cheap if you'd been paying full price ;)

The ray of hope here though is the professional music types seem to have a very similar mind set to professional indie types. So working a deal doesn't seem impossible.

@Phil (again): You know they won numerous awards for the CG for B5's "Battle of the Line". As well as the season 4 finale. If you can capture that kind of feel in a computer game, I want a ride to the next IGC in your private jet ;)

Simon Windmill   (Dec 01, 2003 at 18:26 GMT)

On voice acting.. the AFTRA members' minimum rates are on their website.

Mike Morrison   (Dec 01, 2003 at 22:54 GMT)

In most cases, voice-overs are best left to the professionals. For Midnight Ryder's Trajectory Zone, I called in a couple of favors to get a professional actor (who wanted a credit on his resume for voice-overs) and a radio DJ (who's an avid gamer and jumped at the chance).

First the bad news. On the production side, good digital recording gear (for speedy editing) is key. You can't really skimp there, but voice-overs can be fun sessions, and if the local studio owner is anything like me, he'll give you a good rate. You might be able to get studio time happening for as little as $25-$40 an hour. At the very least, the place should have some kind of large diaphragm condenser mic. Cheap dynamic mics -- like what you see most live performers use -- won't cut it.

The good news is that there's probably more hungry talent in your local area than you might think, and it doesn't have to cost you a lot of money. Seek out nearby playhouses/theatres or stop by a local performing arts college and you can probably score yourself some quality talent for little more than gas money and a meal. Give them permission to list the work on their resume.

Couple of other things in the voice acting vein:
- Most voice actors have a collection of "voices" that they can do. Some have 1 or 2 (think James Earl Jones). Some have 10 or 20 (think Robin Williams). Don't push them too far beyond their basic repertoire, though. They'll tell you what they can do and what they can't. You don't want the guy who does Spongebob's voice narrating an epic game trailer. ;) Get the right voice for the job and save everyone a lot of frustration.

- Preparation for a studio session saves time (and therefore money), and makes everyone's job easier. The script should be complete, and neatly printed copies should be provided to the engineer and each of the voice actors at the start of the session.

- If a meal is part of the payment plan, make sure it's at the end of the session, not the beginning. (Many foods will kill voice quality for hours, and microparticles of food will be flying at the mic while they speak.)

- If you've got a list of 40 or 50 in game one-liners, you can probably get them all in one session, and probably in less than 2 hours.

- Large-scale voice projects (15 pages of script for an RPG, for example) are best broken up across multiple sessions so the talent doesn't get burnt. Try to keep each session to four hours or less.

- Editing, mixing, and output are independent of time with the talent. You don't need the talent in the studio during the editing and mixing, so let them go. If you can do the editing and mixing on a different day with fresh ears, so much the better. Depending on the delivery format, sunspots, bad hair days, and other universal silliness, you can loosely estimate editing to take .5 to 1 times the recording time (e.g. 2 hours of voice recording will likely result in 1 or 2 hours of editing and output). Budget wisely!

Hope some of this answers your questions. If you have any questions at all, or would like more information, feel free to contact me via phone or e-mail. The info is on my Web site at http://www.singleflame.com

Xavier "eXoDuS" Amado   (Dec 02, 2003 at 00:08 GMT)

Take it cool phil, you will do great and eventually become a full indie dev :)
Also, it's good that you are concenrned on all the details of the game, that will assure a quality product.

Btw, one thing that most space games go wrong with is... sound! There's no sound in space.. :)
No air, no way sound can be generated, so make it mute :P
Ok, I know, I know, Star Wars wouldn't be half fun without those green lasers sounds... ewnnnnnnnnnn ewnnnnnnnnn :P

Gareth Davies   (Dec 02, 2003 at 14:29 GMT)

Thank you Mike, the insight is greatly appreciated. Few avenues I hadn't thought of there. Must think more indie...

I'll have to really re-think my voice overs now, but darn text is so much cheaper ;)

Matt Laurenson   (Dec 03, 2003 at 04:10 GMT)

no having much fun then phil? :/
- i thought you were enjoying this whole
- space-game thing.. - i guess finding some
- pro standard artists is the key..
Sorry about not being able to really contribute anything
at the moment...but im sure there are plenty of other more
skilled artists around..keep at it m8

Phil Carlisle   (Dec 03, 2003 at 15:39 GMT)

Matt: Naah, I'm having great fun. But it frustrates me whenever I look at what Ive got :) kinda makes me sick seeing youre little demo and how nice it looks :)

But its all worth it, in the end it will rule!

Phil.

Eric Forhan   (Dec 03, 2003 at 18:28 GMT)

Hey Phil,

I've been playing with custom space scenes a lot lately. If you tell me what you'd like, I might be able to throw one or two together for you, gratis.

I can do unique planets, moons, suns, nebulas, and star fields. Any color, size, and density. Planets can even be arid, populated (cities), cloudy, oceans, ice...just about anything. :-)

Let me know here or email me. :-)

-Eric F

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