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Solar Battles Progress (Screenshots)

Name:	James Laker (BurNinG)
Date Posted:	Oct 11, 2007
Rating:	5.0 out of 5
Public:	YES
Comments:	YES
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Profile Page:	View profile page for James Laker (BurNinG)

Blog post

Haven't blog in a while, since I never felt ready yet with the progress of Solar Battles. But since my progress has been stellar, to say the least. I felt I would show a screenshot or 2 of what is waiting around the corner.

First some progress and how I approach(ed) things.

Being only one person working on this (and being a programmer), I decided to first implement the basic art I bought. Start working on the features. While planning the game I decided that I would need the following things, before I start working on the Art side of things:
- Velocity hud (Showing your speed or a Targets Speed)
- More advanced Health/Energy gui with things like bitmaps, rotation, target health/energy, etc.
- Range hud (display your Radar/Targetting Range) which was simple
- Distance hud, to show you how far you are from your target.
- Updated fxShapeReplicator (which is a resource that needed to work in TGEA)
- Targetting hud, Have a target reticule (hope thats the correct term) on them.

- Commander map changes to allow Capture points and spawn at those points when your team captured them.

This was the results of the commandermap:

Just take note that the art has changed, (even in some screenshots below).

Now these things might not sound like a lot of work, but those weren't the only things. Stuff like LOD's needed to be done on ship. Backgrounds, Stars (which was a b1tch an still not 100% they way I'd like them to be), fixes to TGEA 1.0. It all adds up. I later had to port everything over to TGEA 1.0.2 with the awesome FGE pack by my friend Martin Schultz

Here is what the LODs look like for comparison, and this had to be done for 13 ships:

Being a programmer, I've always struggled with content. And I mean everything; from Models to music. But now that I have met up with a friend from Cape Town, it was quite a coincedence that he creates ambient music as a hobby. After listening to some of his tracks, it was obvious that I have found the perfect person to work with on Solar Battles, being a space game.

By now you'er probably wondering what the game looks like... If you're still interested go have a look at what it once was. A friend of mine and I was just thinking of how far I came in the past months since I started. Take a look at the screenshots at my MyDreamRPG Contest entry.

So here's a pic from a while back (still with FGE noticable):

And here's a screenshot with the latest GUI design (not all working though but implementing it now, and fixing old bugs):

And another one I think looks sweet:

The website will be up shortly, describing more about the game and ship roles/classes. There's a temporary forum up at www.solarbattles.net with some more images of ships. It hasnt't been made public, since it's going to be taken down and changed soon, but you can still go have a look if you're interested.

I'm planning on a beta demo in November to gather feedback, general impressions and maybe a competition. So watch this space!

Comments would be nice :)

Recent Blog Posts

List:	12/10/07 - Solar Battles Update (Video & Screenshots) 10/11/07 - Solar Battles Progress (Screenshots) 07/31/06 - Space Game Progress 05/05/06 - Futher development on Space Sim (screenshots) 04/24/06 - Space Sim, Content Discussion and Resource Updates (Screenshot) 02/21/05 - Plan for Burning 12/10/04 - Plan for Burning 09/20/04 - Plan for Burning

Submit your own resources!

Martin Schultz (Oct 11, 2007 at 20:14 GMT) Resource Rating: 5

Yessss! Looks great!!! :-)

Tom Eastman (Eastbeast314) (Oct 11, 2007 at 20:14 GMT)

Looks cool!

Donald \"Yadot\" Harris (Oct 11, 2007 at 20:20 GMT)

Man that looks awesome... although I will admit I am sad to the 3rd dimension get added. What happen to your 2D look and feel why did you change? Amazing work from a one man team... good stuff.

James Laker (BurNinG) (Oct 11, 2007 at 20:25 GMT)

Hey Donald, havent seen you around in aaaaages... The 2D version just didn't feel right. I'm trying to start something that will allow me to follow my dream of doing this for a living. And I feel that a 2D version just wont grab enough attention to make that dream come true. Maybe as a side project one day... I still have the backups... and as you can see it's the same ships... Just prettier with shaders and all... ;)

Donald \"Yadot\" Harris (Oct 11, 2007 at 20:50 GMT)

It looks really good can't really complain about that at all. As for not being around latley I have been busy. After having the second child 2 mos ago I havent had much time. Other than I have start consulting for some video games company and I am trying to focus on that. I have a prototype I am working on TGB right now that is a 2d space combat game.I am looking to get something on WiiWare platform so we will see how far this dream goes. Not sure if I want to document it much on the .plans just in case it fails :) The other game I was working on along with the partnerships I form discolved but i learn quite a bit from it. Hopefully I should be able to get started here soon.

Andy Hawkins (Oct 11, 2007 at 22:27 GMT)

Awesome! Never enough space shooters IMO. Keep it up.

CDK (Oct 12, 2007 at 06:38 GMT)

Great work James! Great to see how it progressed from what you showed us at our meet up.

Leslie Young (Oct 12, 2007 at 08:12 GMT)

Its looking really good.

Ian Roach (Oct 12, 2007 at 10:22 GMT)

looks awesome.love space games.

Gareth Fouche (Oct 12, 2007 at 11:28 GMT)

Awesome work James! Go the South Africans!

mb (Oct 12, 2007 at 14:04 GMT)

Very nice!

John Rockefeller (Oct 12, 2007 at 14:24 GMT)

Indeed, I agree with all of the posters here; This game looks fantastic! And you've done an amazing job as a one-man team. Congrats!

ando (Oct 12, 2007 at 15:10 GMT)

Love the graphics, last pic is awsome

Stefan Lundmark (Oct 13, 2007 at 14:31 GMT) Resource Rating: 5

Lovely.

James Laker (BurNinG) (Oct 14, 2007 at 13:41 GMT)

Getting ready for the pre-demo test tonight. I thought I'll quickly post another screeny

Donald \"Yadot\" Harris (Oct 14, 2007 at 14:13 GMT)

Looking good... how many players can join one battle?

James Laker (BurNinG) (Oct 14, 2007 at 14:18 GMT)

Thanx..

32 players. That's how far up I tested with bots. Will have to see about human players, but the 32 is planned.

Donald \"Yadot\" Harris (Oct 14, 2007 at 16:43 GMT)

I smell Instant Action all over this. Any customization in the ships.

James Laker (BurNinG) (Oct 14, 2007 at 16:55 GMT)

The game is aimed to be all about action. Which I believe puts it aside from the normal Space Sim. There's no travelling to distant place that takes hours. No money, no trading... You fight.

The ships will be classed based. So no customization. You choose the ship that is right for you, and complement your style of play.

Think Team Fortress when thinking class-based.

Donald \"Yadot\" Harris (Oct 14, 2007 at 17:24 GMT)

Are you going to approach GG about InstantAction.com? The reason I started following you is I had a similar idea but for 2d space. Got the Game Design Doc written up and all. I plan on visiting with a local game studio here in Austin and have them build it for me.

James Laker (BurNinG) (Oct 14, 2007 at 17:35 GMT)

I will probably contact GG at some point.
Being 1 person things take time, I guess... I want something solid, tested and tried. Dont want to jump the gun here. My feeling would be that with a more solid product I will get better feedback/advise from them.

And the GG staff is probably a bit tired after IGC ;)

Cyberkada (Nov 04, 2007 at 11:49 GMT)

Very nice screenies. We are pretty much developing the same type of game. Two things: how did you determine range to target and is the ship in the Right MFD placed there using GUIObjectView?

James Laker (BurNinG) (Dec 11, 2007 at 07:45 GMT)

Sorry Cyberkada for the late response.

The distance is a simple guiDistanceHud I created, and yes, I'm using the guiObjectView.
Edited on Dec 11, 2007 07:45 GMT

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