Try out a new city?

PingBosun · Post by **PingBosun** » Thu Jul 09, 2009 5:18 pm

Earl - Stunning! I really like the "Bay doors amy close without warning" notice.

Is it possible to have a collaboration with Vice with a mission to search a large city like this for things, not I suppose disimilar to Dark Star?

Post by **Marvin** » Thu Jul 09, 2009 10:20 pm

Amazing. But what are those tube-like things you see at the 0:16 mark? They look like tunnels ... are they above ground? (Hard to tell from the video.)

Ravenfeeder · Post by **Ravenfeeder** » Thu Jul 09, 2009 10:27 pm

Whew! Not that really does look like a city. Well done.

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Fri Jul 10, 2009 3:09 am

Marvin, those are the roads. To make them visible, there's duplicate of the road top surface on the light layer, and apparently it loads first

There are 3 service tunnels that you can take to enter the main docking area.

Post by **Marvin** » Fri Jul 10, 2009 8:53 pm

Reminds me of "Caves of Steel" ... this game now resembles, even more, Asimov's Foundations and Empire.

Nigel_Strange · Post by **Nigel_Strange** » Sat Jul 11, 2009 3:36 pm

Hi,

Looks great from the video. I tried to download, but the file has "expired." I really want to try it out, and maybe at some point to have custom cities on each planet, so that each planet will have a different appearance and culture.

I think the size of the city is a pretty good size in relation to the size of the ship. It brings into focus, though, how small the planets are and how slow the ships move.

Hopsalot · Post by **Hopsalot** » Sat Jul 11, 2009 9:01 pm

Just watched the video, very cool Earl! Please re-post the link when you can.

Thanks!

Post by **Marvin** » Sat Jul 11, 2009 9:57 pm

Originally posted by Nigel_Strange
It brings into focus, though, how small the planets are and how slow the ships move.

Again, this fits in quite well with Asimov's first Foundation novel. Plop three of these cities on a planet and it should cover a lot of the surface. Now just call the planet "Trantor" and ... that's it!

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 4:22 am

The download is going to be re-posted as soon as I'm totaly done with the model. I think I'm done with the city, but the ship I parked outside looks junky, I'm fixing up some better textures and adding some light to it.
Please, anything else you think a futuristic city needs would be helpful

Post by **Marvin** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 4:58 pm

Could you make the ship an add-on to the city? Else, it might seem odd that, no matter how many cities you visit (on different planets), they all have this same ship parked outside.

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Sun Jul 12, 2009 5:37 pm

It'd be an entirely different model, but sure. My file for the texture is set up so that I can do color variants as well, but those .bmps do take up space.
When I get to putting this on different planets, it's going to be pretty rare. Maybe just 2 or three tops. I really don't think you'll see it all that much.

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 6:35 am

Ok, here's the latest...
http://www.yousendit.com/download/cmcxQ ... SlNGa1E9PQ

Just a city default replacement this time. You shouldn't have to go looking for it, it'll be on every planet.
Hey Vice, if we all do eventually make several of these, is there any chance you would let us use the original city as the default?

Post by **Vice** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 3:22 pm

You mean have the game revert back to the original 'default' city any time a custom one is not available? It's possible, it's built in code and isn't a static mesh though if you were interested in it for something else.

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:03 pm

No, I don't want to mess with it, but it is a cool model, and it'd be a shame to have to leave it out...

Accountant · Post by **Accountant** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:19 pm

Come to think of it, that would be a nice idea. We could create a mesh and name it Sapphirecity.x, and only Sapphire would have the custom mesh. The rest of the cities would still be the default mesh.

-Accountant

tha_rami · Post by **tha_rami** » Tue Jul 14, 2009 11:01 am

I have to agree though, that the planets dÃ³ actually seem minor with those cities. It is a spectacular city, though.

warsign · Post by **warsign** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 6:41 am

Originally posted by tha_rami
I have to agree though, that the planets dÃ³ actually seem minor with those cities. It is a spectacular city, though.

I like this idea. Agreed.

BraveHart · Post by **BraveHart** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 11:53 am

WoW just saw the video....Excellent work Earl

Earl · Post by **Earl** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 11:59 am

Video's old. Youtube's stubborn or there'd be a better one right now

Scaling is still a big deal... So sounds like you guys would rather have something scaled to fit the planet more exactly? Right now I'm basing it off the player, as most everything except the planet size is in a 1:1 scale to you. It only seems to be super huge because to fly through it, you have to create some big open spaces so that the gravity field around the city is wide enough to let you though. At this size, the tunnels are still a bit rough at some points.
I may not get around to another one for quite some time, but I'll try to make it less imposing when I do. It'll be a simple solar farm

tha_rami · Post by **tha_rami** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 12:03 pm

Well, the problem is we canÂ´t have both. At this point, IÂ´d say keep it this way, the scaling towards the player is the most important after all.

Post by **Marvin** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 8:26 pm

I have no problem with very large cities.

BraveHart · Post by **BraveHart** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 9:45 pm

I liked the Large city

Carwash · Post by **Carwash** » Thu Jul 16, 2009 11:48 am

Just sticking my oar in here, sorry in advance Vice. I'd love to see far, far bigger planets (maybe not 1:1but getting there...) which would make finding a city as tactile as this a real pleasure. Yes I know this has been discussed elsewhere and I know the rationale behind having smaller, quicker-to-fly-down-to planets, but for me big cities still ruin the planet visits. To the extent that I avoid going there. Breaks the gameworld for me.
If you accept exploration of a planet is a goal in itself, then spending time getting down and then approaching a city from a great distance is actually fun. I want to see the city grow from a speck at great altitudes to a vast thing a can fly into...

verbosity · Post by **verbosity** » Thu Jul 16, 2009 12:08 pm

maybe the planets could be bigger but the atmosphere could be tweaked so its possible to easily jump to around , say, 10 km above it , with a tweaked gradient ( given that the edge of our atmosphere is 100KM as defined by the united nations) so ( halving that for gameplay) 50KM no visible difference ( though maybe a slight coloured aura around the planet, at 25km extreme speeds ( <4K )do slight damage, aura is bigger, at 12.5 KM the atmosphere starts becoming visible, extreme speeds are now slightly more damaging ( say about the same rate as a repair3 can repair ;P ).

so at 10km even a noob could jump in without much chance of dying, but at 7km and below damage is as it is now...............

If this was possible, you could use these values to give more difference in some planets ( esp if you could have different sized planets. ), you can even 'add in a deadly layer ( where the density or other effect cause death), and in the case of land-able planets just place this inside (IE make it smaller than the planet itself) the planet. thus you could have gas giants, where there is a small core, a large 'deathlayer' and an atmosphere 100's of KM's ( think of the mining/ combat possibilities).

I'd actually take this further, remove moons! they could be generated within the system above, but they would in some cases be dockable. This of course would depend on the game being able to handle multiple objects of the same type in view at the same time ( something I'd really like to see)

[Edited on 7-16-2009 by verbosity]

warsign · Post by **warsign** » Thu Jul 16, 2009 12:29 pm

Originally posted by tha_rami
...... the scaling towards the player is the most important after all.

I know what you are talking about.
Yes, most important thing is...