Warning: I ramble. You have been warned.
I've played a lot of 4x games. It is by far my favorite genre of games. 4x in space is my favorite part of the genre. My only problem is, I've always wanted specific things from a Space 4x that just aren't present in the market.
In most Space 4x's, the Galaxy map is a static thing, showing any number of stars, which are an arbitrary distance away from your starting world. When you explore these systems, you see, inevitably, a static graphic, depicting the planets that are present, asteroid belts, gas giants, and that's really it. If you have colonized a planet, there might be a symbol denoting your ownership, same for the enemy. If you want to take a planet, you click a couple of buttons (generally "Orbital Bombardment" or "INVADEEEEE!!!!") and the turn advances, you either take the planet or don't.
Planet screens are a static "This is how many "people" you have on Farming/Industry/Research", "This is your colony output" and "This is your build queue".
Now, to be fair, there are games that change that up in one way or another.
GalCiv2 had all of the planets and stars out in the open, no separate screens for systems. The planet screens were very different.
Space Empires IV and V had the system laid out in a hex grid, though I didn't play either too much. I'll admit, I was intimidated by the sheer customizability. There was a lot to do to get a functioning race at the start, which was awesome, and tough for someone who is just starting out, veteran of the genre or not.
Ascendancy has 3D space in the systems, for the galaxy map, basically for everything they could have 3D for, they did. It led to some wackiness with the tech tree, but otherwise was a bold move (at the time).
They all hit small pieces of my itch for a game, but they all had their flaws to me. GalCiv2 was a whole lot of micromanagement, and towards the middle, and end of the game, it was hell for me. Space Empires was fun, but I could barely get past the opening screens. Ascendancy, I'd get lost in the 3D, even on the iPad. Typical 10 minutes of trying to figure out if the system is connected to where I think it is - "Is that...*rotate, rotate*..no..different view...*rotate, rotate*..No..*mutter, rotate, rotate*..Ok. I'm done." *shut game off*
So, here's what I'm doing and the why's for it, perhaps in a more readable format.
1.) The galaxy map screen is going to have movable star system representations.
The reason for this is: The Master of Orion galaxy map has been done to death. I read a Tabletop, Pen and Paper RPG called Diaspora that gave me some major inspiration when it comes to the galaxy level stuff. Basically, systems are connected by wormhole points, so their spatial distance is meaningless. So, to my game, the Galaxy map is just a representation of each of the star systems, and what they're connected to. That's it. Not "System Sol is 1.5 parsecs from System Wolf 359 and will take X turns to get to", instead "There's a wormhole at the edge of our system that leads to Wolf 359, it will take Y turns to cross the system and get to the wormhole, with another turn to get through it to the next system".
For Example: I might organize my Galaxy screen in a hierarchal format, with my home world at the top, followed by my colonies, then the systems in between myself and the enemy (if I've found him/her/it/them), then the enemy systems. Someone else might put the enemy systems at the top, or have the systems they want to colonize at the top, to the left, right, etc etc. I want to leave that choice to the player.
Really, the Galaxy screen is all about easy to access information, and in order to make it easier, I want the player to have the choice to customize it further in order to facilitate their understanding of the game cluster they're playing in.
2.) If we're going to fight over Star Systems, Planets and the resources contained therein, I'm going to make them the center of the game.
In every 4x game, you fight over resources inside systems. You don't fight for systems that you can't do anything with in MoO2, you don't fight over stars with nothing in them in Distant Stars. So, why have empty or useless stars? I never liked that in MoO2, I could have an absolutely crap start because all but one of the stars near me had nothing in them I could colonize or use, no specials, nada.
So, every system that gets generated is going to have something in it. It might not be useable right away, or it might be you need to build a space station in the system to access it, but there will be a way to use every system.
The other thing that drives me a little nuts is the lack of motion in a system, or motion that's meaningless (ala MoO2). Planets don't just sit there, asteroid belts have orbits, moons orbit the planet, the star has a gravitational pull, and so on. So, inside systems, things are going to orbit. Because of that, there are going to be interesting mechanics involved.
For instance, lets say you have a destroyer class ship with mass drivers, and you shoot at an enemy, and miss. On the next turn, a planet with your colony on it impacts that missed round, and it levels a major part of the colony. Population, Industry, Research all drop to represent what just happened. I might have other things happen as well, but those are the basics. You might also have some form of tractor technology (still on the fence about that), if you do, throwing your enemies into the star, or a dead planet etc. will be a viable tactic.
That also means you need to watch the orbits, and be sure your ships are out of the way, otherwise...well, the planet always wins in the end.
That brings up the orbital bombardment stuff. If you have mass drivers (and it's going to be a basic tech) you can bomb a world form orbit. Yes, there will be bomb techs, plague techs, but all you really need is a ship with mass drivers, and some time. Energy weapons (when you get them) are likely going to be useless for bombardment, I'm still on the fence about that too.
3.) Techs are going to make sense, and I'm going to stay as close to hard sci-fi as I can, with fun trumping reality.
Fairy tale techs, like anti-gravity, are going to be in the realm of "Special" techs. Ships are going to have fuel, and refueling is going to be a part of the game, though I'm not at the conceptual part of that yet, I just know it's going to be there. Same thing with ammo. Energy weapons are becoming a reality now, so I'm going to do some extrapolation and put them in as well, though nothing like "Black Hole Gun" (well...you can get one of those eventually...but it'll be a long way off, and there will be special conditions you need to fulfill). A lot of this point is tied up further down my tree of things I need to do.
4.) You can research more than one thing at a time, and the tech trees are going to be semi-random.
You have 4 planets. Each of them has a research lab on them. Why do they have to all work on the same project, at the same time? The player will be able to allocate labs to projects as they see fit (or order a governor to do it for them).
The tech tree is also going to be a little more general than "Laser 2". It will be a priority system. Energy Weapons: Priority 1, Armor: Priority 2 ... and so on. So, the techs you get will be semi-random.
5.) Some micromanagement is good, some automation is good. Too much of either can be a real drag on gameplay.
I am going to put in automation options. Options being the key word there.
I hate micromanaging every single colony I have. Really. That was the only thing that drove me away from GalCiv2. As soon as I hit mid-game, I was spending more time hitting each and every colony than anything else. So, I'm going to put in customizable governors. I'm still at the conceptual stage, so...nothing concrete there.
The same goes for ships, and fleets of ships. I'll have Admiral AI's for automation for them as well. Some will be aggressive, others defensive, etc. etc. Still not far enough along to really nail that down. But if you don't want them, they're not required.
Research Governors are also something I'm looking at.
One mode of gameplay is going to be a fully automatic game. The player gives mandates, orders and such and the AI carries them out. No real direct control. The player will be able to look at all the stats, see how things are progressing.
6.) No Space Monsters. Space Pirates, on the other hand.....
I don't like space monsters. I don't like the concept, nor the art direction most go with them. I understand the need for some games to have them, but I don't like them.
So, instead, at a certain point, Space Pirate organizations are going to pop up, and going to spread. They will have the ability to board and steal, ships, board and destroy Space Stations, steal wealth, shoot at ships, planets, kidnap scientists to do their own research and hurt yours, the works. They will be pirates. Leave them alone long enough, and you might have to start paying them for their "protection", or watch them destroy your civilization.
7.) I am going to have non playable races.
There will be races/species that are not useable/playable by the player. This will be due to how I want the race to work, and that if it was in the hands of the player, that player would steamroll players who were playing the normal races. On that note.....
8.) Yes, there will be multiplayer.....
.....eventually. I have a long way to go before I get to that portion.
9.) I'm going to write this for the iPad.
I like the interface of the iPad, the touch controls, and so on. I might write it for the iPhone, and maybe the Mac. For anything else...I'm one guy, with a full-time Network Admin job. I don't have a whole lot of spare time to re-write the code for it to work on Android, Windows or Linux. Maybe sometime in the future, but who knows, this game might completely flop and everyone will hate it. Who knows.
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Status of the project: Working on getting the basic displays up for the galaxy map, including gestures.
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