Star Command (Game Dev Story meets Star Trek)

[wuzmaname]

I'm going to say June 2013 just so I'm not disappointed - once again.

With their approach to making a perfect game with no bugs, I can't imagine what it will be like when they release new content (when they actually have everything bug free, it's probably going to be release once every 2 years). People will have moved on by then, Apple will have introduced newer models with more power in their devices, the developers will go back to the drawing board to accomodate for this (like putting in retina) and gamers will have to buy new devices just to accomodate for this to keep playing this game. I always thought one of the benefits of mobile game development should be its flexibility as supposed to the tradition game development of 50 - 100 developers over a span of 2 years. Updates could be pushed out just as easily as console patches nowadays, no?

I can see why they don't want to release a buggy game but is it worth losing disappointed customers over this principle?

[MrAlbum]

Originally Posted by wuzmaname

I'm going to say June 2013 just so I'm not disappointed - once again.

With their approach to making a perfect game with no bugs, I can't imagine what it will be like when they release new content (when they actually have everything bug free, it's probably going to be release once every 2 years). People will have moved on by then, Apple will have introduced newer models with more power in their devices, the developers will go back to the drawing board to accomodate for this (like putting in retina) and gamers will have to buy new devices just to accomodate for this to keep playing this game. I always thought one of the benefits of mobile game development should be its flexibility as supposed to the tradition game development of 50 - 100 developers over a span of 2 years. Updates could be pushed out just as easily as console patches nowadays, no?

I can see why they don't want to release a buggy game but is it worth losing disappointed customers over this principle?

While that is a good point, be aware that we are lacking half the picture: we have no idea what the development of the game is actually like. We don't know the code; we don't know the majority of the animations or backgrounds; we don't know the audio. There's a lot that is beyond our vision, and if stuff we can't see makes development takes a long ass time, then it's no wonder we're getting impatient; we don't see the issues, because at this point we are incapable of seeing the vast majority of the game.

It's just a thought, and the fact of the matter is that the devs have been honest and have always come through with letting us know what is going on with the game's development, at least on an uber-broad level that any listener could understand. That's enough for me to be patient because a lot of devs in general, indie or otherwise, do not do that, but these guys do, and I think that's special. I understand that may not be enough for everyone, and I'm okay with it.

Feel free to move on and forget, and I mean that in a positive, non-threatening way. Your time is yours, so just take charge of it.

I do agree with the sentiment that the devs are gonna have to release the game some time before or after this holiday season, even if it's riddled with bugs, because, as Extra Credits put it, at some point devs HAVE to release, even if they are not comfortable with the release, because we potential customers need to have a product at some point; something, ANYTHING, just get it out and stop fussing over it!

My $0.02.

Sincerely,

Mr. Album

[Estupendo1]

Originally Posted by MidianGTX

I can't read through 77 pages, so I'll just ask... does this game have permadeath? If so, any rough idea on how long each session can last? Is there a definitive end to the game?

Each crew is a unique special snowflake, so when they die, they are gone for good. You can recruit new crew to fill their shoes, however, each new crew is a rookie with newb xp levels etc.

As to game save, it's still unclear how this will work. I like the idea of save+quit on progress, personally. As to game over routines, no idea, I like the idea that the challenge scales so that you can get by with low level crew for a time, but comes a point where if you are low on xp-crew then you're dead meat and need to start a new game and save more of your team for later. Also like the idea of escape podules incase of catastrophe and your ship is destroyed, you get to save eg 1/4 of the crew to transfer for a new game.

Yes - there is a definite "end of game" being "level 30" in the initial game with expansions for further missions up to 100 ie more episodes of trek/futurama as it were, planned. IE Ravenmark does a sort of chapter upgrade model too for comparison.

Hope that is useful, but as said, lots of details to be disclosed when they the devs are ready *lead up to launch I expect*.

Latest info from star command facebook:

We have isolated crew behaviors, enemy AI, tilemaps and all missions. We will have spritesheets on day 1 of all characters, enemies, rooms etc.

We will also have video walkthroughs of our pixel process - how we made organic characters, tips for quick animation and then a separate series for rooms and physical objects like the ships. [for kickstarter backers]

[justincoombs21]

"As to game save, it's still unclear how this will work. I like the idea of save+quit on progress, personally." - Estupendo

The save games works both automatically and manually. The game has 1 'Autosave' spot. Then there are 3 manual-save spots to save whatever game, whenever you would like.

The auto-save saves at the ending of your most recent completed mission. This is to prevent people from having the inability of beating a battle - instead if you load up the auto-save it will be a little further back - but ensures you are never stuck with an inadequate crew/ship for the mission you got yourself into.

[justincoombs21]

We are 100% shooting at January. No matter what honestly. We don't wanna compete with December release - and we'd have to submit in the next week to make that - BUT January is our month.

We are about on our last dollar - rest assured we have spent it wisely and utterly 100% on the game. Our last 'big buy' was on a fantastic programmer on AI for the last two months - that will ensure every alien feels unique and different. We thought that would be the best way of ensuring a fun game the entire length through.

The missions are a little simpler towards the end of the game right now - we don't love that - we are trying to add more story/one-of-a-kind events but as it is - we are ok with this. We will have plenty fo time after launch for more/better missions - and also we still have some of December to try our best.

Beyond that - the game is playing really well. Still a few bugs - and some polish - but godamn we are ridiculously close.

[MidianGTX]

Originally Posted by justincoombs21

We are 100% shooting at January. No matter what honestly. We don't wanna compete with December release - and we'd have to submit in the next week to make that - BUT January is our month.

We are about on our last dollar - rest assured we have spent it wisely and utterly 100% on the game. Our last 'big buy' was on a fantastic programmer on AI for the last two months - that will ensure every alien feels unique and different. We thought that would be the best way of ensuring a fun game the entire length through.

The missions are a little simpler towards the end of the game right now - we don't love that - we are trying to add more story/one-of-a-kind events but as it is - we are ok with this. We will have plenty fo time after launch for more/better missions - and also we still have some of December to try our best.

Beyond that - the game is playing really well. Still a few bugs - and some polish - but godamn we are ridiculously close.

Sounds great to me! I've always been on the lookout for that one iPad strategy game that really clicks with me and in all honesty, this is the one I'm looking forward to the most. I hope you find enough success to keep adding more content and depth, there are so many possibilities with a game like this it's awesome to see them all realised. It really makes the difference between a forgetful mobile game and a timeless classic.

[Doctor U]

Originally Posted by justincoombs21

We are 100% shooting at January. No matter what honestly. We don't wanna compete with December release - and we'd have to submit in the next week to make that - BUT January is our month.

We are about on our last dollar - rest assured we have spent it wisely and utterly 100% on the game. Our last 'big buy' was on a fantastic programmer on AI for the last two months - that will ensure every alien feels unique and different. We thought that would be the best way of ensuring a fun game the entire length through.

The missions are a little simpler towards the end of the game right now - we don't love that - we are trying to add more story/one-of-a-kind events but as it is - we are ok with this. We will have plenty fo time after launch for more/better missions - and also we still have some of December to try our best.

Beyond that - the game is playing really well. Still a few bugs - and some polish - but godamn we are ridiculously close.

I approve this message.

[Estupendo1]

Originally Posted by justincoombs21

The auto-save saves at the ending of your most recent completed mission. This is to prevent people from having the inability of beating a battle - instead if you load up the auto-save it will be a little further back - but ensures you are never stuck with an inadequate crew/ship for the mission you got yourself into.

Ah, I assume that means players can "power-up"/prepare their ship + crew better, before attempting the "battle encounter" again (& with knowledge of what they could have improved on also)?

So replayability is more about choosing different options than dealing with different results from different "runs"?

Definitely save some EPIC missions for latter stages - don't "do a Mass Effect 3 on us"!! Or at least throw in some real surprises eg "it was all just a bad dream..."

[coxy]

Originally Posted by Doctor U

I approve this message.

I also approve - but hope it's early Jan rather than late Jan...

[killercow]

From the newest kickstarter email:
"We're close folks.

Bunch of stuff to cover, so let's get to it.

We will start with what you want to know first, then reverse engineer. So release date. It's looking like January. How confident are we of this? We can guarantee the game will be out in January, but on a limited basis. We will being doing a soft-launch in a couple of western territories. We're not really going to bring attention to it and we will be doing bug squashing and gameplay fixes based on these results for the big USA and UK launches. This is a big reason we do not have an exact date - we don't know what may come up yet. It's very dependent on how smoothly those soft launches go.

Why soft launch? We are a first time release company for a game that has quite a bit of hype and with a large scope to boot. We currently have 17 m issions, 10 races, tons of ships, classes etc. That's all very good but there is a lot that can go wrong as well. We still are a very small team and massive QA testing is very difficult for us and would push our release date significantly - so this is the path we have chosen. We fear a Pocket Planes scenario where a small percentage of phones are aging saved-games wiped - y'know tiny bugs like that."