Interesting idea, but it has some serious competition. Especially if it’s multiplayer focused.
From what I have seen the ship building looks quite limited at the moment. I think it’s still far too early to be charging money for this. That pricing system really doesn’t help in this regard.
Is this one of those games where if you don’t log in every five minutes, everything goes to shit?
Yeah I have to agree with Aeon here. I don’t think their pricing model is very good at all. I would easily drop 10 bucks and check in on the game every few months but the way they lay it out doesn’t make me want to help them out.
I wrote them about getting on any press list they might have. If they respond, I’ll use that as an opening to comment on how their pricing model will likely hurt rather than help them.
Yeah, the pricing model pretty much put my wallet back in my pocket. Hopefully they’ll change it.
Same here. If they do, I’m in.
Wendelius
Ditto. It feels like I’d be purchasing what’s there, not the promise of development - and what’s there doesn’t warrant a purchase at this time.
Interesting…
True or not, this is indeed what it feels like. Call me cheap (you’d probably be right), but I feel the same way.
Meet Nail.
No, it’s not like that at all. It’s like… Minecraft in space. ;)
I agree about the pricing model. I tossed $10 their way because, frankly, I really want to support a game like this. But the model prevents me from recommending it to my friends now, instead it’s “Check out this cool sounding game, keep tabs on it and buy it when it’s out” which I don’t think is the effect they’re looking for.
It’s funny, even with the success of Minecraft and Mount & Blade, indie devs are still too afraid to follow the early adoption model. The industry must be so ingrained with the traditional slave labor/release/hope and prey model that they can’t understand how it happened to those two games and just assume that it couldn’t possibly happen again. It seems like there would be so much more peace of mind with an open development that has a very tangible measure of how pleased your audience is. Of course you get to listen to all the whiners complain about how your games isn’t what it’s “supposed to be” but hey, that’s just feedback. Better noisy feedback than none.
Like I said, I’d buy but not with that model.
Hey now, don’t forget that Elemental was also largely funded on the back of pre-order money, and that turned out super great! </low-blow>
Any comments on the actual game itself and not the pricing model? I tried to run it but it crashes instantly and I’m too lazy to figure out why.
Make sure you have XNA 3.1 and .NET 3.5 installed.
'SOFTWARE: (links are available below)
- Microsoft XNA Framework Framework Redistributable 3.1
- Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1’
- DirectX 9.0c or Better
NOTE: You may need to install XNA 3.1 regardless of whether or not you’ve already
installed XNA 4.0.
Not really played it much yet. Nice music, nice menus, runs very smoothly and I like the controls. I haven’t figured out how to actually pilot the ships yet, but I have not had a chance to look at it too closely.
To be likeable like Minecraft, a game need something familiar. With minecraft this was the green fields, and player frolicking. This space game have… humm… not much of that. Maybe further on will show videos with player playing…
It’s only about 4 months into development. There’s not really a game there yet, as its mostly engine work at this time.
At this stage its basically an early Minecraft creative mode in space.
Knocked this up in about an hour.
Not sure what to do with it yet. Can’t figure out how to pilot it directly, nor any of the other ships that come with the game. I can control it remotely, but its a bit of a fail at the moment, because I can’t figure out how to rotate blocks, or even if it possible. Stuff like engines and weapons are obviously directional, so need to be installed in the correct orientation (think stairs in Minecraft). The engines and guns on my Tie Fighter don’t operate in the desired directions, so it does not fly straight and I blow a hole in the wing when I pull the trigger. This was obviously an early prototype and the engineer in charge probably felt Vader’s wrath…
Bugger, at the moment engines and weapons operate in a predetermined direction. When you create a new ‘entity’ or ship, no indication of this is given, so if you happen to plonk down blocks and create your ship with the wrong facing, you’re screwed.
You can place a ‘helm’ block, which has a rather obtuse texture on it hinting at the forward direction (rather than a fool-proof arrow or something).
That said, altering the direction of blocks is on the todo list.
Edit: It may have changed already, I was using W22. W23 apparently changes block facing so it is relative to the direction you are facing when placing the block. I’ll give it a crack.
