neat indie game

[Lizard]

I've just been checking out the demo version of evochron legends, it seems like a pretty cool freeform space trading/combat sim in the vein of elite etc.  I've only played through the training section but it seems quite neat, one thing that impressed me was that the whole thing was only about 48mb to download, they seem to have packed an amazing amount into such a tiny download.


http://starwraith3dgames.home.att.net/evochronlegends/index.htm


I thought this was pretty cool for an indie title, I may even end up buying the full version - it's not expensive.


This is probably the kind of level of polish we need to be aiming for with M.A.D.

[BS-er]

I gave it a try and was impressed.  The graphics and artwork are quite nice.  I found directional control to be a weak point.  If I was a 22nd century spaceship engineer, I would design thruster correction that doesn't let you spin endlessly.  They believe they are improving realism with their approach, but they are really failing to account for ther tech that should be available for good rotational control.  Then again, maybe I'm not into space games enough to appreciate these things.

Voiceovers are slightly robotic in tone (as well as augmented to sound synthesized), but are still very well done and professional.

The game seems to have quite a performance hit, especially for explosions.  I wonder if it may have heavy memory demands, possibly creating a lot of texture information dynamically.

It is a very different game than MAD, but still we should hope to make something as polished as this game is.  At its core, the MAD engine will allow us to do that.  Drawing upon Ogre features, it is highly data-driven and script-driven, meaning that it draws much from the art content and many forms of scripting and configuration.

[Lizard]

yeah it's not perfect, controls are a bit strange I will admit but they're not impossible - I was using a joystick and it wasn't too awful, it could certainly have been better though. Maybe it's just the ship you start with that handles like that ?


I had a quick go of the demo - it's time limited so you can't get too far without buying it - landing at starports on planets is cool, some of the missions you can do seem quite neat aswell - I bought a tractor beam then used it for a mission to clean a solar array.

The game seems to have quite a bit of depth, I'm still amazed at how much they seem to have crammed into 48mb

every now and then I have a look for a space trading game  - the last one I tried was X3 the Threat, it was OK some bits were really cool like having to fly into stations to dock with them but the storyline was a bit linear and the way the various sectors were compartmentalised was a bit rubbish, in the end I lost interest after a couple of weeks .

Evochron seems to give you a bit more freedom than that and it looks very nice too, I think I might give it a go - it's nice to see indie developers putting out quality products like this.

I think the game might have been written in Dark Basic which may account for any performance issues.

[Slaor]

Yeah this looks cool, dig space sims.

Anybody played Darwinia? Multiwinia is over the top, luv it.

[BS-er]

I tinkered with the Darwinia demo a bit.  It gets points for being different and unique.  I noticed the AI had trouble trying to get from A to B a few times, but hey MAD AI can have that problem too.  I didn't get far though, too busy making a game to find much time to play games, although I've hitting BZ2 multi lately to seek inspiration for making MAD multi.

[Slaor]

Multiwinia is a different beast, it's much more focussed on the little stick dudes who behave kinda like lemmings with lasers. Worth the $5 even if just to check out the different playstyles (there are 6, a few of which are quite unusual and fun, especially with the random crate drop powerups...).

Highly recommended for RTS fans on a time budget, or if stick figure genocide floats your boat.

[Lizard]

Yeah this looks cool, dig space sims.

Anybody played Darwinia? Multiwinia is over the top, luv it.

yeah I played the Darwinia demo for a while .... I think it might even have been you who put me onto it .


while it was certainly a very original game it didn't quite grab me enough to make me want to buy it.


anyone heard of a game that's just been released called The Path ? it's a previous IGF entrant and a few people seem to be talking about it at the moment, indie games certainly seem to be starting to get more attention these days.

[Lizard]

I was so impressed by the demo in the end I decided to buy this game, after reading a bit more about it it turns out the game has been developed mainly by just one guy which is even more impressive.

[BS-er]

Don't tell me he did the programming AND multiplayer AND artwork, AND sound etc.!  I've come to believe that one person simply can't do all that and produce something so large in scope.

The game Tank Universal was primarily a one-man project, which I found impressive, but the developer took some clever shortcuts.  It's a bit abstract and gets away with simpler art, and the game's scope is a bit more modest than ours, and is single player only.

[Lizard]

from reading the readme I gather he had some help with the multiplayer system other than that it seems to be mostly his own work - programming, artwork and all.

[BS-er]

Some of the art and models are from 3DRT according to the trailer, but may have been buffed up a bit.  Still, very impressive that the lead developer did so much.  He must've made some sacrifices and fully devoted most or all of his time to it for awhile.  I will certainly use this as an example of indie quality, and will personally aspire to produce something as impressive (maybe even more so).

[Lizard]

the guy has been making indie games for a long time, I first became aware of his work years ago with StarWraith when I was looking into Dark Basic, Evochron seems to be a natural progression of that game , I think he's released several titles along the same lines over the years each with expanded features and other improvements.