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DarkTrader

Who remembers the 1980's space trading game Elite? And the 16-bit sequal Elite 2: Frontier? I've been a fan since I was a kid, and still find myself playing Elite Plus now and then. Originally this game was going to be a remake, however while it's going to be along simular lines, I'm not setting this in that universe.

Because all my other projects have been open source up to this point I should say quickly that this one won't be. It's my own personal project and I won't be accepting help from anyone.

Anyway the bit people want, the first offical screenshot of the game engine in action, you will see Elite ships, which I am using for a basis, however this will be changing very soon and I'll be dumping any elite models, and producing my own. This will of cause take time, so I'll continue to use these ships as place holders.



I am using Billboarded planets and suns rather than full 3D, but stations, missles, and other objects will all be in low poly 3D.

The HUD doesn't work yet, but the ship flys, soon it will fight.

The flight engine is closer to Elite then froniter in design, jump drive, and an x-wing style flight engine.

I've also been generating a trade system, because lets face it, it's not much of a space trading game without a way of generating stockmarket prices.



I'm developing is along side the graphical engine as a text system, so I can quickly and easily test it.

The lastest addition to the project, is the 3D graphical representation of the galaxy, which has also just been converted over to the eXtends plugin.



Updates

Text Based Trade and Galaxy System Build 002 - 235 lines of code

http://forum.thegamecreators.com/xt/xt_apollo_download.php?i=957301

Changes:

Starchart Build 001 - 1st Auguest 2006 - 209 lines of code

http://forum.thegamecreators.com/xt/xt_apollo_download.php?i=957768

Star data converted into graphical representation
camera controlled with arrowkeys
stalks added.
Random name is number based.
* If pressing escape doensn't work first time, try again, there's alot of loops in the programming and I've yet to add an escape key function *

Build 002 - 1st Auguest 2006

Seed based price generation for shipyard equipment upgrades.

Build 001 - 31st July 2006

Seed based price generation for general stock market


Lastest Version of game is Build 003

http://forum.thegamecreators.com/xt/xt_apollo_download.php?i=956659

What Has Changed?

Build 003 - 248 lines of code - 31st July 2006

Version Numbering system changed to builds:

Music Added
Volume Control Added
Q and W adjust volume

Updated the demo - v1.1 - 30th July 2006

, or < slows down
. or > speeds up
J activates jump drive
Arrow keys steer

Added labels to planets, made planets closer.
Added Planet and Sun collision data
Added Speed indicator
Added Angle indicator

Original Goals
mixed variant of elite and frontier.


[Center]Design notes[/Center]

I am in the process of redesigning my whole approch, while it will be very simular there will be key differences. For instance I am replacing the Elite stock market, ship names and models, equipment, solar system names, tech levels, discriptions, and other features.

The types of solar system will be as follows.

256 Tech level 4, Advanced shipyards, advanced research world,
512 Tech level 3, university research world, commerical shipyards.
1024 Tech level 2, advanced industry, Advanced farming, poor college world, open source ship building world.
2048 Tech level 1, advanced mining, industrial, Anarcy, farm world
4096 Tech level 0, mining, poor industrial, Anarcy, poor farm

Advanced shipyards:

Will give access to the full range of technology and ships. It will pay extra for computers, robots, manufacturing equipment, explosives, chemicals, Synthetic food stuffs, and organic food stuffs, light metals, heavy metals, and alloys.

Advanced Research world:

Will give access to experimental and rare equipment, only which will be generated randomly, so you won't get everything on the first visit. Will pay extra for computers, robots, manufacturing equipment, explosives, chemicals, Synthetic food stuffs, and organic food stuffs, light metals, heavy metals, and alloys.
Will pay extra for old scrap cruisers and ships foe the students to experiment with.

University Research World:

Sells the occasional peice of advanced equipment, will pay extra for computers, robots, manufacturing equipment, explosives, chemicals, Synthetic food stuffs, and organic food stuffs, light metals, heavy metals, and alloys.

Commerical Shipyards:

Sells standard ships and standard equipment, will pay extra for computers, robots, manufacturing equipment, explosives, chemicals, Synthetic food stuffs, and organic food stuffs, light metals, heavy metals, and alloys.

Advanced Industry:

Produces alloys, light metals, fuel, heavy weapons, hand weapons, explosives, Synthetic food stuffs, Oxygen, life support systems, mining equipment, farm equipment, chemicals, manufacturing equipment, Computers, and Robots.

Will pay extra for minirals, raw ore, precious metals, gem stones, raw gases, rare eliments, Organic food stuffs.

Advanced farming:

Produces grain, fruit and veg, live stock, animal produce,

Poor college world:

Open Source Shipyard:

Advanced Mining:

Industrial:

Anarcy:

Farm World:

Produces Grain, fruit and veg, organic food stuffs.

Mining:

Sells Ore, precious metals, gem stones, gasses, rare eliments.

Pays extra for life support, oxygen, food stuffs.

Poor Industrial:

Produces life support, oxygen, fuel, computers and robots.

Pays slightly extra for raw ore, alloys, manufacturing equipment.

Anarcy:

Sells nothing, great place for bounty hunting, both sides will pay you to kill the enemy.

Pays extra for heavy, and hand weapons, explosives and fuel.

Poor Farm:

Sells Grain.

Pays slightly more for farm machinary.

I've been converting alot of the graphical engine to use the eXpands 1.1 plugin. The dynamic object loading, and billboarding system makes things much easier to manage. I'm also going to convert the display over to movable windows with the XGui feature as well. Here's the first billboard demo produced with the excellant eXpands plugin.

Controls:

Arrow Keys
, and . to slow down and speed up.

eXpands? Or eXtends?

If you mean eXtends - it is a fantastic plugin isn't it! I use it in my Dodge The Fart game. Makes life a LOT easier! The GUI's are cool too.

Thats the one. eXtends, yes. Combined with a few arrays it's dynamic objectloading is very useful, I've been using function up until now, that while work fine, I've got to remember how to write them every time I start a new program, B3D Make Object is all I need now. The chap who produced it is nice too, very helpful.

** Edit **
Updated the demo - v1.1

, or < slows down
. or > speeds up
J activates jump drive
Arrow keys steer

Added labels to planets, made planets closer.
Added Planet and Sun collision data
Added Speed indicator
Added Angle indicator

It's not a space trading game without a star system and trading prices generator. I'm developing it along side the graphical engine as a text based system. This first build generates prices automatically. This allows me to quickly test prices, and trading routes without having to play the game in graphical mode.

I thought you were through with the Dark Basic community, since we're all childish. And why are you pimping OpenOffice.org?

I was, until Linux decided to corrupt my laptops hard drive. And this isn't open source, so I don't have to deal with anyone else. I'm not giving this code away, and I'm not accepting community help. And I'm "pimping" OpenOffice because it's cheaper than Microsofts, and as effective for the average home user. About the only thing it doesn't have is an outlook alternative.

Now, bear with me for a moment Kenjar. I wish to orient everyone to my perspective before I outline my opinion. You're already quite aware, so I certainly don't mean to insult your intelligence.

Recent conversation...




Hey, I always appreciate feedback, especially honest feedback. I mean, if my project is no good, I certainly need to know about it. Thank you

So, I'm going to return the favor of honesty. Here goes...

In my experience with other indie software developers, the start of the development cycle has tremendous bearing on the finished product. So, I can only assume that the finished product will resemble what I'm seeing now.

I downloaded those two executables of yours. I have no idea why you posted those. One flashed words too fast for me to read, the other just flashed words about space prices or something.

The bottom line - I wouldn't bother downloading this project when it's finished. It just looks generic and poor. Crappy graphics don't make a good game. Good gameplay does, and good gameplay does not exclude good graphics. It's a lot of words, and very little work. More of an idea than anything else.

This project is also too early for WIP. I think that you should go back to the drawing board for a bit before you continue publicly.

Well, hope all of that was useful for you. Good luck!

Actually, as I've already stated it's more than 6 months into developement. I've mentioned side projects in the past. I'm basically converting the code to take advantage of eXtends plugin.

The point of the text based trade system is that it's generating these prices in real time without additional media such as text files. I've written a mathematical sequence that should reproduce the same results over and over again, while giving the impression of randomness. The prices are also controlled by the type of system, which is also generated by an apparently random number. So farm worlds will produce fruit and veg, grain, live stock, animal skins etc at reduced prices compaired to an industrial world. So you can buy 10 tons of grain at 25 credits for example, and sell them for 35 on an industrial world. You can then purchase farm machinary for 255 credits on the industrial world and sell it for 275 on a farm world. If you are looking for more excitement if life then trade runs back and fourth, you can also purchase small firearms, and fuel, and fly to an Anarcy system, which has warring goverments. This means you will get bounties for destoried ships, combat experiance and if you are good enough you will be able to sell your existing cargo for a profit as well. I'll also be adding mining worlds, Core worlds and technology levels between 1 and 5, to control what can and can't be purchased on the ship yard. Of cause I'm working on ship pricing right now.

It's a demonstration of how a simple mathematical forumula can be applied to many different aspects of a game, from stock prices, to distance between planets and stars, to distance between systems, and even the discription of such worlds.

News Update

I'm renaming the project DarkTrader because I'm expanding the trading system past original frontier and elite standards, and no longer basing it in that universe. The major change I am making is a planet type feature that will dictate what the system sells, and what it buys.

The Work in Progress stockmarket list is as follows, I've listed the items that will be sold, on each world you will get the full list when selling, but when buying you'll get the worlds specific trading lists.

Hospital World

Flowers
Fruit
Chocolate
Gifts
Cards
Entertainment Items

Industrial Pharmacy

Amphetamine
Dextroamphetamine
Anafranil
Bupropion
Buspar
Buspirone
carbamazepine
Carbatrol
Catapres
Catapres-TTS
Celexa
Citalopram
Clomipramine
Clonidine
Cylert
Depakene
Depakote
Desipramine
Desyrel
Desyrel Dividose
Dexedrine
Dexedrine Spansules
Dextroamphetamine
Dextrostat
Dilantin
Eskalith
Eskalith CR
Fluoxetine
Guanfacine
Haldol
Haloperidol
Imipramine
Lithium
Lithium Carbonate
Lithobid
Luvox
Luvoxamine
Methylphenidate
Norpramine
Olanzapine
Paroxetine
Paxil
Pemoline
Phenytoin
Prozac
Risperdal
Risperidone
Ritalin
Ritalin-SR
Sertraline
Tegretol
Tegretol-XR
Tenex
Tofranil
Trazodone
Valproic Acid
Wellbutrin
Wellbutrin SR
Zoloft
Zyban
Zypreka

Advanced Industrial:

Short Range Communications Equipment
Long Range Communications Equipment
Directional Array
Field Generators
Short Range Communications Equipment
Long Range Communications Equipment
Navigation Array
EM Field Generators
Subspace Field Generators
Fusion Control Units
Fusion Reactor Casing
Tritium Enhanced Control Units
Tritium Reactor Casing
Interface Consoles
Hyper Optics
Advanced CPU
Advanced GPU
Advanced NPU
Advanced ISPS
Nanobots
Diamond Windows
Subspace Spectrum analysers
Spectrum and electromagnetic analysers
Enhanced Engine Parts

Industrial:

Robots
Computers
Circuit boards
Synthetic Meat
Silk
Steel
Radiation Shielding
Modular Reactors
Signal Compressor
Glass
Fibre Optics
Transparent steel
Gyroscopic stabilisers
Wires
Optical arrays
Engine Parts

Farm:

Vegetables
Fruit
Meat
Grain
Genetically altered live animals
Organic Vegetables
Organic Fruit
Organic Meat
Organic Live animals
Fertiliser

Mining:

Silicon
Aluminium
Iron
Gold
Silver
Diamond
Gem Stones
Coal
Carbon
Super Conductive Silicon
Uranium
Radioactive Gases
Combustible Gases
Atmospheric Gases

Misc (Gained from scooping from debris fields, and ship explosion clouds)

Empty Cargo Container
Scarp Metal
Chemically Contaminated debris
Rubbish
Radioactive debris
Damaged equipment
Discharged Power Cells

Futher more I am dividing the solar systems up into groups based on technology level. The higher the technology level, the fewer systems have it, so the harder it is to find. There will be 8000 systems to explore, list comprises the following. Remember this is a WIP so it might change at any moment, and is open for discussion.

1 Tech Level 8, Special Military Shipyards.
15 Tech Level 7, Unknown Xenophobic System.
16 Tech Level 6, Advanced Alien Ship Yards, Advanced Research World.
32 Tech Level 5, Alien Ship Yards, Alien Research World, Alien Colony World, Alien Mining World.
256 Tech level 4, Advanced Shipyards, Advanced Research World,
512 Tech level 3, University Research World, Commerical Shipyards.
1024 Tech level 2, Advanced industry, Advanced Farming, Poor college world, Open source ship building world.
2048 Tech level 1, Advanced Mining, Industrial, Anarcy, Farm world
4096 Tech level 0, Mining, Poor industrial, Anarcy, Poor Farm

Odds of finding a system in same order as above.

0.0125%
0.1875%
0.2%
0.4%
3.2%
6.4%
12.8%
25.6%
51.2%

My first Dark Basic 3D project was an Elite variant. It has been put on hold for a few years...

Yours looks a lot like the original game. Hope it gets finished..

Right On Commander!

Good luck with this one, and don't forget the Thargoids