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Squid Empire

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Posts posted by Squid Empire

  1. I't taken me a long time to do all the drawings, but here it is!

     

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    The Kemet Kingdom

     

    The Kemet are an alternative futuristic ancient Egyptian nation, set in the year 1978. In this universe they are the direct continuation of the classical Ancient Egyptian kingdom, never having been conquered. The Kingdom controls almost the entire African continent and the Middle East, but remains entirely focused on the Egyptian homeland, with the external territories sparsely populated by native people. The Roman Empire controls the Mediterranean, parts of North Africa, and Europe, the Chinese Man Dynasty controls Asia and the Pacific, while the Great Yucatec Alliance controls the Americas. The Kemet’s technology is comparable to our 1970’s technology with some differences, mostly relating to more advanced technologies.

     

    The Royal Military

     

    Due to the large amount of nearly empty desert and plains owned by the Kingdom, the military is focused on fast moving, hard hitting units with little armour or staying power. The standing army is comparatively small as the main forces they fight are bandits and smaller kingdoms. However due to complicated religious rituals and traditions in the military, commanders have great flexibility in upgrading their ground forces through religious dedications.

     

     

    Strengths:

    • Fast moving units with good firepower
    • Good anti-armour units
    • Excellent transport units
    • Powerful naval units
    • Late game advantages involving resources
    • The team can specialise in one form of combat (ground, air, water)

    Weaknesses:

    • Buildings are slow to build
    • Units have low health
    • Specialising the team leads to hard counters
    • Limited anti-infantry units
    • Suffers when the sun isn’t shining
    • Speedy units require lots of micromanagement

    Kingdom colour: [x]

     

    Units

     

     

     

     

    INF = infantry

    VEH = vehicle

    NAV = navy vessel

    AIR = aircraft

    COM = commando

     

    Tier 1:


     

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    • INF: Soldier – basic infantry unit armed with a bladed rifle that can close in for melee attacks

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    • INF: NEBAST – robot attack unit for combating infantry that can detect stealth and the like

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    • INF: Bowman – soldier armed with a ‘bow’; a long range anti-armour/air laser that must deploy to fire

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    • VEH: Chariot ATV – extremely quick low powered vehicle for harassing enemy formations and chasing down survivors that can attack while moving, also has a long view range. It can carry one infantry unit who can also fire.

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    • VEH: Scarab M/L – mining truck for acquiring minerals

     

    Tier 2:


     

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    • INF: Khopesh Soldier – soldier armed with ‘khopesh’ flamethrower that must get close to attack but drains health/armour quickly and leaves units burning for some time.

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    • VEH: Spearman Tank – anti-tank tank armed with missiles for destroying enemy armour

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    • VEH: Sphinx Tank – tank equipped with dual machine cannons that fire burst shells for destroying aircraft or buildings

    (no picture... oops!)

    • VEH: Mobile construction village – builds a new construction village

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    • NAV: River Galleass – slow boat that can transport up to twelve units and six of the units can fire at enemy targets while on board. It travels slower the further it is from the shore

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    • NAV: Cataract Class Cruiser – Fast ship with stealth detection and anti-air firepower, useful as escort

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    • AIR: Gnat Fighter – extremely fast fighter craft that can hover which attacks with machineguns, effective against infantry and other aircraft

    Tier 3:


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    • INF: Set Commando – powerful anti-armour and building infantry with a weak anti-infantry attack

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    • VEH: AHT Tank – weakly armoured tank armed with long range lasers for taking down enemy buildings. Has a very short view range, but does more damage the more tanks of the same type that are targeting the area.

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    • VEH: SHA Tank – small, heavily armoured tank with low damage weapons that slow enemy units down. It can use rockets to fly short distances after a recharge time, and when it lands it can crush units beneath it.

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    • NAV: Osiris Class Battleship – powerful all-round warship with especially effective anti-ship weapons.

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    • AIR: Falcon Attacker – Fast moving rocket fighter/bomber with laser weapons that can’t hover but can remain in the air forever (when not tasked it will fly in circles).

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    • COM/NAV: (requires Osiris) Revenge Battlecruiser – a huge boat that can 1-shot most ships and that can transport up to 20 units, of which 6 can fire off the boat as well. Used to dominate the seas (but can’t target air or on land)

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    • COM/VEH: (requires Ra) Ra’s Fury – a large, fast tank that can transport ten units and can attack up to 5 units at once with high powered lasers.

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    • COM/AIR: (requires Nut) Geb Starship – a moderately fast, large ship, that can switch between ground or air target mode (taking about 40 seconds to change). In air target mode it annihilates aircraft easily, and in ground target mode it can continuously bombard an area. It cannot be targeted by ground based anti-air weapons

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    • COM/INF: (requires Hathor) Hathor Combat Priestess - a stealthed sniper unit that can one-shot enemy infantry units, and also heal nearby friendly units. Has no building or vehicle attack

     

     

     

     

    Buildings

     

     

     

     

    DEF = defensive structure

    SUP = superweapon

     

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    • Construction Village (construction yard) – a large apartment building that houses workers and architects.

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    • Refinery – processes minerals

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    • Solar turbine – produces power from the sun. It is affected (a little) by the map’s weather

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    • Garrison – Trains infantry

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    • Communications Obelisk – allows radar

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    • Vehicles workshop – builds vehicles

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    • Drydocks – builds ships

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    • Air ramp – builds aircraft

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    • Cult Temple – advanced building needed to reach tier 3. Once built it must be dedicated to one of 5 gods, giving a bonus and choosing the commando. Once dedicated it cannot be undone and any further cult temples built will remain dedicated to the same god. Abilities:
    1. Set: all infantry gain regeneration and all units gain experience faster. All units have armour and attack increased. Any unit that dies has a 1/50 chance of becoming a “greatest of 50 unit” instantly promoting them to the highest rank and granting increased health, attack and speed. No commando unit is granted.
    2. Osiris: all boats gain repair, river galleasses can heal units inside them, and all ships gain extra range and view sight. In addition, units transported by boat have increased speed for a few seconds after deploying.
    3. Ra: All laser weapons now cause their targets to burn, and all laser units gain extra health and speed. All vehicles and buildings regenerate health when in the sun.
    4. Nut: all aircraft move faster, are built faster, and refund half their cost when destroyed (stacks with mortuary; i.e. 65% refund)
    5. Hathor: mining vehicles move/collect much faster, gain your opponent’s line of sight, all building hit points increased and defences automatically repair

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    • Mortuary – once a mortuary is built a small refund (15%) is provided every time a unit is destroyed.

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    • Monument – a small monument that can only be built each time a level 3 unit has been destroyed. Each monument you have provides a small income.

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    • DEF: Prince Wall – a wall that soldiers can patrol across if a guard tower with garrisons is adjacent.

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    • DEF: Guard tower – a tower that can fire automatically but can also garrison up to four soldiers

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    • DEF: Sphinx tower – anti-aircraft flak tower

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    • DEF: Suntower – a tower that shoots lasers at ground units, it is more effective when in direct sunlight.

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    • SUP: Locust Device – a superweapon that removes all the ore at a set location (but not the ore respawn mechanism)

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    • SUP: Sobek missile – a big missile that cannot damage units or destroy buildings but that drains power and damages all buildings (to 15% health) in a large blast radius. Once launched it is destroyed, and a new one must be built.

     

     

  2. Looking nice, I like the overhangs on the roofs. Danpaul's right about adding details and deciding what to texture and what to model. Personally I base that decision on the scale of the detail, if it's a downpipe say I'd model it, but a small drain or maybe a keyhole would be textured. That also depends on how good of a texturer you are and how much time you want to spend on it. If you're better at modelling it can be faster and more convincing to simply model every detail; but that's only an option if you're making something for art's sake and have no complexity constraints.

  3. So, it'd be essentially a group of allied soldiers taking cover behind steel/metal debris while a hind puts a volley of 12.7mm on their position. 3-4ish men, one looking to fire a redeye at the hind. Urban or semi-urban environment if possible

     

    This is going to be tough, but I'll give it a shot.

     

    In the meantime I did an animation! First one I've done in almost forever and I haven't gotten any better in the interim, but I still think it came out okay!

     

    desert_outpost_by_squidempire-d9n6f6d.gi

  4. newsolidericon_by_squidempire-d9mpyng.pn

     

    So here we can see that that sort of tracing as practise can hopefully pay off. This is one is from scratch using the same techniques as the above.

     

    If anyone thinks this guy looks familiar he's one of my troops from the old 'make your own c&c faction' thread back on BHP

     

    Also I still do requests if you've got them, it's been pretty quiet here for a while...

  5. I have some news and info and then I'll quickly reply to the comments I've received. I'm sorry I don't have any pictures right now, I've been working on another large picture but it's going to take some time to finish. Here's a sneak peak:

     

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    Regardless here's some news:

     

    Regarding actually making this game, and what's missing from current sandbox town building games

    I've been playing a lot of Fallout 4 recently - Fallout NV being my favourite game ever - and came to the realisation that if it were easy and viable to extensively mod that game it would make an excellent base for my game. It already has AAA character models and animations, weapons and effects and so on, an interface for building towns and basic resources and management, and clever AI workers that can do tasks in a timely manner and so on. The biggest problem would be that I imagine such a complete and polished game would be very hard to modify in any extensive way - most mods I know of for games like these simply add more of what already exists or change around models/textures/other content.

    I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I found the settlement building in Fallout to be like many other games released recently. It becomes tedious to build simple structures over and over, and the ability to customise extensively - which should be the positive trade off to tedious manual construction - is limited anyway. The townsfolk seen smart enough, but they're also frustratingly dependant on your micromanagement, and what management you can give them is pretty stunted. In short, the mix of micro and macro building elements just hasn't been balanced yet.

    I feel like some simple fixes can bring these town building elements up to scratch, and that's what I want in my concept. Firstly; change manual wall, door, or floor mat placement into the construction of entire buildings in one go - with options for customisation if the player really wants it. Fallout actually has some pre-built shacks you can place, and this is a good start, but these need to be made the normal way to build rather then a 'lazy' extra. Decoration of homes should be up to the NPC inhabitant - this will take that burden off the shoulders of the player and also make your townspeople seem more real and wilful. And that would be the second biggest fix - focus more on the townspeople to make them appear more alive. Fallout has some nice little tricks to do this; the people will all meet up at a bar as the day ends. But it also has many issues. Once they get to the bar, they stare at each other and the player with vacant expressions, simply waiting until the time they shuffle off to sleep.

    The townspeople should manage their own lives. This sort of independence can be faked pretty easily with some AI routines and a random number generator. The people will do their jobs in a fairly robotic manor, but in their downtime will behave in a (at least somewhat) human fashion, going for walks, buying groceries, talking to neighbours, tidying up their homes, or going out for entertainment or dinner. This sort of detailing really goes a very very long way in making the player feel like they're actually building something real and worthwhile, rather then a cold and lifeless pile of bricks inhabited by some robots.

     

    Possible expansion #1 - religions?

    This is one aspect I've been thinking about for months now. But first, by expansion I originally meant as in 'expansion pack', or I suppose DLC. Some extra content that could be released later on to keep the game alive and new. However if I'm planning DLC this early on it might as well be 'expansion' as in an expansion on the game's concepts, and be considered content to be included in the first release. With that out of the way, onto the ideas!

     

    Basically the idea here is to add religion as an aspect of your town's and people's culture. This being a game set in some fictional world, the religions would of course be fictional as well, and would almost certainly be created by the player themselves. There's a lot that could be done with this concept but here's what I've been considering as of now;

    • The player can choose to have their settlement be religious, atheistic, or neutral. As a religious settlement the player creates and controls the spread of their chosen/created religion and gains certain benefits from it. An atheistic settlement will have it's own benefits and detriments, and will behave much like a religious settlement. In a neutral settlement the player has no influence on what their people worship or how, and so gains no benefits from any stance, but can have issues with their people worshipping all sorts of ideals.
    • When creating a religion, the player can choose from a bunch of types of religions, from New-Age-ish belief in crystals and energy vortexes, to cults of personality all focused on the player. I'll give my ideas below. They can also customise a great variety of features, like sacred colours, materials or places, religious holidays or festivals, rituals and beliefs and so on.
    • After a religion is created the player can enforce it however they see fit. By default most people will support the town's religion in a muted capacity, participating in some events or rituals when they see fit. By focusing on the spread and influence of the religion the player can increase the amount that their people care about it, eventually forming a holy city full of zealots, with banners and sacred symbols all over if they want to.
    • Certain constructions and abilities will only be available to certain religions and levels of religious fervour, see below for my lists.
    • By choosing atheism the player actively attempts to stop all religious worship in their settlement, which again is a function of how much effort they put into enforcing their chosen path. A fully atheistic city will disallow all worship in any form, but comes with it's own benefits, like increased productivity and a unified population.

    Here are those lists

    Religion types:

    • Monotheistic: the worshipping of a single all-powerful god. Choosing this makes your people rather intolerant of other religions and keeps the religion very stable. It grows slowly but steadily and no one really leaves the religion. It won't slow production in any sense and generally makes your people happier; it's a good solid choice all around. However in times of strain or when the population is very faithful your people will tend to get violent and even less tolerant. Most of this religion's benefits focus on making your people more unified and happier.
    • Polytheistic: the worshipping of a pantheon of smaller gods. Choosing this religion is another solid choice, as it grows very very quickly and is incredibly tolerant of other religions. Your people will be able to quickly absorb other religions into your own, giving you their benefits but at a reduced potency. However this flexibility is also a great weakness, as a polytheistic religion is not very stable and can be usurped by other, more solid, religions, causing your people to convert and leaving you with empty temples. This religion mostly benefits your people's happiness and boosts trade in your town.
    • New-Age: the belief in magic and the paranormal. This religion is an interesting choice. It grows at a normal pace and people leave and join as they want, it's also tolerant of other religions. Your people will start doing weird things like collecting crystals or wandering around looking for ley lines, which will take them away from their work, but their strange new habits pay off in increased immigration and trade to your town. Sometimes your people will stumble across meaningful discoveries in their activities too, gifting the town with resources or religious artefacts. Choosing this religion will increase the overall happiness of most of your people, and will bring in weird and unexpected benefits, but it also makes your people less focused and so less productive or ready to defend.
    • Cult: this religion is all about worshipping that which shouldn't be worshipped. Picking the cult path is not for the faint of heart. Your people will become more violent and restless, and will be intolerant of other views. This religion grows slowly but no one can ever leave the cult once they join. The payoffs can be great, in the form of tithes, more powerful soldiers, and greatly increased unity. However they come with high costs; trade and immigration will be highly stunted, crime will increase, happiness will decrease, and occasional human sacrifices from your own town might not be out of the question. It'a all worth it though to keep U'laqm'k'ams benevolent though right?
    • Personality Cult: the people will worship you! Choose this religion if you know who the real deal is around here: yourself. Your people will be much more productive and attentive, while other religions will be snuffed out. This religion causes increased immigration but decreased trade, and will actually make all your people a little less happy (though they'll never tell you that). You'll grow rich off heavy taxes, but your town will be poorer for it. This religion is concrete in it's stability - unless the player is killed, in which case the religion will shatter in a few short hours.

    Buildings religions unlock:

    • Sacred site - the smallest place for worshippers to gather, unlocked by polytheistic or new-age
    • Shrine - a small site to worship at, unlocked by personality cult or monotheistic
    • Alter - a sacrificial alter, unlocked by cult
    • Temple - a large, standard religious site, unlocked by a moderately religious new-age, cult, or personality cult population
    • Church - a large, standard religious site, unlocked by a moderately religious monotheistic or polytheistic population
    • Cathedral- a huge, magnificent building, where the entire settlement can worship at once;unlocked by a highly religious monotheistic, polytheistic, or new-age population population
    • Cult statue - a gigantic statue of the cult god, unlocked by a highly religious personality cult or cult population.
    • Templar Guard - a special guard barracks of highly armoured holy soldiers that only fight against those of other religions - unlocked by a highly religious monotheistic, cult, or personality cult population
    • Inquisitors - a special guard barracks of brutal guards that only punish people not in the town religion - unlocked by a highly religious monotheistic, or any cult or personality cult populations.

    My ideas on this whole topic are a bit up in the air at the moment, hence the 'expansion' concept. Instead of saying that all this is definitely going into the game I'd like to spend a lot more time refining it before I decide whether or not it would be too much.

     

    Possible expansion #2 - heroes and the arts?

    I remember reading a while back about a town-managing game with a twist: the game was a traditional RPG world with heroes and dungeons, but your job was to run the town that the heroes rest in before heading out to slay dragons and so on. I never played this game but I suddenly remembered the concept while I was thinking of my own. While it would be too much to wack the entire premise of that game into mine I was thinking of ways to incorporate some of the elements, while also adding some extra dieselpunk flavour. What I was thinking was that there would be certain hero like characters that might enter the world every now and again, and stop off at your town. If you're really lucky they might choose to stay, bringing a raft of bonuses to your people, but most of the time they'll pass through, providing some temporary boost. These would be people like explorers, celebrities, or mercenaries. Here's a list of some appropriate ones I thought of:

    • An explorer who is charting the wilderness beyond your lands. The explorer will buy supplies in your town like food and clothing, and will help you identify nearby deposits or resources or hidden treasure before leaving. If they stay full time they'll take up residence in a house and continue to leave and return on expeditions, bringing back resources or other items.
    • A big-time celebrity musician who's either looking to retire or take a break in the outskirts of civilisation. They'll stop off in your town to give a performance, making your people happier, and continue on their way, or might stay for good, putting on a show every few days and buying lots of luxury goods.
    • A mercenary who's looking for their next paycheck, they'll stop off in your town to see if you want anything done for money, and might stay for good, doing military tasks for a discount price.
    • A travelling merchant who will stop by to sell some rare items. They might decide to stay and set up a shop.
    • A detective hot on the heels of a big shot criminal, who will stop off toe quickly settle any current crimes and buy coffee. They might stick around and become the town's police force.

    A few things here might need explanations. While crime didn't feature in any of my original plans, it could become an important element of gameplay that opens up a lot of avenues. Having criminals in your town doesn't have to be due to poor management (when people are poor or hungry they'll resort to stealing like in most city-builders), even perfectly happy people might commit murder for one reason or another. Having town guards helps to alleviate crime and they might be able to bring some criminals to justice, but they're not really trained to act like police. Having a detective hero can help to bring criminals to complete justice - with the player being able to dispense whatever punishment they deem reasonable.

     

    From the start I wanted bars and restaurants to feature live music in game, with some of your townspeople acting as musicians. This I feel would add a nice little touch to your town's nightlife, with patrons tapping their feet along as they drink. This of course could be expanded. Perhaps dedicated musicians would perform this role, with player build musician apartments. Maybe there would be radio stations, and you might earn profits from artist's selling their records. Of course why stop there?
    There could be art studios in general that produce paintings and sculptures for your people, and even newspaper buildings that print the current times. Then that opens up having reporters, flash bulb cameras and the associated lightbulb production chains, and perhaps even the possibility for regular townspeople to become celebrities. Then we get into tourism, and the effects that might have on your town, and even the possibility of having a Las Vegas style town where nothing is really produced except entertainment, where all other goods are imported, and where the snap of flash bulbs mixed with the harmonies of big bands echoes out from a neon lit city blasting spotlights into the sky. It certainly allows a different sort of game then building another depressing pile of steel boxes with robots inside.

    In these sort of games, it's important that the player has lots of things they can add to their cities so that the game isn't 'over' in a few hours. While a lot of this is extra content that can be added later - hence the 'expansions' - it's not all just feature stacking.

    To be honest through, every bright idea I might have is another 2 years on the projected production time of any sort of implementation.

     

     

    Now onto your comments!

     

     

     

     

     

    Remember the guards I posted about just above? You'll be glad you hired them once you see what's in this spoiler...

     

    (Warning; SPIDERS)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98EDY_ihto0

    Really glad you went that middle route with the soldier concept. The striklers have their own thing going for them, no doubt. Are they somewhat like mutants?

     

     

    The soldiers were tough, but I'm also really happy with how they turned out. The striklers are supposed to just be the creatures that live in this world, they're not mutants any more then you might consider a snake a mutant. I don't really want any supernatural enemies in this game as it's supposed to be grounded in a real (if fictional) world that follows the same rules as ours. That's not to say there's no room for any imaginative, I just don't expect there to be ogres or anything.

     

    Spiders... Excellent choice, no one feels sad killing them and everyone gets freaked out by them.

     

    Hit the nail on the head there! I was thinking about spiders recently and I'm pretty sure people aren't scared of them because of their danger (they're pretty harmless mostly), but just because their 'freakiness'. The freakiest things about spiders I can think of are:

    1. They have lots of long legs that go all over the place - it seems unnatural and unsettling
    2. They don't behave like most other animals - they sit waiting for extremely long times before suddenly and expectantly moving all over, we can't see their faces and we can't predict what they're going to do
    3. They move very very fast and erratically, zooming around walls and floors.

    In a lot of video games spider monsters are just reskinned animals that behave in a predictable way, they see you and charge for you, spitting acid or waving their jaws at you up close. I've never really been scared of an in game spider, except for by their sheer size. To make a really scary spider in my game I have some ideas. Firstly, make the legs move a lot. Nobody likes spider legs, so we animate their legs to flick and twitch all over when they're moving. Next we make their behaviours unpredictable. Most of the time they'll ignore you, sitting perfectly still on a wall or tree as you go past - you probably won't even see them. Sometimes they'll suddenly move to another branch, or slowly move their legs around to feel the floor. The player should have no clue what they're going to do next, and should get the willies every time they see a strikler staring at them with unmoving eyes from the roof. Finally when provoked, they should move really really fast. They should zip all over and hide behind some scenery, so they player panics as to where it went. Then it'll pop out at the last second and grab onto their leg or arm, biting away.

    That my friends, is a terrifying monster that I would run away from in a game!

     

    awesome whoa

     

    Thanks!

  6. After a longer wait then half life 3, here's chapter two!

     

     

    Already it seemed they had been driving for weeks. The frigid outside remained a featureless white, and the steady roar of the engines persevered. Of course it was better that the GDI ship had crashed so far from the Sanctum, but it meant that the small team Ekman had at his disposal was on its own: no reinforcements would be coming. Ekman was not an action hero. His hands grimly gripped the roll bar above his seat as the buggy shuddered across rocks and snow. His driver’s face meanwhile was fixed in a solid grin, eyes darting back and forth, as he pushed the buggy to it’s limits. The buggy radio clicked on “This is McInnis, Sir we’ve got a few vehicles ahead, I believe they’re ours, they’re not responding on any known frequency though over”

    Ekman snatched the radio; “Halt all units!”

    Shredded snow flew through the sky as the buggies all slammed to a halt. Ekman and a collection of infantry lept out and ran over to the lead buggy. The air was calm and was beginning to heat up and the horizon was receding. Corporal Lloyd from McInnis’s buggy was waiting for them when they caught up to the lead buggy. “Where are they?” Ekman called out. Lloyd pointed over the nearby embankment. Pulling his binoculars Ekman began scanning the area.

    Amid the remains of a small forest he spotted it, a small group of three red painted Tick Tanks. All three were in deployment, oriented upward. Ekman remained looking at the tanks. There was no movement, but he spotted some signs of struggle; discarded weapons, some small craters. Ekman put the binoculars down. “Sir? There’s no one there, should we move on?”
    “No Corporal. Which of you men have anti-tank launchers?” One of the soldier stepped forward and shouldered a large rocket launcher.
    “Destroy those tanks soldier.” The soldier quickly aimed and released the rocket, which spiralled lazily off into the distance. A resounding thud followed as the Tick Tanks were obliterated in a hail of slush and metal. “We can’t have our units falling into enemy hands. All hands return to your vehicles, we have a dropship to inspect.” The soldiers ran back to their buggies, Sinon focused and distant. Roaring back to life the buggies toar onwards, not much further now.

     

    The soldier groaned and blinked his eyes. He was alive! His breath echoed in his helmet, muffling the sounds outside. He held it, and heard fire. Attempting to get up he felt pressure on his stomach. Rising to an elbow he saw he was pinned down by some rent metal debris. He shifted it off and held his breath again. Gritting his teeth he struggled to stand. Crying out in pain he finally stood, and cried out again. Tears welling in his eyes he felt his shirt was damp, and raised his hands to his visor. Coated in blood, he blinked hard and looked around himself. Gravity had done a thorough job, the dropship lay in useless pieces around him. He also saw a few of his crewmates. They were undoubtedly dead. He felt his armour over. It was torn and shredded, he found his wound too; a knife sized piece of shrapnel on a shallow angle embedded in his collarbone. He tapped his helmet, no EVA. He was in this alone. Gritting his teeth once more, he decided he’d have to scavenge any medical supplies left intact. He took a tentative step forward and winced as his shin cried out in pain. Another step and he came face to face with a… rifle? “Oh kill him already” and then a shot. The soldier fell limp, and the Nod team exchanged a few chuckles. Ekman ignored them and scanned the debris. Hardly anything remained intact. McInnis strode up beside him. “Sir, it might be a good time to tell us what we’re looking for.”
    “Very well sargent. Gather round men!” The soldiers formed a circle around Ekman, who stepped atop the recently dead GDI soldier. “We’re here because this is the remains of the GDI Europa Dropship. Europa was carrying something important from history, a museum piece Kane himself is interested in acquiring; a old Soviet nuclear detonator which we believe is still active, and which we know operates active nuclear warheads. Too bad for GDI Europa here an ion storm ruined their plans. This is all of no concern to you though. What you’re looking for is a small metal briefcase, maybe chained to one of these men.” He kicked the body below him for effect;
    “Now get looking.”

    The soldiers fanned out, and began kicking the debris around, searching for a metal briefcase. Ekman motioned McInnis to follow him and headed towards the largest piece of debris. The two arrived at the twisted hunk of GDI-brown metal, which revealed itself to be the cockpit. “Sargent what downed this craft was an Ion storm right?”
    “Yes sir?”
    “Well we don’t want that to happen to us, so I want you to report our success back to the sanctum, and then immediately ready the buggies to return.”
    “Sir, but what if we don’t find th-”
    “I already have it.” Ekman raised the case from behind the hunk of metal he was standing at. “Scientific objects are always stored in the fore emergency oxygen tanks. I had the troops move out just in case any other GDI men survived. Now go send that message.”

    “Right away sir!”
    McInnis jogged back to the parked buggies while Ekman surveyed the case. It was old all right, covered in scratches and grazes. He could make out some writing on top, in cyrillic. A sudden gust of wind made him look up again. He saw a group of his men running towards him. Before he could react his earpiece exploded: “Sir! Sir! The situation has changed!”

     

     

     

    What's changed? Is it good or bad? Maybe something happened back at base?

  7. Remember the guards I posted about just above? You'll be glad you hired them once you see what's in this spoiler...

     

    (Warning; SPIDERS)

     

     

     

    strikler_by_squidempire-d9ck4jx.png

     

    These are striklers - which is what I'm calling them instead of spiders. I want to keep the animal count down in my game because I know absolutely nothing about making animals in 3d and I suspect it's a tough job, so these will behave as the main hostile monsters in the game. We've got three types, so triple the fun!

    1. The forest strikler. These guys are the least dangerous and most common type of strikler. You'll find them chilling in webs in forests, or hanging out (heh) in your town. That's right, these guys don't fear humans at all, and will happily make a home in a seldom-used basement or between some telegraph lines. Their bite can harm and in numbers kill your people, but they won't really attack unless provoked. They're also pretty weak, their only armour being a little chitin plate atop it's thorax. Their webs are a nuisance, being strong enough to slow down a human easily, and also being highly flammable. Chances are the player will keep them out of their town by killing any they see.
    2. The desert strikler. This little bugger is nasty. The desert striklers are rarer then their forest cousins, and only like to live in open deserts or dry plains. They burrow into sand to hide and build their nests in their tunnels. Desert striklers have the most potent venom of all, and a bite will kill a citizen in minutes. They're not armoured, but they're very very fast, and they jitter all over the place making them hard to hit. Fortunately they're also very afraid of humans, and will tend to stay away from people at most costs. The only times they'll attack are when cornered or when defending their nests.
    3. The wandering strikler. Now these guys are the worst. You know the saying, "they're more afraid of you then you are of them"? Well these monsters are not afraid of you, not one bit. Wandering striklers don't have nests or homes, they simply wander the world looking for prey. While their venom isn't as bad as the desert striklers, they more then make up for it in aggression and strength. They're very rare though, and will tend to stick to cold, dark places (bad news for snowy towns). If you do spot one, the player will want to keep an extremely keen eye on them. They won't attack if they think they won't win, but as soon as they see an opportunity they'll strike, picking off your weaker citizens or those by themselves. Truly scary!

    Basically I was thinking, "what's the worst possible thing to come across while exploring in my game?" And then I drew these suckers. I think I'll include a game difficultly option to turn them off though!

     

     

     

  8. These guys took almost as long as that city because I had a lot of roles I wanted them to fill.

     

    soldier_concept_by_squidempire-d9c0di3.p

     

    In the end I had to split it, so the guy on the left is more police looking and the one on the right is more adventurer looking. The soldiers in this game will fill many roles so their designs should be flexible. They protect the town from enemies and also from fires or other disasters, they fight wars for the player, they can be tasked to follow the player around exploring, and so on. I'm thinking that if I offer customisation in the game (which would be fantastic), one of the first things It'd be appropriate on would be the soldier's uniforms or roles.

    I left the patches on their arms and helmets white - these might be team coloured in game.

  9. This seems like something most people will have an opinion on!

     

    What're your favourite 3 games of all time? What about your favourite game universes/visuals? Or your favourite gameplays? How about your favourite games for their story?

     

    Mine:

     

    All time:

    • Fallout: New Vegas
    • Rise of Legends
    • Bioshock
    Universes/visuals:
    • Rise of Legends
    • Bioshock Infinite
    • Metro 2033 Redux
    Gameplay:
    • Rise of Nations
    • Age of Empires 3
    • Anno 1404
    Stories:
    • Bioshock
    • Deus Ex: Human revolution
    • Half life 2
  10. That's awesome Bashar! Prions freak me out though, they're worse then viruses... Have you met Brady? I love his youtube videos, they're all filmed at the University of Nottingham with the various professors. Numberphile, periodic videos, sixty symbols etc.

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