Disputed Space - FPS Action Game

Implementing local multiplayer:

 

Implementing four player local co op multiplayer:

 

Short video showing the transition between single player and co-op local multiplayer:

 

Needs moar lazers

 

Here is a video showing the transition from single player campaign mode to multiplayer co-op mode. Additional players just need to hit the fire button on their game controllers or joystick. Then they will be added to the game and the screen will automatically be split as needed.

 

I made additional improvements to aiming by both the player and the AI based fighters today. It is smoother to play now.

 

Here is an improved version of the main menu.

 

I like your project! There is so much going on in the scene its crazy. Perhaps you could improve it by adding some kind of storyline and some characters to talk to the player.

I say that because right now you have a fully working game, but it just feels like you're being thrust into the scene without any context. Why are these ships blasting away at each other? Whats at stake? Why should the player care?

I don't know if you're going for the "lazy space battle" feel but the projectiles travel pretty slowly and it feels like a dream. It doesn't feel intense. It looks like there's just this plasma and lasers being shot out in to space and its just drifting around colliding with things.

Perhaps you could increase your projectile's velocity by a good amount. Also I've seen some glitches in previous videos (I just watched the last 3) which concern the flight behavior and in some cases the aiming of those projectiles. I think I saw a ship do a midflight flip and then realign itself with the forward vector. It did not look natural. I don't think you're doing any predictions of where the ships may be in the future so that could be whats making those projectiles miss. I did notice that some of the bigger ships seemed to be firing behind the other big ships.

You should fix those bugs because they will affect the players experience and perception of your game, and add a story or something to make the player care about this project of yours.

I like your art style too.

 

Thank you for the detailed feedback. I really appreciate it.

I do need to add something to give the player a storyline. I recently implemented an announcement system in the game to give the player a short bit of text based instruction. It includes simple stuff like "Defend the Base" or "Destroy Enemy Fleet". I have been considering doing some basic storyline stuff through that same solution, but I may need to expand the storyline elements using voice overs. I was hoping to avoid using voice overs, since that would greatly expand the scope of the project, but it might be the only way to deliver enough storyline elements.

The projectile speeds for the big ships are relatively slow, and the big ships don't lead targets. The projectiles from the small ships are much faster, and the small ships do lead targets. If I increase the projectile speeds too much, it will be very hard for players to strafe to avoid incoming projectiles. The core gameplay mechanic is strafing and aiming, similar to old games like Descent and Descent 2.

I have made a lot of improvements to the movement code for both small ships (fighters) and big ships (capital ships) in recent months, so I am not sure if the comments about flight behavior refer to current bugs or previous bugs.

 

Disputed Space will be available through Steam on June 12, 2017.

 

Disputed Space is now available through Steam Early Access.

 

Don't feel as if VO is the only way to add some kind of storyline, but it's really just about the easiest way to do this type of thing--no special animations or anything, just someone speaking into a mic.

On Steam you mention 30 single-player levels. Do you already have those set up? Can you describe their general flow? Are they scripted, or do you plan to have them scripted at all? Do you plan for the storyline (or the 30 missions) to be a linear affair, or are you considering the idea of some differing results based on the player's actions (failing to stop a capital ship might trigger a unique scenario for instance)? That all might help come up with a storyline.

Are the enemies humans as well? Do they have similar types of ships, or are they of a different design? Ships of a different design might imply otherworldly creatures, which might infer certain plot ideas.

Additionally, are you planning for the full thing to be combat, or have you considered any other type of gameplay (such as trading) common to space games?

How do these hit you...

"It all began in the year 2540. The earth was dead, and we couldn't save her. Man rose to the sky in search of another home. Years later, the fleets converge on a single habitable world light years away. But...when we arrived...we weren't alone."

"It began in the early twenty-first century, with the first private spacecraft plunging into that ineffable void not for king and country, but solely for wealth and power. Now, years later, the inevitable conclusion of this history is clear: all-powerful corporations control massive fleets capable of destroying entire worlds. They wage war with one another over scarce and precious resources, their leaders safe within the cradle of the earth. And we...we are the cogs, fated by life to obscurity, yet seeking our own piece of the sun, our own glory in this post-modern world. If we fight and die...we're no worse off. But if we live...if we win...there's no telling how far we'll rise.

In this Disputed Space...I will fight. I will rise."

Sorry, that last one just kind of ran off on its own.

Edit: By the by, just wanted to say I bought it. I'll try it out and give some feedback tomorrow.

 

I'd be interested as well to see how you'll forge context and boost engagement from where you currently are, because I'm in a somewhat similar situation of having a much clearer vision of mechanics and core gameplay loop, than of the narrative context that I want to give. Most importantly, how do we communicate that in screenshots? The way I see it players need to see at a glance what it is they should care about.

 

Disputed Space is an arcade action game. It is not a simulator, so non-combat gameplay like trading would not be a good fit. My goal with Disputed Space was to create an epic space battle based on the movement physics from the old Descent games, but in outer space instead of inside a mine. The core gameplay is aiming and strafing.

The 30 levels currently in Disputed Space are implemented using procedural algorithms. The levels are not scripted. What I was originally planning to do was implemented additional procedural systems for generating some simple storyline elements on the fly. The current storyline is a simple "Aliens spaceships attacked Earth, so humans are purging the galaxy of those threats." It is a very simple story. At this point, all of the enemies are non-human.

One I am planning to do is add more gameplay modes. For example, maybe I would add a Realistic mode or a Story mode in addition to the current Arcade mode.

The next thing I need to add is a Scoring system, because most players are asking for that. I am not sure if those players actually want a scoring system or if they are just looking for additional reasons to replay levels and scoring could give them that. Either way, that is next.

It has been really fun getting feedback and iterating the game based on the feedback.

 

Excellent. I would love to hear more feedback after you play Disputed Space. Thank you.

 

Yeah, another challenge I have noticed in my case is that a lot of players have vastly different expectations about space games. For example, Disputed Space is an arcade action game. Players who want an action game will love Disputed Space, but some of those players got turned off to space games in the past because many space games are simulator focused. And the flip side of that is that some space simulator fans might grab Disputed Space because it looks like it might be a space simulator, but then some of those players are let down by the purely action experience. Anyway, a huge part of my marketing strategy is simply trying to explain very clearly what Disputed Space is and what it is not.

 

I actually think you have a bit of a problem there. I've glanced at screenshots of your game in the past and I somehow got stuck in my head it's something RTS-ish, because on the screenshots it easily looks like that if you overlook the first person cursor. I think you really need some kind of clearly visible cockpit on the screenshots. The title is also something that I would have guessed to be more strategy, because it kind of sounds like "contested territory", which doesn't evoke any thoughts of lone-wolfing through an arcade first person game in me.

That's the thing though, you need to explain as much as you can of that in a way that doesn't require people to read anything or watch the trailer. If someone doesn't want a space RTS and looks at the game for 3 seconds, chances are they'll leave the store page already because it looks so much like a game in the spirit of Homeworld. And if people looking for the strategy/simulation kind of game buy this instead of your target audience, you'll get more bad reviews.

 

I never thought there was any risk of users thinking Disputed Space was an RTS. I assume people ignore nearly all text, but watch at least some of the video. For example, my current video is 55 second long. If somebody is considering buying Disputed Space, I assume they will watch part or all of the video prior to purchasing. Here is the current video:

Even without a cockpit, I assumed it would be obvious that the game is a first person shooter.

I have experimented with cockpits in Disputed Space. One challenge with a cockpit is the cockpit blocks a large portion of the screen. In a simulator, that is fine, because there is less action going on in simulators and people expect to rely on HUD elements inside the cockpit for the purpose of realism. When I have set up cockpits in Disputed Space, play testers complained that the cockpits made it too difficult to see the action.

I am definitely planning to add a cockpit option at some point, but I honestly expect a lot of players will disable it after playing for a few minutes.

 

Good choice.

Definitely not the case for all people. Don't have any stats on it though. When a game looks like it's in a genre people don't play on principle, then there's no reason to watch a video. In the discovery queue I usually click straight away on screenshots before the video has loaded. Tags also often get looked at first and when I see MMO, F2P, or Plattformer, I usually click next already. A friend of mine has gone through thousands of games on the steam discovery queue, I've gone through 2000+, most games don't get more than a quick glance. I don't think I'm overexaggerating with the 3 seconds in some cases.

Not sure which shape your cockpits had, but how about something like this:

http://www.dorkadia.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Titanfall-enemy-rider-alert.jpg

You could leave top and sides free and only have some hardware visible in the corners, and do something like their "paneling" on the display, which doesn't cover up much screenspace.

 

Apologies for taking so long to reply. I've had a terribly busy past few days. But I've played a little bit so far...

It would be nice if, with a controller, I could simply press "B" to go back when in the options menu. And you should really clarify what "arcade" and "simulation" mean with regards to the gameplay.

Maybe it's just me and the types of games I play. or maybe it's the fact that I'm practically falling asleep right now (not because of the game, because I slept from 4-7:30 last night), but it feels kind of like a cluster!!!! with these tiny little ships flying everywhere with their lasers dancing across the sky.

Death seems very undramatic. You get a shot of your ship exploding, then poof you're back again.

And it's here that the conceit (of flying a ship) really seems to be out of place, because outside of this there's basically no indication. What with the blank screen. I agree with Martin_H here, a cockpit would be valuable.

Additionally, I don't have any real clue what's going on with the UI. It probably just needs a sentence explaining each element. But that can't be too hard to add.

it seems really weird for a mission to begin at the end of the previous mission.

Any plans to make the levels prerequisites of one another (in a linear fashion)?

You should really be able to change controls during a mission. In fact, playing on a controller, for me personally, the controls feel bad. Mainly mapping the vertical yaw to the joystick. Just feels unintuitive. I'd rather have planar yaw there, with perhaps the triggers becoming the roll (D-Pad isn't good there). Not sure about where you'd put the vertical yaw then--both it and the guns seem best on the bumpers.

The controls, or at least acceleration, also felt very sluggish to me. That could definitely be more responsive.

Now, I basically just circle-strafed the big ships and blew them away. I stayed away from the smaller ships, and they stayed away from me. This shouldn't happen, especially if this is a "dogfighting" game. And as a matter of fact the scale for the smaller ships seems off--they seem tiny in comparison to me. But anyway, they should engage me and pull my attention away.

If the goal is truly to have it be a dogfighting experience, perhaps you could give the big ships massive hitpoints, far outside of the range of me just plugging away at it. And send the dogfighters after me if I peel off and go for the ship. And perhaps, if you shift the focus this way, it would be better to have a certain number of dogfighters you fight. Or perhaps something where either a certain number killed or enough killed in a short period of time finishes the mission, or triggers destruction of the larger ships.
And please, whatever you do, don't keep "The Hive."



Those are the things that stuck out to me. Apologies if it seems harsh.

 

Thank you so much more the feedback. During the past several weeks, I have received a lot of feedback from YouTubers and players, and I have been releasing updates as fast as I can. I really enjoy iterating software based on feedback.

There are currently two control schemes in Disputed Space. In Menu->Options->Controls, you can select either Arcade or Simulator. The Arcade control scheme plays like Descent. The Simulator control scheme plays like a flight simulator (similar to Elite Dangerous). By default, the Arcade control scheme is selected, but you can easily change that if you want.

There are already pressure systems in the game to regulate how many small ships are attacking you at once. There were most likely 8-12 small ships targeting you, but if you were strafing around quickly enough you may not have seen them much. I will try to brainstorm a solution to apply even more pressure to the player if the player is hammering on a big ship.

The big ships already have huge hit points relative to the small ships. During a large battle, the capital ships on the player's team will target the enemy capital ships, so there is quite a bit of damage being applied to those enemy capital ships even when the player is not directly attacking them.

In the control, what do you mean by acceleration? Are you referring to the acceleration of aiming movements or the linear acceleration of the player's ship?

Which UI is confusing? Is it the hull health and shield UI in the upper left? I have already gotten quite a few requests to improve that item.

Regarding the "Hive" enemy, do you not like the name or do you not like that enemy? Most player enjoy the Crimson enemy more than the Hive enemy. My original plan was to have the Hive enemy be a easy training/tutorial enemy just for a few levels to get the player comfortable with the game flow before jumping into more aggressive enemy factions.

 

The Titanfall cockpit layouts might work. I don't know for sure. I am personally not usually into cockpits, but I definitely understand what everybody is saying regarding needing to add one.

 

I mean the linear acceleration of the playe's ship. It seems very sluggish. Otherwise it seems fine.

And mainly that upper left...thing. I kind of figured it has to do with the health, but I wasn't really sure what was going on with it.

And the "Hive" name is just extremely generic. I don't have an opinion on the enemy type. If you do plan to add a narrative focus, you might consider changing the name.

 

Are you talking about the player's ship's acceleration or top speed? Some people have said the top speed is too low, and the ship actually accelerates too quickly. Some people want the top speed to be much higher, but they also want the ship to react much slower so it feels heavier to them. Personally, my vision is an arcade like feel with a quick reacting ship.

 

It might be the top speed. Probably is. I honestly wasn't even considering them separate from one another, shame on me.

Yeah, I think that's correct. It wasn't moving very fast at all--it wasn't about how quickly it got to that speed.

 

Ok. Technically speaking, the player's ship is moving fast, but it is trying to cover large distances so it does not always feel fast. I have received similar feedback from a number of players regarding the player's ship's top speed, so it is definitely something I will address soon.

One idea I have is to create an additional game mode called Hyper, which would have a much higher speed for the small ships and for all of the projectiles. I am currently playing around with the Hyper game mode having triple speed for those items compared to the Normal game mode.

 

I included a cockpit and improved HUD in today's update. I also refactored the Afterburner feature to be a manual Afterburner instead of the automatic one. For now, the afterburner is the Tab key.

 

I added an "Arcade Hard" game mode to Disputed Space. This includes faster projectiles, faster fighter ships, and more aggressive enemies.

 

I added a Back/Cancel event for the B button on game controllers today.

 

Good to hear.

 

Disputed Space - Full Release Announcement:
http://steamcommunity.com/games/637410/announcements/detail/1465223726782138736

Disputed Space - Steam Store Page:
http://store.steampowered.com/app/637410/Disputed_Space/

 

Have you already done the full release? Wouldn't a date along with a little bit of a marketing push (if you could get it, on websites like PC Gamer or RPG) helped drive sales?

 

Yes, I did the full release yesterday. I am not skilled at marketing. I did not make any marketing progress during the past few years despite many attempts, so I did not want to delay the full release in hopes of getting website coverage. I sent out thousands of keys and reached to the best of my marketing ability during the past six months on Early Access.

 

Okay, gotcha.

 

I recently posted the laser projectile code from my Disputed Space and Allspace projects to GitHub:
https://github.com/ShilohGames/InstancingPoolDemo

If you want to know how I managed to put so many lasers in each scene, check it out.