Fully destructible spaceship - fun or frustrating?

I'm working on a game where you build a spaceship by placing modules on a grid. Each module has particular functions e.g a turret, a shield generator, a hull or a thrusters.

When fighting other ships which are built up in the same way, you can destroy the modules individually which works really well and is pretty fun watching them slowly break down.
Every ship also has a "core" module which, if destroyed, disables the ship (game over in the players case)

The problem comes when you win a battle or escape a battle after taking devastating damage. For example you might defeat your enemy, but they destroyed all of your thrusters... Now you're stranded with nowhere to go.

The nature of the game is that you continue to explore the universe and build up your ship - you can only modify your ship at planets, so if you aren't able to get to a planet then you're basically done.

My thoughts of how to resolve this are...

1. Give the ship a small amount of thrust on the "core" module so you can always move slowly as long as you're not completely destroyed - the problem is you'd be really slow if you had a huge ship
2. Give the player a "Teleport to planet" function which you can't use in combat
3. Make modules "damaged" rather than destroyed. When damaged, thrusters have a weaker thrust and weapons deal less damage, but projectiles will pass through the modules, allowing your core to take damage

I like the simplicity of Teleport (actually just thought of it while writing this!) but I'd like to get some thoughts on this problem in general.

Cheers

 

I remember trying this out a couple of months back in a Feedback Friday thread. Your description of the game sounded strangely familiar until I realized who you were.

I prefer the third option you mentioned, but probably only for certain systems. I think it's probably find if all of the ship's weapons get completely destroyed in combat. Shields can probably also be fully destroyed, as can any tools, like the tractor beam. But the thrusters, I definitely feel like those only need to be crippled, but not destroyed. Something similar happened when I was playing and ran out of power far from a planet. I had a tiny bit of thrust, and it tool a couple of boring minutes to get home. I would really recommend you don't add boredom as a punishment.

What I'm thinking is that maybe when the thrusters are damaged enough, you almost completely lose the ability to rotate. You can barely turn, enough that over a long enough distance you can set a course for a nearby planet. But you'll be pretty much unable to maneuver around obstacles, or deal at all with enemy attacks. You thrust, however, can probably say reasonably high, at maybe 50% or even 75% of normal. That kind of a handicap would definitely convince me to head home, since it becomes too difficult to do anything else. But it wouldn't make the trip home overly difficult and boring.

Just an idea. I think all you really need to do is make it fairly undesirably to end up in the position, without necessarily making it a complete annoyance.

 

@dgoyette I agree with what you're saying. I like the word "crippled" as the modules could be crippled in different ways.
It would be easy to feedback to the player that the modules are crippled by changing the particle effects so thrusters sort of sputter and spark instead of flowing nicely.
The other advantage here is players wont need to replace destroyed parts, they'll just need to repair them.
When repaired I can simply change them back to not being crippled.

The only issue I see with this is it might be confusing when your bullets start passing through the enemies crippled modules instead of hitting them.
I guess if I change the sprite enough to look like its just a frame of the module it would make sense that the bullets go through it and you need to target the core instead.

 

In a game like this (sounds sort of sandboxy, though obviously with a lot of combat), I would advocate for multiple ways to deal with the problem.

• You could broadcast a distress signal, which tends to make some random NPC ship show up and tow you to the nearest shipyard — for a fee.
• You could take out an insurance policy, which includes a homing beacon you can activate that calls the insurance company's own tug to tow you to a shipyard (but probably results in an increase in your premiums).
• You could provide things you can do on your ship while slowly puttering your way back to a shipyard. Make that a part of the game — gives the player a chance to cool down after a heated battle, and also work on various shipboard maintenance/upgrade tasks they've probably been neglecting for too long anyway. Or earn a bit of coin by surveying nearby stars/asteroids/whatever on the way (if you can gamify that).
• Provide some way to cobble together crude thrusters (or other key systems, like life support) out of the scraps of your lost modules. Not as good as repaired or new, but good enough to get you home. Perhaps the efficiency with which you can do this depends on your engineer skill, or something.

I'm not a huge fan of bullets passing through damaged modules. I say just take 'em out, and use the methods above to deal with the missing systems after a battle.

 

@JoeStrout thanks for those suggestions. I really like the idea of doing some simple peaceful tasks on your ship while you get towed back. I guess you could do those thing while warping to other systems too. I’ll have to have a think about what tasks would make sense. I think upgrades and unlocks would be a good one as upgrading modules is coming up on my todo list

 

Yeah, either got module on the bullet path, or is destroyed.
I think @JoeStrout got good ideas, to solve problem.
I would think about repair ability, which you purchase in advance at the base.
So you spend on repair tools, and you can use them, when not in combat.
That will lay a responsibility on a player, to thin in advance, in case hqvy damage situation.
Player then could be able to fix, or fix partially modules, at least to the point, that ship is at minimum operational state. For example can move with thrusters.

Now player should be able to fly to the base, to do full repair.

So the repair tools in my view, are to allow, to partially fix modules (to state of damaged rather destroyed). Player will have limited amount of rapir tools, with grate cost for each. So player would need to use them smartly. Probably wont be able fix all modules, but most critical.

Some variation to concept, is to allow player select, which modules to fix.

Or, allow player to place an emergency propulsion tools on the ship, just to allow ship to move to nearest base.
Player would be responsible for buying in advance such tools. For example more tools, means faster movement. Of course for a significant cost for example.

 

Do like Metroid Prime and give the ship an automatic repair function, but it activates after the ship is heavily damaged, after winning or escaping a battle. And when it is automatically repairing, your ship is invulnerable from attacks from other ships. And when your ship is finished automatically repairing, it can travel to other places at half speed, until you fully repair it at a repair station.

 

@Antypodish @BrandyStarbrite

Repair ability is another great idea! I could allow the player to activate repairs which drains appropriate resources to heal the damaged modules. I like this one because it means if you took a small amount of damage, you can repair and carry on. If you take a large amount of damage and actually lose important modules, you can repair and head back to base for a full repair.
I think a combination of repairs for minor damage and a teleport or "towing" service after massive damage is what I'll go for cheers.

 

Another insurance/distress beacon option: Would it make sense in your game world for someone to bring you a replacement thruster? If you call AAA roadside service in the US they can tow your vehicle in, but if you are just out of gas or have a flat tire, they can come out and bring you some gasoline or change your tire for you. Costs AAA less than towing your vehicle.

On the insurance premiums, I would be careful with costs going up as you use insurance. That could easily feel like the player is being punished for losing and create frustration. Plus, what if you run out of money? Unless you want that to be a "Game Over" condition.

 

I think you should play "Faster Than Light".

For example when you were out on fuel the trader might come to you and sell some.
You can make some kind of space emergency organization that you can call for help.

 

Play captain forever if you have not already. That’s the exact game you’re building.

captain forever is fun but is less about exploring and more about fighting and building. They have a small amount of thrust on the core module. But moving slowly isn’t an issue because enemy ships come to you.

 

@Socrates I think being able to self-repair is fine here. You carry resources around with you so it makes sense to be able to repair the ship to some degree. I'll definitely consider interaction with some sort of AAA service though, that sounds pretty funny.

@Antony-Blackett Just watched a video of captain forever, it looks crazy similar! Sad that mines not as original as I'd hoped but it'll be some good ideas and inspiration
Looks like they handle the post-combat by allowing you to attach destroyed enemy parts to your ship and "jump" to the next level (so you don't need to fly all the way to the next planet).
That would take a bit of a rework on my design but definitely worth considering

 

I would consider having crew be able to repair destroyed modules, which could be to a half functional state. It could be they can repair only certain modules, like thrusters, but not weapons.

Spoiler

As an example from my own sailing game I'm making, the ship's crew can repair sails and masts at sea, but not cannons or any other equipment. If all the crew are dead with no one to man the sails, you still can move at 25% normal speed. If your ship is sunk, and you're at sea in your escape dingy, instead of making your way back to port you can teleport back to a pre-saved location (only available in the dingy). With all that it makes damage hurt, keeps building and equipping ships back at port, but not feel game breaking when you're seriously damaged at sea.

 

I would go for a minimum thrust value, maybe with a short timer. In terms of going from 'zero to something', anything else is just introducing added complexity to solve a problem that should never arise in the first place.

Going from 'something to something really good' is where I think the focus of the gameplay development should take place.

 

What if you can send an SOS signal to the nearest planets or something?

 

I took a look at some other similar games and I got this idea:

When a module is destroyed, after a few seconds of being out of combat, it will begin to automatically rebuild.

I think this makes gameplay continuous without interrupting the flow of things and removes the frustration of having to re-add the modules that were destroyed.

I've tested it out and I'm really happy with how its working.

Thanks for all of you ideas!

 

Aye, cool. I'm glad all of us were able to help you.