Modular Space Freighter

Modular Space Freighter - v1.1 Released

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There are a number of modular space ship packages available on the Asset Store. One thing I noticed every single one of them was missing, though, was the ability to walk around inside your ship. I wanted a ship that felt like a home among the stars, and Modular Space Freighter (MSF) is my attempt to give that to developers.



MSF contains 106 pieces to arrange however you please, 4 pre-built ships to tinker with, and 6 color schemes you can easily apply with a single click. There are animated boarding ramps, loading elevators, roof hatches, and interior doors. And with the 1.1 update, some new machinery, weaponry, and animated lateral docking ports.



Please feel free to play with the web player demo to get a closer look at what's included. If you like what you see, swing on by the Asset Store and consider a purchase!

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Note: Due to the amount of cleaning up, reorganization, and optimization, along with the upgrade to Unity 5, it is recommended you uninstall old versions of this plugin before updating. Since I am but a single man with finite time, I am unable to support versions of Unity below 5.0.

Still not convinced? Maybe a couple more screenshots will help.

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As always, your feedback and/or patronage is greatly appreciated.​

 

very interested in this, when is the 1.1 update? thank you

 

Thanks for the interest, @wintermuteai1!

I haven't bothered with additional 1.1 content on account of there being little interest in the asset at all so far. I have an additional internal machinery part (bringing it up to three now, which can really be used for whatever you want, i.e., impulse engine, hyperdrive, life support, etc) and added to the package, and I have a few sketches of external weaponry, but couldn't justify the extra work without there seeming to be a desire for it, ya know?

Is there anything you'd like to see added that would make this a Must Buy for you?

 

Hello, being able to sit at the controls, fly the craft at impulse and also hyperdrive, weapons, and being able to change camera from internal to exterior view would be a must buy for me. I am developing something quite large in scope and your asset caught my interest. see here:
https://www.facebook.com/wastesoft
Basically my game will have a "do almost anything" type including space flight/fighting so I really need something like what you are creating as I also have planets you can actually walk around on.
tyvm
-Winter

 

Everything you described is what I initially intended to do. What I realized, however, is that the more complex the system got, the less likely it would fit easily into someone's existing game structure.

If you've looked into having moving ships with navigable interiors, then you already know about what a tough time people have with them. It's the basic "moving platform" problem but to a much larger degree. There are several different solutions to the problem, but taking one approach would potentially limit the usefulness for someone who can't use that as an option (for example, a static ship with moving exterior, or using separate layers for different scales of interaction). Additionally, building a comprehensive solution that would fit nicely into other systems and including all the functionality you described would take enough time and effort to drive the cost of the asset up quite a bit, and would limit the wider appeal an affordable asset provides.

So what I decided to do instead was make more of a model pack for building sets that should fit nicely into an existing game structure. I'm absolutely interested in building a fully functional drag-and-drop space ship system, but that may or may not happen quite a bit down the road.

 

As far as that goes, frankly I would have it set so the player is parented to the seat while piloting from inside view, disabling the actual character control and activating the ship control for flight.

 

Right, that's one option. But what if it's a multiplayer game? Or what if a developer has to offer the ability to walk around the ship while it's in motion? These are all the specific customizations that vary so widely it seemed infeasible to write a simple to use and yet one-size-fits-most solution.

Again, I'd love to create a full system, and will quite possibly attempt to some day. But I guess this is the time to say that if that's what you're looking for, this asset is not that.

Edit: Case in point, the game I had in mind when I originally began this project was where you didn't fly the ship at all. You were just a crew member on board the ship who was responsible for running around fixing stuff as the ship was getting banged up and blown to pieces in its interstellar voyages. The solution that would work for that game is potentially much different than what would be used in yours, though. It would be a great challenge to take on, but I think there's also good reason why no one's released an asset that fits that mold.

 

Sure, well there is always a way to solve for X, I still will probably buy the asset in near future and work out my own solution as I really do like it One thing I would like to suggest however, is the interior is quite nice the exterior however...just an opinion but perhaps can look more streamlined?

 

Well thanks! And for the record, anyone that buys my asset, I'll probably end up using all the proceeds to buy the game you use it in.

 

Fair enough. I was definitely going for chunky and low-poly, but I imagine I could add some pieces to allow a smoother angle. I'll definitely add it to the list. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

Thought I would post a quick message to show what I have done with the Modular Space Freighter, together with a few comments and questions. As you can see from the screenshots below, I have retextured both the interior and exterior of the ship, and customised the interior.

The main problem I have encountered is because I am using a third-person character. The elevator and ramp control panels are impossible to use without switching from third to first person camera as my character gets in the way ;-)

Retextured exterior with BFG - gotta protect my cargo somehow ;-)




Red window-pane still there after the door opens:-



Cockpit mod:-


Storage bay with ROV's ready to explore planets



Engine room mod:-


One minor issue is that the red coloured window panes don't move when the doors open - see screenshot-2

Also I removed the 85mm Lens flare on the built-in point-lights as I didn't like the flare dazzling me when the doors opened.

All in all I am really enjoying using your Modular Space Freighter, and I am looking forward to any future updates.

Frank (Secret Studio)

 

Thanks for the comments, @SecretStudio.

In regards to the windows, did their relationship with the door happen to become broken somehow? They are a separate object, and should be parented to the rig for the door. Check the structure with a packaged prefab to see the proper structure, and let me know if that's not the issue.

Love the retexture! Outside of the ship looks very "space marine-y", and the ridiculously huge weaponry on top is a nice touch.

I'll grant you that the FPS script is exactly that... focused on the standard FPS controller. It shouldn't be hard to modify it to ignore objects in a certain layer or by tag, depending on how your player is set up. I'll make a note to add an option for that in the eventual update, though.

 

I'm having major problems for some reason. In using this in unity 5, when I try to actually make these fly, I simply cannot. Any type of flying or moving script will move either the camera leaving the ship behind, or alternatively the ramp (frog for example) will fly leaving the rest behind. Anyone have any luck making these actually pilot-able?

 

Sorry to hear you're having issues, @wintermuteai1. The asset itself is really just models. A couple of little scripts, too, sure, but the meat and potatoes are the models themselves.

If all your parts are parented to a single GameObject, and your camera is a child of that same object, I don't see why you'd have issues with the ships leaving the camera or other parts behind when it moves. At the very least, I can promise it's not because of anything relating to this asset.

Care to post some script examples and editor screenshots of your object hierarchy to help debug?

 

Figured it out: The models are set to static, lol.
Works fine after getting rid of that

 

Alright here are a couple of views of your Frog ship, one from space rear view and the other landed upon a planet.
Quite happy with the product.

 

Nice! Just want to make sure you're aware, though... You can build your own custom ships in any fashion you choose. (The prefab ships included are just samples for inspiration)

 

Quick update, I am still working on update 1.1, which will include lateral ports (side docking hatches), several external weapons, and a few surprises. This has been taking me a lot longer than I expected because I had to clean up a lot of my work that was done kind of hastily for initial launch.



As part of this, I'm also modifying some of the existing parts. Windows, in particular, will now be built into their parent objects as a single item. This will prevent airlock doors from breaking by moving objects in the hierarchy and such.

I do plan on a future update adding the ability to have multi-deck ships. That's gonna be a doozie, though, as that will more than triple the number of parts in the pack. This was requested from a customer, though, and you gotta give the people what they want, right?

As for any other addition requests, just post a mention of it here or contact me and we'll see about getting it done.

 

Just a quick sneak peek at the progress. This update will include a new demo scene, and at least this new ship prefab to show off the new parts. Two of those parts are visible in the screenshot below.



Additionally, MSF just got easier to build. Adding the ModularShip script to an empty GameObject gives you the previous ability to apply materials to all ship parts simultaneously (for swapping between any of the included 6 colors, or your own), it also allows for convenient reorganization.



Clicking the Organize Objects button will sort MSF pieces into Internal and External empty objects. This allows you to easily turn off the exterior parts with a single click (disabling the External empty), for viewing the inside of the ship in the editor.

Stay tuned for more!

 

Today's Update: Docking ports.



Docking ports can be placed along the edge of the ship to allow access to other ships (or bases) through another docking port. When the panel is activated, the docking ring will extend to a defined length, at which point the doors will open.



I've actually created quite a headache for myself here, as I wanted to give players the option of having a docking port door without the extending ring, so I created them as two different objects. Getting them to activate each others' animations within the system I've already built is proving to be a pain, so I may not put too much effort into these until I rewrite the system at a later time. I'd rather get it into people's hands and let them handle things their own way, if they prefer, than hold the update back until I get something worked out.

Also interestingly, the FPS controller included with Unity 5 is proving problematic on several fronts. The old standard controller just barely slipped through the hole I had made for the docking port. Because the new controller has head bobbing, it actually bumps up against the top of the hole and won't pass through. I'd like for users to not have to modify the standard controller in any way to work with this asset, so I may have to adjust the sizing further. But to be honest, I felt like the ports are a bit too tall as is, so I'm not sure what to do about that yet.

Additionally, the Standard FPS Controller also freaks out while riding the elevators now because physics. Again, I could spend time resolving this with my own solution, but since some users will be using their own character controllers, I'm not sure how much time is worth spending on figuring this out.

 

Version 1.1 is now available!

Reminder: If you had the previous version installed, enough has changed that you may just want to start fresh by deleting the asset and downloading it fresh. The folder name has been changed to mitigate total project destruction, but just the same... backup your project first.

 

Hey there, MSF fans. It's been a while, but I wanted to share what I've been working on. Most of my free development time lately has gone into working on Node Map, but there's been one thing that's always bugged me about MSF that I wanted to rectify, so I'm taking breaks to do it.

Although MSF is the only Unity asset that allows you to build customized space ships with full interiors, actually building the ships isn't exactly intuitive. You have to be sure to align all the tiles just right, make sure the interior and exterior pieces jive, and select the appropriate prefab for the situation... when you may not even be sure what it is you want to build.

Well, all of that will change with MSF 2.0!

MSF2 will include a GUI ship editor to allow you to quickly and easily draw your ship in the editor, and the appropriate tiles will be selected and placed for you! Here's a little WIP shot to show you how it works.



It's as simple as adding a new ship through the new menu options, selecting it, clicking "Edit", and drawing away on the scene grid!

There are a lot of implications of doing things this way, and I'll get into more detail on that stuff later. The gist, though, is that ships are going to get a lot more customizable, and building them will take only a fraction of the time. For you. For me... I've got a lot of work to do.

MSF2 will be a free update for all current owners of Modular Space Freighter, which is currently on sale for 25% off. If you haven't purchased yet but have an interest, this is the time!
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And if you don't own Node Map yet, go ahead and pick that up as well.

 

So after creating and releasing a different asset pack, I worked on making a game for a while. That's currently stalling, so I took a break from that to work on MSF2 a bit. I got some additional customization working, like adding windows and interior walls and doors, and setting layouts for rooms. Here's how it currently looks working with it:



There's still a lot of work to do, and I don't have an anticipated release date yet. But I'm confident this will be well worth the effort, as it'll make creating ships so much simpler for end users. And if I may say so, it's actually pretty fun in its own right!