Another cool thing in Game 2 are portals/wormholes or as they are currently called “Micro-Rifts”. These things can be built around a map and connect different points in space instantly. Sounds neat and it is… but let me explain further why these things are a good idea and how they solve an important game design problem. First up, a screen shot with three Micro-Rifts.
This is a contrived little example to show how things work. Note that in a real game there wouldn’t be much need to build these m-rifts so close to each other. But I wanted them all in the same screen shot, so here you have it.
First, notice there is a little m-rift to the left of the Assault Ship. There are two others, one in the middle towards the bottom and the third is on the right of the map. There can be many m-rifts on the map, really only limited by a minimum distance from each other and your available time and energy.
The way these little guys work is that each m-rift you see is actually the same “point” in space. They are actually only one object, even though they appear in three different locations in this example. So when packets need to head toward that blue ore that has a red “dig X” on it, the packets don’t have to travel the long way down the shaft and to the left. Instead, they can enter the m-rift to the left of the Assault Ship and instantly emerge from the middle m-rift. The travel time is instantaneous since all m-rifts are actually the same thing. Put another way, anything can enter an m-rift and instantly emerge from any other m-rift!
You can also see that I have selected the lower Blaster and am trying to move it where the green target square indicates. Without the m-rifts the Blaster would have to travel all the way back to the surface and then down into the right most cavern. But with Micro-Rifts, the journey is made shorter. That gray segmented line shows the path the Blaster will take… into one m-rift and out the other. These gray segmented lines appear within the game whenever you want to move a unit. They show you how the unit will travel.
Now that you understand what Micro Rifts are, you might ask what they have to do with game design other than just being neat. So Game 2 potentially suffers from a problem of scalable “reach”. Many games suffer from a similar problem in various ways. For instance, in a typical RTS game it can become difficult to conduct a protracted military assault at a great distance from your base. This is because it takes a long time for new units to reach the ‘front’. Typical RTS games solve this by limiting map sizes, and/or allowing you to build production factories or have production bases closer to the front. In Total Annihilation/Supreme Commander you can just build factories all over the place.
Game 2 requires you to dig down, ever deeper. As you dig, it takes progressively longer to dig. This is because packets aren’t dispatched till a terrain cell can be dug. Yes, there will be a packet speed-up upgrade in the game. But packets still won’t move faster than 30 terrain cells per second. This is really fast, but with a completely straight shaft to the bottom of the map it could still take 3 to 5 seconds for a packet to reach the bottom. That’s a ‘long’ time. Typical travel times could be 10, 20 or even 30 seconds as packets snake around tunnels. Micro-Rifts solve this problem in a rather elegant way. They let you decide when it’s “too far” and decide to invest in a new m-rift. They also are things that can be irritating to lose, but don’t mean total instantaneous defeat. They are better than additional packet production factories because they don’t introduce the computationally complex problem of deciding which factory should produce a packet for a given target. They also work for units (though perhaps only after an upgrade) and let you move your limited forces around quickly if you need to.
So that’s the short story on Micro-Rifts… one more cool thing to keep your underground war factory dishing out destruction.
Do micro-rifts cost any energy after you build them?
Right now, they cost an uncomfortable amount to build (not too much, just something a little on the expensive side) but they do not cost anything to maintain.
This could change… but right now it seems to be working to have them not draw any energy to remain open.
you could make it so that it cost energy for objects to go threw the rifts and the bigger the object the more it costs. So that packets cost almost nothing and blasters and stuff cost more.
Ah, excellent! However, a few questions still remain.
Can creeper flow through these or is it simply destroyed on contact with hostile creeper? I can just picture myself making a dense chamber of “friendly” creeper and opening a microrift right next to the enemy to quickly overwhelm it…
If the answer to the above question is yes, can these microrifts be destroyed? I can imagine someone opening a very highly pressurized chamber of creeper unprepared and destroying any nearby microrifts before the creeper can get to them and avoiding anything else being destroyed…
Can microrifts be created that go into enclosed spaces (provided of course that said space has no hostile creeper in it)? Such a trick would be useful in a situation where you need to fight uphill…
Right now, they are destroyed on contact with bad creeper. No health, no delay…. just pop.
As for friendly creeper, it does not flow through them right now…. I’ll have to think about that one. If I did it (assuming I can do it without a large computation hit) I’d have to allow the player to turn it off on a rift by rift basis…. otherwise it would flow into one m-rift and then out of all of the other m-rifts…. probably not what the player would want.
Micro-rifts can indeed be in enclosed spaces. But you have to ask how it would get there in the first place. Right now, they have to be built like regular structures, so packets have to be able to reach them during construction. Of course they could preexist on a map…
Maybe you could purchase an upgrade to allow good creeper through? or have a separate m-rift (different colour?) that will allow creeper good and bad or just good or just bad (strategy wise… that would be awesome!)
oh that just gave me a good idea: creeper is flooding a cave like area in which you need to empty/get rid of quick, just build (though you said they are expensive hmm…) a bad only/all creeper m-rift to transport the creeper somewhere you don’t mind it!
I don’t know, just throwing out some ideas. What do you think?
Interesting ideas. I always have to guard against thing that are “too powerful” or “too convenient” since they can kill game play. But the idea of letting friendly creeper go through micro rifts isn’t bad… I”ll just have to play with it and see if it fits in the game.
Yes… Part of the reason I suggested it was because I wanted there to be at least one reason not to build one right next to the ship… It may increase how long it takes your packets, but it allows you to properly funnel the “good” creeper right where you need it. I think building too many should have at least one drawback.
rifts being rifts, they let stuff through right? I would say let both vreepers through. That way rifts could be put useless for a while, or make them another way to kill some creeper
Sadly, I totally figured this out long before the post. Nonetheless, Micro-Rifts are a very good idea and offer some intruiging possibilities, especially in map editor…
You just think of all the neatest things.
Now I really can’t wait for the game to be done.
how are micro-rifts created?
They are built like other structures. You click a place you want one built and then construction packets head there.
rifts are actually one point in space, as you mentioned. maybe you should have them getting built by sending packets to another M-rift? Couldgive a lot of balancing problems though
is this one of the game levels?
No, it’s just a test level I have. I have 3 levels I constantly change to test things on and try things out.
Hold on a moment. Why is it that the energy says 48 out of 50? In the last screen shot, your energy level was out of 10. I don’t see any storage type buildings. I assume that you needed the higher energy levels for the micro-rifts, but how did you get it up there?
Also, you seem to be farming some Ore.
It went up to 50 because I raised the starting limit basically. Nothing more than that. I am experimenting with the idea of not requiring you to build storage structure to increase this limit. First, it would be a little higher to start with. Second, there might just be one or two levels of research upgrade that increase the max.
Yes, some ore is being farmed in this shot. I will probably simplify the ore to just three levels (instead of five)… perhaps even just one or two levels…. whatever feels right.
I see. Research is a good idea.
I think you need at least two levels of ore, by the way.
I should also point out that the “Cracked Earth” terrain in this screen shot represents terrain that will be damaged when Evil Creeper touches it. I keep changing the graphics around for what the terrain cells mean, but in this screen shot there is only “easy to dig” terrain and terrain that the evil creeper will destroy (over time).
That would make sense.
I still think the solid block graphic should be an indestructible terrain.
Sorry I wasn’t very clear. The solid blocks are indeed indestructible. The rest of the terrain is easily dug terrain. The ‘cracked’ can be destroyed by evil creeper when it is touched.
In the editor will you be able to change the size of the area?
Vertically, yes. You will be able to make a really short map if you wish. In fact, some of the early story missions will be pretty short since the player will just be learning to play and won’t have all technology.
One thing about vertical length, its not infinite right?
Not it isn’t infinite. It will be in the range of around 100-150 cells high at max. This means a map is around 4 to 6 times as high as it is wide for the tallest maps.
Is there going to be multiplayer?
No plans for multiplayer.
like ever or just in this game?
Just this game… one day I’ll return to the whiteboardwar universe and make ChopRaider 2… and it is a good candidate for multiplayer. “But that”,as they say at the end of the Conan movies, “is another story”….
YAY!!! that means you will return to Chopraider right?, Because I loved that game!!!
Just a bunch of observations as I read, and one idea that floated into my mind (I’m putting it here, since it seems you’re too busy to read the forum suggestions :))
Rift travel: Someone once likened it to traveling along a piece of fabric – you can either follow the fabric or fold the fabric, bringing the origin and destination points together.
Scalable reach: The reason both Napoleon and Hitler were unable to invade Russia. 🙂 Distances become too long. The invading supply lines stretch longer and longer and breaks down during the harsh Russian winters.
Suggestion: Halfzonium. Seriously. You know how you have indestructible crazonium walls in CW1? Well, I was playing and I thought that if both sides had creeper, then it should (might?) be possible to break down a halfzonium wall if there is creeper (friendly or enemy) on both sides of the wall, but only if it is on both sides, since that probably indicates that you own that area anyway. Does away with a lot of the ugly maps we have in CW1 and if the builder insists, they can “insulate” the wall by leaving a space in the middle. 🙂
Interesting idea about the two-sided wall decay rule. Right now cells that can decay require evil creeper to touch them. The decay rate is proportional to the surface area of the cell being touched. So a cell that is surrounded by evil creeper decays four times faster than a cell that is only being touched (completely) on one side.
Clarification. It should be the same type of creeper on both sides. If you have friendly on one side and enemy on the other, it does NOT break down.
I still love everything I see and I am more and more convinced this will be a completely different game than CW1 (which is very good).
Looking at your screenshots I can imagine that it won’t be possible any more to stack units/emitters and such, is that right? Will there be an option for map makers to increase the amount of enemy creeper over time to postpone the ‘turning point’ of a map?
You are correct about stacking. During game play you should not be able to stack any two units on top of each other. This is also true for CW1. Units can fly over each other (or around each other in the CW2 case) but they can’t land on the same spot.
In CW1, I let people make maps that had stacked units. In CW2 I haven’t decided yet….
Either way, I may also have more sophisticated control of the emitters so you can get differing levels of output over time. Basically, you can specify and “amount” and in “interval” (like in CW1), but you can specify multiple sets of these. So for the first 5 minutes you can emit a large amount, then you can switch to a slower amount for the next 15 minutes, then you can go higher again.
One other thing I support in CW2 is a “maximum”. If you set the maximum on an emitter to something really high (like 1000000000, or effectively no maximum) the emitter will emit “amount” at each “interval”. It will do so regardless of the density of surrounding creeper. If you did this in a confined space in CW2 and let the game run for hours, you would end up with a hyper compressed and massive amount of Creeper. Opening such a chamber would result in an unstoppable all-ending eruption (might be fun for a while :).
To solve this problem, you can specify a maximum on an emitter. This means that the emitter will look at the density of the surrounding Creeper and not emit anything that would cause the density to exceed the maximum. So with a maximum a confined chamber will only accumulate so much creeper. But if this chamber is drained, the emitter will start producing again.
Wow, this is better than anything I hoped for, thanks! 🙂
Wait a second…
These Micro-rifts have a minimum distance from each other? What would be the point of that?
This distance might be 1, or it might be larger. I just wanted to leave the door open to there being a minimum distance. A minimum distance is a geometric way of limiting the number that can exist on a map. The reason I might need to do this is to manage the performance implications of having too many rifts (like 100 or more) on a map.
One note about these screen shots:
It’s not totally obvious, but the screen shots on the blog are reduced to 80% of their size. You can click one to get the full size image and see things in a little better detail.
I will SO make a map that makes you deal with super-massively dense creeper that slowly eats it’s way towards you and to save yourself You’ll have to construct the new ultimate weapon… >:)
How big is the game as it is now, and how big do you estimate it to become?
If you are talking about screen resolution, the game has a default of 800×600 but can be made full screen.
Regarding mission content, there will be around 20 story missions, maybe a few more or less. I’ll do whatever it takes to convey the story I’ve written.
I imagine there will also be some other maps that explore different concepts outside of the story (like in CW1). And of course there will be a map editor that people can make all the maps they want with.
Sounds great, can barely wait 😀
Have you thought about having more than one line for the story?
I’ve considered it, but I doubt I will implement it. I’ve never been too thrilled with games that have multiple endings. I always have to go back and play through different paths so I can say I played everything.
But, there could be offshoot missions that are optional… I”ll have to think about it.
mabey two campaign things with slightly differnt tec and buildings
As a graphics-enthusiast, I would love to be able to modify the pixels of both units and terrain-tiles in the map-editor.
Will that be possible?.. and if so… could the editor possibly be setup to handle 36bit-images (rgba) like png with alpha ?… you know, transparency could do wonders for the visual possibilities 🙂
I asked for something similar and Virgil replied here:
http://knucklecracker.com/blog/index.php/2010/06/cw-2-more-considerations/#comment-59
Yeah, certainly for the map tiles. The units are a little harder since they are “Flash” objects and made up of composite parts (sometimes), like a body and a gun barrel.
Png’s are easy enough to support and they are what I use for all of the bitmap based graphics. Transparency is tough in practice since the tiles aren’t stacked and are drawn over the dark background. But there still might be some interesting effects you could come up with…
“Flash-objects”… mmm… arn’t those possible to import/export as something xml-alike?
If so, there may be an opening for importing/editing (pure txt), and replacing geometry for each “symbol” in the object.
But… perhaps that quickly becomes a stinking mess of files, formats and verifying to handle… I’m no flash-expert.
All I know is, that fiddeling with visuals makes me all warm and fuzzy inside 😀
For the multiple endings, once you beat it, no matter the ending you get, all paths will be shown and can be played one at a time to see them all.
One game at a time… 🙂 but yes, I plan to create ChopRaider 2. And you never know, maybe Crimson has a secret lab somewhere that’s been experimenting with a Creeper like substance…
Micro-rifts is an awesome idea! 🙂
Since packets travel through rifts, it would be logical if rockets and laser beams could too. Laser beams could fire at creeper through a rift provided the beam travels in a straight line.
Now imagine a rocket launcher very close to a rift. In addition to its normal range, a rocket could go through the rift and target creeper nearby another rift. Now imagine if a player builds a lot of launchers close to a rift. Every other rift is an extension of that pack of launchers! Thus you could have a very large armada of launchers that fire though several rifts out of a single rift on the front lines. That makes for an interesting computational challenge 😉 (and possibly a completely unbalanced game)
(or you could just say that the available weaponry isn’t sophisticated enough to target through creeper)
Someone suggested that each object that passes through a rift does cost some energy. I suggest that each *large* object (buildings for example) pays a part of its weight or volume (building cost) when passing through.
Or rifts cost exponentially more energy to build the more you have. Or their cost is determined by the proximity to other rifts. (they disturb each others gravitational field?)
I’d also thought about letting each weapon take a small amount of damage as it passed through a micro-rift. Charging energy is tricky, since there may not be any energy available at the time a unit wants to go through a m-rift… at which point… well I’m not sure what at that point.
Having the cost of a rift (the cost in ore and or energy) go up as you build more is a good idea. That’s another way to limit just building them everywhere….
What about fire through them?
That sounds like fun.
Maybe make it an upgrade?
You have said already that there are five terrain types:
-Easily dug
-Moderate to dig
-Hard to dig
-Can’t dig
-Easy to dig and evil creeper will destroy it.
You also said bad Creeper can “dig” through cracked earth. But I see two types of cracked earth, one slightly different then the other. One type of this cracked earth has only two examples in the picture and can be distinguished by the dark splotches on it. Is it different than the other type, or am I just seeing things?
I also think that micro rifts should cost more the more you build, as that would keep a limit on the amount you can build while making rifts in the beginning will not be hampered because of it being too exspensive.
The cavern of Creeper on the bottom left is completely surrounded except for a corner, next to where the blaster is traveling to. Shouldn’t the Creeper be able to get through that?
As for layout, it is looking very good. I especially like the look of the indestructable terrain, ore, collectors and of course, the micro rifts.
You aren’t seeing things. That is cracked earth, but it is slightly damaged. It got damaged when the Creeper flooded up against it before I took this screen shot. It takes a little while for the cracked terrain to break down. It will get more ‘smudged’ up the longer evil creeper touches it. These particular cells are about half way through to breaking down.
The creeper on the bottom left has just been shot at by the blaster sitting on the ledge. If you look carefully, you will see a little blue mist that is almost faded out.
The blaster in the upper right hand cavern is also taking shots at the emitter. You can see the mist better there. This blaster is hovering in the air (you can see the little exhaust coming out of the bottom).
Once the game gets further along I’ll do a video. It all looks better and makes more sense when you see it moving around. For instance the micro rifts rotate, the flying units have thrust exhaust, the mist from destroyed Creeper drifts and dissipates, etc.
Is the Indestructible terrain solid? And can nothing destroy it? When do you plan to make the video and will you post it here or make a link to it?
Those rocks in the screen shot are completely indestructible. So nothing can penetrate them…. There has to be something like this in the game, otherwise they just form another kind of “really hard to dig” terrain.
Any video will just be posted here on the blog. If it’s good enough I’ll youtube it, otherwise I’ll just embed it here. It could be a little while (weeks) before I post a video, though. Things are still moving pretty fast, and I don’t want to post a video too soon.
Good, just do it when your ready.
Does that mean that your weapons can fire while flying?
Or only hovering?
And do they use energy while flying?
And can they “Land” on the ground (to stop using energy)?
Currently, they can fire while flying and flying is “free” (takes no energy). These rules may be tweaked a bit….
That is good for retreating.
I am sorry, but I meant bottom RIGHT, not bottom left. In the pocket of Creeper, at the top of it, there is a corner that is exposed. Shouldn’t the Creeper be able to push oout of that into the tunnel
Ah, you are wondering about if Creeper can squeeze between two diagonally oriented terrain pieces. The answer is “no” in CW2. That’s why it isn’t moving into the chamber that has the move-path in it.
I may tweak the graphics to show more of a contiguous terrain segment when there are two diagonal pieces of terrain. This will make it a little more clear that the Creeper doesn’t “leak on the diagonals”.
A more connected terrain segment would definitely help me. In CW1, the Creeper could flow through diagonally oriented terrain pieces so it might confuse veterans as well as people new to Creeper World a little bit. Plus, I think it would look a little better. ; )
What about 0 intensity emitters??
The same concept can exist… As I have it right now, an emitter can have a maximum amount it “emits”. By emit, I mean a max value that it sets the creeper in a cell to. This means if you put an emitter with a max of 100,000 in a pool that is 1,000,000 thick…. it will destroy 900,000 creeper each time it “emits”. So with this system you have analog control over how much creeper gets destroyed. In game1, you had to create a 0 intensity emitter and it would destroy all of the creeper under itself when it “emitted”.
I’ve not decided if I will keep it this way for sure, but unless something comes up that makes me change it I probably will.
In the story missions and such, I will probably not use this effect since it can be counter intuitive. But if I leave it, it could be useful for some effects on custom maps.
you could make it so theres differnt types of emitters.
ok, what about double down?
Maybe…. this is a simple thing, so I will probably include it.
In that case: could you please differentiate between normal and DD scores?
Yeah, I’ll definitely include that “bit” of information in the posted score data.
I love your game and your blog. I can’t wait for the next post!
Maybe you can make it so that the mist will flow on top of the creeper and not go through walls?
It actually looks a bit better the way it is… but I may tweak it some more before it is done.
This.
We heard the different terrain levels now, what about the ore levels? is that not decide on fully, or ?
Not fully decided…. maybe just three levels… maybe just one. This probably won’t be worked out till I get further into game balance and pacing.
Is there going to be a tec tree or is it going to be the same kind of upgrades as last game.
I’ve not decided how linear to make the upgrades yet. They might be flat or they might form a shallow tree/graph.
What about spores? Will there be some spore like enemy that comes out of the ground?
There will likely be an “ethereal” enemy. Something that can move through the terrain and conventional weapons won’t work on. This will be similar to spores from a game play perspective.
Will there be waves of them?
Something like that….
Will there be a beta?
Like can we-the loyal players of CW who have paid-get to try a beta?
Or are you going to do everything alone still?
There will be a beta…. and I will invite a number of people from the community to participate in the beta.
Music and art are two of the things I won’t do all myself. So I am looking for good artists to render some still screens, character (face) art, and maybe even some basic unit design.
Cool, I’d like to try and get into the beta, but thats up to you.
So what your saying is, we’ll get to see how the commander and others look?
artists? i’m now redircting you to sauffaus.
Have any plans to make a Android build of CW2? Adobe Is working on improving it, but it might need a major GUI rework to fit the tiny screens..
Will you choose random people from the community to be on the beta? or do we have to make a request or something?
I’ got a cool thought could you set it up so we can make a Top map, like CW 1 can and then after we Clear creep out of a landing zone, we go down and destroy the Creeper. As in we have 2 Part maps. It’d be nice to have Map editor wise 😛 Also looks amazing so far.
I love CW, virgil! I can’t wait for CW2, and I hope I can be in the beta!