Author Topic: So how many ships would you guess are in the game now? More than I thought.  (Read 13564 times)

Offline x4000

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Ship Lists Now On The Wiki
It's been on my to-do list for a while to make a full list in the wiki of the ships in AI War.  Recently I did that for the expansion, but now I've also done that for the base game, sans descriptions for most of the ships.

The Latest Ship Counts
The fact that there are 122 ships in the expansion should come as a surprise to no one, as that was one of the bulleted items on our list.  But it's been a long time (maybe since 2.0 ) since I last counted the number of ships in the base game.  Upon initial release of 1.0, there were about 198 or 196 -- something like that -- ships in the game.  Between 1.0 and 2.0, exactly 50 ships happened to be added to the game, bringing it up into the 240s.

And that was the last time I did any counting, I'm pretty sure of it.  Well, I counted again today, and the total is now 293 as of version 3.120.  That does not include the control nodes or the modules for the modular ships -- or even cheesier stuff like the remains for the various turrets, or whatever.  Including that sort of thing would have inflated the number by another 40-60 or so above even the 293 that I consider to be actual valid ships.

So, putting that together with the expansion, we're up to a whopping 415 ships in the game.  I wouldn't be at all surprised if we see another 50 ships as free DLC by the time the next expansion comes out, and the next expansion is likely to add somewhere in the 100-200 ships range, so by the middle of 2011 we're going to be pushing towards a total of 600-700 ships in this game.

Growing Faster Than Expected
Holy cow!  My ultimate goal was to hit 1000 ships or so over the course of about 5 years and 5 expansions, but we're already at 415 ships after just the first year and the first expansion.  To say that this game is growing more and more quickly than I ever imagined would be a huge understatement.

And here's why: you guys.  I could never have come up with all the ideas that are represented in this game.  I did come up with the majority of them, and refined pretty much all of them to at least a small degree during the process of implementation or after, but you guys have done at least as much refinement of every idea I had in here through your suggestions and feedback.  Some of the ship classes that I initially designed for the 1.0 version of the game are a far cry from those initial designs now -- much more balanced and interesting and varied.

Looking to the Future
AI War has grown a ton, but there's still a lot more to do, too.  The forums are practically bursting over with ideas, as everyone knows, and it's to the point where we have to do those community polls for the DLC, as you also know.  Of course, each time we do an expansion we'll also churn through a lot of features more rapidly, adding huge bunches of them instead of a steady-but-significant trickle as we do with the DLC.  Keith and myself both still have tons of ideas for the game, but that's nothing compared to the huge firehose of quality ideas that the community continuously submits.

In summary, I guess I'll just say that I'm blown away by you guys.  Every game developer gets tons of suggestions, but somehow the suggestions here seem to be of an unusually high quality.  We're all making this game together, and I think it really shows.
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Offline keith.lamothe

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I'd like to echo Chris's gratitude for all the input and feedback.  Not to mention the community-gifted ship graphics and sound effects for the Riot Starship and Heavy Beam Cannon units (and tons of units in the past, those are just the two I've implemented in my time onboard), which likely would not have happened in this timeframe without those :)
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Offline ShadowOTE

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gah, and I thought I had seen at least a good chunk of what was out there... now I find out I've seen maybe half to a third  :o which is pretty awesome ;D

Offline RCIX

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 :o that's a lot!

Well thanks, all i could do was do my part, and we should never forget that without you we'd not have the chance to toss out all of these great ideas!
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Offline x4000

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gah, and I thought I had seen at least a good chunk of what was out there... now I find out I've seen maybe half to a third  :o which is pretty awesome ;D

:) It's funny, but my three alpha testers -- who have been playing this game with me since November or December 2008, 6+ months before the game was even released, and who helped shape it into what it currently is through many different iterations before there was even AI, and whom I regularly play the game with (supposedly twice weekly, but it doesn't always work out usually because of me) -- (whew) they haven't seen everything, either.  And some of the stuff that they have seen was so far back in the hazy past that they're like "EyeBots?  What are those?"  And even if they did remember, EyeBots are likely completely different units now, anyway, what with being useful turret bludgeons, etc.

That feeling of perpetual discovery is important to me, to say the least.  I'm always running into new combinations of ships and new ways to play that I never thought of, and with the various AI additions the AI is always doing stuff I never expected it to, which is also rewarding.  I like having to think on my feet, and it seems that the core playerbase for a game like this agrees (whew).  Hence all the content and crazy combinations and abilities, etc.

Glad it's a hit! :)
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Offline HellishFiend

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Glad to do my part for such an awesome game and awesome developer.  :)

Here's to more success in the future!
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Offline superking

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I'll make sprites if you guys use them  ;D



Offline Fleet

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Thank you for the meticulous documentation of giving credit where its due to player concerning changes and bug fixes within the release notes.

Offline keith.lamothe

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This last dev cycle I wasn't as meticulous about the thank-you-list, actually; I often had to run through a lot of stuff and then go back and fill in the thank-yous.  I think I got most everyone but if anyone sees an inaccuracy or omission please let me know so I can fix it.
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Offline HitmanN

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The DLC stuff makes me feel all Total Annihilation-y inside. Loved how they released a new unit every week in-between the initial release and the expansion, and some units even after.

Truth be told, I haven't played a proper game of AI War in several weeks, but I check the forums daily. That tells something about the community. ;)

Not to mention the community-gifted ship graphics and sound effects for the Riot Starship and Heavy Beam Cannon units

I'm equally glad to hear my Heavy Beam Cannon sprites were of use. :)

This last dev cycle I wasn't as meticulous about the thank-you-list, actually; I often had to run through a lot of stuff and then go back and fill in the thank-yous.  I think I got most everyone but if anyone sees an inaccuracy or omission please let me know so I can fix it.

Well, my contribution has been pretty small, but if my username could be there somewhere, that'd be nice. I plan to contribute more in future anyways, if my stuff is accepted. ;)

Offline keith.lamothe

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Well, my contribution has been pretty small, but if my username could be there somewhere, that'd be nice. I plan to contribute more in future anyways, if my stuff is accepted. ;)
You're the first line in the release notes thank-you list ;)  Or do you mean the in-game one in the credits?  Chris manages that one.
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Offline HitmanN

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Was thinking about the credits actually.  :-X

Maybe a small section of 'Miscellaneous content contributions' or something. I think that would be fair, in exchange for donating content.

Not that I'm trying to seek attention or make it seem like I've done a lot. Just one of those things that 'would be nice if'.  :)

Offline x4000

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Yeah, sorry, I try to keep those up to date when we do a major release, but yesterday was crazy and I didn't manage it.  Generally for art contributions we just put people under the art section, though if there comes a time when there are hordes and hordes of those, I might need to break it out in a separate section.  And for the rest of the suggestions, those go in a section of the credits where players get their name if they've had three non-bugfix suggestions.  We're mostly on top of that, but there again I forgot to do it this last round, and sometimes things slip through, so if anyone thinks their name should be on there when it isn't then please let us know.  I'll definitely go through the release notes and see if there are any that need to be added for the next prerelease, though.

You shouldn't need to feel bad about asking for credit for your work -- it's something we try to always make sure happens, but there are a ton of people and features here, and few of us, so sometimes we drop the ball, which is nothing personal to anyone.  We'll definitely try to keep on top of it as best we can, of course, but if we do drop the ball just let us know and don't sweat it!
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Offline HitmanN

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Thanks. That is all understandable and well.

If there was a 'thumbs up' emote here, I'd paste one right here.  ;D

Offline x4000

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Thanks. :)
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