Post by: x4000 on July 16, 2014, 11:27:06 am
Spectral Empire is our upcoming 4X title, which is slated for release in April 2015. This is something that we're working on in tandem with the current expansions for AI War and The Last Federation, as well as the general ongoing work on those two games, and the linux ports of all our other titles. Whew, busy times!
Anyway, there are a few things that I wanted to share today about it, just as an early teaser.
The Last Federation And AI War Are In The Same Universe
This hasn't really been stated outright before, but I view these two games as being in two different galaxies in the same universe. The Last Federation takes place in just a single solar system somewhere out in the cosmos, while AI War: Fleet Command takes place in a portion of our own galaxy, connected by wormhole networks. Nowhere in either game is the other referenced, and that makes perfect sense because they are nowhere near one another.
But what a lot of people -- even sci-fi enthusiasts -- really don't think about very hard is just how HUGE the universe is. You could claim that every sci-fi work ever written by anyone was all in the same universe, and it would still be a pretty empty universe if that was all that was going on. (Lots of parallel Earths in that case, too).
Anyway, the relative timelines of AI War and TLF are not made clear, and I don't intend to clarify that here. However, suffice it to say that Spectral Empire takes place far into the future from the timelines of both games... and it brings them together, at least a little.
The Planet Of Ivoria
Ivoria is a large planet somewhere far away from both the normal stomping grounds of AI War and TLF, and as noted the events of this game take place also far into the future from either of those other games. However... mysteriously there is a rather unlikely gathering of races on this planet. Races from both games, plus all new races, all make an appearance on this one large planet. What exactly is the story behind that? Well, that's something you'll be able to piece together from the story as you play, and I'm not about to spoil that here.
Unraveling The Story
Before you ask, the game is not going to have a traditional scripted campaign like Age of Empires or similar does -- that's not where the story is. The way that a game plays out in SE will be the same as in AI War or TLF, where it's all procedurally generated. You won't always get all the bits of the story in a given playthrough, but you will pick up clues as to what is going on depending on how you play. I really don't want to say more about it than that at this time, for fear of spoilers, but suffice it to say that one thing that encourages multiple playstyles is how the game reacts to you and what you learn about the world when you do.
The Included Races From The Last Federation
For anyone who has played TLF, the above races are familiar, and you can skip ahead to the next section. You already know these guys, and they work as they do in TLF. You will notice that the Hydrals and the Obscura are not included in Spectral Empire, and there are a couple of reasons for that.
With the Hydrals, TLF is really all about them, and I felt it was appropriate to keep them to that story. For another, based on story events in TLF, it doesn't really make sense that they would be plentiful in the far future, if you catch my drift.
With the Obscura, those are a really cool race and one that I just feel like makes the most sense as kind of a Borg-like presence in TLF's upcoming expansion, and that gets undermined if they are just a basic race in Spectral Empire as well.
Another thing that you'll notice is that with the groupings and labels that I have above, I have massively oversimplified what the races are actually like. But the very quick rundown:
Andors are robotic goody-two-things on your feet. They aren't above a fight, but they aren't belligerent at all, and they tend to build utopias for themselves and then want to help everyone else. They are the solar system's "busybodies," as well." In TLF, these are often grouped with the Peltians and Skylaxians as the "good guy" races.
Acutians are robotic capitalists, and are known for being cold and calculating as well as huge polluters. They aren't evil, per se, they are just completely amoral. In TLF, these are often grouped with the Burlusts and the Thoraxians as the "bad guy" races.
Burlusts are kind of like Klingons on crack. With chicken legs, lots of warlords, and National Murder Day is definitely a favorite holiday.
Thoraxians are a hivemind insectoid race, with lots of workers that are part of the networked consciousness of their queen. The queens are a bit worse than amoral, really; they don't really value life at all, and they are both moody and selfish. Their race is the absolute terror in terms of ground combat. They are kind of a cross between the Buggers in Ender's Game and the aliens in Alien.
Peltians are communist barn owl farmers. They are pathetic in a fight, not technologically astute, but really easygoing. So at least they have that going for them, I guess. They are kind of the Ewoks of the solar system. Although, I will say, in space ships they are just as deadly as anyone else. And since they are so pathetic in ground combat, they instead take to suicide bombing with their (for some reason manned) personnel pods, and they delight in bombing the heck out of planets from orbit. Not that they'll be able to do any of that in Spectral Empire, since SE takes place entirely on the surface of Ivoria.
Skylaxians are extremely honorable, and also by far the most technologically advanced of the TLF races. They aren't above warfare, but they do have a keen sense of the value of life.
Boarines are kind of a cross between werewolves and the snow beast from The Empire Strikes Back. They live in very cold climates, get into big fights with one another if they live in too close of proximity to one another, and in general are isolationist. It will be interesting to see how they have adapted to more cramped life on Ivoria, yes? These and the Evucks are basically the kind of "neutral" races in TLF, really.
Evucks are technologically advanced, and in some ways they are wise, but they are also incredibly paranoid. They also have an "if we're going down, we're taking everyone else with us" attitude. Not great friends.
The Included Races From AI War: Fleet Command
The first thing that AI War players will notice is that neither the humans nor the AI are included here. Why is that? Well, those two factions are just so central to AI War, and so heavily explored there, that they don't make sense to bring to SE. Plus, humans as a race are just so... vanilla to me, when it comes to sci-fi. I wanted to stick to the more interesting races.
The first three expansions for AI War each explored one of the races above (The Zenith Remnant, Children of Neinzul, and Light of the Spire). Even so, despite the bits of backstory you get from those, and the sense of them you get from their technology, the races themselves are never really someone you get to know on a more personal level. That changes in SE.
Zenith are an ancient dead race in AI War, and thus only one that you ever find the remnants of their derelict technology. But what technology you do find in AI War is extremely powerful, and can be repaired by either the humans or the AI into terrifying war machines. Of course, just because the Zenith are completely absent in our galaxy doesn't mean that the entire race is dead, which is just the assumption that the humans made. Turns out there was at least one contingent that survived...
Neinzul are extremely short-lived (like fruit fly lifespans -- an earth day or so per individual), and very swarm-like. They aren't a hivemind or anything like that, but they do share collective knowledge telepathically with one another. It's the only way that a race that short-lived could ever actually accomplish anything as a society, right? This is basically all you learn about these guys in AI War, but there is more to find out in SE...
Spire are another very powerful race, but not extinct like the Zenith supposedly were. The weaponry of the Spire varies from the small to the most-massive-ever, and everything they have is glowing white and very mysterious. You never really meet them, per se -- not in the flesh, anyway -- in AI War. Except... turns out that you were meeting them all along, and until now (right now) it was never known. The "spacecraft" themselves are actually the Spire organisms, which are kind of cyborg-ish in nature. How do these sort of beings adapt to living on a planet's surface? Well, in their distant past they once lived on planets, so it's not new to them...
New Races Unique To Spectral Empire
You didn't think that we would have a new game without any new races, did you? As fun as it is to pull in the races from AI War and TLF, there also needs to be some new blood. Granted, the majority of the races (11 out of 14) do indeed come from our older games, but a big reason for that was that we already had a deep roster of interesting races that our fans are familiar with.
Coming up with some new variant of race that is Burlust-like, rather than just using the Burlusts, both keeps the races shallower as well as more confusing when you are moving from game to game. I felt that it was a lot more sensible to do a mixture of new and old, deepening the old stuff in cool ways as well as making it so that when you encounter the Burlusts for the first time in this game, you know what to expect immediately if you already played TLF. It's basically the reason that Star Wars and Star Trek keep using the same core races while slowly extending them, rather than having completely new mixes of races in every story.
Anyhow, the new folks:
Fenyn are nature-lovers that basically put the Peltians to shame on that score. It's true that the Peltians are agrarian and thus very sensitive to the environment, but they are cultivators whereas the Fenyn are more about preservation. Not that they don't build giant cities and technology like anyone else, but preserving vast tracts of wilderness is equally important to them. Despite their "tree hugger" nature, and their waif-like appearance, they are both beautiful and extremely deadly.
Krolin are crustacean-like bipedal creatures with lobster-style claws and very intricate hard shell organic armor. They are excellent fighters, and absolutely ruthless in a fight, but they are mostly dispassionate. They are extremely fascist, however, so there is that. Authority and order matters a lot to them, but the actual individuals in their society have varying degrees of opinion about all that, and there are outlaws among them.
Yali are very spiritual and meditative, and believe that they alone are "enlightened." They don't bear any ill will toward anyone else, but they are quite intent on spreading enlightenment. Via words if they can, but when words fail they are willing to sacrifice peace and lives in the sake of the protection of wisdom. Wisdom, in their view, is similar to but separate from knowledge, and thus they are by no means a super-technologically-advanced race. And yes, those are snakes on the ends of their six arms. Along with the head of a snake, adorned with ram's horns.
The Specter
There is one other presence on Ivoria, but I won't say much about him/it at the moment. It has a masculine voice, and all of the races are aware of it, and they each have their own name for it. It is never seen, but makes its will known in a variety of ways. It is not a faction like the others. The nature of this presence is one of the core mysteries of the story of the game. It's also where the voice acting comes in for this one.
Thanks for reading!
Post by: Draco18s on July 16, 2014, 11:38:37 am
But what a lot of people -- even sci-fi enthusiasts -- really don't think about very hard is just how HUGE the universe is. You could claim that every sci-fi work ever written by anyone was all in the same universe, and it would still be a pretty empty universe if that was all that was going on. (Lots of parallel Earths in that case, too).
Haven't heard about Tommy Westphall (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Westphall#The_Tommy_Westphall_Universe_Hypothesis) yet?
Basically: every TV show ever made is just part of Tommy's imagination. The most recent version of the visualization (http://yujinishuge.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/crossoversscaled.jpg) will let you walk from The Adams Family to CSI: New York by way of Friends (or Lost). Or you can get from Sarah Jane Adventures to Gilligan's Island via the Drew Cary Show.
Post by: x4000 on July 16, 2014, 11:41:49 am
Post by: Draco18s on July 16, 2014, 11:45:57 am
Quote
The Specter
There is one other presence on Ivoria, but I won’t say much about him/it at the moment. It has a masculine voice, and all of the races are aware of it, and they each have their own name for it. It is never seen, but makes its will known in a variety of ways. It is not a faction like the others. The nature of this presence is one of the core mysteries of the story of the game. It’s also where the voice acting comes in for this one.
I'm getting "Kosh" level feelings here. ;)
Post by: x4000 on July 16, 2014, 11:57:44 am
Post by: Draco18s on July 16, 2014, 12:42:11 pm
Nope, but interesting! :)
I figured, that would be cliche at this point (despite the fact that I don't think its ever been done again). But that was the feeling I got.
Post by: wwwhhattt on July 16, 2014, 02:04:24 pm
The whole story thing sounds too good. It kinda reminds me of Analogue: A Hate Story, which is about as dissimilar to this as it's possible to get. So yeah, not bad. And that is one nice logo.
Post by: nas1m on July 16, 2014, 02:37:51 pm
I really like the concepts for the three new races as well as "the specter" (which very much reminds me of Dan Simmons' Shrike for some reason - in case you know it - if not I definitely recommend picking up Hyperion and its successor Fall of Hyperion, I think).
The three new race icons are gorgeous - great work. I like the Spire one as well.
Unfortunately I can't say this for the Zenith and Neinzul ones :-\.
They just don't seem to fit into the rest of the race emblems in my book...
Well, likely much to early to complain about stuff like artistic consistency, right ;)?
Post by: Teal_Blue on July 17, 2014, 12:02:20 am
I thought they were fine. Why would you think they weren't?
-Teal
Post by: Histidine on July 17, 2014, 12:46:14 am
Spire are another very powerful race, but not extinct like the Zenith supposedly were. The weaponry of the Spire varies from the small to the most-massive-ever, and everything they have is glowing white and very mysterious. You never really meet them, per se -- not in the flesh, anyway -- in AI War. Except... turns out that you were meeting them all along, and until now (right now) it was never known. The "spacecraft" themselves are actually the Spire organisms, which are kind of cyborg-ish in nature. How do these sort of beings adapt to living on a planet's surface? Well, in their distant past they once lived on planets, so it's not new to them...Aaaah headcanon exploded. I was operating under the assumption that it was the Zenith who were the living ships, and the Spire were (unlike the Zs or the Neinzul) more typically anthropomorphic aliens with individual human-sized bodies and such, which would explain why humans get along so well with them.
I guess I can shelve (not-)Spire-dating-sim now :'(
...and then I'm going to have a few words with Drs. Davidson and Langstrom from the FS campaign. How did they miss something this big?! >:(
Post by: nas1m on July 17, 2014, 07:08:07 am
I thought they were fine. Why would you think they weren't?I, by no means, wanted to imply that the icons are abyssmal, mind you :).
They just stand out from the rest for me, likely due to all other race emblems depicting the physical appearance of each race to some degree (which I like) - which does not seem to be case for the Zenith and Neinzul emblems ???. Maybe its just me not being able to make out what the emblems actually are supposed to depict, though - I definitely had some trouble with the one for the "wisdom" race before reading Chris' text.
I just feel like, if you would put all the emblems together into one screen, they would look like they originated from different games (instead of a single game with a coherent style) - which is bad in my book.
OT: Just guessing from your current avatar - but did you back Rain World as well? They have a really nice pathfinding related update going over on Kickstarter - in case you haven't read it yet. Worth a read!
Post by: x4000 on July 17, 2014, 09:48:03 am
Spire are another very powerful race, but not extinct like the Zenith supposedly were. The weaponry of the Spire varies from the small to the most-massive-ever, and everything they have is glowing white and very mysterious. You never really meet them, per se -- not in the flesh, anyway -- in AI War. Except... turns out that you were meeting them all along, and until now (right now) it was never known. The "spacecraft" themselves are actually the Spire organisms, which are kind of cyborg-ish in nature. How do these sort of beings adapt to living on a planet's surface? Well, in their distant past they once lived on planets, so it's not new to them...Aaaah headcanon exploded. I was operating under the assumption that it was the Zenith who were the living ships, and the Spire were (unlike the Zs or the Neinzul) more typically anthropomorphic aliens with individual human-sized bodies and such, which would explain why humans get along so well with them.
I guess I can shelve (not-)Spire-dating-sim now :'(
...and then I'm going to have a few words with Drs. Davidson and Langstrom from the FS campaign. How did they miss something this big?! >:(
Well, the Zenith do have organic components to their ships, and some of their ships are actually alive. But those aren't the Zenith themselves -- that's more like them riding a "Space Whale" or something. In terms of the actual Spire stuff that is in the FS campaign, one thing to note is that I mentioned how the Spire had planetary origins. So they did start out more that way, but kind of evolved in the opposite direction until at least some of them became living ships. A lot of the Spire that you're meeting in FS are more splinter factions rather than the main race.
Post by: Draco18s on July 17, 2014, 09:58:45 am
They just stand out from the rest for me, likely due to all other race emblems depicting the physical appearance of each race to some degree (which I like) - which does not seem to be case for the Zenith and Neinzul emblems ???. Maybe its just me not being able to make out what the emblems actually are supposed to depict, though - I definitely had some trouble with the one for the "wisdom" race before reading Chris' text.
The Zenith one is an Armored Golem (http://www.arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=Armored_Golem):
(http://www.arcengames.com/mediawiki/images/thumb/2/20/AIWarArmoredGolem.png/100px-AIWarArmoredGolem.png)(http://s12.postimg.org/9lctbfqfd/zenith.png)
Post by: Coppermantis on July 17, 2014, 10:18:44 am
Spire are another very powerful race, but not extinct like the Zenith supposedly were. The weaponry of the Spire varies from the small to the most-massive-ever, and everything they have is glowing white and very mysterious. You never really meet them, per se -- not in the flesh, anyway -- in AI War. Except... turns out that you were meeting them all along, and until now (right now) it was never known. The "spacecraft" themselves are actually the Spire organisms, which are kind of cyborg-ish in nature. How do these sort of beings adapt to living on a planet's surface? Well, in their distant past they once lived on planets, so it's not new to them...Aaaah headcanon exploded. I was operating under the assumption that it was the Zenith who were the living ships, and the Spire were (unlike the Zs or the Neinzul) more typically anthropomorphic aliens with individual human-sized bodies and such, which would explain why humans get along so well with them.
I guess I can shelve (not-)Spire-dating-sim now :'(
...and then I'm going to have a few words with Drs. Davidson and Langstrom from the FS campaign. How did they miss something this big?! >:(
Well, the Zenith do have organic components to their ships, and some of their ships are actually alive. But those aren't the Zenith themselves -- that's more like them riding a "Space Whale" or something. In terms of the actual Spire stuff that is in the FS campaign, one thing to note is that I mentioned how the Spire had planetary origins. So they did start out more that way, but kind of evolved in the opposite direction until at least some of them became living ships. A lot of the Spire that you're meeting in FS are more splinter factions rather than the main race.
So then, the Spire Starship clearly isn't alive (while the Capital Ships are), but what about the legitimate Spirecraft that we make from asteroids? Do those count as the aforementioned "living ships?" What you've said seems to suggest that no, since the process of becoming a liveship seems to take a while, unless...
perhaps the "asteroids" are sort of like embryonic Spire? So we're basically harvesting their eggs and incubating with the "mining" vessel until they grow into full-grown live ships?
And what of the Neinzul? Those are definitely "alive," right?
Post by: x4000 on July 17, 2014, 10:24:05 am
Certain things in the past I also left deliberately vague, to be up for human interpretation. The Neinzul ships I never really thought of as being alive (to my recollection, but I could be wrong), but rather as being like exoskeletons for the underlying living organisms. In other words, in some respects kind of like Strike Suit Zero.
Regarding the Spire ships that you are constructing, my thought has always been that none of those are alive, and frankly the same for the Neinzul ones that you construct. My feeling has always been that they are missing vital parts of what would make them an organism, which is why you have to order them around. There are organic components, yes -- the same as with the Zenith ones -- but those are basically non-sentient wetware in my mind.
All of the ships controlled by you and by the AI are completely unmanned and nonsentient despite any organic components to them, in my opinion. But when you interact with minor factions of any sort, in almost all cases (possibly literally all cases) those are manned and sentient.
Post by: Histidine on July 17, 2014, 12:31:07 pm
For the Neinzul: The fan theory I came up with involves them as a haplodiploid (http://Haplodiploidy) species.
- Each enclave is a colony of related Neinzul organisms with a networked intelligence in an organic-tech ship. These are diploid individuals, slow-growing but immortal (i.e. they don't die of old age, like most animal cells do).
- Younglings are formed as haploid offspring of the enclaves. Their cells grow and replicate very quickly with the proper nourishment, and they can use water to "pad out" volume like plant cells do, but are also very short-lived and die quickly; regeneration chambers reverse the degenerative process. The younglings are connected to the enclave hivemind and store their memories there, which the replacement offspring can access. The humans (and the AI?) simply grow younglings as single-use clones in vats.
- The Enclaves can also bud off "mature" diploid offspring, like the Railpods and Scapegoats.
Quote
The Neinzul are an insectoid race of perpetual “younglings” that live for an extremely short span before dying and being superseded by fully-aware and vicious replacements. Their Enclaves form mini-collectives with their own personalities, goals, and desires.
Post by: Aklyon on July 17, 2014, 01:47:22 pm
...and then I'm going to have a few words with Drs. Davidson and Langstrom from the FS campaign. How did they miss something this big?! >:(Well, they did point out that the Spire are...rocks, just not what else they looked like. And were busy with making sense of what the Spire actually said (The early journal entries are either from human sources, or are in a word, terse. The latter entries are much less terse, but I haven't seen all of them.)
Also, as far as i can tell, the only time the zenith have spoke was in nebulae. In the probably not-grimdarkness of the spectral future, do they still speak in poem?
Post by: keith.lamothe on July 17, 2014, 02:07:04 pm
The Exodian Blade journals are actually pretty explicit that the blade itself is a sentient individual (spaceship). Though ironically it's also trying to hint that it (and the other one you've "met") are not really Spire per se, but rather from a separate race associated with (and former masters of) the Spire. But the association and similarity needn't be coincidental.
Post by: Rekka on July 18, 2014, 10:11:44 am
Post by: MaskityMask on July 18, 2014, 02:09:50 pm
Anyway, "awww, I was too late at race suggestion thread when I posted" was my first thought before I noticed that three new races are plants, crabs and snakes
I mean, crab aliens are really rare for some reason, dunno why insects are more often used than crustacean its really pity, but yeah, awesome to see more aquatic scissor goodness
And I love snakes, they are really beautiful animals so its nice to see sort of indian-ish(the six arm thing reminds me of hinduism's gods) snake race instead of "Graaah, snakes are eeeevil" thing westerns have going on. Stupid us, Asian mythology understand beauty of snakes better xP Seriously though, no big feelings on dryads even though I like plant races(I hope they really look like plants and aren't just some other type of alien that likes flower crowns or something), but I love crab and snake race
(Good thing that plant race is deadly though. I mean, I always figured out that any race based on plants should be really alien and hostile to non plants considering that plants are really far away from other form of life)
Anyway, yay for getting new reptile and arthropod race despite posting about draconians and insect races too late in suggestion thread xD
Post by: Alex Heartnet on July 18, 2014, 03:03:38 pm
So then, the Spire Starship clearly isn't alive (while the Capital Ships are), but what about the legitimate Spirecraft that we make from asteroids? Do those count as the aforementioned "living ships?" What you've said seems to suggest that no, since the process of becoming a liveship seems to take a while, unless...
perhaps the "asteroids" are sort of like embryonic Spire? So we're basically harvesting their eggs and incubating with the "mining" vessel until they grow into full-grown live ships?
Indeed I pointed this out earlier. (http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15962.0.html) Perhaps a retcon might be in order?
Post by: MaskityMask on July 18, 2014, 03:12:35 pm
You guys pulling a Wing Commander II and assuming that all 8 TLF races somehow survived?
Well, it IS video game tradition that usually the best ending is the canon one :P Usually. Plus it'd be boring solar system if hydral fails to create union between all 9( minus 1 aka hydrals) races xP
Post by: topper on July 18, 2014, 03:43:35 pm
Plus, that means that there could easily be other systems with those races as well.
Post by: MaskityMask on July 18, 2014, 03:49:53 pm
I'm holding onto my theory that the TLF solar system was setup as a zoo by a bigger/badder race. Possibly with the Hydrals as a sort of jail-keeper. It seems more likely than having so many intelligent species occur in such proximity on similar development timelines.
Plus, that means that there could easily be other systems with those races as well.
Eh, reason why they have similar development timeline is that they have been space capable for long time already, but hydrals have been forcefully stopping them from getting to space so we can assume that hydrals got to space long before any of other races and one by one each race has gotten up to technology where they can send primitive manned spaceflights only to be shot down by hydrals which has been hindering their technological progression
Post by: topper on July 18, 2014, 05:59:44 pm
I'm holding onto my theory that the TLF solar system was setup as a zoo by a bigger/badder race. Possibly with the Hydrals as a sort of jail-keeper. It seems more likely than having so many intelligent species occur in such proximity on similar development timelines.
Plus, that means that there could easily be other systems with those races as well.
Eh, reason why they have similar development timeline is that they have been space capable for long time already, but hydrals have been forcefully stopping them from getting to space so we can assume that hydrals got to space long before any of other races and one by one each race has gotten up to technology where they can send primitive manned spaceflights only to be shot down by hydrals which has been hindering their technological progression
Depends on how long a "space capable for long time" is. Tech development of spaceflight is on the order of 10^3 to 10^5 years once intelligence is achieved. Evolution of intelligence may be on the 10^6 magnitude once planetary processes are done. Interesting to read that we may not see signs of intelligent life out in space because it all occurred millions of years ago.
Then again, I really do not want to debate a hypothetical situation occurring in a virtual universe in a video game. :-X
Post by: KDR_11k on July 19, 2014, 11:37:05 am
Then again humans and the AI would probably be a bit too strong considering both can destroy a planet with trivial effort, even the Evucks require a massive effort to pull that off.
Post by: Salamander on July 24, 2014, 01:06:51 pm
I still snicker at: "Fascist Lobsters", sounds like a race to try for sure!
Post by: Teal_Blue on July 24, 2014, 04:52:30 pm
I thought they were fine. Why would you think they weren't?I, by no means, wanted to imply that the icons are abyssmal, mind you :).
They just stand out from the rest for me, likely due to all other race emblems depicting the physical appearance of each race to some degree (which I like) - which does not seem to be case for the Zenith and Neinzul emblems ???. Maybe its just me not being able to make out what the emblems actually are supposed to depict, though - I definitely had some trouble with the one for the "wisdom" race before reading Chris' text.
I just feel like, if you would put all the emblems together into one screen, they would look like they originated from different games (instead of a single game with a coherent style) - which is bad in my book.
OT: Just guessing from your current avatar - but did you back Rain World as well? They have a really nice pathfinding related update going over on Kickstarter - in case you haven't read it yet. Worth a read!
yes, i did, thought it looked very very cool, and no i haven't seen the new pathfinding update yet, will have to check that out thank you very much! :)
-teal
Post by: ScrObot on July 24, 2014, 08:34:31 pm
Post by: x4000 on July 24, 2014, 08:42:02 pm
You guys pulling a Wing Commander II and assuming that all 8 TLF races somehow survived?
Well, it IS video game tradition that usually the best ending is the canon one :P Usually. Plus it'd be boring solar system if hydral fails to create union between all 9( minus 1 aka hydrals) races xP
Actually, we're not pulling a Wing Commander II in this case. SE makes no assumptions whatsoever about what happened in the solar system that the races originated from. But that's all I'm going to say about that... ;)
Post by: Coppermantis on July 24, 2014, 11:03:22 pm
I have to say, the M in the logo looks like an alien squatting and peeing to me. ;) I apologize in advance if I cause others to see it that way. Perhaps fatten the leg up a bit so it doesn't look quite so much like a stream?
I don't really see it. 'Tis a bit of a stretch, think it's fine.
Post by: Draco18s on July 24, 2014, 11:20:31 pm
I have to say, the M in the logo looks like an alien squatting and peeing to me. ;) I apologize in advance if I cause others to see it that way. Perhaps fatten the leg up a bit so it doesn't look quite so much like a stream?
I see it, but I can unsee it too.
Post by: Histidine on July 25, 2014, 05:52:22 am
Anyway, just delete the fifth leg? and it'll be fine. Nobody even has any idea what that thing is supposed to do.
Post by: Teal_Blue on July 25, 2014, 07:02:33 am
I have to say, the M in the logo looks like an alien squatting and peeing to me. ;) I apologize in advance if I cause others to see it that way. Perhaps fatten the leg up a bit so it doesn't look quite so much like a stream?
The logo reminds me a bit of the tri-pods from the war of the worlds novel. Of course that is just my imagination. Please don't change it, I rather think its nifty having a 'symbol' double as the letter 'm' in Empire. :)
-Teal
Post by: TheVampire100 on August 26, 2014, 09:53:31 pm
Let's have a look at what the Spire are. Spacecrafts, alright, but furthermore in the FS Campaign you get the info that they are a rock-like/crystaline race without adding more information to it. The Spire Spaceships look crystaline in structure (white and glowing appearance, as could you almost look through them), so you can say that your researchers have talked about the spacecrafts themselves when they talked about the Spire.
Now let's take a look at the Spire colony system. You can create new colonies from colony ships, so let's say that these ships are indeed Spire themselves this would say that the Spire itself carries the seed for a new population. How does Spire reproduce? Assuming they are mineral in structure they won't reproduce sexually instead they gather enough minerals to "construct" new Spires. However these minerals are rare and only found at specific places and that's the reason why Spire cannot spread across the entire galaxy like they want. The colony ships however contain enough minerals to create a new city with inhabitants in it. I guess the Spire have some kind of "morphing" process that allows them to shift between their spaceship/space travel form (so they can move between different planets and expand their reach) and an unknown surface form they use to live on planets (and I guess this form will be used in Spectral Empire).
The process of changing might be exhausting and takes some time, explaining why you need ressources and time to create spire crafts at the colony.
Some additional information about colonies: Whenever you create a new city the cap for spiry ships raises. Why is that so? Why only with these types of ships? Because new colonies means of course a greater population meaning you have MORE Spire ships at your hand.
Now let's have a look at the Spire mining system. You can mine asteroids for rare minerals. these are the minerals that I mentioned above that Spire need to evolve/reproduce. A miner ist propably a larvae like form of the Spire. It is currently young, has no wys to protect itself and searches for nourishment. After digesting minerals it can use the transforming ability that all Spire have to evolve in a better form, creating a new spire ship.
This explains also why the miner disappears after it created a new star ship: it just transformed into a better version of itself.
I may be right or may be fully wrong with everything I said above but this is at least my opinion on how Spire work and I think this is a pretty awesome setting for a sc-fi race.
Post by: Zebeast46 on November 25, 2014, 09:55:41 pm
Post by: x4000 on November 26, 2014, 08:52:41 am
I really like the Fenyn and the Yali (too bad I cannot play as Yali) However, I believe the Fascist lobsters resemble the Burlusts too much. They both are good at fighting, they are both red (kind of a weak comparison I know) and they both have internal wars. My favorite races from TLF are the Peltians and the Boarines and I'll probably play a lot as them.
The Krolin and the Burlusts are two races that I am working on differentiating as much as possible, but I thought it was important to have two militaristic options. I've made a lot of strides on this since the original post about them.
For the Boarines and the Peltians, those are both the most complex races to play as (see other post I just made), go figure. ;) Not that that makes them bad at all, but it makes them definitely different. I think I may wind up playing as the Boarines a fair bit myself, although the Skylaxians pretty much always have a special place for me.
Post by: Zebeast46 on November 27, 2014, 06:06:53 pm
Post by: x4000 on November 30, 2014, 03:24:37 pm
Post by: Zebeast46 on November 30, 2014, 10:38:25 pm
Post by: x4000 on December 01, 2014, 10:06:27 am
The timeline of SBR takes place in the fairly distant future from both AI War and TLF -- neither of which are on the same timeline, themselves, either. Right now it's not clear which of those timelines is actually first, as they are in different galaxies. And it's not clear exactly how far into the future the SBR events are, which are in yet another galaxy.
Suffice it to say, the bulk of the Zenith are indeed extinct, except for those that are... well, I won't really say. They're on this planet, anyway.
Post by: Aklyon on December 01, 2014, 10:31:24 am
Post by: x4000 on December 01, 2014, 10:34:17 am
Post by: Aklyon on December 01, 2014, 10:54:08 am
Quote from: 4journal.xml, Shattered Pillar vs Astrids/Dark Spire
Commander,
The Dark Spire attacking the friendly Shattered Pillar Zenith in the $planetName nebula just lost their last base there. The Neinzul Astrids are still fighting, but this is a very positive development.
Attempts to communicate with the Zenith have failed up til now. They're friendly, but still pretty aloof to humanity. At least when fighting for their lives. But we've got their attention now. I've attached their message below. It's a bit... sketchy. Zenith are always like that.
=== ATTACHED TRANSMISSION ===
Human forces, welcome.
Welcome, little we can give.
Foes, come upon us.
One has fallen, rejoicing.
Rejoicing, little we can do.
Attacking, another yet remains.
We seek something from you, aid.
Aid, we shall give in return.
Artifacts, of the shadow shard.
So, please, as your own poets have said:
"Nuke them from orbit,
it is the only way to be sure."
Example ho!
Post by: x4000 on December 01, 2014, 10:57:36 am