My space dogfight game has the same problem as Freelancer

[Rotorist]

I find this quite funny because the whole reason I'm making this game is my issues with Freelancer's dogfight system. Mainly, it just takes FOREVER to kill an enemy and it takes so long that my mind just dozes off in the middle of a fight... Enemy's shield constantly regenerates and they even use nanobots, which prolongs the fight even longer. Considering the fact that you often find yourself against 3-6 enemies, it's not uncommon that even with the best weapons it takes upwards of 10 minutes to finish off all of them. That's the reason I really hate taking those "wipe out enemy group" type of missions.

Soooo, this year I started making my own space combat game. After 4 months of writing AI code I can finally complete a proper dogfight in the game. Here's a video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-aPfQUs...e=youtu.be

Despite my effort in making the AI ship move more predictably, killing these four enemy ships still took over three minutes, with my weapons slightly better than theirs (I have 2 guns + 2 turrets, they only have 2 guns). I think the reason might be that their shields regenerate too fast. But I have made it so that having a low shield doesn't protect you completely from hull damage, and starting from about half way, lower the shield more hull damage you'll get. I also took out shield depletion time so the they always regenerating to balance the fact that shields don't completely protect the hull.

The reason I chose to do that is I want player to choose the right weapons for each fight. The player should equip two types of guns, one effective against shields and the other more effective against hull, this way as you charge towards an enemy, you first weaken their shield somewhat and then start blasting their hull, and if you position correctly and manage your weapon power well, you should be able to take out one minion in 2-3 charges. Also, if you are good at maneuvering you can keep the target inside your gun's gimball range longer and deal more hull damage before his shield recharges more.

Anyways, I'd like to discuss what you think may be good ways to make dogfights less tedious and rewards more towards player's skill rather than patience (lol)

Also if you wanna try it out let me know I can provide a build... just expect it to be extremely broken

[Skorak]

Those projectiles are fairly slow looking.
You were fairly far away.
So you hit very rarely.

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[Corile]

Feels like one spacesim that may not be completely garbage.

Good luck.

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[Rotorist]

Those projectiles are fairly slow looking.
You were fairly far away.
So you hit very rarely.

ha, I didn't think of that.
how do you feel about the movements of the AI? I made them more "mellow" compared to FL's sudden zigzag movements of NPC during combat.

[Rotorist]

Feels like one spacesim that may not be completely garbage.

Good luck.

thanks, I think it's really about solving those mysteries of arcade space sim.

[Alley]

It's really nice overall, good work!

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Alley was right.

[eigos]

If my opinion means anything, I really like it! Always makes me happy to see other people's work, so thanks for sharing and thumbs up!!!

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[Lanakov]

Wow, you created all of this by yourself ? I was gearing up for something much more ugly and disfunctional.
It looks really nice, the HUD is particularly smooth. I see what you were going for, it looks like a more considerate and thoughtful take on FL combat. I think it could work ! As Skorak pointed out, perhaps boosting projectile speed could help in regards to making dogfights more exciting ; you would hit more often and therefore exposing yourself to your target's line of fire would be much more dangerous, thus rewarding careful positioning.

Also I'm not sure what ship classes are represented in this demo ; some sort of freighter ? It did seem to carry a lot of inertia. I think a good thing to do would be to strike a good balance between ship size and maneuverability ; they're quite big so easy to land shots on, but if you make them more maneuverable, it can open the way for some interesting tactical moves.
I also like your idea of a shield only stopping SOME damage, and no shield means you're really in BIG trouble. That a shield at 1% could block a projectile strong enough to otherwise decimate the ship in one go has always come off as a little cheesy to me.

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[Rotorist]

Wow, you created all of this by yourself ? I was gearing up for something much more ugly and disfunctional.
It looks really nice, the HUD is particularly smooth. I see what you were going for, it looks like a more considerate and thoughtful take on FL combat. I think it could work ! As Skorak pointed out, perhaps boosting projectile speed could help in regards to making dogfights more exciting ; you would hit more often and therefore exposing yourself to your target's line of fire would be much more dangerous, thus rewarding careful positioning.

Also I'm not sure what ship classes are represented in this demo ; some sort of freighter ? It did seem to carry a lot of inertia. I think a good thing to do would be to strike a good balance between ship size and maneuverability ; they're quite big so easy to land shots on, but if you make them more maneuverable, it can open the way for some interesting tactical moves.
I also like your idea of a shield only stopping SOME damage, and no shield means you're really in BIG trouble. That a shield at 1% could block a projectile strong enough to otherwise decimate the ship in one go has always come off as a little cheesy to me.

Yea, the one player is flying is supposedly a freighter with overpowered firepower. For this game I'm going to add wingmen feature, so if you are doing trade runs you need to have some wingmen to protect you. the freighter will have very little weaponry but thick shields and lots of defensive mechanisms, like a aircraft carrier, you know Slow and big, but with escorts.

I also liked FL's idea of different types of shields that can protect different kind of weapons; so I have implemented that as well, but it's kinda tricky to balance because if a player finds himself surrounded by enemies whose shields are immune to his guns, then he'll be very mad, lol

[TheShooter36]

Dont make it an immunity perhaps. %15 resistance to certain guns would work. Or even %25. More would make things too much of a statgame rather than actual skill.

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