Space Sims/Strategy Games Catch-All

Looks like one of the Starfarer devs has quit his job to work on the game full-time: http://fractalsoftworks.com/2011/06/...

I bought the game recently but haven't spent much time with it, between S.P.A.Z. and Space Rangers 2.

Alpha. Centauri. $6. Full Stop.

I would post a link, but you should click the GOG.com link over to the left first, then click the news link for Alpha Centauri.

Right. Now.

Stop whatever else you are doing.

Right. Now.

<----------------------- Click it!!!

SMAC is definitely a strategy game, but it's not exactly in space.

Hmmmm it is on another planet which is good enough for me but I do see your point.

Aren't we all just hurtling through space at this very moment?

Like... dude...

I,I "Imagine a perfectly spherical penis, hurtling through space."

Gremlin wrote:

Worked fine for me, the last time I did it. GOG + Freespace Open Installer is the easiest way to play Freespace these days.

My missus and I just finished watching Battlestar Galactica (I know I somehow never bothered when it first came out) so now I'm hankering for a space sim of some kind.

Think it'll scratch the itch? I checked out that FSOInstaller thing - looks handy. Does it do stuff like give a decent screen res etc on a modern system? I had a look in their wiki but nothing really jumped out to say so...

Cheers.

Blackstep wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

Worked fine for me, the last time I did it. GOG + Freespace Open Installer is the easiest way to play Freespace these days.

My missus and I just finished watching Battlestar Galactica (I know I somehow never bothered when it first came out) so now I'm hankering for a space sim of some kind.

Think it'll scratch the itch? I checked out that FSOInstaller thing - looks handy. Does it do stuff like give a decent screen res etc on a modern system? I had a look in their wiki but nothing really jumped out to say so...

Cheers.

You'll be happy to know this exists then.

garion333 wrote:

You'll be happy to know this exists then.

Nice! I'll try and give all this a shot on the weekend I think.

An appropriate 250th post! I'm happy 4X games are still being produced by devs with enough capital to present at E3.

Edit: Hot damn. This looks like the game I've always wanted, but never existed. Definitely on my radar now.

I've petitioned Kerberos to add in a race of fish people to the game so it really would be the game you've always dreamed of.

Isn't there a race of dolphin people? If so, close enough.

You guys don't like Sins of a Solar Empire? I realize Diplomacy blew and Entrechment made the Vasaari damn near impossible to kill, but still.

Grenn wrote:

You guys don't like Sins of a Solar Empire? I realize Diplomacy blew and Entrechment made the Vasaari damn near impossible to kill, but still.

Wait, what?

Mmm. SotS2 is looking pretty nice.

Its just I haven't seen much talk about Sins in here. Maybe I just skimmed past it.

I think there was some talk about it, and it's mentioned in the OP, but since it's got its own rather large thread, we've largely ignored it. Same goes for X3.

Has anyone actually jumped on board with the Miner Wars alpha?

Well, Sins has its own thread. This is sort of the "everything that isn't Sins" thread.

Edit: Mega-Tannhausered! That's what I get for leaving a thread open for 15 minutes before reading it.

garion333 wrote:

Has anyone actually jumped on board with the Miner Wars alpha?

I did. It's still just a tech demo with updates generally being focused on graphics and performance. So far, it has fallen short of what was supposed to be Minecraft in space.

But they don't talk much in that thread anymore. So I just figured...you know...hijack the thread......

No Grenn! Is a BAD Grenn!

SPAZ News (emphasis mine):

Phew, since release on May 9th, it has been the busiest time of our lives. We have managed to stay number 1 on Impulse's weekly top seller list since the 9th so we are really shocked/proud/happy

For those that are curious, we have sold 8595 units as of this post. That has put a decent dent in the development costs and gets us about 1/3 of the way to being profitable. At the very least it means that we will not lose out homes, this year anyhow.

In the past few weeks we have spent a lot of time getting our distribution options in order, and working on compatibility patches. This meant a lot of time solving problems instead of making progress on gameplay. We are VERY pleased to announce that we are now ready to get back to work improving on SPAZ full time, instead of building/fixing infrastructure.

The key result of our work is that SPAZ is now available for purchase from us! If you had been waiting to grab your copy because you wanted to ensure the devs got the largest cut, have a less than legal copy, or if you had your doubts about Impulse in the past (although they are a great company actually) then we have the solution. Click the link below to purchase through our new page on BMT Micro. We have not branded the page with our art yet, but it does the job.

https://secure.bmtmicro.com/servlets...

We also want to give a special shout out to ScarletMadness and Colin. Those two went above and beyond providing expertise/code for our new key activation system.

We have also uploaded the new build (Version 0.9.007) to GamersGate this morning, and once we give the green light we will be live there as well.

They also say they could be available soon on D2D and Desura. Glad to see the game is selling well. I find it a bit grindy and repetitive, but it's fun. It seems crazy to me that 8600 sales has only gotten them a third of the way to being profitable. I didn't have any idea it would cost that much to develop an indie game.

I imagine a lot of purchases were through Impulse (read: me) and I don't know how much they were getting from that. It's understandable.

SPAZ's production values are high enough I can see 30,000 units as being a reasonable amount if this is their full time job. That said, $130,000 (if all purchases were $20) is a lot of money, but I firmly believe that SPAZ is what we use to know as "B-level" games. They're indie, but they're not putting out a flash game, ya know?

garion333 wrote:

I imagine a lot of purchases were through Impulse (read: me) and I don't know how much they were getting from that. It's understandable.

SPAZ's production values are high enough I can see 30,000 units as being a reasonable amount if this is their full time job. That said, $130,000 (if all purchases were $20) is a lot of money, but I firmly believe that SPAZ is what we use to know as "B-level" games. They're indie, but they're not putting out a flash game, ya know?

Yeah, the production values are definitely there. Impulse (and others like D2D and GG) takes 30%, according to the devs (vs. the 9% that BT Micro takes). I hope they have a lot of success, especially now that the game's available outside of Impulse (which is where I bought it, too).

They took in a decent amount of sales for a first time beta. I hope it exponentially increases upon a full release on digital platforms (especially once Steam give the okay).

Now that it's available not on Impulse I'll maybe give it a whirl.

So how come steam still hasn't picked this up? Seriously, I want to give these guys my money, but I want it on Steam.

BlackSabre wrote:

So how come steam still hasn't picked this up? Seriously, I want to give these guys my money, but I want it on Steam.

They rejected an earlier build, so apparently they have to resubmit and go through the approval process again. I don't know what Valve didn't like about it cause Terraria came out in an alpha state and still feels like less of a complete game than SPAZ. *shrugs shoulders*