Beta Galactic Artifact - Release B

[TrevorBradley]

Apparently a few of you have been anticipating this...

Galactic Artifact - Release B (SVN 234)

After 2 more weeks of development, the next alpha of my non-combat real time space exploration game "Galactic Artifact" has been released!

From the game manual:

QUOTE
Galactic Artifact is a real time, non-combat game of space exploration. Alien archaeologists are in search of a prized galactic artifact, hidden away somewhere amongst the stars, and have sent you on a quest to find it! You are in command of a star ship, ready to explore the galaxy, discovering hidden artifacts along the way and making a bit of profit on the side. You gather and these artifacts and sell them to the alien archaeologists for cash to upgrade your ship, or trade them for information that provide clues to help you complete your quest. As you accumulate more information, the region of the galaxy that need be explored is reduced, until the quest is completed and the prized artifact is found.

Galactic Artifact can be played as a single player race against the clock, or as a multiplayer race against other players.

Galactic Artifact is available for Windows and Linux, and will be ported to the Pandora console once it is released later this year.


This release has several bug fixes, introduces mouse control, several changes based on posts here in the forums, and most importantly, multiplayer. At present there is only one server, and it's set up for a maximum of 32 players. I've tested it with 8 players and it seems very stable, but it's possible something could go wrong in the early going. Please be patient and I will get around to restarting the server.

Changes in this release:

* Multiplayer Networking. Easily three quarters of the work done since last release. Create a server to handle messages, sharing of ship location, shared artifact plundering, etc.
* Multiplayer games have ship captain names of historical, modern, and fictional explorers.
* Eight player multiplayer tested, appears to work great.
* Wireless network connectivity tested, appears to work great.
* Network traffic is now encrypted.
* New Fonts for Alien, Victory interfaces
* Omnidirectional Radar bug fixed
* Added left keyboard controls as per forum request.
* New cargo hold graphic (not very good, but easy to replace now)
* Galaxy Minimap now has pretty graphic
* Improved galaxy rendering, including use of the much faster SpriG graphics library for galaxy image zooming.
* Game can now be controlled entirely by mouse
* Switched from doubles to floats. Game still works great, but the galaxy has a different placement of stars than the one in Release A.
* New algorithm to remove bad starts. Players now always start the game on a minor arm of the galaxy, from 40 to 100% away from the core.
* Elimination of multiple bugs having to do with losing ship location (usually during panning)
* Artifact location displayed at end of multiplayer game.
* Network games have multi-coloured player cursors with displayed player names.
* A new menu interface (mostly a placeholder for now), but allows player to choose between single and multiplayer game.
* Improved sound system, with all new music by Harmonics of Frequency Modulation.
* In single player mode, game pause no longer causes negative, fuel, cash.
* Memory leaks now eliminated. Game shouldn't use more than 100 megs of memory, usually below 90. (Most of this is the massive galaxy graphic image used to display in the background.
* Network players are kicked for inactivity.
* New alien radar noise
* Added version conflict code so that clients told to download an upgrade if the server has been upgraded.
* Client attempts to move to single player mode on server crash.
* Pause now works properly in single player mode.

Please read the game manual before diving into multiplayer.

I am formally putting out a call for Graphics Designers to help in the project. I've gone as far as I can go with placeholder graphics, and need some assistance to move forward. If you would like to contribute to the project, please send me an email using the form on the game website.

I might be on to challenge some of you shortly. Multiplayer game names are at the moment chosen randomly, but I hope to get either "Jameson" or "Zelnick".

Happy Playing!

 

[gruso]

Fantastic!

 

[kattle87]

I've found a weird bug! I started on a planet of the Ancient aliens, that had an ancient artifact (how lucky!) I sold it for 30 galactic bucks, then I bought fuel (i wanted to buy radar instead, but I missed the option)
Results: game frozen and I had to kill it...

 

[TrevorBradley]

I've found a weird bug! I started on a planet of the Ancient aliens, that had an ancient artifact (how lucky!) I sold it for 30 galactic bucks, then I bought fuel (i wanted to buy radar instead, but I missed the option)
Results: game frozen and I had to kill it...

Hmm, that's new. I'll have to try to reproduce that.

Lemme know if it happens again. Can anyone else with this lucky start see if this happens?

Edit: Were you playing the Windows or Linux version?

 

[fusion_power]

Wow, I hope someone can translate the game and especialy the big Manual into german. I really read manuals but it is always better to read it in the mother language. ^_^
I'm downloading the new beta and will test it as soon as posible (with only a 56K Modem at home it is not fun to download :rolleyes: )

 

[Gruntfuggly]

This looks really interesting! I haven't downloaded it and tried, so I can't really criticise, but I've noticed you have used several different fonts. It might look a bit more polished if you stick to one font (and maybe without serifs)....

Will there be a GP2X release?

PS - I assume there is some imspiration from Elite in this - especially if you're after the name 'Jameson'...

 

[WoD]

What! No OSX binary? *cry*

I wish I had the skills and time to help on the graphical front. Will try the windows version over the weekend.

 

[adamorjames]

Awesome! Looking much nicer.

 

[kattle87]

Edit: Were you playing the Windows or Linux version?

Windows one.

 

[flatmush]

I found a bug when panning down by a lot of cells, possibly going over a major boundary of some sort.
Also is it really necessary to have 30MB of music with the download, surely it could be compressed at a lower quality or something.

But otherwise it's a brilliant game and really good fun, though I have to agree with Gruntfuggly that it looked more consistent with only one font style.

 

[Javacat]

Just had a quick go on the latest version using the multiplayer and won I like the new font for talking to aliens. Great game!

 

[sinoth]

Great update! Multiplayer seems to work well. At some point in the future I'd like to be able to host my own local game, even if it means downloading a dedicated server. I'd also love to be able to chat with other pilots during multiplayer.

 

[Screeny]

Great game!
I miss a chat feature but you are able to program this feature too, aren't you?

 

[TrevorBradley]

Hey guys, just waking up here to read comments and add a few myself.

We got bumped down to Beta Testing which is (A) correct and (B) a place I fear where threads go to die, as they don't get near as many readers. I'd actually inteded to check with the mods to determine where I should have posted this, but it was late and a few of you were antsy for a fast release. We'll have to make the most of it and get the Beta forums thriving and get those other users down here to check out what's going on.

Now, to your comments, in random order.

GP2X version. I actually have a very early test ported to the gp2x. (Just the galaxy zoom, actually) The controls stunk and it crahed a lot. But the real problem is the screen real estate... 320x240 is enough to draw the galaxy but probably nothing else. I'd need redo the hole UI and probably throw out the UI. Plus the GP2X is rather wimpy CPU wise, I'm not sure how much I could do. It would be a different game, and possibly an unsatisfying one at that (think Nintendo DS's "Spore Creatures" vs the actual spore.

Multiplayer Chat: I considered this, and was thinking of adding it into this edition, as well as the ability to type your own name, but then issues of server monitoring came into play. Chat is easy enough, but I don't want to be awake at 3am watching to make sure someone named "Rectal Plunderer" isn't zipping around space annoying all the new players. If someone can point me to a decent word filter I'll look into it. It really should be in there for the next release.

Fonts: The old fonts had to go, and I'm happy with the new ones. But you're correct in saying that three different fonts for aliens makes things unpolished. What I need is some different way to theme the visits to alien homeworlds.. Probably by changing what they say and by adding in those Alien graphics I've been hoping for. The futurist (game menu) font is my favourite right now, but that's open to discussion. Any suggestions?

OSX binary: If you've got an OSX SDL dev environment and would be willing to attempt to build the thing for OSX, get in touch with me. I'd love to have an OSX bnary myself.

Translating the manual: It's barely readable in English! Apart from high school French which I've mostly forgotten, I'm not going to be much help in translating the manual to other languages. Translating the *game* to other languages might be a big problem because of all those artifact names. You'd need to figure out a way to construct a 3 word name (adjective noun of the noun in English) and then come up with 3*3*143 words to fill in the blanks, which is a near impossible task in English.

Boundary Bug: That's listed in the manual actually. You can see a broken background graphic in sector 556 for example, it's cut off at the right hand side.

Hosting a local game: Possible. I'd need to have some sort of central realm server that maintained a list of servers, which would bring up the traditional list of servers with server names, number of players, and pings. But as I've only seen a max of four players on the server at one time, it didn't seem worth the effort for this release!

 

[TaG]

I am formally putting out a call for Graphics Designers to help in the project. I've gone as far as I can go with placeholder graphics, and need some assistance to move forward. If you would like to contribute to the project, please send me an email using the form on the game website.

We got bumped down to Beta Testing which is (A) correct and (B) a place I fear where threads go to die, as they don't get near as many readers. I'd actually inteded to check with the mods to determine where I should have posted this, but it was late and a few of you were antsy for a fast release. We'll have to make the most of it and get the Beta forums thriving and get those other users down here to check out what's going on.

Why don't you create a topic on the dev forum asking for graphics design help and link to this thread: first it will highlight your need and second any interest that post gets will bring people to this one.

 

[TrevorBradley]

Wow, I've been blogged about in German. I win the Internet!

(should run babelfish through that puppy..)

I'll have to check out that repackaged installer. Babelfish says this about it:

For Windowsbenutzer a new Installer is on-line. This has a new icon (sees more beautifully out ) and loads automatically the most current Patches from a secondary server. Also an on-line guidance was added. This is momentary still on English, is however rapidly translated. Promised errors in the Installer repaired

I only have my Asus EEE in front of me right now, so I'll have to check it out later.

 

[TaG]

And in English too.

(I suspect you missed my post above whilst you were typing - I think that will increase the visibility)

 

[TrevorBradley]

Damn you Poole! Good game...

(I'm presently McKay by the way).

(I really have to add chat to this thing)

That's a lot more frenetically paced than I remember in testing..

* Mental note... Need to make the victory screen stay up for at least 5 seconds without having it disappear by hitting enter.

Someone seems to be quitting and joining a lot to get a really awesome name.. and the name randomization feature on the server seems pretty weak at the moment... Got to look into my daughter's suggesting of giving a list of names for you to choose from.

EDIT 2: SOOOOO close da Gama! Just beat you... gg

 

[TrevorBradley]

That was odd... the server hung. No error messages, it just stopped logging data about 30 minutes ago.

I was having a great game too.

Think I'll observe rather than play... make sure everyone else is having a proper experience...

Be sure to nag me here or on the feedback form on the website if there any server issues, I'll try to kick it and see what's going on.

I'll be on as Captain Vancouver.

 

[fusion_power]

Translating the manual: It's barely readable in English! Apart from high school French which I've mostly forgotten, I'm not going to be much help in translating the manual to other languages. Translating the *game* to other languages might be a big problem because of all those artifact names. You'd need to figure out a way to construct a 3 word name (adjective noun of the noun in English) and then come up with 3*3*143 words to fill in the blanks, which is a near impossible task in English.

No, not you should translate the game but someone who is able to do this. I hope Pandora programs will have a standard way to save language files seperately so every program can be easily translated without recompiling everything. Just by adding a additional language File.
I think the artifact names can stay english. In german, every english word sounds cool so noone will have a problem with that.

I've played the game for some time. Interesting, but not so easy for beginners (later, a ingame help that describes the important stuff on screen would be great), especialy the navigation and the controls. (I choosed the mouse mainly to navigate and the arrow keys for the radar). I wasn't able to finish the (singleplayer) game because the "boss" artifact was in the absolute opposite corner of the galaxy :lol: So I really missed a save option.
In my opinion the game needs some good automap function. I always forget which Planet I've visited and where the next Alien Planet is, would help to save fuel and time. AFAIK there were suggestions of displaying the route of the ship, also a good idea. (I bet I would win the lifetime zigzag award for the most ineffective and weird route )
Scrolling from one sector to another would be also helpful to keep the orientation. I have to switch in another sector to select a planet, the ship is not onscreen. I also cant choose a destination outside of the visible sector because I have to click onto a planet to start the ship. Maybe some interactive minimap can solve this?
Ship only jumps from planet to planet, I can't control it like in Star Control. So the sector switching is even more complicated when you at the border of a huge main sector....hard to explain this problem so I think I quit this, my english is not good enough.
Oh, the informations of the aliens are better with more valuable artifacts. Is it better to leave the "unmarked" sector (without the main artifact) for new informations or is it in theory possible to get any information about the galaxy while staying in one area? AFAIK I wasted some artifacts because I've got the same information twice so I think traveling around is much better.

To make things more easy, the game could store visited planets in a database, complete with coordinates (sector, artifact found, Alien race there, etc...) so I can choose a planet from the list and the map shows me the place of it and if I want I can directly travel back to this planet. Each Alien Race could have a unique Planet colour onto the map (only AFTER the planet with the Aliens was discovered of course)
Yes, the game needs more graphic. A visible Ship would be nice and optional marks onto the map where I can see the type of planet, the next special Alien race to sell the artifact for the best price.

Crazy Idea: A automatic drone ship that can search for one type of artifact within a specific area and sell it. So I automaticly recieve some money. (only low cost artifacts maybe to makke it not too easy )