Hello everyone! Welcome to the twenty-second issue of the RoVerse Development Newsletter, where we keep you updated on the progress we've made over the past week! This week we've made a great deal of progress on scripting work, so much so that it's hard to list it all without going into to much detail! Nonetheless, we'll get right into it, starting with some of the most noteworthy accomplishments. In order to create the massive expansive open world we want for the planets of RoVerse, we are miniaturising everything in the game to 15% scale including players. However, with the camera and gameplay mechanics we'll be implementing, you won't even be able to notice you're not full size! There are many benefits to this, such as expanding the perceived render-distance by 85% along with numerous performance improvements for the lighting and physics engines. Up until now, rescaling characters to miniature sizes caused all sorts of animation and physics instabilities, but thanks to Fractality's coding and LordRex's animations, we have 100% stabalized miniature characters! This hasn't been the only development for player characters, as this week we released a poll to the community to decide which avatar type RoVerse would use - the old R6 or the new R15 (www.strawpoll.me/11769243/r). The votes came in very quickly and though it was very much 50/50 at the start, R15 came out on top. But do not fear those how dislike the R15 avatar - with our custom-made animations, the wacky over-the-top movement is no longer a concern! As you will see in another alpha showcase video we'll be posting tomorrow, we have given it animations much more akin to the R6, appearing far more realistic and mature. And you need not fret if you don't like the look of the animations in the video, as you will be able to choose from several animation-styles for your character in RoVerse, such as that of a businessman, soldier, merc or pirate, just to name a few! The new animations and miniature scale showcase aren't the only developments that will be in the video. You'll also see footage of our latest step towards the Dogfight Alpha, fully functional weapon turrets scripted by Firebrand, which will be used on all ships to mount chosen weapons. This turret system includes collision detection, rotation time (for capital cannons), specifiable rotation degrees of freedom (for guns that are meant to be forward-firing only) and of course firing safeties so only the guns that are aiming in the right direction and angle can fire - wouldn't want every one of your guns on your battleship to fire in all directions when you just want to fire your front-mounted cannons! Along with all of the above, tomorrow's showcase video will also include spherical planetary terrain which Idyllic completed a week ago, but this time with full planetary gravity, thanks to BlobbyBlob for open sourcing his work, enjoy! With all of that scripting progress covered, we come to the building work. Sadly ArcticCitadel has confirmed he won't be able to get a new PC for an indefinite amount of time, and so he has stepped down from development until he can build on ROBLOX again without freezing. Meanwhile Galbotrix was bogged down with studies and essays so he couldn't get much done this week, though he did manage to get some time to optimize the current interior designs and do some work on the industrial mineral review room (he'll be livestreaming his work now that he's free, so be sure to check him out over on our Twitch channel https://www.twitch.tv/roverse_official). It's not all bad news though because Idyllic has completed his architecture project in real life and is now back to full-time development! Last week we also welcomed a new builder onto the team, WhoToTrus, who will be helping Galbotrix to cover the completion of outpost interior construction, speaking of which you can take a look at his fantastic start on the corporate outpost interior right here: He's also been working on several different corridor concepts, which will be used for the arms of the corporate outpost which connect the different modules. And he's not the only one who has been making a promising start on his new assignment, as HeroMaster is already showing he can build wrecked ships just as expertly as regular ones: And here's the interior of the wreck, which he plans do build in a very unique way by making use of modular design to give players all sorts of pathways to fly throughout: Even though Idyllic was extremely busy with his architectural project presentation in real life today, he still managed to get some work done on the next pirate outpost module - now that's dedication! Each week we compile a Q&A section here whenever there are any new questions posted on the RoVerse Community group wall, so be sure to join if there's something you'd like to ask about RoVerse: https://www.roblox.com/Groups/Group.aspx?gid=2948290 Q1: Will there be some form of special "elites" in RoVerse? A1: This is an interesting question. As of now we haven't planned any sort of special abilities for only a certain career/class of player since there would be the risk of it being abused, however this is certainly an idea to look into in future expansions if it is compensated by certain disadvantages to make it fair and balanced for other players. Q2: Will RoVerse have a fast travel? Like Hyperspace or Warpspace? A2: Yes indeed, there will be jump drives in RoVerse however they will be extremely difficult to obtain and fuel, they'll also only be able to be fitted on capital class vessels. Jump drives are mostly only meant to be used by the military for tactical uses, since when they are used they temporarily open a jump tunnel which other nearby players can enter along with the capital ship, this makes it a useful way for a fleet to make a surprise attack or a combat retreat back to a safe star system. Jump drives will still be obtainable by players outside of the military, but only rich individuals will be able to afford them or sub-factions who own their own personal armadas. Q3: Will we be able to build things on our planets later on in the expansions? Such as cities, factories, shipyards, etc? A3: When planetary gameplay is released, main factions will be able to plant colonies and cities on their planets as soon as they have conquered it. These will grow and expand on their own as time passes and their economy becomes wealthier. Individual players will also be able to construct permanent bases on planets, exactly like outposts. Of course, player bases won't be anywhere near the size of main faction cities which can grow to cover entire valleys. Q4: How will character customization work? Will you be able to select alien races? Will factions be able to submit their own races? A4: When a player first joines RoVerse, they will be asked to create a character to play as. At this screen they will get to choose skin colour, hair style, facial features and extra details such as scars or tatoos (most of this can be changes at any time through a clothing store). The race of your character will be based on what main faction you start your character as, each clan that joins is considered its own species/race. It should be noted, during the game you can switch to a different faction if you are a member of that group on ROBLOX. This will change what faction you are a citizen of, but your character's race will remain the same as what you were first 'born' into RoVerse as. Q5: Will melee weapons play a role in Ro-Verse? Will there be something similar to "magic" in Ro-Verse? A5: Absolutely, sci-fi themed swords and other melee weapons will be sold at equipment dealers in RoVerse. It will be up to clans how their melee weapons are designed, but you can expect ones like in Halo, Mass Effect, Star Wars etc. When it comes to the standard civilian melee weapons, they'll be kept pretty simple and straight-forward, however that's not considering future sub-faction corporations which might specialize in designing and manufacturing upgraded melee weaponry. As for abilities/technologies that play like a sci-fi version of spells or magic of a fantasy MMO, it isn't planned for initial release. But if the playerbase show interest, there is certainly room for expansions that add "nanotech abilities", which would be comparable to biotic abilities from Mass Effect. Q6: What ship types will get interior? A6: Most likely just capital class vessels (that includes freighters and other small capitals like frigates), however Very Heavy Fighters, the heaviest class of fighter, may get interiors. A great deal of which ships do or don't get interiors will come down to which clans supply interior designs for their submitted ships. Q7: Since clans can assign automatic uniforms for their soldiers, can they issue automatic hats to wear as well (to give them a more 'soldierish' look? A7: Most definitely! In fact, custom made hats will be a big part of RoVerse, as they open a whole new realm of opportunity for clan culture and personality, as well as individual player customisation. There's even the possibility for exosuit designs that boost a player's durability or speed, though this is still to be planned out and shouldn't be considered a definite feature. Q8: Will vehicles require resource to operate (energy such as gas to get the engine going)? Will replenishing this resource cost a fee? A8: Yes, ships and ground vehicles will use up fuel over time, though fuel will be very cheap and common to every station, colonized planets will also construct gas stations in and near cities over time. So as long as you remember to stop for fuel and only venture into uncolonized space with extra fuel tanks for the trip, you'll be free to worry about the more important things, like pirates, hostile races, solar storms, hazardous environments and whatever else the deep dark black has in store for you! This just about wraps up our week of development progress! We hope you enjoyed Comments are closed.
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AuthorsVaktus: Leader of the Vaktovian Empire and head of the RoVerse Project |