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Land, sea, air, and orbital combat; 1v1's on a single planet, to 40 player matches across an entire galaxy; thousands of units, all of this brought to you by a team who's worked on Supreme Commander, Total Annihilation, Command and Conquer Generals/ Zero Hour, Battle for Middle Earth, and other titles.
Some of you may know, that Total Annihilation (The Core Contingency) is my favorite RTS game ever made, with Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance - the stand alone expansion to the spiritual successor of TA - being my second favorite RTS game ever made. So naturally, I am rather excited to see another Total Annihilation derivative - especially one with such innovative features - in the pipeline!
it looks really awesome indeed. though they have the same problem most games I like have... gonna take AGES to be released, since they are on kickstater program. still need to make the thing. oh well, I shouldn't complain I got plenty of games
Apparently they expect a relatively quick development time, because of the technology they are using, and because of the size of the team. They said they could have the beta up and running by Q2, 2013.
They are making the whole development process very transparent, with regular updates showcasing their work so far. The other day they were showcasing their work on terrain and maps. It was impressive to see how much work they had done already.
However, their project is very ambitious, and they still have so much to do, so we will just have to wait and see how the rest goes.
If it werent for my lack of internet, I'd so join. I suck at RTS games, but meh. Enjoy losing too.
One question... You sayd 40 players over the entire galaxy? Is it possible to have all 40 fighting at once? Like, competing over the same planet and whatnot? If so, daaaaamn. Wanna see one of those battles
Yes, it would be possible. Everyone would either need to spawn on that planet, or invade that planet, but the game is fully real time. If everyone sends a transport to that planet, then everyone will end up fighting there. This would be quite plausible in the case of a metal planet, which is a valuable asset to control.
These 40 player events will likely be rare though. Most games are likely to range between 2 and 16 players, if Total Annihilation spring is anything to go by.
One thing worth noting Jacojerb, is that this game has no DRM and does not require an online connection to play. It also has LAN support. So when it actually comes out in December, you and your friends should get it, and play it amongst each other at LANs and such. Support the developers for being awesome!
It's DRM free because it is crowd funded through Kickstater, and the crowd demanded it have no DRM. The developers kindly agreed. Of course this means you and your friends can easily crack it and LAN it like you would Age of Empires II or something, but as honest, good people I think that you should at least buy the game and the developers. Effectively you will also be giving a vote, with your money, for more DRM free games in the future.
Ryall wrote:One thing worth noting Jacojerb, is that this game has no DRM and does not require an online connection to play. It also has LAN support. So when it actually comes out in December, you and your friends should get it, and play it amongst each other at LANs and such. Support the developers for being awesome!
I'd want to support a game like that. I'm not a fan of RTS though. Too many things happening at the same time. If it's real time I like controlling one thing, and if it's large strategy then I like turn-based. One of my favourite strategy games was Seven Kingdoms Ancient Adversaries because the economy and trade were more useful than in Civilization and, at least against the computer, I could control how fast time moved.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
“Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.”
~John Milton~
Indeed, macro and micromanagement under time pressure isn't for everyone, and it does require a lot of practice to get used to. However, I would recommend stepping out of your comfort zone just to try a game like this. It's entirely unique in its scope and scale, with regards to its inter-planetary warfare, physics simulations, and limitless supply cap. Its core gameplay promises to be like Supreme Commander and Total Annihilation, with less focus on micromanagement, and offering players tons of strategic depth.
That means that it's a bit slower paced, and that you can spend much more time strategizing, and much less time worrying about how fast you can split your marines to avoid banelings.
Today is the official launch day for Planetary annihilation! Get involved people!
To celebrate, let me tell you about the awesome game I had this morning. If you don't like reading long stories, then stop here. I tried to make it as short as possible without leaving out too much detail.
I played a 4 player free for all across 5 planets this morning. It lasted 67 minutes!
Three of the players, including myself, all chose to spawn on the same planet (you don't know where others will spawn). I threw up several factories, rushed enough tanks to make General Patton proud, and went straight for my neighbor. It turns out he was already under assault by the third player so I waited for him to be destroyed. As his commander went nuclear, I deploying my air force and engineers to secure his wrecked base and the resources in it.
After a brief artillery war, and some flanking, I managed to surround the third commander and assassinate him, securing my dominance over the planet.
At that point I consolidated, expanded my base over the entire planet, and constructed orbital launch facilities, as well as an orbital and deep-space radar to monitor my final opponent's movements. At this stage he was far ahead of me in terms of resources and technology, having not encountered any resistance in his start. Realizing this, I prepared for an invasion.
He started by launching inter-planetary nukes at me, which were shot down by my missile defense system. He then started his assault. His fleet, which had slingshotted itself around the sun's gravitational field, arrived: his orbital fabricators immediately constructed teleportation gateways, unleashing a flood of enemy ground forces marching straight from his home planet onto mine.
My planetary defense lazers started firing massive blasts of energy into space, annihilating units orbiting my planets. A few of my own orbital fighters met his, and while I had a much smaller fleet than his, I had the defense advantage. Meanwhile, ground forces were much more advanced than mine, and began to fall against an onslaught of advanced tanks, assualt mechs and rocket launchers.
Machine guns, rockets, shells and plasma missiles wreathed the planet in fire whilst a spectacular lazer show took place above the planet.
Things became desperate. In about two minutes I lost control of half the planet. At one stage, I was using my commander - my 'King' chess piece - to help hold the line against the invaders.
I had banked on having air superiority over my planet though. I had sank a substantial amount of resources into the production of about 20 advanced gunships. As soon as they were ready, they made a bee line for the his teleportation gateways: I had to stop his overwhelming reinforcements. Seeing this, he immediately started producing mobile ground-to-air missile launchers to protect them, but he was too late. The teleporters were destroyed, and suddenly he found his army cut off from reinforcements and without any anti-air capabilities.
Meanwhile, having won the orbital war thanks to my planetary defense guns - many of which had been destroyed by his ground forces - I moved my fleet to a moon-sized asteroid orbiting on the fringe of the star system. He had already established a base there, and there was a small ground skirmish, before my fleet destroyed his forces from orbit. He fired a nuke at the asteroid, but by the time it arrived I had moved my forced to the other side of the asteroid, and had begun construction on a massive engine.
Meanwhile, I reclaimed my home, and rebuilt it's defenses and armies. His subsequent invasions failed miserably, as I was able to immediately shut down his teleporters with air units as soon as he built them, and my orbital defenses were strong.
I launched a few assualts on his planet, to attack key targets such as experimental orbital lazers he was constructing, no doubt to attack my planet with. The assualts were successful, and bought me more time whilst putting pressure on my opponent.
By this stage, I had a clear plan in mind to finally destroy my enemy. The massive engine I had constructed on the asteroid was complete, as well as a second and third one. He had a fleet advancing on it, but they were too late: the engines activated, and the asteroid suddenly accelerated at massive speeds on a collision course with my enemy's home planet. I moved all my units off the asteroid.
Having detected the celestial activity, my opponent panicked, and immediately started to evacuate to a neighboring planet which he had already colonized.
The problem was, his new base was relatively undefended compared to his home planet. He had fallen into my trap.
A vanguard of advanced assault tanks I had developed in defense of my own planet, suddenly erupted from teleporters I had secretly constructed behind his own. They crushed the part of his army that had made it through, and quickly laid waste to the teleporters and supporting structures. As my vanguard steamrolled through his pace, I saw one final act of desperation by opponent that made me smile: his engineers had just constructed another teleporter, which activated, and his commander walked through.
At this moment, I looked away to watch his planet as the asteroid crashed into it. A blinding white flash was accompanied by a deafening blast. The part of his planet that had been the hub of his operations, took the brunt of the impact. The planet shattered, and about a third of its mass was jettisoned into space. The impact was so massive, that even his units orbiting the planet were destroyed. It was utter annihilation, and it was spectacular to watch.
There in background, I saw the tiny flash of a commander's nuclear explosion on the planet he had escaped to, and I smiled in acknowledgement of my victory.
He had produced 2500 units, of which 2000 where destroyed, and I produced 1500 units, of which 900 were destroyed. The other two players had produced and lost around 300 units each.
So I got the game on the recent steam special ($15 ^^). And... It's glitchy as hell. The tutorial doesn't work. Pressing the tutorial button does nothing. Have encountered several infinite loading screens. Eventually I actually got into a game. 1v1 against a bot. Got a few tanks, when suddenly his army rolled into my base... killed me. I then started another bot gave, a 7v1. To give me time to actually do some stuff. Built all the advanced factories, trying to find the thing to send my troops to different planets... Had orbital things, but it took me a while to realise I actually have to focus on the other planet...
This'd be really nice if I had some sort of tutorial xD
A lot of people complain about the lack of tutorial.
Some time in near future when I am not writing exams, I can give you some tips and pointers.
In the mean time, I will say you should start by building a factory and some workers first. Holding down shift, and queuing actions (like constructing multiple buildings) is an integral part of the game.
Ctrl+Z selects all units of that type, visible on your planet (doesn't select units on the other side of the planet), which, when used in conjunction with shift, is a great way to rally your army.
Be sure to set your factories to 'continuous' build command: they will infinitely produce units, in the order of the queue you made for that factory. It's important that your factories are continuously building units for defensive and offensive purposes: a simple example is to enable continuous build mode, and queue 2 flame tanks, 5 regular tanks, and 1 mobile anti-air. It will continue to build in that ratio, forever. You now have a diversified tech 1 army.
Factories and builders use energy and mass as they build stuff. You can pause production by clicking on the 'energy' command in the UI, to allow you to concentrate on important projects. Production can then be resumed at any time.
Your Commander has an alternate fire-mode called the 'uber cannon.' If I recall the hotkey is D, but a button is available for it in the UI. It has to be fired manually, and has a short cooldown The uber cannon one-shots most land units, but does reduced damage against buildings.
Hope that helps for now!
Yaaaaaaaaay! If it happened after this weekend, I probably wouldn't be able to download it. At a friends place now. Have very limited internet at home
Anyway, those tips are indeed very useful. Figured out the shift one in my last game. control + Z sounds useful. UBER CANNON!!! Queuing units. All things that is very useful...
And then M7 posted...
It does feel very glitchy. But the bit of gameplay I did... I dono. I love it
MontgomerySeven wrote:The game has not been receiving particularly favorable review.
PC Gamer, for example, only gave the game 60%, saying that it still feels far too rough around the edges.
Yeah look, the game is definitely still a work in process: if you asked me they released it prematurely.
I do love the gameplay though, when it all works.
It innovates on the Total Annihilation and Supreme Commander RTS formula, and both those games were highly critically acclaimed. While game lacks the amazing story line and presentation of its predecessors, and its graphics aren't as pretty as Supreme Commander, its scale is even bigger, it has lots of strategic options like its predecessors, and it innovates where no RTS has gone before: its maps feature full on spherical asteroids, planets and moons with which to play on, with land, sea, air, and orbital forces.
That and I built a death-star the other day, and used it to blow up a player named Ackbar, along with his entire planet after a failed invasion attempt on his part. I'm not making this up. I exclaimed, "it's a trap!" as his planet exploded.
He didn't find it as funny...
