Flight of the Eagle - with Demo

[Tarsus]

Demo!!

Approx 30-50 mins long.

Requires RTP/RM installed - 24mb

https://www.dropbox.com/s/el1a2rpq72qk4i2/Flight%20of%20the%20Eagle%200.2.1.exe?dl=0

Known demo Issues - 

Spoiler

Some animations missing from battlers.

Moving walk way seems to flicker and judder

No skills implemented into battles yet (attack still works)

Victory music needs replacing

Despite it saying 25 tags. only 5 are actually available in the demo. 

Story

It is the 259th year of the Empire of Orion, approx 400 years after the invention of the W-Drive and humanity first journeyed to the stars.

The aging Emperor and his wayward daughter are attending a Navy award ceremony when disaster strikes, unknown attackers lay siege to the ceremony and an attempt is made to kidnap the Princess.  Commander Norys after receiving an anonymous note is able to reach the Princess in time to save her.  Norys, along with a shadowy governement agent and a talented navigator is able to get her safely aboard the only ship left that is truly loyal to the Empire, the Eagle.

The events that follow are recorded in history as the closest the Empire has ever came to complete collapse and outright war, the fate of billions lies with the crew of the Eagle.

Setting

The game is set in a world very similar to our own.  Set approximately 500 years in the future.  The Empire of Orion is a sprawling mass of allied worlds that encompasses around a third of the human race, spread over a section of the Milky way called the Orion-cygnus arm, or the Orion spur hence the empires name.  Many of the worlds and systems are based off real life equivalents with a large helping of fiction thrown in.

75% of the game takes place on board the Eagle, a 60 year old Empire class battle cruiser converted into a heavy carrier, unlike its only counterpart the unconverted Wolf.  Together they are the two largest and most powerful ships in the known universe.

Characters 



Commander James Norys, XO of the Eagle.

Norys is the main Protagonist and many of the games story arcs will involve him in some way, even when not directly playing as him.



Agent Tailor (Mr White)

Tailor is a government agent, tasked to protecting the Princess.

Other characters

Captain Green

In command of the Eagle for 11 years.  Extremely intelligent, brilliant strategist.

Squadron Leader Dolan

Commands one of the Eagles 3 Strike units.  Flies an XF-5 Heavy fighter, one of 12 in his unit.

Marine Sergeant Dutch

Specializes in ship to ship boarding and low gravity fighting.

Lieutenant Poll and Ensign Dalton

Bridge crew of the Eagle.

Princess Amira

Unmarried heir of the Imperial throne, spoilt and selfish, useless in a fight.

Lieutenant Greaves

Navigation officer on board Trailblazer 2

Screenshots

Spoiler

Features

The game will be based around multiple different battle systems all using a similar backbone of an ATB engine. There will be 3 distinct types of combat. Actor based, Spaceship based, and Bridge based.  There is now only two combat types, both ship combats are being merged together now for ease of development and my own sanity.

Actor combat uses a basic ATB system and sideview battlers, shown below.



Ship combat uses a similar system, the ships will fight automatically, with you issuing orders and diverting power and crew between areas to boost certain aspects of combat.

The game is still in fairly early stages and im recruiting people to help out, I am in desperate need of artists in particular.  See here http://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?/topic/35238-recruiting-flight-of-the-eagle/

 

[Tarsus]

updated first post with more info, including a concept battler image.

 

[Tarsus]

Some more updates.

The actor battle system is now 99% done, I want to do a bit more testing before I start on the database for it.

The Ship battles are coming along nicely now as well.  The merged health and missile delay scripts are both done and i just need to complete my range/maneuver addon and then build a system that allows a custom HUD to draw on a per actor basis.  I should be done with this by next week.

Some concept art to look at here.

  

Both show my XF-5 Heavy Fighter, on the left is what will appear on my maps and on the right is the animated battler showing the early HUD design.

Im still looking for artists to help me out with character portraits and spritesets, im going to need around 10-15 unique named one and about 10+ generic NPCs.  I'm naming them and fleshing out the backgrounds as I create them so in addition to being credited for their work, any artists who help out can name the characters they create.

My goal is to have a space fighter combat demo out by next week so I can get testers helping me balance the game and also to get a bit more feedback.

 

[hiromu656]

This looks really unique, as did your Pirate game. Hopefully you keep at this one. I wish I could help with some of the art but I'm already balancing some things of my own (including my game). But when you get that combat demo done I'd really like to try it out.

 

[Tarsus]

It's a shame I lost track with the other game. I just could not get the different features to mesh together properly.

I've done loads more planning for this one and I've learned a lot from my mistakes.

 

[Tarsus]

Updates incoming!

My battle scripts are now 90% done, just a few more tweaks then its ready for full testing.

- completed script that controls enemy range and integrated it into missile script

- radar display is done and working for both ships and missiles.

- updated the system and battler graphics

- added a random name generator for enemies (not shown in video)



next up is getting some basic animations done and then making a start on the enemy database so i can get a ship demo out.

I'm still looking for artists who can help out with any sci fi style stuff.

EDIT- I can't decide if the players HP and other stuff should stay on the main battle screen as an overlay or if would be better off in a small window to the lower left. What do people think?

 

[hiromu656]

I like the HP bars and such where they are now. Although I think it could look better with a more Hologram-like appearance (the text and bars that is). The Range system you're using is really cool. I like how the radar shows the distance between your attacks and the enemies, its a nice twist on the basic ATB system.

 

[Tarsus]

I'll play around with a few designs for the HP display then. I really like the regular windows I have so I'll try and get a something done in a similar style.

In the bottom left I think I'm going to add a few at getting computer that displays the details of your targeted ship, right now as you can see you just have an arrow.

 

[Tarsus]

More updates!

Started work on the tile set for the interior of the Eagle as well as other Imperial ships.



I have also made an alternate version of the fighter seen in my earlier images and videos, I think the flatter angle of this looks better and emphasizes the long range aspect of the combat more.



Scripting is now almost done, just a few tweaks here and there.

I think i'm going to be a bit delayed on getting the demo out this month as I plan on entering the melody map contest, but I also plan on basing my entry on a scene from this game so all my work into the music and tiles wont go to waste.  So look forward to being able to explore the interior of the Imperial frigate OES Melody very soon.

What do you think of the new version of the fighter? its not quite finished yet but I think i prefer the look of it.

 

[Tarsus]

Updates!

I've got quite a lot of work done behind the scenes on this game now. The scripting is now finished to the point it needs to be for a demo, I just need to populate the database now.

I've got my first map almost complete and the second, much larger map, is laid out and is being tweaked. I had to completely build several custom tile sets and character sheets, but once they are done my mapping should speed up greatly.



I have made custom characters, part way between the larger mack sprites and the ACE ones.

I'm now in the process of building up a set of rules for my universe, and creating the universe itself. I have 6 star systems in my game, only 2 of which you can actually explore, but I plan on building a full Galaxy of hundreds of star systems for use in future projects in the same universe.

 

[Erik Holland]

This looks really promesing!

There is one thing i don't really like in your battle engine that i know has to do with the script you have. But it's kind of strange that the players ship is moving but the enemy ships are not.

 

[Tarsus]

I assume you are looking at the little drone things in the gif and the video, they are just temporary images I'm using to test out the range script.

The ship battles is getting a bit of an overhaul right now. The ATB system I built it around was very basic and had too many limits, I've decided to make my own system so that I can customise it to exactly what I need.

 

[Tarsus]

Updated first post, including a demo link.

 

[Tarsus]

added screenshots to first post, update demo link with working version

 

[gRaViJa]

Playing the demo now. One thing, the spaceship in your screenshot (going sideways), it' shows the combustion on the rocket thruster, but that's impossible since there is no oxygen in space.

 

[Tarsus]

The oxygen is in the fuel, the same as in real life.

 

[gRaViJa]

Okay, but aren't they typically used during launch only? Anyway, it's a detail. So far the story is pretty interesting but i'm missing some... ambience. Better lighning, better use of music and sound effects, this can really add to the game. For example, when the battle began in the place where the speech was going be held, the same, mellow music just kept playing.

I'll write a full review when i finish the demo.

 

[CrazyCrab]

Playing the demo, I'll write down my impressions as things happen.

- Finally a reasonably sized demo! Thanks for not stuffing it with unused music.

- Nice title screen and intro, not too much not too little.

- I like the character busts. The uniforms look really well.

- The spaceship clashes a bit with the other resources, as unlike the chairs for example it doesnt have an outline... I'd recommend trying to add one and seeing how it would look then.

- Walter White? Just joking. Really impressive busts so far, again. They look really well.

- The door opening sound was a bit too loud,made me jump up as I had it set to loud for the soundtrack ^^' You may want to normalize it.

- Same goes for the menu sounds, like confirm etc, a bit too loud.

- Story's really good so far. No needless description, no useless chatter. All the meat, none of the bones

- I wish the items had a description, even a bare bones one. Guessing you're still working on that though. 

- The mapping is a bit... sterile. No mistakes, but everything just seems... hmm... ''perfect''. Guessing it makes sense since it's an important ship, but I'd expect a changing room to be a lot more messy.

- Huh, his bust changed as well when I picked up armor. Attention to detail, neat!

- Not a big fan of ATB, but its nice to see animated battlers and it all just looks really well. When the screen shakes you can see a black line on the edge though... I'd remove the shake altogether tbh.

- Eh, no skills and random encounters + ATB - it's a bit of a chore to sit through pressing attack at this point. I hope we get skills / interesting items later on. It also doesn't make too much sense, where are all the guards coming from?

- Too...many...guardsmen... Stopped fighting, started running.

- The conveyor belts look kinda out of place.

- Got massacred by the heavy guardsmen, Game over screen is slightly to the left, with a black bar on the right.

Had to go anyway, overall it was quite enjoyable but the battles are just so, so monotonous. They take so many hits and with no skills its pretty much buttonmashing attack until they all die. Like the story and the graphics, but this really kept me from carrying on.

Anyway, looks promising! Do something about the battles and you'll be good to go

Keep it up!

 

[Tarsus]

Thanks for the feedback.

When you say the space ships outline do you mean the shuttle in the bay?

The door and menu sound are still all RTP defaults and I'll change them for custom ones eventually. Sounds and music arent my area of expertise so I'm struggling to get that stuff sorted.

Player skills are a work in progress right now, along with the battle balancing. The heavy guards at the end are supposed to be tough but I think they might be just a bit too much.

I've switched back to scripting for a while now, but I'll try and get all these things improved.

 

[CrazyCrab]

When you say the space ships outline do you mean the shuttle in the bay?

Yeah, that little ship-thingy (sorry, really bad at space terminology) in the bay as well as in space.