Galaxy Online

Hey everyone. Long time no hear, but as you can imagine I am pretty busy with the ongoing alpha. However I finally had the time to work on a little trailer movie for Galaxy Online - The Tournament. So yes... its finally done. I am not really a good video editor either, but I still hope you like it :)

If I am looking back at my online gaming history, there is one thing that always pops up my mind: Regardless of the genre I played one of my biggest concerns were cheaters. I would say every one of us, who is a serious gamer, was at some point confronted with them. They are like an unavoidable barrier. Not really tangible but still present. When I created Galaxy Online, even in the early stages of development, I already knew I have to do everything human possible to avoid cheaters. The good thing in online games is that you have several possibilities to do so. While you can never trust the client you still have the upper hand on the server. So you really need to make sure that you recheck every action from every player on the server again. The server is the only part which you can trust. I think you can't put enough efforts into this.

However we all know that there exists several other types of cheating too... let's just name trading of virtual goods, botting, macroing or GM corruption etc. ! Since its often very difficult for the players to find out about its existence, we all know: As long as there are humans playing we may see those things happen. I for one just want to make clear, being a hobby developer and knowing how much work the creation of such a game is and how fast such a behavior can ruin it, I totally refrain from anything like this. And you can be sure that I will do everything possible to detect and ban such incidents from this game. So you can expect an absolute zero-tolerance regarding this subject!

After some more sleepless nights, the website of Galaxy Online - The Tournament is finally online. I really hope you enjoy it. The site and account management is fully implemented too. In the coming weeks I will also open up the forum and post more information regarding the beta of the game. So be the first and register now for your free Galaxy Online account. If you want to support this project, help spread the word to your friends on facebook, twitter etc. !

It’s done! After almost 2 years of continuous work during my free time, the last milestone is achieved and finally turns the project from boring data/numbers/code… into a complete game!
I have to say I was totally surprised on how difficult it turned out to be in order to create the TCR (Tactical Combat Replay) window and get the animations going. I really wanted to make sure that the combat feels fast paced instead of just turn by turn. This proved to be really complex in terms of synchronizing game animations and linear replay data. But after several sleepless nights, I am quite happy how it turned out (remember that I am only using 2D objects!).
All combat actions are almost complete, only the combat log events are still missing.
As you can see below, I have attached a screenshot of the TCR window for your viewing pleasure, I hope you like it!
There is still a lot of work ahead of me (see dev status for more information) and I am also in the process of creating a little teaser video of Galaxy Online – The Tournament. So stay tuned.

(T)actical (C)ombat (R)eplay Window

A few days ago I have started with the Tactical Combat Replay System (TCR) of Galaxy Online - The Tournament. It will help you to find the strengths and weaknesses of your ships by visualizing the combat. One part of the TCR will be the basic rendering of the ships attacks. Since I am only using a simple 2D image of the ship itself I tried to find a way to make it feel a little more dynamic. This is what I came up so far...

For the explosions I am using different types of particles. The numbers indicate the damage done to the shield as well as the core of the ship. Enjoy.

The last weeks were very busy. I managed to finish the economy system as well as the account managment site (so everything is prepared for alpha). Basically, the client is now fully functional (I have already added some sound effects too). The only thing missing is the visualization of combat - this will be my focus for this month. However the time has come and I finally want to show you some of the progress meanwhile, so I have uploaded the very first screenshots of the alpha client :). Hope you like it... oh and on a side note, the FAQ and develpoment status section have been updated too!

Shipyard

Ship construction

Tournament registration (AP assignment)

I have updated the FAQ of the game. The game is coming along nicely and once the economy system is fully implemented (which should be by the end of this month), I will start with the internal alpha as well as the visualization of combat replays.