Project Cryoship Initializes

ID:98986
 
Jul 21 2010, 12:14 pm (Edited on Jul 21 2010, 12:57 pm)

Poll: Should I just go ahead and release my unfinished games?

Yes 45% (5)
No 45% (5)
Mudkips 9% (1)

The polls are now closed.

Potential employment looms as a specter over the endless void of my free time. It's dark and not a little scary in such a void, time seems to have no meaning, and consequently what is motivation but a fleeting dream? Thus, having even such a limitation as the mere possibility of a job provides some much needed context.

Furthermore, I've fallen into a very good habit of burning 500-1000 calories a day on exercise. It takes hours of low-intensity exercise, during which I've most recently been watching kids anime I'm not particularly proud to admit I've been watching, but my motivation has sharply increased. Seems a bit of my true self emerges whenever I get myself to exercise.

So I'm going to restart BYOND development. My 4X/RPG hybrid being tentatively titled "Project Cryoship" will fixate on an idea that my mind seems to be returning to often enough that I think it's something I really want to do:

Basically, the player is 20th/21st century people (like you and me) who died and had their remains sent to cryonics. Next thing you know, you wake up in the distant future to discover that you're aboard a ship whose sole purpose is to facilitate the revival of you and your fellow fossils.

From there, the game becomes a full fledged Sci-Fi RPG with some strategic elements. Each server is essentially its own cryoship in its own pocket of the galaxy, enabling players to define their own adventures. Each cryoship will have control consoles to travel around the universe, and a mission: to colonize the sector, beating back an ever-increasing threat to the survival of the human race.

Part Space Station 13, part Star Trek, part Battlestar Galactica. That's the goal, anyway.
Jul 21 2010, 12:31 pm
I've always felt compelled to release my unfinished code but as others have suggested. Don't. You will most certainly revisit at some point down the line. I think the biggest concern with open source is rips. You wouldn't want to start a bunch of sci-fi rips would you... would you?

Arranging a partnership with a specific person who is really interested in taking a project forward is a totally different matter.

I think that should happen more on BYOND but...

ts
Jul 21 2010, 12:36 pm
I was thinking more along the lines of just releasing the files needed to play the games, not the source, so that curious players could at least play what I did complete. The idea is that it would better demonstrate what I have been working on, while giving players an opportunity to provide feedback on past projects of mine that they might be interested in seeing more development occur.
Jul 21 2010, 12:58 pm
Geldonyetich wrote:
I was thinking more along the lines of just releasing the files needed to play the games, not the source, so that curious players could at least play what I did complete. The idea is that it would better demonstrate what I have been working on, while giving players an opportunity to provide feedback on past projects of mine that they might be interested in seeing more development occur.

Ahh... didn't catch that. In that case, absolutely not. People rarely have anything nice to say about a partially made game. It's always "suggestions" or worse, no comments. Which translates to more work, which mean more weight, and without the element of surprise, you have little gas to run with.

So my vote still stands as "No". Don't get me wrong, I'd love to check out any work you've done but I'm well aware of the reasons and risks of doing so.

ts
Jul 21 2010, 1:03 pm
Hmm... true, true.

Perhaps if the motivation on my part is to simply show off I've been working on things and to open it for feedback, I aught to create a few hubs but just populate it with screenshots. If players want to leave feedback, they can still drop it on the Discuss portion of the hub.

Yes, it would still generate negativity in regards to the general partial completeness of the thing, but the damage would be mitigated to a level in which the potential hype of the works would exceed.
Jul 21 2010, 1:05 pm
If the game's playable and you just need to balance, tweak, fix small bugs and the like, go ahead and release it. If it has game-breaking bugs or you can't actually play it you probably shouldn't release it.
Jul 21 2010, 1:16 pm
Many of my previous projects have sort of a basic sandbox aspect to them, but are missing an actual reason to play. They're decent enough toys, but not much of a game.
Jul 21 2010, 1:19 pm
Oh, well if it's at least working then I don't see any harm in releasing it. Maybe once the feedback starts coming in you'll be motivated enough to finish it proper.
Jul 21 2010, 1:40 pm
I think ship battles would be pretty fun.

You should look into this.
Jul 21 2010, 1:54 pm
I always release as soon a possible. Getting feedback is hard enough without restricting access.
Jul 22 2010, 12:32 pm (Edited on Jul 22 2010, 1:08 pm)
I suppose I'll just close the poll right there. 5 in favor, 5 opposed, 1 for mudkips, and a mysterious 1% of the vote missing. Where is that deciding 1% of the vote? I suppose it's whether I'm inclined to do so.

I'm up to my shoulders in Project Cryoship now. I'm starting from scratch, no imported code, although I may import art assets, and use of libraries is fine. I'm keeping things so simple, sticking to basic BYOND functionality, that I suspect the game will be playable in well under a week, although at that point it's time to add substance.

It seems the hardest part to nail down is the RPG context. A sandbox is all well and good, but I'd like to give the players a purpose other than just farting around.