New UFOs (Looking for Artists)

It's been pointed out that there's a couple of additional UFOs which didn't make the final cut for the game. There are already air combat and xenonpedia images for them, but there aren't images for the UFO which can be used for ground combat.

As it might be useful to have a couple of additional UFOs available for modding purposes, I thought therefore that I'd highlight this and see if there are any artists out there who'd like to have a go at producing some images which could be used for them.

The two UFOs in question are the Destroyer and the Dreadnought, and there are images in the aircombat and xenonpedia folders which show what they look like. It might be possible to use some of the existing UFOs as a base, as the Destroyer has some resemblance to the Corvette and the Dreadnought looks a bit like the top section of a Cruiser.

In addition, on the same topic, it might be cool to have ground combat images for Bombers, Strike Cruisers and all of the alien fighter craft (Fighter, Heavy Fighter and Interceptor) in case anyone fancied making a mod where you could recover those in ground combat, too.

Excellent! I'd also go as far as suggesting some brainstorming might be engaged for additional entirely new UFOs: what is the UFO you always wanted to see in the game? Do you have fresh and original ideas what kind of a gameplay niche it could fill? If so, feel free to share!

I did just remember that my brother's fairly apt when it comes to artistic things and has Xenonauts on his Steam wishlist. I wonder if I can bribe him with a copy of the game?

Talk about neglecting your family, kabill! What are you waiting for, mate

Also does your brother know of your legendary status across here?

Weren't those ufos so large that when devs were planning to include them, they were considering only having mission inside the ufo mission without breaching the ufo?

In which case, couldn't you just use alien base stuff to create unique maps for them?

Yeah, I feel the exterior areas become pretty much redundant and boring after cruisers. Large ufos are big enough to be meaningful as is.

EDIT: Written before Skitso's reply.

I honestly don't know.

Looking at the air combat images, the Destroyer is roughly 2/3 the size of a Carrier, while the Dreadnought is slightly larger than the Battleship. So based on that, I don't think there's a reason why you wouldn't have them work like the other UFO types.

I also think you'd need to include somewhere for the dropship to be on the map, so you'd need some kind of outside part anyway I believe. (Hmm, actually I think I could solve that issue by adding in a new submaps for the dropships which don't actually have the dropship on them)

Not a bad idea to throw out, though. Has given me other, entirely unrelated ideas too.

I guess it's a matter of personal preference, I always enjoyed the two-part feel of each GC mission, even after Battleships started appearing. Probably it has to do with the number of aliens as well (I'm using heavily boosted aliens so I'll get in a situation where 4-5 Harridans are simultaneously sniping me from rooftops every now and then).

One thing that could help would be if somehow bigger UFOs are tied with different, specifically designed maps. Don't know if it is possible to tie map variations to UFO type at the moment though.

Of course indoors missions also have merit and would deliver refreshing variety, as well. At this point I'd rather have that as a different mission type than the generic crash sites though (such as assaulting landed ships for instance?)

UFOs are placed on maps as submaps, so you could easily have specially designed maps for specific UFO types.

Does that mean you can have 4 different general maps for scout, 4 for corvette, 4 for cruiser, etc? If so, I got it all wrong. And it could definitely add much more variety to GC.

Yes, you could.

At the moment, there's some overlap on the maps used for UFOs. For example, the same map might be used for both Scout and Corvette UFOs. But if you really wanted, you could set it so that there's only one type of UFO that can spawn. (You could do this for dropships as well, for what it's worth).

I'm not sure there's much of an advantage to doing this, though, since actually you're reducing your map pool. If you have four Scout maps and four Corvette maps, you've got four of each. If you uses all eight of those maps for both UFO types, you've got eight of each instead.

EDIT: Completely off-topic aside, but this thread has helped be figure out how you could get the dropzone to spawn above ground level, which is something that's bothered me in the past.

Yes, you could.

At the moment, there's some overlap on the maps used for UFOs. For example, the same map might be used for both Scout and Corvette UFOs. But if you really wanted, you could set it so that there's only one type of UFO that can spawn. (You could do this for dropships as well, for what it's worth).

I'm not sure there's much of an advantage to doing this, though, since actually you're reducing your map pool. If you have four Scout maps and four Corvette maps, you've got four of each. If you uses all eight of those maps for both UFO types, you've got eight of each instead.

Generally speaking this is spot on.

Although if you tie in the crew variations you could come up with interesting tactical choices, or dare I say it, plot themed missions! It's a bit early stages to be discussing this though. Once the content has been expanded and we have say double the alien races to play with the discussion would look different.

Anyway, thanks for opening my eyes on this particular topic. One can learn something new each day.

EDIT: also, what XenoMask said!

Problem with 8 maps for each is that it makes it possible that you have seen all map variants before reaching corvette meaning that when you reach corvette you are like "Oh, its same map but ship is different" making the maps for new ships feeling less new and unique.

Hm, yeah, that's a fair point.

EDIT: It might also override the not-having-the-same-map-twice-in-a-row feature.

You want a good suggestion? Do a mod where you scrap the existing UFOs. Build a UFO tileset like the original X-Com does, where they are square shapes with destructible walls (you can use the existing interior tiles too). You'd only need like ten new hull "walls".

That way you've got modular UFOs and can add loads of them. Redoing the art for the existing UFOs would be easier than adding new UFOs using the existing system, believe me.

Yeah, and that would make all your work on FitH redundant! Great, isn't it!?

I might even consider officially sponsoring (i.e. paying for the artist time needed) if I got a persuasive enough proposal on this. The UFO designs in the final version of the game were one of the worst design decisions we ever made.

Could you elaborate on that? What do you feel is the most dissapointing feature of the ufo designs for you?

I'm very happy to hear this, Chris, and I totally respect your criteria. Though (without disagreeing with the judgment) I'd like to note you are a bit harsh on your accomplishments, your UFO designs were what sold the game to me. I was literally buzzing to see each new UFO I downed and this single handedly got me through the first several hundred ground missions without experiencing any fatigue (before bumping on the Carrier long alien moves).

So, anybody got any design suggestions? The more persuasive, the better

The problem with modular design - in my opinion anyway - is that I'm not convinced that a modular UFO system would look as good. I really like the UFO designs in Xenonauts and each has its own distinct aesthetic and I'm not sure you could pull off anything as good using a modular system.

That said, I guess it wouldn't be so different from the Nissan huts in terms of composition and they work very well. I was a bit unsure about whether roofs could look good, but the Nissan huts are probably the exemplar of how to deal with that to ensure they don't just appear flat and box-like.

Edit:

@Chris: What do you mean by "decent enough proposal?" (by which I mean, what would be being proposed, exactly?)

They'd basically have to look like the original X-Com UFOs...or possibly a little like those in the new XCOM.

So a proposal would involve finding a coder competent enough to look into the game code and disable the "hide walls" functionality on the current UFOs, plus some floorplans for the UFOs you wanted to implement already mocked up in the game for everyone to test. Once you had those we could make some special hull tiles to build the maps with, and if things still worked then we could pay to redo the artwork for the UFOs themselves on the strategic map (which isn't really that much work tbh).

The final result of the UFO designs we chose for Xenonauts was acceptable, but it took so much effort to get them working it was ridiculous. I also really regret not having destructible outer hulls tbh.

So a proposal would involve finding a coder competent enough to look into the game code and disable the "hide walls" functionality on the current UFOs, plus some floorplans for the UFOs you wanted to implement already mocked up in the game for everyone to test. Once you had those we could make some special hull tiles to build the maps with, and if things still worked then we could pay to redo the artwork for the UFOs themselves on the strategic map (which isn't really that much work tbh).

I'm quite happy to have a look at putting some interior designs together in case I can make anything you like the look of.

Out of wonder, why would the hide-walls function need removing? Presumably, if the UFOs are modular, then the new walls would work like any other wall in the game so there'd be no need to use the current UFO wall designations.

EDIT: In terms of new designs, I presume it would be best to ensure that they fit in the same size submaps as the existing ones, so you don't need to go through all of the maps and re-position all of the UFO submaps on them.

I would absolutely love to help with this project. I mostly do blender 3d artwork and then convert it to sprite based images for editing or finals, if there is anything I can do give me a message on the forums!

It's probably worth signposting the thread which I created in response to the discussion about modular UFOs:

http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/10974-Modular-UFOs-Discussion-and-Suggestions

Is this project dead now?