UFO Design

[Aaron]

I was the poor fool who did them, but we ended up not going with the "sliced up" implementation for UFOs - we made it as far as the Corvette with that approach before the size of even that UFO made it impractically complex for our tools.

Instead we use a system where the UFO outer hull is a single image (or in the case of the larger UFOs, multiple large chunks), which the game "intelligently" hides when you reveal any space within the UFO so you can see what's going on inside there. This approach was also a nightmare to get working, but it did at least work; it's still not all the way done even now, but it's pretty close to working correctly - I just spent about 2 days updating and modifying the UFO doors/floor so you cannot see the ground through the UFO door "hole" if viewing the craft from another level while the door is open (this update also includes destructible doors FYI).

I have said it in another thread, but if anyone wants to try and make their own modular style of UFOs I would be happy to give them assistance and advice via PM - I think you could probably make them look pretty good, and you could do fun things like walking on top of the UFOs, multiple breach points etc...

Edited August 1, 2013 by Aaron

[Ishantil]

Sounds like you put a whole lot of work into the system. Thanks for doing that.

And I love how you guys are happy to work with the community, Aaron. Good show!

[Mytheos]

You know, I personally say just cheat reality on the UFOs

Add Teleporters that go DOWN from the main floor plans, that expand the size of the UFOs under the assumption part is "buried" under the ground.

Even if it wouldnt logically match up just perfect to the UFO hull design.

But UFO's really need expanded so far as depth and tactical fun.

I know the current system is set, but it seems, even a DLC redesign would be worth it, as it seems the current system is just a mess to work with.

Seems like it is just riddled with hard to fix bugs...hull disappearing, shooting through walls, accuracy issues inside, shooting through the doors causing issues, throwing grenades being problematic in one way or another.

It seems weeks could go by trying to balance the house of cards that is UFO design and when finally done every little change could have it all come tumbling down at any moment creating several new bugs.

At some point you have to realize its better to just cut your losses. Even if you ended up with some generic bland UFO, people would appreciate it more if it was fun, and worked.

Otherwise you have to accept it as being the one thing holding the game back from greatness.

But again I would just cheat and expand them down.

[Black Cat]

I was the poor fool who did them, but we ended up not going with the "sliced up" implementation for UFOs - we made it as far as the Corvette with that approach before the size of even that UFO made it impractically complex for our tools.

Instead we use a system where the UFO outer hull is a single image (or in the case of the larger UFOs, multiple large chunks), which the game "intelligently" hides when you reveal any space within the UFO so you can see what's going on inside there. This approach was also a nightmare to get working, but it did at least work; it's still not all the way done even now, but it's pretty close to working correctly - I just spent about 2 days updating and modifying the UFO doors/floor so you cannot see the ground through the UFO door "hole" if viewing the craft from another level while the door is open (this update also includes destructible doors FYI).

I have said it in another thread, but if anyone wants to try and make their own modular style of UFOs I would be happy to give them assistance and advice via PM - I think you could probably make them look pretty good, and you could do fun things like walking on top of the UFOs, multiple breach points etc...

This is why I chose to buy this game early and will support you guys for a long long time. Why because when we ask a question a lot of times we get answered. Thank you very much for taking the time to reply to my query Aaron.