[Game] Time Travel multiplayer RTS

[Innociv]

http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?story=57911

This sums it up I think:

"Chris used a neat strategy against me in a memorable free-for-all game between him, Konrad, and myself. I launched a massive surprise attack on Chris's mining base, so he traveled back in time, prepared a large fleet to counter my attack and succeeded. However, in the present I acquired nukes and sent a nuke back to the end of the battle that destroyed his remaining fleet. Before it was over, he jumped back further in time, moved his mining base and undid his counter attack. Since his fleet had left the area and my army had conquered it, my nuclear blast from the future decimated my own forces! Right at that time, Konrad came at me with his forces, so I didn't have time to undo my nuclear blast."

I believe the graphics are just for a prototype proof of concept. I think they've been spending years making the gameplay solid, and have another year to put some half decent graphics. But I'm not really sure. It looks like a small dev, so it might actually look like that. But doesn't matter much if the gameplay is great and it's cheap.
They say they're looking for a publisher so they can get art done and stuff, and that pretty much just art and balancing is left. The UI and controls look solid already.

 

[smokeythebear]

Looks interesting but not all I read was good. Like if a paradox happens you have a 50/50 chance of unit surviving.

So if I build a few tanks and attack my enemy, but he sends forces back in time to destroy my tank factory, then when the timewave hits the outcome of the game could be up to chance and not strategy, since all my tanks could survive, or none. And if CoH has taught us anything it's that random chance is not good for competitive games...

 

[Innociv]

But then he said something about if you're really good, you can control it better.

Like the 50/50 chance thing has something to do with how there is a maximum distance you can go into the past and then things resolve.

Who knows, but it sounds awesome. They have to handle paradoxes SOMEHOW, because they are paradoxes.

Much better than just not allowing a tank to attack the factory that built it.

 

[smokeythebear]

If you paid attention he says paradoxes are resolved by that time wave interval thing, ie the multicolored waves

I don't know how well this game is going to do. I play a lot of RTS and the typical RTS player can barely wrap their head around CoH or RA3s gameplay mechanics.

 

[Innociv]

The typical FPS player can't wrap their head around RO's freeaim and bullet drop.

 

[Tomcat_ha]

my head is bursting

but i must try this

 

[Rak]

Looks like special crafted for nerds

 

[The Masta]

This looks pretty interesting.

 

[Dillinger]

The amount of strategy here would be absolutely mind-blowing, and I think that'll be it's main problem. Too hardcore, even for the hardcore! I had a tough time wrapping my brain around all that stuff that guy was saying and I've read Stephen Hawking's Brief History of Time and Universe in a Nutshell multiple times!

Good luck for them finding a publisher because they will want to dumb it down, regardless of how innovative that feature is.

I just see this game as being endlessly frustrating when people keep going back in time to undo your ***-kicking.

 

[smokeythebear]

I don't think it will be that hard. With the visualizations it's pretty easy to understand. Plus instead of time in the past spending energy it's used per-order, meaning a lot of attack-move and very little micro. I think they should just go all out hardcore since those are the only people who will play it. Make energy spent on time not orders/have complex economy/microable units, it will make starcraft look like a slow rts.

 

[Innociv]

The amount of strategy here would be absolutely mind-blowing, and I think that'll be it's main problem. Too hardcore, even for the hardcore! I had a tough time wrapping my brain around all that stuff that guy was saying and I've read Stephen Hawking's Brief History of Time and Universe in a Nutshell multiple times!

Good luck for them finding a publisher because they will want to dumb it down, regardless of how innovative that feature is.

I just see this game as being endlessly frustrating when people keep going back in time to undo your ***-kicking.

Will it'll be hard to master? Damn right, it should be.
That's what RTS are about. What they were about before becoming pansy like Dawn of War 2.. RTS are supposed to have so much depth that people are still figuring out new strategies 10 years later (starcraft2).

It'll just be like Starcraft2. SC2 is enjoyable with noob vs. noob. It's enjoyable as intermediate vs. intermediate. It's enjoyable as pro vs. pro. The game looks perfectly playable for newer players, but of COURSE a better player will beat them. Shouldn't the better player win?..

Keep in mind you can go back in time to undo their undoing your ***-kicking.

It adds so much more to the game, I think at least, where you can't just put all your eggs in one basket. You can't relie on this one massive attack. You can't relie on building this one unit, because they can see you were going to build all those units and make counters to them, etc.

 

[Lt_Kettch]

Will it'll be hard to master? Damn right, it should be.
That's what RTS are about. What they were about before becoming pansy like Dawn of War 2.. RTS are supposed to have so much depth that people are still figuring out new strategies 10 years later (starcraft2).

It'll just be like Starcraft2. SC2 is enjoyable with noob vs. noob. It's enjoyable as intermediate vs. intermediate. It's enjoyable as pro vs. pro. The game looks perfectly playable for newer players, but of COURSE a better player will beat them. Shouldn't the better player win?..

Keep in mind you can go back in time to undo their undoing your ***-kicking.

It adds so much more to the game, I think at least, where you can't just put all your eggs in one basket. You can't relie on this one massive attack. You can't relie on building this one unit, because they can see you were going to build all those units and make counters to them, etc.

This game haz ballz lol

 

[NoxNoctum]

I don't get how this could possibly work. I mean it sounds awesome, but since it's a MULTIPLAYER game and BOTH players are going back in time constantly to mess with each other, you're going to have 2 completely different parallel "universes" with different outcomes. How can that possibly work?

EDIT: OK reading the FAQ now... I don't get how the paradoxes are resolved though. Like if you're a good player timing it so the timewave helps you... hoes does this work?

Definitely sounds VERY cool though.

 

[smokeythebear]

EDIT: OK reading the FAQ now... I don't get how the paradoxes are resolved though. Like if you're a good player timing it so the timewave helps you... hoes does this work?

Definitely sounds VERY cool though.

Ok I will try to explain.

When a paradox occurs it is resolved by the timewave. From the video you can see that the time waves occur at fixed intervals in time, so I think it would be easier to think of them as static events.

Each event is like hitting the refresh button, it finds the information from what was changed in the past (the sum of all the changes of the preceding intervals), and applies that to the present. So if I move a unit in the past then return to the present, the unit will be in it's original location until the timewave hits. This means you would have to time changes in the timeline to intervals between timewaves.

It's never really revealed how some paradoxs work though.

 

[Innociv]

Yeah the devs said its' not a 50/50 chance thing, it's just that's the best way to put it to someone new.

He said a good player can manipulate the paradoxes to work in their favor, but in the average game the paradoxes aren't going to happen because of how confusing them are for new players.

It's just like any good game: More experienced players win.
I don't know why some people have an issue with that.


I didn't understand how multiplayer could possibly work either, until looking at the video. They.. really have their **** together with the time thing. It's not just some gimmick. They just need to make good rts gameplay to go along with it.