What do you plan on trying to implement into the game before beta ends? Have some goals in mind? Do you have a foreseeable timeline for this or “just as long as it takes”?
When beta ends do you plan on continuing development in the same fashion or will it be expansions - or moving onto other games entirely?
What things interest you the most in adding to the game in the long term? More races/hulls or racial specific modules/ships/weapons/etc? More modules and more addition to the FleetHQ? More added to the aspect of multiplayer in challenges/tournaments/replays? Do you have things that you “must” get in that hasn’t yet? Probably the hardest aspect to keep is to balance but wondering what you would like to see the most.
I wonder about the future of GSB also. It has the potential to become a huge growing game or shrink into nothingness, all depending on how Cliffski handles the project and keeps it going. I’ve seen with Left4Dead if you make a game and start working on a sequel instead of patches you can cut your community in half instantly. If Cliffski manages to keep a pace on fixing/balancing/adding to GSB then the community will just grow until it would be a safe bet to go for making an expansion or sequel. We will see, Cliffski, we will see…
So far so good though on the patches, no complaints from me keep it up.
If GSB will bring profit, why not to create downloadable content every 1-2-3 weeks. Like MMO`s, but in this case GSB is somewhat special, so some MMO rules apply to it. Basically never ending story
I certainly want to continue working on the game, because it’s great fun. As an indie developer, I’m at the mercy of harsh economics. Basically you have to think a game ahead, because you don’t earn a penny (and in fact spend a lot of money) during the development of a game, so you need to start working on the next thing at the point at which you think you will need a new game release in a year or so (GSB took a year to make). This is probably one reason why developers love MMO games, because there is a more constant income coming in, and it’s less nerve racking. I could only make GSB because I was living from the royalties of the previous game (Kudos 2) and it did get pretty tight towards the end.
Anyway, GSB isn’t properly released yet so it’s too early to tell if it will be a huge stonking success or a total failure Obviously I’m aiming at the former.
In terms of extra content, I’d like to continue to add new stuff to the game post-release. Ideally I’d combine some free improvements and additions with the possibility of doing a proper expansion at some point. I’m quite a big fan of downloadable (paid) content as a gamer, as well as as a developer. If THQ would sell extra armies for Company Of heroes I’d grab my credit card instantly. I just think that this gives the player some more choice. I’m sure a lot of GSB players love the game as it is, and are satisfied with four races, whereas some might prefer to have more races and ship variety. I’d like to give players the option of that one day.
I really like what valve and stardock have done in terms of post-release support and improvements for their games, but you can only really do that when the game itself is a big hit. I would love to be able to do a similar thing though, whether that’s adding an entire strategic campaign thing around the game, or better online features or a ship editor, I have no idea just yet. My current focus is making the game balanced and stable and fun in its current form, ready for release.
Well, i want to support you so im in for paid expansion(s). Especially waiting for railguns (hopefully in expansion)
Actually paid content would be logical. What’s good for GSB community if developer does not have money to make this game better? And it is not about a game, it is about people having fun. Every person in earth wants to have fun and GSB does a freaking good job bringing fun to players.
I’m having a wonderful time with the beta. I just really hope you have plans to sell the “battle system” to Stardocks or something. This kind of fighting mechanic would be perfect for the Galactic Civilization-series!
While creating challenges and beating your friends up with your fleet is a great deal of fun, I think there is a huge potential in a turn based strategy game. Just think about it.
While a well polished / balanced “vanilla” game is key to getting a decently sized userbase, once that has been achieved, what would take it to the next echelon of popularity and awesomeness?
Well, to harness that community by allowing them to add new ships, modules, levels, game-modes, ai rules, guis, etc etc.
Ideally as much of the game-logic as possible would be exposed to a standard scripting language like LUA, leaving only the rendering / core in code.
Here is my ultimate dream of GSB … the downloadable challenges are not just a fleet, they are scripts! So you want to make a challenge and post it for people, where all ships loose 1% hp every second, ships explosion radius is 50x, and the enemy fleet is a custom-made UBER-dreadnought that takes up half the screen?? Ok, make a new blank/template challenge, then go load up the scripts in notepad++ and make it happen!
Sure, as a random example, Cliffski could probably expand the in-game gui for user created challenges to allow a few things like custom spacial anomalies by picking a modifier from a list and setting its % value. But I do not expect a single developer to implement every cool idea that everyone in the community has. What I would like to see at some point is development essentially turned-over to the community with Cliffski only needing to work on extending the power exposed to them and adding gui niceness to the creation-process. Now THAT would be gratuitous…
Strong moddability is essential. We will surely see the full conversion Star Trek and Star Wars mods and many more. Such mods allow the developer to tap in to millions of Sci’ Fi’ fans around the world. At the same time, it avoids legal issues for the developer. If the mod makers get told, by the copyright holders, to stop distributing their mod, it’s probably already too late - due to the way files spread around on the Internet.
Piggyback on the success of popular franchises - with no licensing costs!
Obviously I’m aiming at the former.