Jump to content

Custom ships or Replicas?


Miedein

Recommended Posts

So sitting here working on some ship designs in Space Engineers while waiting for DU. I find myself asking, what kind of ship would I want to build. As I plan to make it as a ship designer in DU and hope to see many of my designs being flown by all you lovely people. So in terms of single seat, small exploration craft. What do you guys like more? Some custom new design? Or would you rather be flying around in replica ships like an X-wing, Tie Fighter, Federation Shuttle, Battlestar fighter, to name a few. As I'm sure there is already going to be several variations of x-wings in the game I'm just curious what the general populace would be looking for in terms of small 1 man ships. Do you want raw combat potential, or maybe something long range exploration with endurance and survivability in mind. Curious to hear what you guys think, and also curious to hear what other designers are looking to doing as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just be careful with the "replica" ideas.

 

Nobody will be any the wiser if you build a pixel-perfect copy of an X-wing in your single-player SE game. 

 

But the moment that happens in an MMO where potentially tens of thousands of players will see it, buy and fly it, the owners of the original IP will quite likely have an issue with it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, even the problem there with original IP's having an issue. If you want a sleek looking fighter that's both powerful and efficient, it's likely going to look awfully similar to something already existing either in fiction or RL. I could build you a fighter and someone come up and say, "Hey that looks like a Z-95 Head Hunter." Or, "That looks like an F-18 ect ect. Just look at Youtube's current system of DMCA claims. Designs are inspired by, if not modeled after or in some cases, straight carbon copy replicas. You would think, however, that in a game where it's all about player creative freedom to build whatever they want. If the entire population wants to fly around in X-wings. There's not really a whole lot that can be done about it from Disney, other than them telling the developers to delete all the ships that look like stuff from their IP. Then you could have any nation's air force even coming in and saying, "Hey those look like our jets. Get rid of them." So then we're stuck having to fly around in cubes. Where Star Trek comes in and says, "Hey those all borg cubes, get rid of them." 

You see the conundrum that that opens up? I mean. Show me something that someone claims is completely 100% original in design, and I'll show you other designs that are similar enough you can make an argument that it's been used elsewhere. 

It's really a problem with today's entertainment as a whole. Sure games, movies, TV shows have different stories. But the plots are all the same. 

Maybe I'm just rambling at this point cause its 7 am. But hey could be a good topic to discuss. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is a difference between ships being similar because they are the same type of craft and one being a replica of another.  You were asking about making replicas and legally the IP owner can choose to not allow that.  Disney in particular has the reputation of being fiercely protective of their IP.  What the players or developers would like this game to be does not change what the laws are.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Even still. Replica or no. The original question I asked was the type of ship players would be most interested in, in terms of a small, single-seat craft. Maneuverability and fire power? Or endurance and survivability. Of course all this is speculation to me on things like fuel use, what we actually need to have with us on long journies, O2 supplies, all that other stuff. 

 

I would assume things like needing some form of fuel to power ships, generating oxygen to breath, and maybe even hopefully food would be with the game. Maybe not with the alpha or beta. But I do like some survival elements to my games after all. So long as things like food is balanced to where its more a chore to keep food coming in just to stay alive having to shove entire herds and gardens down my throat daily to stay alive.... 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, NanoDot said:

Just be careful with the "replica" ideas.

 

Nobody will be any the wiser if you build a pixel-perfect copy of an X-wing in your single-player SE game. 

 

But the moment that happens in an MMO where potentially tens of thousands of players will see it, buy and fly it, the owners of the original IP will quite likely have an issue with it.

In my experience player creations don't run into that issue.  Whether it just flew under the radar, or they didn't care... idk.  As soon as one company uses another's stuff, then they are on it immediately 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am thinking of building endurance ships as I will be attempting to explore locations for a base of operations to be established. 

 

As for the IP issue others brought up; it once was said in Ecclesiastes 1:9 (NIV)

 

9 What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We don't really know enough about the combat system to give meaningful answers about what types of ships we prefer, because who knows what the combat meta will favor. However, while I'm sure there will always be a market for replicas, especially once the game becomes more developed, the vast majority of people will look for performance over style, especially the bigger orgs in major conflicts, who will be using a large majority of the ships (because theirs will keep getting blown up). 

 

That being said, if I can make a replica Firefly work as an effective anything, I'm going to fly that, because Firefly. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm building racing craft first, because racing is one of the activities that will be easy to do even in the pre-alpha given that the testers will have access to semi-unlimited materials, and will only really be able to build and fly.

 

That means light-weight, fast, maneuverable, and able to survive a minor crash. Also FLASHY, with some hull space for designs. No one is going to want an ugly speed-monster, its gotta be a pretty speed-monster.

 

Hopefully though that process will give me ideas for where armor is going to need to go, and what impact it has on speed and maneuverability. From there, I'm going to be designing high performance military ships favoring speed and maneuverability over armor and firepower.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have built a test model of a deep space exploration ship loosely based on the EVE Tengu  model as it's a very functional design. It's kind of become rather different actually in SE where it is able to launch smaller ships from different levels of hangers both on the sides and bottom of the main ship. How this idea will adopt into DU I do not know yet, but it will be a focus for me to try and get it built as soon as I can. I think SE certainly is a good start if you have not built in voxels before. The scripting is a lot more powerful than I originally thought as well.

 

There's a lot of EVE ships available in SE but as mentioned above I could see CCP become much more aggressive in defending their IP in a game which really will be looking to attract a lot of the same player base (which SE really does not). Taking cues and ideas is IMO never a bad idea, but build it yourself and not copy a 3D model. AFAIK there will not be an option to directly import 3D models in DU anyway.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 100% Custom ships that may have a few replica features I like but they will still be unique ships I design. I will probably build one ship and keep improving it but no more than three ships because I plan on mainly focusing on weapons system when weapons are implement into DU.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm going to build what I want. if one day I decide to build a Star Wars ship, I'll build a Star Wars ship. if another day I decide to build a Stargate ship, guess what? I'll build a Stargate ship. I am no way concerned about copy right infringement at all. You think Space Engineers and Empyrion developers are getting sewed everyday because they get workshop submissions of vessels that look like Star Wars and Stargate ships? Nope. This has been discussed ad nauseam in the SE and EGS forums. I don't foresee an issue.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Considering the setup of engines nothing will look exactly as IP builds, and yet because of setup you will take into account efficiency and function first of all.

Fuel consumption, how well it can handle, what's the purpose etc. There is many factors when applied, will determine almost naturally how the ships will start to look.

 

Remember for engineers there is no half empty/full glass. Glass is twice as big as it should be ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...