How to make a small game massive:

(This is my first blog post, so excuse any mistakes and if the overall quality is poor.)
(This is also my entry into the Jumpgate Beta Key contest, being hosted by Bad_Panda)


The Days of Old,

I need you, fellow GAXers, go back with me. Back in time, to 1993, before the 3D accelerator and before the Halos. Back to a time, where Lucasarts finally figured themselves out and released X-WING, and started the space gaming genre. X-WING was a crude game, adapted from old flight simulators for the sake of making the game more fast and arcady, than realistic and slow. And it was as it should of been. After all, Star Wars? Of course it should be fast and without any regard to Earth borne physics. The game was crude, but its claim to fame laid in its design and concepts, of fun and fast space combat inside of a popular and thorough universe, already popularized into the minds of a generation. This was the birth point for the recognized space and dog fighting game genre, which we can still trace back to these first games.

Take a gander at the above photo. Do you see the crude UI and the harsh outlines of in-game objects? Such a presentation would make one think that to dogfight, in that sort of pixelated world to be impossible, or at the very least too much of a strain to be enjoyable. Think again. X-WING was remembered as one of the best games of its year, and still one of the best of its genre. That isn't saying much however, when you look farther down the time line.

As the gaming industry grew into the later 1990s, dog fighting specific games began to attract less appearance. I believe Yatzhee said it correctly when he spoke of the extinction of the adventure gaming race during the rise of the FPS genre. While the probable cause of this downturn was more of a changing world than a downfall in quality, as was claimed in reference to the adventure genre, the fact still remains that dog fighting and aerial combat games began to loose the prominence they had in the earlier days.

The first experiment, the jump into a MMO

You all know what I'm talking about, the original Jumpgate, released on September 25th, 2001. The game was good, having a believable environment, an interactive economy, and a solid, if not unintuitive combat system. However, this respectable cross-genre experiment was broken by the limitations of the real world. Only a few months after launch, the original publisher, 3DO, dropped support for the game. The developer, NetDevil, quickly scrambled, securing player data and additional server support from third parties to keep the game online. Perhaps due to expert maneuvering on NetDevil's part in response to a clunky launch and losing their publisher, the game slowly limbers on to this day, the Worldwide server still open.


The shift toward realism and a shit load of math

If your reading this, you may have heard of a series known as the X series. First beginning in 1999 with the release of its first game, the X series moved the genre into a new direction, where the focus was on both physical and economic realism in a fictional environment. While it did well what it set out to do, the genre seemed like a far cry from the earlier, arcade focused games. If you wanted exact simulations of economic forces in a space environment, you were in nirvana. If you wanted something better described as "fun" you were in the doghouse. Unless of course you get off doing math, then all the power to ya. For a better example of the X series, there is a demo of the most recent game, X3, on steam right now. The release of the X series in 1999 and into the early 2000s marked the development of persistent and intricate economies, but this new aspect of the genre was still detached from what made it all great in the first place, the combat.

Then we have EVE Online. Take the economics of the X series, multiply is by a few factors of 10, and change out the real time combat for something more... more slow, to be nice. What EVE accomplished, was integrating the MMO structure with the economy model that had developed in the X series. What it forgot, was the combat that was unique to the genre back in the days of X-WING. It was as if it was a cousin to the original Jumpgate, as where it succeeded in economics and a sustainable business model, Jumpgate succeeded in terms of combat, and being what may be called, a "true" MMO of the dog fighting genre.


The return to the promised lands

Ahh Freelancer. Never played it myself, but I heard it was good. The genre was now slowly limping by on a few notable releases every few years. The original Freelancer took it all back to its roots, taking the development of in game economies and combining them with good ole' arcade-ish, (or at least more arcade-ish than the previous renditions,) dog fighting and blasting. At this point, in 2004, the genre had mastered taking in-game economies and a believable environment with a proper form of enjoyable combat. Another note of importance- The original Freelancer had up to 128 player multiplayer, with servers able to keep persistent environments up indefinitely. It was almost like a functioning MMO, only lacking developmental support, a more massive world, and an in-game direction.

Looking ahead, whats next?

It's 2008, and the space-fighting genre in the arcade sense is oddly missing from the headlines of the major game media. I remember an old documentary on Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge for the Xbox, in which they said vehicle based games tend to be less successful and ultimately less appraised by critics than games that center on an identifiable character. Perhaps its just a coincidence, perhaps the result of poor game quality. But look at racing games, those seem to be doing extremely well. Maybe, like the FPS's with their Doom, and strategy games with their Starcraft, this genre just needs a flagship to get behind.


Jumpgate Evolution

It seems a bit too early to tell in my opinion, but according to information I've gathered from the Jumpgate site, the game intends to be the following:

- Low system requirements, like, Geforce series 2 low,
- PVP Centered

- Two combat systems
** One of which, will be like the old Jumpgate, acclaimed for it's physics accuracy, but denounced for how hard it was to get into.
** And another, for newer pilots, which makes use of in-game inertia dampeners to make flying a bit easier to get into, as the ship will act more like a plane inside of an atmosphere, rather than in the void of space.

- Player Based economy
- Player owned stations
- Player control of PVP terriories
- A fully developed economic and trading system
- A missile combat system, best described in this interview here.
- Think EVE, but reverse the focus on economics and stats to that of real time combat.
- Currently, the development staff is at a staggering 9 people! Not that the small size is being reflected in the current shape of the game, I mean, just look at these shots!

Again, this is all very early to tell, and things are subject to change. Not to mention I kinda threw this up spontaneously. Right now, as I type this, I know of dozens of different aspects about this game that I haven't talked about, but are out there. It's just... hard to verbalize. Perhaps it's just the fanboy's feeling, but I urge you all to check out the official site and forums, as it's a good bunch of people working over there. Little things, like how the flight system will work, and little voices you hear when docked up to a station, such as pilots making jokes at each other as they flow in and out. I know I may not have done the best job explaining anything, but I hope I have you all interested.

By the way, still not hyped? Take a gander,

Teaser- Low Rez

Teaser- High Rez