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I'm busy making an far future airship building management game where you have a little crew dropped into orbit of some kind of gassy planet, their mission to mi

I'm busy making an far future airship building management game where you have a little crew dropped into orbit of some kind of gassy planet, their mission to mine resources from the atmosphere and expand their ship, diving deeper and deeper as they pick up mass. I don't want there to be giant gas balloons obstructing the view and/or gameplay that's happening, so I'm using a zero point module that can keep the ship floating at a given altitude.

taneq 3y ago
Not to complain about zero-point-module based airships, of course, but you could do as the '90s isometric RPGs did with houses, and just not render the airships' lifting bodies.
- bshipp 3y ago
  Agreed, or only render the bags at full zoom and have them dematerialize as you move in for a closer look. That way you can easily find the airships on an overview map by their large sphere but still be able to micromanage the infrastructure as you zoom in.
- animal531 3y ago
  You are correct, it is still an option. But at some point I will introduce some combat as well and I don't want the ship to have such an obvious weakpoint. It could be that I delay the combat at which point the player will have the option to have a honeycombed lifting body(/ies?) that can be armored or shielded in some way.
  - ticulatedspline 3y ago
    You're probably overthinking the realism. you do have prior art in all aspects though Zero Point - Skies of Arcadia Propeller - Final fantasy balloon with combat - Red alert 2 Kirov Airship will kinda depend on if this is 3d or not. if you're first person just shooting at the balloon portion, then yeah. go zero-point since profile will matter greatly. If this is an isometric or top down kinda game then like red alert you're just shooting a target not a piece of a target and you can just ignore damage to lifting apparatus (propellers or balloons) without breaking immersion.
    - animal531 3y ago
      Thanks for the feedback! You're right, it's not meant to be super realistic. Although it is 3d its more of a base and unit management game, so its not an issue if other entities just ignore the envelopes.

taneq 3y ago

Not to complain about zero-point-module based airships, of course, but you could do as the '90s isometric RPGs did with houses, and just not render the airships' lifting bodies.

bshipp 3y ago
Agreed, or only render the bags at full zoom and have them dematerialize as you move in for a closer look. That way you can easily find the airships on an overview map by their large sphere but still be able to micromanage the infrastructure as you zoom in.
animal531 3y ago
You are correct, it is still an option. But at some point I will introduce some combat as well and I don't want the ship to have such an obvious weakpoint. It could be that I delay the combat at which point the player will have the option to have a honeycombed lifting body(/ies?) that can be armored or shielded in some way.
- ticulatedspline 3y ago
  You're probably overthinking the realism. you do have prior art in all aspects though Zero Point - Skies of Arcadia Propeller - Final fantasy balloon with combat - Red alert 2 Kirov Airship will kinda depend on if this is 3d or not. if you're first person just shooting at the balloon portion, then yeah. go zero-point since profile will matter greatly. If this is an isometric or top down kinda game then like red alert you're just shooting a target not a piece of a target and you can just ignore damage to lifting apparatus (propellers or balloons) without breaking immersion.
  - animal531 3y ago
    Thanks for the feedback! You're right, it's not meant to be super realistic. Although it is 3d its more of a base and unit management game, so its not an issue if other entities just ignore the envelopes.