Games

This is going to be a remake of the classic ST\Miggy game Carrier Command. I don't like the word remake as it's not really going to be a remake - what I really mean is 'inspired by'. I haven't ripped off any media, and indeed it will have a new name. I will certainly be continuing some of the concepts of the original but also adding my own ideas and taking out aspects that I think slowed down the original game.

Modelled the carrier - the carrier has a moving lift, dock door and exhaust billowing from the chimney. The carrier is the pivotal point of the game - this is where you command your tactics and other vehicles. Ultimately it will have internal detail where you'll be able to see where the planes and amphibious ants are held. There will also be a bridge where you will be able to control all the action from. The carrier is also missing weapons - I'm still yet to model these.
Effects wise the carrier rocks in the water (I think) realistically. As it moves it leaves a wake behind and splashes up water in the front. It looks much better moving than in the screenshots :)

The wasps have been modelled and a basic physics engine has been written to handle the flight. The flight is by no means going to be realistic - it's just going to be enough to give the feeling of flight. The main reason for this is to keep everything pretty straightforward. It is not meant to be a simualation but a fun game where you can blow things up without having to worry about stalling the wasp.
The planes will be able to carry missiles as well as other various smaller weapons. I'm still not sure of the details, but give me a shout if you have any ideas. The AI of the wasp at the moment is very simplistic as there isn't a lot to do. However, they fly from one waypoint to the next without crashing into things, which I think is a pretty good start!
The Amphibious Ants have been modelled and most of the physics are in place. Although it won't roll down hills or roll over if it's on too steep a slope, I think I might just make it impossible to tack across a steep slope so I don't even have to worry about it. After all, it would be annoying to keep rolling over anyway.
The ant bobs convincingly on the water and rolls out onto the land smoothly. I'm really pleased with how this has worked out as it was a pain in the arse to make the transition from water to land look good.

The Ants are there to set up auto build units on the islands to populate them with buildings. Depending on the properties of the island you will decide what kind of island it will be - stockpile, factory or resource. Ants can also hold virus bombs to convert an enemy island to a friendly island, although you'll have to get your Ant past the defences which is where you'd send the planes in first to take them out. The Ants will have basic weapons, but being slow moving these are for defence rather than attack. I'll be adding a turret to the top that may be able to turn independently of the ant. Not sure about how to control this yet, but I like the idea of it.

Buildings - I've modelled two so far. These will build up the bases on the island. Different buildings will do different jobs; there will be one command building per island - this controls all the events that happen on that island, e.g. defence, mining etc. So if the command building is destroyed the island is effectivly dead and a new one will need to be built. This would also be a way to take enemy islands and using their buildings so you don't have to rebuild from scratch.

The islands are all generated programatically so I haven't drawn or programmed any aspect of them, including the names! The idea behind this is so that any amount of different games can be created from a single seed, so, you can either play a new game or indeed play the same game again. At the moment it takes about 4 seconds to generate a single island. I don't think this is too bad in the grand scheme of things as once they're created everything will run off disk so it will only be a one-off hit when you start a brand new game.

As you can see from the screenshots there are a few particle effects. Currently I'm using my own particle system for smoke, water splashes and vapour trails. I'm planning on making use of an open source particle system called Lotus. This should be better than mine as it is a single surface system and therefore should keep frame rates higher.
You may also observe a distinct lack of shadows. I'm not sure whether to use my own shadow system or buy in the Sswift shadow system. Sswift is much better than anything I'd do, but I'm not sure if the detail this gives is necessary...we'll see how it goes!

The texturing on the models is not complete. This will have to be looked at in the future. However, with the game in it's present embryonic stages it's adequate.

Give me a shout if you have any ideas on how to improve upon the original game, what was good about it, what was bad about it etc.

Here's the screenshots so far...