So I am toying with the idea of making an RTS with a lot of procedural asset generation. I am thinking I would like to make as much of it as possible be generated at runtime, so even though it will be really low detail and all, it should still be interesting to look at. I would like to do things like make even the trees drawn by the game different for each tree so those won't get repetitive. I am thinking of trying to do something similar with music as well.
So below I have an image that's got a few things going on, it's basically just a brainstorm of some different things. This is at night, which is why the background is black. You can see a few guys there, one of them is walking back towards the building (I guess with some logs from cutting down trees, but I don't have a way to show that yet). Another guy is cutting down a tree, those speckles are to show action, they would be moving in game. Next to the trees are some tree stumps for trees that were already cut down. Below the building is a torch, so you can see what the ground would look like in the day time. This is obviously pretty messy, but I am just getting some ideas down. The art would look more or less like this, though, with the really low detail stuff.
The default zoom level would be 4x, although you could zoom in and out in powers of two. Just in case your browser farts on the imgzoom and smooths it out, here's the same thing at 4x:
As far as gameplay goes, I would like the building and development aspects to be more indepth than something like Command and Conquer. It would be similar to Rise of Nations or Age of Empires I where you would go through different eras or ages of technology. Not sure how many I would have, but I am thinking that the first age would be before any real military, so you can probably only have regular citizens or maybe citizens and hunters. Probably in some sort of iron age is when you would be able to build military units.
There would of course be a gunpowder age where you get simple guns and cannons and such. Cannons would probably be a mobile unit that takes 3 civilians to make (To make a cannon, you would send 3 civilians to whichever building makes cannons, and then those 3 civilians would become the cannoneers). Before cannons might be a catapualt or trebuchet, and that might not be mobile. After cannons might be a priest artillery or something like that that is even more mobile and has a farther range.
Some ages would also give certain unit types special bonuses. Somewhere around an industrial age or something like that would let citizens turn into militiamen and they would be able to be strong fighters while still being able to do citizen tasks (building, gathering, etc.)
I would like to do something with night vs day like maybe different animals will spawn at different times. I would also like to make different animals spawn in different ages. That way, while you likely would not have to worry about attack from another civilization early on, you would have to worry about a sabertooth tiger or mastadon. As you progess through the ages, those animals might change to wolves and elephants (I am not really concerned with making the newer animals the eveolutionary decendents of older animals lol) and then eventually it would turn out that not many wild animals spawn near your cities.
Something that would interest me is trying to make it a multi-faceted game where you can focus on building cities, and it would be something like city life, or you can focus on the fighting and interacting with other nations. Not sure yet how I would work that out, so it's just an idea.
I'll keep thinking and try to get more images, but in the meantime if I can get some C&C (Not command & conquer :P) that would be great!
EDIT: Oh yeah, I should probably say it if it isn't clear, but the images above are just mockups :P
So below I have an image that's got a few things going on, it's basically just a brainstorm of some different things. This is at night, which is why the background is black. You can see a few guys there, one of them is walking back towards the building (I guess with some logs from cutting down trees, but I don't have a way to show that yet). Another guy is cutting down a tree, those speckles are to show action, they would be moving in game. Next to the trees are some tree stumps for trees that were already cut down. Below the building is a torch, so you can see what the ground would look like in the day time. This is obviously pretty messy, but I am just getting some ideas down. The art would look more or less like this, though, with the really low detail stuff.
The default zoom level would be 4x, although you could zoom in and out in powers of two. Just in case your browser farts on the imgzoom and smooths it out, here's the same thing at 4x:
As far as gameplay goes, I would like the building and development aspects to be more indepth than something like Command and Conquer. It would be similar to Rise of Nations or Age of Empires I where you would go through different eras or ages of technology. Not sure how many I would have, but I am thinking that the first age would be before any real military, so you can probably only have regular citizens or maybe citizens and hunters. Probably in some sort of iron age is when you would be able to build military units.
There would of course be a gunpowder age where you get simple guns and cannons and such. Cannons would probably be a mobile unit that takes 3 civilians to make (To make a cannon, you would send 3 civilians to whichever building makes cannons, and then those 3 civilians would become the cannoneers). Before cannons might be a catapualt or trebuchet, and that might not be mobile. After cannons might be a priest artillery or something like that that is even more mobile and has a farther range.
Some ages would also give certain unit types special bonuses. Somewhere around an industrial age or something like that would let citizens turn into militiamen and they would be able to be strong fighters while still being able to do citizen tasks (building, gathering, etc.)
I would like to do something with night vs day like maybe different animals will spawn at different times. I would also like to make different animals spawn in different ages. That way, while you likely would not have to worry about attack from another civilization early on, you would have to worry about a sabertooth tiger or mastadon. As you progess through the ages, those animals might change to wolves and elephants (I am not really concerned with making the newer animals the eveolutionary decendents of older animals lol) and then eventually it would turn out that not many wild animals spawn near your cities.
Something that would interest me is trying to make it a multi-faceted game where you can focus on building cities, and it would be something like city life, or you can focus on the fighting and interacting with other nations. Not sure yet how I would work that out, so it's just an idea.
I'll keep thinking and try to get more images, but in the meantime if I can get some C&C (Not command & conquer :P) that would be great!
EDIT: Oh yeah, I should probably say it if it isn't clear, but the images above are just mockups :P
