TGB for Strategy Games
by kgoodrid · in Torque Game Builder · 04/18/2010 (2:04 am) · 3 replies
Hey everyone,
I worked with TGB a few years ago, but got away from it due to the usual business of life. I have some more time on my hands, and have started thinking about breaking out my copy of TGB again to play with some of the ideas that have been running through my head.
I'm wondering what the current thoughts are on using TGB for strategy games, such as turn-based 4X (ie: Civilization, Master of Orion) games. Obviously, I'm not looking to create something on the scale of Civ right off the bat, but I'm curious as to how people feel about using TGB for a game of that nature. I saw some discussion on this subject, but it all seemed to be from several years ago. Based on the current state of things, how suitable do you feel TGB is for creating games like this?
Planning of the actual game mechanics is not an issue; I have quite a bit of experience with that sort of thing. My challenge will be the actual implementation in a game engine with scripting and programming.
Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks!
I worked with TGB a few years ago, but got away from it due to the usual business of life. I have some more time on my hands, and have started thinking about breaking out my copy of TGB again to play with some of the ideas that have been running through my head.
I'm wondering what the current thoughts are on using TGB for strategy games, such as turn-based 4X (ie: Civilization, Master of Orion) games. Obviously, I'm not looking to create something on the scale of Civ right off the bat, but I'm curious as to how people feel about using TGB for a game of that nature. I saw some discussion on this subject, but it all seemed to be from several years ago. Based on the current state of things, how suitable do you feel TGB is for creating games like this?
Planning of the actual game mechanics is not an issue; I have quite a bit of experience with that sort of thing. My challenge will be the actual implementation in a game engine with scripting and programming.
Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks!
About the author
#2
04/19/2010 (6:25 am)
I'm working on something similar. My game is inspired by Galactic Civilizations and Sins of a Solar Empire. I'm using a macro-grid approach where the explorable areas are in a fixed array (i.e. sectors) but movement within each area is free-form. I would hate to minimize the potential of TGB's built-in physics.
#3
http://www.torquepowered.com/community/forums/viewthread/113513
04/19/2010 (7:04 am)
Here is another recent thread discussing this issue:http://www.torquepowered.com/community/forums/viewthread/113513
Torque 3D Owner Gavin
If you are planning on a 4X game, then you will need to come up with a large map and to handle many entities. I am pretty sure TGB can handle quite a large number of entities. It would probably require that you plumb the depths of the TGB source code (or read the docs) to determine the max number of units/planets/cities/etc. that you could create - again I seriously doubt that it would pose a problem in your design (unless you wish to go overboard to create 6000 space systems ala Lost Empire:Immortals).
The other thing about a 4X game would be whether you want it to be tile based or free to roam (as in Galatic Civilization vs Space Rangers 2: Dominators). I would prefer the game to be free to roam although a tile-based game would make it quite "tidy" for turn-based playing. Of course, you get another headache altogether if it's hex-based. A hex-based tile game would mean you have to strip whatever's under the hood of TGB and rework it into a hex tile engine. The other alternative is to creatively use existing arrays for a hex-based game.
My type of strategy game would not be 4X for now. In truth, I am currently into exploring using TGB to write a wargame from a plan view (something akin to the Nintendo DS game - Advance Wars:Days of Ruin).
Hope that discussion sparked some ideas.