Notch tweeted the link to the video today, saying it made his day. I'm definitely curious about a game that duct tape is a big part of.
Quote:
A New Game
Hi, I'm Notch, and this is my new game. It's going to be a space game, and it's quite ambitious!
The game is still extremely early in development, but like we did with Minecraft, we expect to release it early and let the players help me shape the game as it grows.
The cost of the game is still undecided, but it's likely there will be a monthly fee for joining the Multiverse as we are going to emulate all computers and physics even when players aren't logged in. Single player won't have any recurring fees.
In a parallel universe where the space race never ended, space travel was gaining popularity amongst corporations and rich individuals.
In 1988, a brand new deep sleep cell was released, compatible with all popular 16 bit computers. Unfortunately, it used big endian, whereas the DCPU-16 specifications called for little endian. This led to a severe bug in the included drivers, causing a requested sleep of 0x0000 0000 0000 0001 years to last for 0x0001 0000 0000 0000 years.
It's now the year 281 474 976 712 644 AD, and the first lost people are starting to wake up to a universe on the brink of extinction, with all remote galaxies forever lost to red shift, star formation long since ended, and massive black holes dominating the galaxy.
Game Features
The game is still very early in development, but here is a list of things we hope to include:
= I'm focusing on fun gameplay instead. I still want to get corrected on glaring scientific errors, though.
= Lots of engineering.
= Fully working computer system.
= Space battles against the AI or other players.
= Abandoned ships full of loot.
= Duct tape!
= Seamlessly landing on planets.
= Advanced economy system.
= Random encounters.
= Mining, trading, and looting.
= Single and multi player connected via the multiverse.
The Generator and the Computer
Each ship has a generator capable of producing a fixed wattage, and everything you connect to it drains wattage. A cloaking field, for example, might require almost all the power from the generator, forcing you to turn off all computers and dim all lights in order to successfully cloak.
The computer in the game is a fully functioning emulated 16 bit CPU that can be used to control your entire ship, or just to play games on while waiting for a large mining operation to finish.
Full specifications of the CPU will be released shortly, so the more programatically advanced of you can get a head start.
Rumor has it the game name is read "Jump to Lightspeed" from the op code 0x10 which on the system he is emulating is "jump" and the scientific variable c, which is the speed of light.
I thought that was creative, if obscure. And if true.
I could care less about the 16 bit CPU, but that seems to be the main driver for this game. Really the main driver should be the open universe gameplay. Being able to build and pilot a spaceship, land on planets, and walk around. If this game is like that, I'm in. I'm also intersted in that other game he tweeted a couple days ago, called Rodina:
__________________ "If I want to say [George Washington] didn't [have slaves] that's my right, and now, thanks to Wikipedia *taps keyboard* it's also a fact."
-Stephen Colbert
Rumor has it the game name is read "Jump to Lightspeed" from the op code 0x10 which on the system he is emulating is "jump" and the scientific variable c, which is the speed of light.
I thought that was creative, if obscure. And if true.
I don't think it's true. There is no JMP command in the language. 0x10 is part of this:
0x10-0x17: [next word + register]
I can't see how programming assembler is "fun". When I did that, it was anything but...
__________________ "If I want to say [George Washington] didn't [have slaves] that's my right, and now, thanks to Wikipedia *taps keyboard* it's also a fact."
-Stephen Colbert
I thought the video was lame. A bunch of 16-bit artwork and a premise that is beyond stupid... the people wake up 20,000 times longer in the future than the universe has even existed to this point? Um... whatever.
Next time stick to showing us gameplay and not pretending to write a story. A good space trading sim doesn't need much (or any) story, just like Minecraft didn't need any story.
I still have hopes the game will be good, but that video was lame beyond belief.
__________________ Everything is true. God's an Astronaut. Oz is Over the Rainbow, and Midian is where the monsters live.
I'm into any game that apes Elite, (which Notch says is the inspiration for this one), but adding a crazy/over-the-top/sarcastic story has made sure I follow this one closely!
I mean come on, any game where the concept is this flat-out ridonkulas has to be at least somewhat interesting, no?
*wakes up* "Oh shit, I overslept
FOUR AND A HALF THOUSAND BILLION YEARS! Boss is gunna kill me!"
Anyway, can't say I've seen this concept done too many times before. The end of the universe, all the stars are dying and spread super far apart, super massive black holes everywhere... kinda cool in a crazy way...
Think I'll be keeping my attention on Starbound. Exploration is my biggest pull for a space sandbox game, so I'll stick with the game making that a priority.
