Comments - Faerdan

I put a lot of thought and time into make an engineering system which was interesting and accessible. I am very happy with the result. :)

Thanks!

Thanks man!

I really hope so. :)

Thanks! Yeah I would love to do a Mac release, but it will depend on demand.

Yeah it's been some journey. I'm very happy with how it has turned out.

Thanks for your support. :)

Thanks! :)

Thanks Doci. I really appreciate your support.

Thanks! :)

Yeah we felt that the game had evolved so much from the early concept that it needed a new name and angle. While multiplayer/coop is still the heart of the game, we're putting lot more focus singleplayer now too.

Isaac is designing our spaceships. He was lead concept artist on Halo 3, ODST, Reach and Destiny. You can see his work here: Artstation.com

It's good to chat to you again, it's been a while! :)

Hey Doci!

Thanks. :) I spent a colossal amount of time on the systems and design.

Hi all,

We have been focusing on development and have really let our IndieDB page slip. I have updated the page with our new name, details and art and I will post a full article during the week, which will contain all of our news/developments and show, for the first time, the completed Engineering UI design.

If you would like to see our updates from the past few months, you can find them on our forum: Universeornothing.com

Thanks for reading!

Hi there!

UNION is played with your computer screen(s) used for the console(s) on the bridge of the ship. There are exterior views of the ship, but they are all from cameras which are fixed to the hull and turrets.

On a basic level we are creating a submarine sim, like the Silent Hunter games (see this video for an example of that Youtu.be).

We would love to, and are fully capable of, add a 3D bridge which you and the other players can share. However we can also do that if we secure enough funding.

Thanks for your interest!

Hey! Thanks for the kind words. :)

We're not signing up anyone else for the closed alpha at the moment, we'll post info on our plans closer to the time.

Thanks man. :)

It has been a long road, but we have come a long way with UNION. Next year will be a big year for us.

Your continued support means a lot to us, and I can't wait to have you playing UNION.

Thanks Doci. :)

We are really happy with how the engine is shaping up.

Modding our vector-based UIs will allow you to not only restyle all of our UIs, but also change how players interact with the game by tweaking functionality.

There will also be the ability to script new functionality for equipment, like shields, sensors, turrets and torpedoes. We'll release information about that at a later stage.

Yeah, it's not a million miles off GoI. :D

Thanks!

Hi Mehelium,

Sorry for taking so long to respond, IndieDB does not notify us of new comments unless they are directly in response to a comment we have posted ourselves. I was looking through our articles and saw your comment.

No, the players will mostly see the UI for their particular role. We are currently busy working on these UIs, the only one we have released a picture for so far is Engineering: Images.akamai.steamusercontent.com

Thanks for your interest!

Hey bloodaxe95,

Sorry for the delay in responding, we've been very busy lately and are just catching up.

Yeah the Captain is a hands off role in UNION. It can be shared with any of the other roles too though (you could be the Helm officer and Captain, for example).

Getting VoIP (voice) chat working well is a big challenge, and one which I do not believe we will be able to take on before release. I would love to do it at some stage though.

So for now, communication will happen via text and menus.

Thanks!

Thanks for checking in, it's great to hear from people who are interested in UNION. The support we've received is pretty amazing too.

We have already about 300 people signed up for the alpha, these are mostly people who were early supporters here on IndieDB. We may include others in the alpha, but we are not sure how that would be arranged. We will post details closer to the alpha release date, later this year.

In the mean time we will be sharing the development process with everyone here.

Thanks!

- Mark / Faerdan

Ah thank you very much for your support and the offer of help, I think we might take you up on that. :)

That really is great advice.

The issue is that the UIs aren't ready to show. I have wireframes and debug UIs but nothing near as visually appealing as the more complete Engineering UI design.

I put all of my focus these past few months into the networking, game systems and rendering. I wanted to be able to support a large amount of players/ships/objects on a huge dynamic map, I wanted to know how the game systems and simulations would work across the network (by building them), and I wanted to see ships firing weapons, hitting shields, taking damage, and blowing up. I achieved all that, and it really does work beautifully.

I could have waited another month or two to go to Greenlight, and probably should have, but I got so excited by the huge milestone that I had reached that I became impatient. It can be difficult putting so much time and energy into something while getting little feedback on it.

Still, the response on Greenlight has been great, better than I had expected even.

I hope this response wasn't too long winded. I wanted to give an honest response on why the trailer is as it is.

I would like to thank you personally as well Samuel, for sticking with UNION all this time. It is people like you who have helped me believe in what I am doing when the going was tough.

Thanks, great to have you aboard! :)

Development has slowed while we dedicate time to marketing the Greenlight page, but we'll be back to full development very soon.

Thanks Doci. :)

Yeah, you are already on my list. :)

I'm sorry, I don't believe you'll find him here. ;)

You should do something which interests you, for your portfolio. Unless it's a place-holder I don't use models in the game which I haven't commissioned. That is to ensure a unique and consistent look for the UNION.

I can't promise anything, but if you present work of a high enough quality (with a low enough poly count) I will definitely consider contracting you to do some models for UNION.

Best of luck with your studies!

I really appreciate you saying that. Part of me thinks we are a bit mad to create such a niche game, but it is a game that we really want to play.

There are two of us working on the project, David being the other. He likes to stay behind the scenes though, so you probably won't be seeing him here.

I would like to expand the team in the future, adding an artist, if we can get the funding to do so.

Thanks. :)

Thanks Doci. I am quiet happy with the effects now and the performance (network and rendering) is very good.

Mod-ability is high up on my list of priorities and I am building the games systems with that in mind. I will have more solid details on it in further in development.

Thanks for the support. :)

Thanks man. It's a still from the video I just uploaded but it came out well!

The explosion is 2D planes, but it is effectively a placeholder. I intend to add more high energy / nuclear style explosions for ship destruction later in development.

Explosions apply forces and damage to nearby ships/objects, potentially causing cascade explosions.

Thanks again for your support. :)