Spring RTS Engine

I'm gonna a make a spring mod about building microbes and taking on defensive bodily structures/cells.

2 teams, the Microbes vs. Antibodies

Resources: organic compounds, inorganic compounds

Gameplay:

Antibodies defend the organs. If main organ is destroyed, antibodies lose. Organs are pre spawned at top of map.

Microbes attack the organs. Receive upgrades as time progresses since microbes evolve very quickly.

Units:

Units spawn by cell division. Some cells divide rapidly, others not so. You start with one cell as the microbes, and you start with many many as the antibodies.

However you could be easily overrun if you do not micro them properly against the onslaught of evil microbes

Sounds a lot like kernel panic disguised behind organic artwork....if there are more ideas for diversifying gameplay please help with this brainstorm.

This sounds neat, E&E..by some means.. did cloning. There are a few gadget's that spawn crap on the map. You can look at the spacerock.lua thing that quantum wrote for me. http://code.google.com/p/conflictterra/wiki/SpaceRocks
Actual code is at the bottom.
If i think of anything else helpful i'll post some more.

for E&E cloning, I just modified the morph script iirc

sounds interessting how not sure how you make look stuff really organic and the map would look the innerts of a body too i guess.
i like that its asymetric if i understood correct.

yes this might be better suited for an engine with skeletal animation for organic units

how did they do the chickens in CA? ill have to look..they seem to look decent for organic units still using Bos/Cob shiite

it might be hard to get it to look organic, but that is fine even if it doesn't. try it any ways.

It would be cool if the microbe "teching up" was handled thusly:

The microbe player would start with a single microbe cell that could divide itself for a given cost.

The player would choose to upgrade a microbe cell and it would become semi-dormant and change over an extended period of time and at a specific resource cost to a more improved version of itself, that could henceforth split into further copies of itself for a cost higher than a basic cell but less that an upgrade.

The microbe player's infrastructure would be handled in a swarm fashion with no central buildings. Microbe Cells could find their own resources or certain specialized microbe cells could ferry resources to allow other cells to focus on their own specialties.

I also envision parasitic microbe forms infecting organs and siphoning off resources.

Note that with this plan there would be no central resource store.

d-gun wrote:yes this might be better suited for an engine with skeletal animation for organic units

how did they do the chickens in CA? ill have to look..they seem to look decent for organic units still using Bos/Cob shiite

For the record Lua unit scripting doesn't add anything by way of animation capabilities.

SinbadEV wrote:It would be cool if the microbe "teching up" was handled thusly:

The microbe player would start with a single microbe cell that could divide itself for a given cost.

The player would choose to upgrade a microbe cell and it would become semi-dormant and change over an extended period of time and at a specific resource cost to a more improved version of itself, that could henceforth split into further copies of itself for a cost higher than a basic cell but less that an upgrade.

The microbe player's infrastructure would be handled in a swarm fashion with no central buildings. Microbe Cells could find their own resources or certain specialized microbe cells could ferry resources to allow other cells to focus on their own specialties.

I also envision parasitic microbe forms infecting organs and siphoning off resources.

Note that with this plan there would be no central resource store.

Earth 2160 Alpha-Aliens had that kind of style. The only structures they could build were defense turrets, everything else was mobile and would eat resources if placed next to them, allowing you to morph or clone them if they were charged up. It was generally arranged so that there were three levels of "base" units that could morph into many others and battle units that could only morph into specific other forms or not at all.

As for microbes, remember that viruses cannot multiply by themselves, they work by re-programming cells to produce viruses, usually until the cell is filled to the brim with viruses and dies off, releasing those viruses. That's also how the virus is destructive, by reprogramming cells that usually perform important functions they mess with the way the body works.

Also anti-bodies are produced by specific white blood cells, they're simple protein structures that attach to the antigens of the virus or bacterium (the antigens are the tools these things use to break into cells to do their work), basically defusing them. Anti-bodies are pretty much unguided projectiles that are spammed and attach to whatever runs into them. Once the bacteria or viruses are neutered the phage cells eat and destroy them.

I don't expect you to adhere to reality but it could provide useful clues.

Be careful with the exponential nature of cloning, it can turn a small unit advantage into a gigantic one. Real cells can only divide a set number of times marked by their telomeres, also consider stem cells which can produce any cell.

When he said "microbes" I hear Viruses, Parasites, Bacteria and "Harmful" cells like Cancer(which would be an interesting mechanic)... these "microbes" would also, unlike real infections, be controlled by a central intelligence.

It also should be pointed out that "Antibodies" are assisted by White blood cells and other natural defenses... so while Mibrobes can describe a wide range of negative cells (though there are positive ones too)... Antibody refers to a very specific particular part of the bodies immune response... perhaps a better name for the good guys would be "Immune System".

Just to clarify, I have passed biology 101/102 and understand the difference between an antibody and so forth.

I chose the name antibodies because it sounded cooler than "immune system", but i suppose it is confusing.

How about

the microbes vs. the response
microbes vs. system
microbes vs. reaction
disease vs. cure

meh

Just to clarify, I have passed biology 101/102 and understand the difference between an antibody and so forth.

I chose the name antibodies because it sounded cooler than "immune system", but i suppose it is confusing.

How about

the microbes vs. the response
microbes vs. system
microbes vs. reaction
disease vs. cure

meh

What about: virus vs system

SinbadEV wrote: these "microbes" would also, unlike real infections, be controlled by a central intelligence.

the player? or are you proposing I write an AI (not in my skill set, i plan to do basic game mechanics scriping, and modeling/texturing)

shouldnt the antis also evolve? i mean if an anti does fit to a certain MO (in the meaning of destroing it good) it get reproduced way more than other antis. maybe this could be a good system somehow

edit:

d-gun wrote:

SinbadEV wrote: these "microbes" would also, unlike real infections, be controlled by a central intelligence.

the player? or are you proposing I write an AI (not in my skill set, i plan to do basic game mechanics scriping, and modeling/texturing)

tower defense

manolo_ wrote:tower defense

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/546713