Spherebot Family Fumblings

[Warlord Zsinj]

The spherebot is one of the best looking things I've ever seen in Spring. Period.

But it does not fit the peewee role, and it doesn't fit the arm aesthetic.

I don't hold it against CA for using it, because they don't have a full-time art team, and they can only use what they can get their hands on.

[Neddie]

I am going to say this once, and only once.

CA is not supposed to fit the Total Annihilation design aesthetic. The units are not intended to be the same as before in name, role, concept or appearance. CA will eventually not be CA at all. It's a collaborative project which began with what most TA mods had, and is directed toward a realized game with only the ghost of legacy in design.

I am redesigning the entire tech tree based on Saktoth's Spherebot. These are my rough public notes for the anti-air mech.



This is the only one I have thus far submitted for consideration. It was not received well, in fact after requesting input, I received none. I do not believe it was recognized at all.

However, I am drafting the entire set. I'm renaming them too, tentatively. I can't model, I can barely texture, but I will deliver something others are willing to work with.

Code: Select all

Lykou - Light Infantry
Adrastos - Heavy Infantry
Iasthais - Supporter
Iapetos - Artillery
Oideus - EMP Charger
Priam - Rocket Skirmisher
Themis - Constructor

Just... yeah. Greek, I was thinking Norse for "Core".

Now, that said, Smoth's new AK model is both reminiscent of the original and seems reasonable for the developing aesthetic for the side which derives from "Core".

[Peet]

It doesn't matter what everything fits to, but it does matter that everything fits together, which is to what WZ was most likely referring.

[Neddie]

It doesn't matter what everything fits to, but it does matter that everything fits together, which is to what WZ was most likely referring.

Well, eventually it shall fit together, hopefully.

Don't tell me TA fit together. It didn't. None of the derivatives do either. Put a Banshee next to a Thunder and you have two worlds colliding.

[Otherside]

Neddie as much as i love history and love greek history especially i think the names will be a little confusing to new users

More general unit names of the period could be easy altho less in number

Phalanx , Hoplite , Immortal (yes i know persian) , Peltast etc etc

you can also move into mythology

[Saktoth]

Id say stick with english words which will better help to help convey unit role. Im against cultural appropriation in this sense.

The Spherebot fits as the peewee role in CA. What you conceive of as the peewee role in TA might not even apply to CA- its a light, fast infantry raider unit. The spherebot looks a lot like the zipper actually, people have commented on the similarity. If anything, the origional peewee is bulkier, squarer, and less sleek- the peewee is a very fast, light unit, and the anime-esque fragility helps to convey that.

[Neddie]

I feel that general words are ill-suited for unit designation in that the majority of them lack definite character or have already been used in any number of games.

I agree, however, that ancient greek names and twists of different roots may not be the best option before us. I'm simply testing the waters there.

[jcnossen]

Why not just call it spherebot then instead of peewee? Everyone associates peewee with the TA unit..

[Warlord Zsinj]

Wow, I'm pulling threads from everywhere >_>

My criticism was not with semantics. I agree that the peewee has a lot of history associated with it, and is one of the favourite TA units by far, so it's always going to be difficult topping it if you're not going for a faithful reproduction.

But, I think you could call it a chuzzwazza and my criticism would still stand. The peewee is at the bottom end of the build tree. It is cheap and disposable. If you have the spherebot at the bottom end of your build tree, you've really set yourself one hell of a challenge to make it look cheap and weak compared to later units.

One of the best thing about TA, and then SupCom, was it's scale. The cheap units looked cheap and speedy. That's why it was called a 'peewee' in the first place! If you make the spherebot the peewee, you have less room to move in terms of design, simply because it doesn't look like a light unit - it looks like a heavy unit, heavily armoured, battle-worn and with a big gun to match. It is also tall, imposing, and evil-looking, which is over and again not what you want at the bottom-end of your build tree. If anything, one of the successes of TA's units in creating character was that the lower-end units were quite cute. They even made little high-pitched squeals when you clicked on them.

[Neddie]

I don't know why they called it Peewee, I wouldn't have and I don't think of it as such.

[Warlord Zsinj]

Peewee was a great name. One of the best parts of TA was that it didn't take itself too seriously. Otherwise you would never have had names like 'peewee', 'rocko', 'the can', 'morty', etc. It all worked together to create a very rich environment that people can still remember to this day. Ask a TA player who hasn't touched TA in years what the name of the light arm bot was, and they'll tell you exactly what it was. Hell, there's even a Book of Random comic featuring a Peewee.

I think the problem is that most games think they need to rip out their thesauruses, fetch greek dictionaries and old testament, and create some chest-puffing name like EPSILON SOUL-EVISCERATOR MK43543vXVII in order to make units sound cool. It's a ridiculous notion, and one of TA's greatest successes that it avoided it. And one of the reasons why we are all so attached to the TA units, whereas I can barely remember any units from the two-dozen other RTS's I've played from around that period.

[Otherside]

i swear i played at least 5 rts's with a unit having the same name

destroyer,destructor,oblivion,apocalypse,raptor etc etc

are so cliche rts names :/

need new cool names

[Neddie]

That is not what I am doing, Zsinj. Did I suggest any of those names, Otherside?

I am a writer, I form worlds out of words.

[Warlord Zsinj]

It certainly sound like you're something that starts with w and ends with er!

I kid, I kid, I wub j00 neddy, you just set yourself up, I couldn't resist!

I misread "they" as "cavedog" when it appears you meant "the CA people", sorry.

[Peet]

Walker!

[lurker]

[Elkvis]

I really like where CA is going with the spherebot.

The arm and core, in ota (and AA and BA), really lack individuality. CA is reinventing each side with a defined character. fits too, that the arm is organic (presumably human) and they have the humanoid bots. If i want nostalga, i can always revert to BA.

[Erom]

One thing I REALLY like about the proposed CA designs is the eye configuration. All the core concept work, and smoths excellent morty, have this very middle-ages knight armor helmet design to their heads, while the arm units have this very organic eye design. You can picture the Arm all-terrain spiders with spider-like sets of round "eyes" and it would match with the spherebot pretty well, while the Core all have these helmets with cylon-esque eye-slits instead of round sensors.

It's also a neat inversion since the "more human" Arm has the less-human "odd number and placement of eyes" instead of the more-human "helmets". It's a neat swap of what you would expect.

Definetely a minor design point, that if intended, good job, and if it wasn't, you should stick with it, it's awesome.

[KDR_11k]

Is this its family?

[smoth]

lol patlabor. at least those mechs are about the size of a peewee.