Gameplay, both in terms of capital class star ships and fighters, is going to be one of the biggest issues we tackle in the mod development of FW: ToW. As we now approach the alpha phase of development, we have been discussing how we should address it.
There are some developers in the camp that believe we should make the mod more movieish. There are others that feel we should make it more X-Wing vs Tie-Fighter-esque. Some believe the proper balance lies somwhere between the two and we have points come up for either side with no definite winner.
One of our developers has even gone so far to make a combat prototype on how he believes fighter vs. fighter combat should be done. Why485, mod develeper of Itano Cirus and contributor to the Flak 88 mod, has spent the last few days working on this project with some fantastic results. This is the video of his progress:
As you can see, it's quite a sight to behold. Obviously, there is still much tweaking to do, but this is an excellent example of what combat may look like in the finished version of FW: ToW
Other great news comes from a developer named Deety, who joined our team a few months ago. He has been working extremely hard on the games Artifical Intelligence as well as changing the way we look at Freelancer and its limitations by bringing up discussion points. Through his tireless efforts to push the boundries of the game, he's found a way for us to mimic the energy partition system we all know and love from the X-wing Vs. Tie-Fighter and X-Wing Alliance Series. That has opened up quite a few doors for us in terms of gameplay, but also has raised a lot of issues in balance of the 104 flyable vessels we have planned for the mod.
As you can see, there's most work to be done on the mod, but it's coming together. All I can tell you all is this: For those of you that love Star Wars space sims, you're in for one helluva treat.
Until next time,
Sushi
PS: For those of you that are enjoying this mod development, please don't forget to vote for it in the top 100 mods at moddb here: Moddb.com Click the Freelancer Icon then our mod. Don't forget to visit the Crossfire mod and vote for them if you like what they're doing!
Great work! This is looking very promising. I look forward to seeing how you implement the energy partitioning. That would add some nice depth.
Good job that you have done!
Thanks guys. We still have a long way to go in development, but we're getting there. The most important thing is that this team is active and passionate about what we're making :)
Thanks for all the support!
I drool with anticipation and cannot wait to get my personal home based wing of players that'll join me in this awsome reawakening of your Freelancer mod.