Homeworld
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Space trading Epic, will it take the ELITE crown? Fusing elements of space combat, strategy and action. Homeworld could provide gamers with a rare insight into decent crafted gameplay in space trading shoot 'em ups. Boasting Boasting cinematic level graphics and an alternative 3D interface, the initial demo looks promising with flight simulator style camera tracking to boot.
Plot is provided in the format typical of SCI-FI Epics casting the gamer in charge of leading his people home to reclaim their lost planetary legacy from "The Conquerors". Featuring an open ended single player structure and multiplayer support for 8 players by way of Sierra's online gaming service. LAn netork game support is also present and correct. ETA expects new ground breaking gameplay in this genre which has experienced a sever lack of attention in recent months with a couple of minor exceptions.
Homeworld is being developed by Relic Entertainment, and will be published by Sierra when development finishes, "near the end of the first quarter of 1999," according to Garden. The title will be released on PC only, due to Garden's belief that "concurrent multi-platform development is very difficult to pull off. With Homeworld, we decided to focus on the PC version exclusively." The 3D "space combat real-time strategy game" has been widely dubbed a surefire hit when it is released, and a playable demo at ECTS in September whole-heartedly supported this prediction.
Setting and objectives of the game? "Homeworld is set in a hypothetical 'galaxy far, far away' (grin). The single-player game is a story about an ancient race of beings called the Kushan, who were brutally exiled from their home planet by a vicious planetary conquering people called the Taiidan. The single-player objective is to help the Kushan regain their cultural heritage and their planetary birthright. The story has a very deep multi-level plot that unfolds through interaction with other alien races in the game, and real-time rendered cut-scenes.
"The concept for Homeworld basically sprang into my head during a conversation about how cool Battlestar Galactica was, and how X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter could be portrayed better by looking at the ships from a third-person perspective. When we got into production, we wanted to make a game based in fact, with realistic galactic phenomenon and so on, but which allowed for creative license where necessary."
The interface, and what were the reasons behind your thinking? "The control design from Homeworld, in its basic form, was a by-product of the game view we wanted to use. Originally, we wanted to place the camera on a viewing sphere we saw enveloping the action. The mechanics behind moving the camera around on this sphere using only the mouse were actually the idea of Erin Daly, our lead designer. His approach as far as we know is totally unique right now, and that's proven in the past to be either a great boon, or a death knell."
Micro-management The key to the whole thing is striking a comfortable balance between helping the player manage their fleets in space and doing too much for them. tiered AI system that allows the player to micro-manage everything if they like, but also provides a mechanism to set broader priorities for the ships at a macro level."
When Sierra's development team implements chat and console commands into their forthcoming release perhaps they'll have a space trading game with the lasting gameplay of Elite coupled with today's internet gamiong capabilities?