Company News Taking Care of Business - Iron Tower Studio 2019 Business Diary

[deuxhero]

Did you consider asking the publisher about translation? With the right deal it seems like the only thing that would cost is some royalties on sales you wouldn't get anyway.

 

[HoboForEternity]

i think at least russian translation would be worth it since they ate up hardcore crpg like this.

 

[laclongquan]

Ahem...

IF the ship was not designed to land... then it cannot land and will in fact fall apart, explode and disintegrate during any such attempt.
Wasnt that considered before the colonists got onto the ship and blasted away? You know, landing on some world once they got there? Has anyone thought about that?

Also, if precision landing is "out of the questions"... then how can it land near some a site with water and raw materials?
Does the ship have any means of reconnoitering and studying the planet surface from distance, before it tries to "land"? Especially considering its internal problems and strife?
If not - say goodbye to landing near any such nice site.
Whats the land to ocean surface ratio there? Wanna fall into the ocean maybe? Any different climates? Nah? Just... arid?

Now, if this was me i would use precisely these impending problems as gameplay objectives with very delayed consequences during the first game.
It doesnt have to be anything too complicated.

If player aligned with this faction and managed to repair or construct some telescopes - then in the sequel the ship could land near a prosperous site because it would have something to discover them with before landing.
If he aligned with that faction then some sort of things could be achieved to prevent disintegration during atmospheric entry. Like i dunno... building a giant atmosphere entry heat shields.
Or some sort of propulsion that will prevent it from just smacking into the planet and leaving a nice crater.
IF not - well then only some parts of the ship survived the "fall" and the player start well off away from a good site with much less starting resources and numbers of colonists. In which case you need to get everyone to such a site and set up shop.
Mix and combine as it fits. Doesnt have to be faction allegiance at all.

edit: This would also remove the drudgery of pointless existence and meaningless gameplay in the first game, so i guess its off!

In the next game this can be started through now usual import of the saves from previous game, or just by choosing from starting slides.

Not that i know anything about anything.
Lets just have a fucking freighter land on a planet despite not being built to land on planets, flying blind right onto a well watered and mineral/materials rich spot - by accident! It was just lucky.
And the planet also has human breathable atmosphere, no helmets and air needed. And biology-chemistry-food is just right for humans and the first time anyone sees a dick snake they should try to touch it!

Well, in my game you would all survive on Martian potatos for a long time and you would be required to contribute to the... agricultural efforts every day.
First game ever, especially an RPG in which you would have to poop to advance the plot!
- Finally something to make constitution a worthy stat.
Also... you would get extra reputation points for contributing extra... effort, and reputation penalties if you contribute too little.
Im trademarking this shit! Nobody touch it!

Also, alright Goral, sorry about that... but when some things start to repeat themselves i just run out of other things to say.
-... Im going to regret this, arent i?

Point number 1: Water. As long as we have water, human can survive at least 15 days, foods notwithstanding. So if We are on a ship crashlanding on alien planet, "Get me some place with water" should be flashing on pilots' priority list.

Point number 2: food. Alien planet = no local food unless you are going to be test rats. The food source will be from the ships, storage and aqua farm sections. If I am crashlanded on planet, I will definitely rely on the ruin wrecks for food source, not be test rats. Which mean we dont need to rely on precise landing zone to get foods, as we are already carrying food. (Same consideration if you are shipwrecked on an island btw.)

Point 3: materials for tools, shelters, etc... again alien planet = no knowledge of local stuffs. You got a big fucking interstellar ship to salvage just sitting right there. See point 2.

So the ship just land on anywhere with water source and it's already a fine landing zone.

 

[hivemind]

I fucking hate psionics

if you can manage to make it appealing in the sequel then like that will be your true achievement as writers and designers imo

 

[Mr. Hiver]

laclongquan
Well yes, but to get to a place with water you need some way of mapping the planet surface, you need a "pilot" who is capable of maneuvering the ship, systems that will allow such maneuvering, you need heat shields to survive atmosphere entry and landing propulsion.

Food, ditto. Thats why i said the crew in my scenario would survive on Martian potatoes for quite some time. Unless - luckily - the planet environment is beneficent for humans. That includes water being not poisonous or full of microorganisms bad for humans but atleast you can boil it and extract pure H2O more or less easily.

Of course the ship should be salvaged for materials first of all. Thats why it needs to survive the landing. Either as a whole or in parts.

But there is no explanations for any of that in the presented material and we know that during the first game the ship will regress into post apocalyptic mess with many of the crucial systems damaged, destroyed or controlled by factions who forgot what its all really for. That actually presents opportunity to integrate those issues into the gameplay and the narrative because the chosen story itself makes these things critically important. These are the very basic things that need to be covered in such a story.
But it seems to me that instead these issues are hand waved away in shoddy superficial thinking about it.

Some of that stems from relying on old school SF of Heinlein era as inspiration, but it is possible to provide some basic cover for all of that so these things are at the least not gaping holes in the story.

 

[Black Angel]

The Inquisition RPG would call for a completely different system and, most importantly, it will be very heavy on unique character models (demons and such).

But what if you *don't* have to use a completely different system at all? Dun dun dun

Spoiler

Can't remember if the Inquisition RPG being asked for is some historical one, but hey, Expedition guys and (hopefully) Warhorse got that covered, even though hindsight's twenty-twenty.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

This update is actually one huge spoiler! Should be in spoiler tags. Vault Dweller reveals that the Colony Ship will do just fine in the first game and be able to land and establish a colony. So what's even the point of playing Colony Ship 1 if I already know the official ending? Does my choices matter?

The only way this could work is if the ship that establish a colony in the second game is not the same ship as the ship featured in Colony Ship 1.
And maybe then the ship of the first game could crashland later or whatever into the colony that's established by the second game. Like if earth sent two ships to the same place. The first one just floats about in space untill Colony Ship 1 happens while the other ship lands on the planet and establishes the colony featured in Colony ship 2.

Also why don't you have some alien space derelicts down there on the planet? Could make exploration a bit more exciting. I want a space jockey easter egg.

e: Must the Aliens be humanoid? Couldn't they just be reptile or something? Perhaps simian?

 

[Vault Dweller]

This update is actually one huge spoiler! Should be in spoiler tags. Vault Dweller reveals that the Colony Ship will do just fine in the first game and be able to land and establish a colony. So what's even the point of playing Colony Ship 1 if I already know the official ending? Does my choices matter?

Would your choices matter more if the Ship fails to land? Anyway, while I don't see a problem with taking one of the endings and building a sequel around it (kinda like one of the possible futures, not "here is what actually happened"), we haven't made any decisions as we aren't working on the game yet.

Also, the bulk of your choices revolve around not the Ship itself but the factions. Such choices are relatively easy to preserve, but again, since we aren't working on it yet, I can't make any promises yet. Last, the game will take place 40-50 years after the landing and your character will be Proxima-born, not shipborn, so you won't be continuing with the same character stripped of his/her abilities.

But what if you *don't* have to use a completely different system at all? Dun dun dun

Then we're back to square one. It has to be different.

 

[Binky]

the game will take place 40-50 years after the landing

Curious about those years. So the aliens just allowed the colonists to set up shop on the planet? Or did the humans use tech from the ship to carve out a spot for themselves and keep the natives at bay?

 

[Vault Dweller]

the game will take place 40-50 years after the landing

Curious about those years. So the aliens just allowed the colonists to set up shop on the planet? Or did the humans use tech from the ship to carve out a spot for themselves and keep the natives at bay?

Allowed is a strong word. The colonists' tech isn't enough to conquer the planet or push back the natives westward expansion style but it's enough to establish a small foothold, at least until the natives' city-states unite to wipe them out. A series of early conflicts would be inevitable until both sides realize they've underestimated each other and pull back to regroup.

At the beginning of the game the humans have 4 locations: the landing site, the first settlement, a frontier-style fort marking the border, and a research base set in the ruins of a nearby town the colonists destroyed. This way there's plenty of history, losses on both sides, and different opinions on how to proceed. You'll be sent to the natives as part of a diplomatic mission and will be able to visit 8-10 'alien' locations. Naturally, you'd be able to talk your way through the game (the aliens would communicate telepathically) or fight.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Allowed is a strong word. The colonists' tech isn't enough to conquer the planet or push back the natives westward expansion style but it's enough to establish a small foothold, at least until the natives' city-states unite to wipe them out. A series of early conflicts would be inevitable until both sides realize they've underestimated each other and pull back to regroup.

For the love of god read Foreigner.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I will, thanks for the suggestion.

 

[Fenix]

The other approach is confronting humans with things that are truly alien and sometimes even incomprehensible and then exploring how humans would deal with all that and how would that affect humans. Like Lem and Brothers Strugacky did, for example.

But there are also examples of humans interacting with alien beings which are different then humans and not just some extreme of the human psyche, yet not completely incomprehensible.

You see, cRPG appreach already determine that it's simple way of a Star Track kind, because in RPG I don't think you can realize really alien aliens, because RPG's narrative, role system etc done in "step by step" basis, for which you need human or pseudo-human society, something like fantasy world of Tolkien or Medival society with its hierarchy.
Alien aliens require different genre, like that recent game, whats-its-name where you are under water, and lost memory.

I hope you’ll take some inspiration from C.J. Cherryh’s Foreigner books.

Wait, I think I have read something form her, somehtign was published in Russian. Wasn't there some novel about mantis-like aliens and some woman in some embassy, I'm not sure?

Vince persuaded me that his mind works differently from mine -- this is less the allure of a future project drawing him off the hard work of a current project and more a matter of making sure his subconscious is doing preproduction on the right thing

I can recognize fellow Virgo for a thousand miles away! )
Yeah, Virgos mind is functioning like that, we can live a usual life and then one day the answer on a question that we was so interested in 3-4 years ago just pop up when we walking on the street, or tie shoelaces.
If we truly preoccuped with something, sometimes answers just... happen, like if we thought about it all the time, somewhere in the background.

Btw I just found out that C.J, Cherryh is a Virgo too, that's good example of Virgo's mind and how it works.

The problem with a multi-ship setting is that it's a different setting. Who’d launch and most importantly pay for an undertaking that costs so much yet delivers so little? Even if Earth were overpopulated, launching a ship to Proxima Centauri – a flight that would take hundreds of years – solves zero problems and thus gets zero cash. Thus, it would have to be a private enterprise with a pinch of religious zealotry and I don't see them paying for a fleet.

Vault Dweller Right, but maybe there could be crashed interstellar probe? There was at least one before the flight, automated probe is much cheaper than another ship with crew, Earthlings want to know what happening. It could contain somehtign useful for us.

Also, just pure theorization, about ship landing - even if ship can't land, theoretically you can salvage it, and without shuttles or similiar small ships, all you need is orbital lift, which require of course really high level of technology.
We can theorize, that early colonisation ships should be less successfull because of this, but with invention of orbital lift colonisation shoudl have more chances.
Honestly, I don't understand, how such huge ship can land on planet, but let assume it can.

 

[ScrotumBroth]

Speaking of sequel, I quote liked twist at the end of Pandorum movie. Factions were fighting on a crashed space craft years after it landed on the new world, without even knowing.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Vault Dweller Right, but maybe there could be crashed interstellar probe?

What would it give you though?

Also, just pure theorization, about ship landing - even if ship can't land, theoretically you can salvage it, and without shuttles or similiar small ships, all you need is orbital lift, which require of course really high level of technology.

Which is why it has to land.

Honestly, I don't understand, how such huge ship can land on planet, but let assume it can.

Let's assume it can land once (being properly outfitted for such a landing back in Earth orbit), taking damage in the process. We aren't talking about such ships being able to easily land and take-off.

 

[Fenix]

What would it give you though?

At least some continuity from previous game. I mean, even if you won't get anything metarial form it, it will give nice feeling - heh, it's thing from first game, from old world.
It doesn't mean it shoudl have some value for the plot. But maybe, if it will be too little, it could dissapoint people if they have expectation for somehtign better in game.
Othewise, it's a messenger from an Earth, who still watching you - could create a pretext or a hint of a further conflict with Earth, as every colony fought for their independence.
Or it's all bullshit, dunno. )

 

[Mr. Hiver]

Its very easy to adjust these things so they at least make some sense. A few sentences thrown into the intro is all it takes at the bare minimum.

The colony ship would obviously be retrofitted or designed for landing, and that and the mapping of planet surface can be excused by the "computer did it!".
Naturally and logically even before voyage started a planet fit to support human form of life would be chosen in advance.
Damage during landing then would be supported by the regression of humans into semi-barbarity during the voyage, yet the still functioning ship systems could pull it off sufficiently enough that some people survive.
And presto - you have your human colony without any special advanced knowledge or advanced technology starting a new life.

Seriously though, is it decided what colors the "aliens" are going to be and what kind of skull deformations they will have?

 

[Vault Dweller]

The colony ship would obviously be retrofitted or designed for landing, and that and the mapping of planet surface can be excused by the "computer did it!".
Naturally and logically even before voyage started a planet fit to support human form of life would be chosen in advance.
Damage during landing then would be supported by the regression of humans into semi-barbarity during the voyage, yet the still functioning ship systems could pull it off sufficiently enough that some people survive.
And presto - you have your human colony without any special advanced knowledge or advanced technology starting a new life.

Believe it or not, that was the plan.

What would it give you though?

At least some continuity from previous game. I mean, even if you won't get anything metarial form it, it will give nice feeling - heh, it's thing from first game, from old world.

Wouldn't that be the ship itself?

Othewise, it's a messenger from an Earth, who still watching you - could create a pretext or a hint of a further conflict with Earth, as every colony fought for their independence.

Logically, if the probe can still transmit, so can the ship.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

Why wouldn't i believe it? Its the most minimal basic overall plot support for the story of that kind.
Told thousands of times in SF already in pretty much every combination imaginable.

But you didnt say any of it so i had nothing else to see then "cargo ship lands on a planet".

 

[Mr. Hiver]

Also, seems a shame to skip the landing too.
Surviving through those first days, scavenging the ship and surrounding land, slowly building first settlement and experiencing first contact are very fertile ground for interesting gameplay.
It keeps things simple but at the same time very significant.

Just like, as i mentioned earlier, connecting the two games more in terms of gameplay, missions and quests having long term consequences for the second game could provide meaningful - higher stakes - gameplay in the first.
Even if knowledge of that isnt clear to the characters except in hints and distorted legends. (the players will be aware in any case since the plot is so well known)
Even if the consequences will be experienced only by future descendants. Theres really no need to force same character to continue at all.

I kinda find that avoiding and skipping such logically and yes, realistic parts of such stories only leads into reduction of interesting gameplay content.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Also, seems a shame to skip the landing too.
Surviving through those first days, scavenging the ship and surrounding land, slowly building first settlement and experiencing first contact are very fertile ground for interesting gameplay.
It keeps things simple but at the same time very significant.

It might make a good survival game but we prefer faction-centric games. We need to reshuffle the old factions the player is already familiar with, which requires a chain of events to unfold, plus internal and external problems which also take time to emerge. Logically, the alien threat will unite the colonists and the factions but only at first. Since the threat is existential and can't be easily overcome, new ways to handle it would emerge which will start driving the factions apart and creating new ones. This process would take a couple of decades as such things won't happen overnight.

Same goes for the natives: they too need some time to process the new threat which requires some victories and losses. We can't have massive battles in RPGs (at least we can't), so it best to skip it and start the game long after the dust settles.

Plus, both sides need to develop some kinda counters to each other's strengths: the colonists would create gear protecting the mind (there's already this tech in the game - mental resistance has been a helmet stat from day one, but it's rudimentary), which would force the natives to find new ways to overcome it; the natives would come up with better shields and armor, which will give the player new materials and equipment. Plus, we'll need human psi-mutants which too takes time.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

All of that can be explored through first days and months on the planet.
No need for a survival game, i never said anything about that. Scarcity is a part of the setting of the first and the second game though. As is scavenging.

No need for huge battles either.
First contact can happen between individuals and smaller groups. Especially since the tech level of both sides is low so there wont be any global news about aliens.
And factions can very well present different approaches to such contacts. One could support cooperation, another submission of natives, third can argue for killing everyone, etc. Whatever.

Developing counters to each other strengths would be more interesting to actually play then to be told about it later.

Not that you need to do any of that, i dont care. Just saying such gameplay and content isnt prevented by the story at all.

 

[Esquilax]

Plus, both sides need to develop some kinda counters to each other's strengths: the colonists would create gear protecting the mind (there's already this tech in the game - mental resistance has been a helmet stat from day one, but it's rudimentary), which would force the natives to find new ways to overcome it; the natives would come up with better shields and armor, which will give the player new materials and equipment. Plus, we'll need human psi-mutants which too takes time.

Just a thought, but I imagine that a race of psionic beings that have evolved to do physical work with those powers rather than their bodies/tools would also not be as physically hardy as humans. Another interesting wrinkle here should be that this species is physically small/fragile as well - even disregarding the fact that they've never seen bullets, they should be pretty mushy.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Plus, both sides need to develop some kinda counters to each other's strengths: the colonists would create gear protecting the mind (there's already this tech in the game - mental resistance has been a helmet stat from day one, but it's rudimentary), which would force the natives to find new ways to overcome it; the natives would come up with better shields and armor, which will give the player new materials and equipment. Plus, we'll need human psi-mutants which too takes time.

Just a thought, but I imagine that a race of psionic beings that have evolved to do physical work with those powers rather than their bodies/tools would also not be as physically hardy as humans.

Yes, of course. As I said on the Watch:

The way I see it, we (humans) need and develop muscles because that's our primary way of interacting with the world: carry, push, climb, run, throw, lift, chop, build, etc. We're all about tools (and we're nothing without them) and tools require muscles to wield them efficiently, be it an axe, saw, or hammer. The aliens will rely on psionic abilities to interact with the world so their physique will be noticeably different. Nobody will mistake them for humans.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

If you are going by that logic there is no reason for them to look humanoid at all.
Or even be mammals of some kind. But, yeah, thats too deep.