WIP "Signal: Close Action!" - Realistic Historical Strategy Game

[Pieter Boelen]

Remember that new "Age of Sail Sim" we announced two weeks ago? We have now received word that its name will be "Signal: Close Action!".
And not just that, the first Test Version has just been released and is now available to the public!

Download and Installation:
This first version is available from this link: http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip
Unpack to a folder of your choice, then edit app.icf in Notepad to set up your screen resolution with the following two lines:

WinFullScreenHeight=768
WinFullScreenWidth=1366

Run the game with engine.exe.


Features:
In this first release, you can do nothing yet other than move the camera. Think of it as a "live" video.
- To pan the camera, click and drag the mouse. Be careful, it's a bit touchy.
- Up/Down arrow keys pitch the camera.
- Left/Right rotate the camera. Not recommend to use this though; it's mainly meant for debugging.
- W/S keys raise and lower the camera. Careful with those too, there are no "stops".
- Escape key exits.

The upper left corner of the screen will show you the FPS. You should be running at 50+.


About the scenario:
16 orange ships (you) face off against 16 black ships (the enemy) with hazardous islands between. Each ship chooses its opposite ship to hunt and engage. The wind is coming from due East, so no side has the weather gauge in this engagement. There are no cannons yet; these will be added in a soon-to-be-released update.

There are many things that had to be cut from this first release because, here and there, they were producing unexpected results. From here on, every Friday afternoon(ish) there will be another release with the latest and greatest.


Future Updates:
Here is the roadmap of what you can expect for the foreseeable future.

Week 1:
- Add user ability to change the wind direction.
- Command ships (sail to point, follow ship friend/foe)
- Automated gunnery
- Ship "animation" i.e. sail orientation, helm/rudder, and ship heel

Week 2:
- Set sail plan on individual ships
- Change time scale
- Visualize tacking/wearing/boxhaul
- Visualize combat damage

Week 3:
- Initial "captain" mode, fully manual control of the ships, toggle to auto
- Gunnery control/command manual semi-auto and auto

Week 4:
- Captain mode complete
- Multiple scenarios with different objectives ("missions" or "levels")
- "Official" Beta release.


More Information:
Check the discussion on the SubSim forums if any points are unclear:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=188692&page=9

 

[bix]

NEW RELEASE - GUNNERY!

okay, don't laugh!

and no comments about the cannon shot being, umm, how shall i say... "disproportionately sized" in relation to the ships

same url, same install instructions:

http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

the latest will always be this url, i back up the previous release numerically, so the old one is now signal1.zip

so what we have here -

for the sake of demo, the range is extreme, and the ships quickly start out with their bow chasers. once within appx 1/2 tactical grid distance, they try to helm about for a broadside as best they can, given obstacles and other ships. again the range is extreme. if they cant make a broadside they will fire a bow or stern chaser. i have yet to decouple reloading/firing times between bow/stern and star and lar broadsides. for now one and only one battery fires, depending on how she bares, and reload is from 5-8 seconds.

the ships only target their opposite number and maintain that target throughout. this is helpful to visualize who is chasing whom, for debugging. naturally, the final will aim at the most opportune target (which still may not be the closest, the ai has a big tree of decisions to consider)

btw, any ship in the line of fire not the target is ignored, the balls pass right through (for now).

you will notice that the gunnery is unbelievably accurate, ie, they never miss. i must reiterate that the ai is NOT cheating, it is just insanely good at picking an elevation and powder charge to drop the ball on point. if you choose to man your own guns, you have the same control params, charge and elevation.

because the gunnery is not faked in any way, i will be able to easily modify the shot based on difficulty level, crew skill, wet or poor quality powder, drunkenness, morale, worn guns, hot guns, poor command, what have you, simply by manipulating a few variables.

oh, yes, the trajectory is also bit exaggerated for clarity.

enjoy! lemme know...

best,
bix

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Brilliant! I posted another update to those Facebook and Twitter profiles of ours in the hopes that people will notice your work.

 

[bix]

thanks!

 

[bix]

NEW RELEASE - WIND CHANGE!!

all,

i added a compass rose HUD element, click a direction to change the wind. for now just the 8 points are active - temporary, i need to make a special widget for this.

amazing what an effect the wind has. this is an instantaneous change in direction, i'll interpolate it soon enough (time to make a class just for the wind).

wind has no effect on gunnery yet, but it will soon. this will make the AI gunners less deadly.

the usual url:

http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

best,
bix

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Two releases on one day? You're on a roll!!!

 

[bix]

well, yes within 24 hours, but for me that was two work days.

i'm just gonna keep pumping it out. i have a friday release planned, but will prolly push a new build tomorrow as well.

i've worked in this industry for more than 20 years, and the problem, from my perspective as a mathematician, is the reluctance on the side of the "bean counters" to allow "unproven" aspects of game-play reaching the public. i have no fear in this regard. i could not care less if some 16 year old kid doesn't like my new physics. which is why this project (at this point) is truly an "indie" game. all decisions are mine to make, i'm the captain, and i my crew is 100% loyal.

several years back i worked on a complex procedural human animation system, for almost a year, and only 1/10th of my work ever saw the light of day, because for some reason or another, the avatars were not "cool" enough. screw that! we are all awkward uncool individuals. if i were as cool as brad pitt, i would not be a mathematician, i'd be a friggin movie star.

and that is the problem. people want to play games where they can be brad pitt, they don't want games that make them face who they truly are.

everything about this particular subject, ie an AoS sim, perfectly dovetails with my deepest convictions about the basis of our mathematical assumptions (and misconceptions), and the challenge of representing them. hell, those stalwart explorers had no clue of their longitude! nor do i, but i, like them, are gonna go there regardless.

i am building this sim for myself. i am listening to experts to ensure that what one sees on the screen is congruent to the expectations of those who possess germane expertise in the field. i'm building a casual game first, but the architecture must be physically and historically accurate, and must be scalable to any depth of interest.

these last few releases, with gunnery and variable wind, injected a huge amount of chaos into the representation. the more it becomes "true to life" the harder it is to understand. simply coordinating gunnery with navigation raises questions of "why did the ship go that way?" well, lets leave that to the court martial, an aspect of game play i intend to pursue as aggressively as bribing the port admiral for a refit.

to reiterate, my primary goal is to create an AI that kicks your ass, but never cheats. the challenge in terms of game design is to ensure you understand why the AI just kicked your ass.

i will soon inject real wave physics, currents, and wind gusts that will completely confound our understanding and expectations about 18th century naval actions. i hope we all may conclude that nelson was just bloody lucky! well, and he had balls.

best,
jbkds

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Sounds pretty cool to me! Especially if the game can actually teach you how to play it by allowing you to learn from your mistakes.
Eventually you should be able to beat the AI, no? Gets a bit annoying otherwise.

if i were as cool as brad pitt, i would not be a mathematician, i'd be a friggin movie star.

I wonder what you mean by "cool" there. I'd be inclined to say that if I WERE really cool enough to be a movie star, I still wouldn't do it.
A movie director perhaps; that'd be so much better. But I'd probably try doing exactly what I've tried doing for the past few years.

 

[superkid]

Can't wait for the final release! It seems a great simulator!
Although, I have a question: why is the download speed only 20 kb/s?

 

[bix]

re AI - the better you play, the better it gets, on a sliding scale. i reckon for any given scenario, the player will win 50% of the time. the AI does not start out with perfect gunnery, as you "level up" so does it. i also intend to experiment with learning algorithms so it learns from you when it looses. i've played around a lot with neural networks and hidden markoff models, and i'm reasonably sure i can code up some "memory" of successful player tactics for each scenario.

re download speed - must have just been the weather. the server is in the usa, and i'm in portugal, with nothing but a mobile usb wireless connection, so hardly a fat pipeline. it just took me < 5 minutes to download.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I always found the concept of games becoming more difficult as you get better at them to be a bit on the strange side.
That's akin to what we have in our regular pirate games here as well, where as you level up, you get more HP and so do the enemies.

On the other hand, if you keep using the same tactic to great success, it would be cool for the enemy admiral to spot that and adapt his strategy accordingly.
But that only works if there is someone who survives the battle who understood what you did.
Kill or capture all enemy officers and you should be able to keep it up for quite some time.

 

[bix]

hmm i really like the idea of keeping tactics hidden if enemy officers are "out of service" in one way or another.

fortunately i wont really be using hitpoints. "hitpoints" in this case are applied to the ship, they all have about the same hp per class of ship. any class of ship can be beefed up a bit at port, but this will give you only a slight edge over an "average" ship of the same class. an unkempt or weather beaten ship however, has a much more significant *disadvantage* to average.

btw. new release in 15 minutes!

 

[bix]

NEW RELEASE - SHIP COMMAND!!

as usual:
http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

in this release -
basic ship command
improved sailing physics
improved navigation/gunnery coordination
grapple and board!!

okay don't get too excited "commanding" is very primitive, as is "grapple and board."

to command:

first, wait till yer orange ships are at least one square into the blue grid.

select a ship by left mouse down and "hold" for a moment. remember i intend to release on tablets, so i'm making input first for them.

you should see some red squares below the ship, indicating it is selected. this was just a quick and dirty way for me to indicate selection. if you dont see the red squares, the ship is prolly not on the grid. i'll soon have a better representation of this. btw, once in manual helm, there is no going back - not until i have finished the menus...

once a ship is selected, select a location within the grid in the same manner, a small yellow square will appear. the ship will sail to that point and wait there. it will still engage enemies but it wont chase them. the currently selected ship will automatically sail to the currently selected location. basically, it follows the square.

i'll soon have follow friend/foe enabled. next release.

grapple and board is automatic when two opponents are within a short distance. they grapple for 30 seconds and release. multiple ships can grapple. i reckon in the final, once grappled, one ship or the other will become a prize, and will remain stationary for the rest of the scenario.

i think this release will bring up several of design issues, particularly in command.

does the ship anchor at the point?
should the ship chase enemies once at the point, if they come in range?
if you don't want to grapple, how do you disengage?
how do you issue a command to anchor several ships in a line?
how can you tell which ships are manual and which auto?

etc...

best
bix

 

[bix]

NEW RELEASE - SIGNAL FLAGS!!

finally getting to why i chose the title.

here is the key, or "cheat sheet" which will show by default when you load the game. press the "K" key to toggle the key visibility:

and the primary document: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interna...e_signal_flags

i've used the basic meanings of the flags, slightly interpreted to the current/historical context. these are not command flags, they are ship status flags. i have other historical flags that are of a "command" nature. these will become a part of the command menu system, and will be added to each individual ship's log. can't wait to start on the "court martial" engine!!

i reckon pieter will have a clear advantage, 'cause he knows these flags by wrote. or he *should* right?

note: ships that you have not YET clicked (and subsequently set navigation point) will only display a flag when the ship is in irons, or she is grappled/boarded, ie, she may require your attention. this is a helpful means to identify which ships you command the helm, which you don't, and which you should. again, once you take command, you have/must command for the duration of the scenario. that may or may not change, all part of game design.

once you *have* selected a ship, she will inform you of her status. not all flag states have been implemented, just a bit more typing to do...

if you compare my chosen text to the wikipedia article, you see it is a pretty straightforward interpretation. any suggestions regarding the exact text to use in the key, gratefully accepted. some of my 18th century "yo ho ho" is a little rusty.

i'm also showing "hit points" as a measure of gunnery and navigation efficiency - just not doing the damage yet. very very very soon. yes they will sink!

G10 is gunnery 1-10 (also minus 1-10)
N10 is navigation

i think the most direct measure of "sunk" is minus 10 in both G and N.
in a boarding situation, minus 5 and minus 5 decides. thus previous damage totally effects the success or failure of a grapple. maybe i throw is some bit of random, and yes eventually you will have rpg-style captain and crew modifiers.

not sure yet how i want to decide "struck." perhaps -5, -5 is correct, but in the case of "struck", i think you really really need a captain modifier. aka rpg. not going there just yet.

the usual url: http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

cracking on,
bix

 

[Pieter Boelen]

i reckon pieter will have a clear advantage, 'cause he knows these flags by wrote. or he *should* right?

The merchant navy meaning, perhaps. Those meanings don't look particularly familiar to me.

 

[bix]

really?! including the meanings from wikipedia? my interpretation i thought was not so off base?

please advise!
bix

 

[Pieter Boelen]

The ones on Wikipedia are the ones I'd know.

Edit: News posted to Facebook and Twitter again, of course.

 

[bix]

NEW RELEASE - SINKING SHIPS!! RESCUE OPS!!

all,

this about has it now, in terms of a playable scenario that "completes."

http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

yes, it even has rescue operations! they occur automatically if your ship is within a certain distance of an ally ship "on fire." see the signal flags. note: sometimes the flags get overridden by a child state (i'll fix it eventually), so if you see a ship with no G/N numbers, it is basically on fire and will sink within 30 seconds. the rescue ship(s) within proximity will scoop up survivors and buff their G/N numbers. when in rescue it can not fire guns. it can still navigate, but i think i'll constrict that, so she really is a sitting duck.

your currently selected ship (mouse down and hold) will show it's G/N numbers in yellow. you can now direct the ship to a point. it may take time for the ship to sort out its sails and get going in the right direction.

once near the point, it will take station. it will fire at enemies but it will not chase them.

i've watched the scenario play out with wind steady from both east and west, theoretically giving no side an advantage. if i don't touch anything, just let it play, it "ends" about even, there are a few ships scattered about with no navigation or no gunnery.

so, my captains, can you "beat" the scenario!!!

i would say a "decisive" victory would be having 8 ships remaining with N/G both > 0, and the opponent being all burnt/sunk or all remaining without N/G

you prolly can achieve this, i have not yet rolled out half the AI tricks i have in store.

this will be the last release for a bit. i need to 1/2 time on this and another project, i'll still likely release once a weekish, on fridays, with whatever is new.

looking very much forward to hearing your thoughts

best,
bix

http://www.cityarts.com/signal/signal.zip

 

[bix]

btw i distilled several posts and compiled a help file here:
http://www.cityarts.com/signal/

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Eeeexcellent! That'll be useful!
Of course I posted your latest release on our public profiles again.