OTTD+500: READ ME 1ST! The future is now (with some help!)

[Tvel]

Oh, sorry
It is a big project, i better start reading

[SirXavius]

Thanks for the heads-up. I didn't know we had other skins!

After experimenting with different colors to no avail, i changed the color to underlined.

[HackaLittleBit]

It has been suggested that this may be an extemporaneous mode of transport that we should consider omitting from OTTD+500

Never! people who suggest that have lack of imagination.


They could have sails to make them visually more attractive.

Way to go "Sir" Xavius.

Regards

[SirXavius]

funny, i'm a fan of yours too.

You should have fun in this playground -- you're an inventor!

I'll be back next weekend!

[cmoiromain]

Wow! looks like you have spent a lot of time on this!

Indeed, a subforum would have made it easier to follow, let's hope the project snowballs a little and gets moving nicely =) Perhaps you could create a wiki to display all these pages as well, so they do not get forgotten in the depths of the forum, and also use it as a way of organising work (separate pages for each task, who it is assigned to etc..., so we can rapidly have an overall view of what is still to be done.

Given the time, I would have engaged myself to the project, but unfortunately my studies are taking more and more time. But be sure that when the summer holidays come up (end of June), I will try to create stuff for the game (graphics probably, or ideas, or ugly graphics showing the basic idea... whatever I can do).

I wish you good luck!

[orudge]

If the project gets going, then it can have a subforum (like NoAI did), but until it is "proven" to some degree, I don't want to commit to that.

[Terkhen]

I still have to read thoroughly all threads about OTTD+500, but this one caught my attention. Since Saturn's satellite Titan is the only body with liquid on its surface besides Earth, selecting methane as the medium for a transport machine equivalent to ships seems to contradict OTTD+500's premise of taking place in a "generic" satellite. Also satellite needs a heavy atmosphere to have liquid on it's surface, in which Titan is also unique amongst all satellites. I know that this isn't meant to be 100% realistic, and if I didn't had a suggestion I wouldn't even be mentioning this.

Due to meteorite impacts, almost every satellite without significant atmosphere has a lot of dust on its surface. This fine dust shares some qualities with a liquid medium: you can't build anything durable on it and in zones filled with dust a vehicle able to move through it wouldn't find "solid" obstacles to move as it wants. Also, dust tends to accumulate at the lowest heights of the satellites. Rivers could be canyons filled with sand or dust. For me, this could be a good replacement for water in OTTD+500 scenarios.

The ship replacement would then be a behemoth sized cross between the caterpillar trucks and the MARS-1 Humvee Rover, which is designed to move through sand, dust, snow and similar surfaces and actually thought to be used in Mars.

PS: I love this project! As soon as I have some free time I'll read everything.

[CommanderZ]

Sounds (over) ambitious. Imo it would be better to have OpenGFX finished first before starting another full replacement set, but if you manage to get started, then we might see some amazing results.

Be aware, that such project requires full long-term dedication of many people. This would not be the first started, but unfinished large project. The LEGO set had a lot of sprites finished and where it is now...

[Bilbo]

Good. Now I can read it :)

1. The town Permission restrictions will need to bypassed, or set to none.
(Zephyris and Roujin believe this is an easy fix, but see next paragraph.)

Hmm ... what about multiplayer? Allowing everybody to bulldoze anything in town can lead to pretty hostile behavior.
I think there should be probably some limits, especially to limit destroying of things near competitor stations.

Perhaps for destroying things near your stations the town rating would decrease less and for destroying near competitor stations more .... this idea may be useful also for regular OpenTTD.

6. The loading algorithm at barge docks will need to be repathed so that ships load parallel to shore, and only one at a time can lade.
(Roujin thinks this will be too difficult to implement, and should be excluded -- IOW, keep the docking procedure the same. PhilSophus would rather we scrap ships, which we may have to do if change #15 cannot be implemented.)

I saw somewhere around a patch that limits ships in overlapping themselves (they can't drive through each other and only one can doct at a time) - see here: http://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=42758

7. Delivery rates will need to be determined by demand and not distance....

I think this economiuc model would be usable also for regular openttd. So when implemented, you can switch between traditional distance-based or new demand-based payment model.

14. Prohibit one-way roads.
On roads, all vehicles will be one speed (part of the gameplay); however, i was thinking that maybe this could be made optionable in case a future .grf author wants to create new RVs that are more like vehicles we have now rather than the conveyor-belt vehicles envisioned here. Open for debate...

When you are on conveyor belt, you can still walk - and then your speed sumj up with the belt speed. So perhaps some smart crates that move on the belt to get even higher speeds could be used.

17. Restrict crossing of Vactubes with all other paths.
Maglev tracks already cannot be built across regular rail, but, if possible, this should be extended to any path type, including itself.

What about forks/tracks joining (like Y-junction) - would these be possible?

[Donoteat]

Lotsa talk, but no visible progress...


Much of this seems to be simply NewGRFs and new cargos, and hence requires very little coding at all- on the whole all I am seeing is replacement graphics for Toyland.

One suggestion- names can be simplified to make more sense to the average normal player so that they don't think they're playing StarCraft... While you obviously have put a lot of thought into backstories for each cargo, I see no reason to burden the player with complicated brand names. The fact is, this is a game about moving cargo, not about a giant futuristic society with a complex culture...

i.e. "Restoratives" could become "garbage", "PlasmaSteel" could become just "steel", "Polyplastics" could be just "plastics" (surely a metal-based plastic is impossible by definition?), "Magnatraks" could be simply called "roads" and the vehicles that run on them "trucks"...really, it could all be much simpler.

[weaselboy246]

Wow.... I really want to see this done, but I can't see this completed within 5 years at least. Always wondered how a futuristic TTD would be ever since Toyland was replaced with Mars.

i.e. "Restoratives" could become "garbage", "PlasmaSteel" could become just "steel", "Polyplastics" could be just "plastics" (surely a metal-based plastic is impossible by definition?), "Magnatraks" could be simply called "roads" and the vehicles that run on them "trucks"...really, it could all be much simpler.

From what I can see, Restoratives is recycled Garbage, would be rather pointless to use just garbage as recycled products. PlasmaSteel could use a better name, perhaps combine them like in the Star Wars universe: Plasteel or Plastisteel.

EDIT: I see the separate threads have been merged here. Can a moderator delete my other posts below me. This was not an intentional triple post.

[weaselboy246]

Love the concepts explained here. Can't think of any negatives right now, but i'll probably come up with something.

[weaselboy246]

Reading over the oxygen and water industries made me think of something. Will it be possible for the colonist to die out without proper transport of required resources?

[dihedral]

you gonna do any coding yourself or are you just trying to get some people interested who could possibly do the work for you?

[Ammler]

Well, he already had a lot of work for the presentation here. I really hope, it will be more than that. Maybe the forums aren't the ideal place for defining specifications and such? I would suggest using the wiki.

Try to split the project in "useable" parts, so you can use it without having everything completed. And maybe finish a part and then take a new part...

Anyway, good luck with this.

Greets
Ammler

[dihedral]

you could get Yorick to do your coding

[Lordmwa]

im not sure why because i love openttd for what it is but this really excites me...... If it will happen. I have seen so many projects here start and then just dissapear into the abyss. I would love to help.....

3 problems however....
1) I am 17 and have years of exams to get through so dont have 6 hours everyday to do things
2) I cant code (i tried but didnt get very far before tutorials ran out...)
3) I really CANT draw and dont have a graphics program beyond paint......

Lordmwa

[Expresso]

Ammler is right, you need to cut this project up in multiple, smaller parts. i.e. vehicle sets, industry and town set, station set(s), landscape set, tree set and bridge set.

You'd do best to start developing the landscape set, as that has the least impact on the gameplay mechanics, but is the most visible.

Also, some material to convince others that you're able to finish this project would be helpful.

That being said: I'd rather see a bunch of grf sets which simply go further in the future. Or change the look and feel of the user interface appropriately, instead of openttd changing in a completely different game (yes, that's what happens when you allow for only 1 town for the first 90 years).

I'm willing to learn NFO, but the tutorial I found (the ttdpatch wiki, newgrf section) is severely lacking in explanation, to the point it was of no use to me.

[peter1138]

If you need twelve separate pages for your documentation, please create a wiki or a website.

[SirXavius]

I really wish you had not taken upon yourself to combine the threads. There was a very good reason why i wanted these topics split up. I don't want good ideas lost in the shuffle, the threads to be made longer because everyone is having to quote previously stated material, and conversation to be slowed down or stifled because people get lost in the volume of one thread. I fail to see the logic of combining the subjects, and this is actually counterproductive to this mod.

This decision to open several sub-threads was cleared with orudge, and he did not suggest wiki or a single thread to alleviate any problems he foresaw.

I have also found that the links are all messed up and don't take the viewer to the subject he might wish to jump to.

Petern, please revert the separate threads to their previous state so we can get started. If you're not sure what they were, let me know and i will re-enter them. I appreciate your intentions (if they were good) but i feel better progress will be made if they are kept separate; there is no harm in having sub-threads in this forum (especially if i'm labelling them to let people know we're discussing the mod).

Thanks in advance.

PS: If you can create a wiki page, feel free, but i'd like these discussions to remain among my peers here in this forum.