Developing HomeWorld into a Massive Multiplayer Online Environment

[DRYSON1]

Has anyone thought of developing HW into a MMORPE? As of right now the only other true space based MMORPE is EVE Online and StarTrek Online.

Relic should look into developing HW to have use based learning skills, building ships from the hull up, mining, mission running, exploration, corporation building, faction warfare, etc.

I have seen alot of very good graphic artists display their ships and modules. From these people Relic could build a new company to the develop HomeWorld - Online which would give EvE - Online some very good competition.

Homeworld-Online would be set in the future of the Homeworld Series where various factions from the old games are introduced into the game as well as creating new factions that would have arisen as a result as factions mixing throughout space.

HomeWorld - Online would be set in a 1000 solar system setting at first with new systems being added during regular patch updates.

[ORCACommander]

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. i think bringing HW into the MMO environment would sully it. homeworld deserves labor intensive love of a child rearing combined with the obsession of a sculptor. brining it to an mmo market the devs would not be able to devote time and resources to perfection but rather would be focusing on the mass turn out of content that is more or less half baked.

[ÜberJumper]

So, EVE Online then?

[Norsehound]

No.

Homeworld is exclusively a story-based experience that is better served in a linear storyline or campaign-type setting like the total war series. Diluting it for the Massive multiplayer online market is a vast disservice to the power of the original narrative.

Yes, I gave up on War3 after it turned into WoW.

[Shraa Elohim]

The interesting thing is, you could at least have Kiithid as the equivalent to clans. And in Homeworld, the power of individuals and Kiithid depends on the swearing of allegiance to various people, with numbers of vassals leading to a rise and fall in power. I think that dynamic could work quite well in the creation of powerful groups as you have in EVE.

Of course, while you guys have problems with turning the space portion of Homeworld into a MMO, why not do the Kharakian side of it, during the Kiithid Wars? This would then be similar to, but clearly different from, WoW and EVE. You would naturally have competition over the more fertile lands, the risk-taking exploration for resources in the desert, and all sorts of juicy violence. Hell, if you include the 'sand baffles' and irrigation schemes getting destroyed, as mentioned in the Homeworld manual, then you might get some kind of environmental conscience get developed amongst the players!

[Navid_A1]

NO... please..!

this has been discussed before... homeworld is special because it tells a story... let it stay that way.

[Siber]

Space MMOs that I'm aware of: EVE, fly a single ship and build up assets slowly, much of the attraction is being part of player organized factions vying for power. Star Trek Online: Fly a single ship in a horribly contrived story scenario, much of the attraction is FREEEEM FREEEEEM PCHEWPCHEWPCHEW wheeee I'm in star trek.(I play STO regularly and enjoy it, but I'm not going to say it isn't a shallow and horribly flawed experience any time soon.)

MMORTS that I'm aware of: Uhhhm.... yeah I got nothing.

I think a good MMOHomeworld would be hard, and one of the reasons is that the storyline would be strained in just the same way it is in STO. EVE is fine, it's a big universe, everyone is a private gun for hire or whatever, you're not really part of any military unless you join a player made one. In STO you've got the forces of player freedom, one of the seductive promises of an MMO, waring with the idea that you're actually part of an established millitary that would give you orders. You've also got the problem that even when you've got good story content, everyone is doing it, so you're not actually special in the universe, and if you try to look at your interactions with the other players through that lens everything gets weird. Breaking the doomsday device and going back in time to save Kirk from the nefarious admiral B'Vat was great, but everyone else does it, and these days I spend my evenings stopping the same three borg schemes over and over in rotation. The Guild Wars 2 model of dynamic world events that you happen upon and pitch into might actually work really well in a homeworld universe, but you're still going to have to overcome the problem of explaining how the player has both access to powerful military technology and resources, AND no pressing responsibility to attend to, AND there are hundreds of other fleets in the same position. Just making you a minor kiith or a freelancer or whatever won't cut it in my opinion.

But you will end up losing some of the gravitas. It's possible to have strong atmosphere and emotion, but the homeworld has very strong beginnings and ends and struggles between them, and I've never seen an MMO get a good strong dramatic arc like that, except MAYBE the bits of SW:TOR I've had a chance to try out. Strong stories need ends, and ends are the antithesis of MMOs. Lots of small stories seems to me like it'd result in you being the spectator on plenty of other people's stories, rather than being focused on your story, and also that you'd suffer from an uneven story quality.

Gameplay is a headscratcher too. How would it work? If you fly one ship it's not really home world, and you're probably going to have to deviate HARD from established ship design and behavior to make it fun. If it's an RTS, what do you do? If you leave the mechanics more or less intact, your fleet is going to hit unit caps pretty soon and be at it for a long time, which is pretty boring. If you slow it down you risk making gameplay boring and glacial. If you take caps off then your fleet can get pretty computer-crushingly huge over time. If you make the player rebuild from scratch repeatedly you lose a lot of the persistence that makes both HW and MMOs fun. Does your fleet persist when you log out, and if so where does it go? Are their social zones? Is everything instanced or is the whole world shared? a few dozen high level players rolling into to the same social zone and launching a full fighter swarm could be quite a drag for on computers. What is the player even doing in the game?

So... it's not a simple question, where you can just make Homeworld Massive and that's the end of it. It's a complicated set of design issues, and you have to ask what you gain from making it massive. THQ has already scrapped one MMO idea because it was too expensive, and that was for the 40k license. the HW brand is a lot smaller than 40k, so I wouldn't expect this to make sense from a business perspective. I've thought some about what I'd do if told to make a HW MMO, and the ideas I come up with always eventually benefit from being in their own universe more than they do from being in the home world setting.

[pipnina]

i think if homeworld mmo was made as part of the seres. it would be ruined. but. it could work as a addon for the game. or after you beat the campaign. and it had no real plot.

[Dryson]

Homeworld as a MMORPE would be awesome when designed like EVE Online.

The MMO version would contain mission agents and other areas that the RTS does not include like building your own ships from the ground up as well as doing many other things that the original RTS did not do.

The remake of Homeworld into a MMO would expand the original story to include new races that came about as a result of the conflicts within the original theme that could be played by players who want to play a certain race.

Just take alook at EvE Online sometime and replace it all with Homeworld and the series will be reborn.

Did you know that CCP took alot of things from the Homeworld Series to make EvE Online?

Take for example the Cryo-Pods from the image above. In EvE Online the same Pods based off of the same design of the Homeworld Cryo-Pods does the same thing that the pods in Homeworld do.

Then there is the Avatar Class Titan that is used by the Amarr race in EvE Online. The same design that was used as the inhibitor ships in Homeworld that you have to destroy were built into a Titan for EvE Online.

Alot of what is at the core of Homeworld has been used in EvE Online to create the game in albeit different forms and names.

Perhaps it is time for Homeworld to take it position back at being the first RTS by challenging EvE Online and CCP. After all the world of CCP evolved from Homeworld and like the Vargyr have taken some of the Homeworld magic away from Homeworld.

When made into a MMO Homeworld would even be able to challenge World of Warcraft for dominance in the MMO world of which there are not very many MMO's like EVE and WoW which would make Homeworld an added welcome to the gaming universe as well as giving the artists here a chance to display their talents and possibly make some very good money while doing it.

[Dryson]

In reply to Siber


No there would be zones where combat was not allowed. Take for instance Hiigara space. In the Hiigaran system all of the planets would have stations and various agents that the player could select a number of mission types to do. The player could also mine, rat the belts taking out pirate NPC's etc. But if a player was attacked special enforcer untis would respond to destroy the player ships because of their actions.

There would be zones where there would not be any security allowing full combat to be waged. Etc. Players could form their own clans, guilds or corporations for the benefit of those involved with the group.

The single player environment would not be gone as storyline missions would allow for single player interaction all the time. In Eve Online each agent has over 100 missions that can be run as a single player or co-op. The only difference is that when the mission is over the player returns to a much larger Universe where other players are engaged in mining, exploring, researching and buidling ships and other technology.

The ship designs would be the same as in the original series but you would be able to fit modules to your ship making them as powerful as your skills allowed you to make them. New ships would also be present that would not be in the Homeworld Series.

Finding the support to sponsor a Homeworld MMO is not very difficult. You just have to know where to look and how to talk to such people to draw monetary support to create the MMO.

[Dryson]

In reply to Orca Commander

Not really developing Homeworld into a MMO would involve a labor intensive investment of love like raising a child.

The MMO would not be like WoW where high number of players is the goal of the game. The Homeworld MMO would immerse the player into a very epic story along the same lines of Homeworld.

I don't know if you have ever played EvE Online but is not half-baked and the Dev's do spend considerable time on the development and implementation of ideas within the game to keep it going.

How would the Dev's not be able to devote time and resources to the perfection of the MMO? In order for the MMO to work the Dev's would have to put their time into it.

[ORCACommander]

Dryson i have been playing eve for 3 years now i know exactly what was inspired by or paid homage to of homeworld. It is more correct to say that homeworld draws heavily from the Honor Harrington Books by David Webber than it did homeworld. As for challenging the market with a space rts mmo one is already in development. Agreed labor would be greatly intensive and from the first line of code to deployment would take at last 5 years. True eve is not half baked. more like three quarters. You have the overall plots within the chronicles and the faction back stories and the two novels but none of those engage the player within the confines of the game. Now you will tell me about the missions. The can be summed up in this Go forth and Kill or Go forth and make me something. True then there are the epic arcs but they are a ham handed way of trying to involve the player in the cope of the events in new eden that are not player created but have no consequences at large. Eve Online works because it is a great sociological experiment that feeds upon its player interactions. The most players get to canonical back story was the sansha nation live events of last year.

The point is part of the homeworld atmosphere was that you were all all alone in the void and brining forth more people into the equation breaks that. Real time strategy has the hardest time of integrating story and game play. in an FPS or RPG you are you pawn on the screen, right in the middle of things, you have personality, you witness events through a perspective and you invest in the pawn and the other pawns around it. in an RTS you are removed from the action, "you" never enter the battle except at preordained times and most often have no direct control over it. To your perspective the units are nothing but pieces in the sand table to be coordinated and expended. MMO is still harder than that because because in an mmo it is not about the story to the player, it is about the progression, getting the next big item because you are in constant competition to out perform your peers. In an MMO it is not your story since everyone else is doing it with you and it is not you watching a story unfold before your eyes because you are directly participating not watching constructs you have, if the writer has done their job right, grown to identify with or in some cases grown to loathe.

I can acknowledge that from a gameplay standpoint a homeworld mmo could be very interesting but to make such a thing would destroy the franchise's soul and personality.

[Vijil]

Homeworld is all about story, and experiencing the story as you play. Only SP or co-op games can properly tell a story, because only SP or co-op games can control things like plot pacing, character development (in the novel sense) etc. An MMO game cannot do this, and no MMO game has ever even come close. They can't anyway short of a multibillion dollar budget. MMOs can have backstory, but that doesn't count. Non linear games have tried, but the best ones always have a linear primary storyline (ME).

So no. You could do it, but it would not be Homeworld any more than the Star Wars Christmas Special was actual Star Wars.

I think it would make more sense to make BfG 40k into an MMORTS, from both a commercial and gameplay standpoint.

[Dryson]

You should try playing EvE Online.

The same impossibility of creating an immersive world that you have described has happened.

Although you cannot command a fleet of a hundred ships all with the click of the button you can however personally pilot and fit to your desires any number of ships that you first must learn to use by training skills for various modules and ships and professions.

In EvE Online you become the Fleet Commander commanding two to over 700 ships that are piloted by real people.

EvE Online is immersive.

EvE Online puts you inside a multi-verse of stories where YOUR story is written by your every action in the environment thus making you the story writer of your own journey instead of being regulated to 16 or so missions where you simply mine asteroids or dust clouds and then complete the mission by sending in a large force to overwhelm the objective.

In EvE Online you can choose from many mission agents to do courier, combat, mining, research and other types of missions that are different with each agent that you contract a mission out through.
Then there are Epic Arc Missions where each mission actually evolves based upon your actions in the mission.

People say that Homeworld wouldn't make a very good MMO.

Just take a look at EvE Online because alot of the same base gameplay from Homeworld is present.

1. Your pilots are contained in embryonic fluid (Vargyr)
2. Your pilot has implants that are connected directly to the ship to control its ever move (base control of the mothership)
3. Minimal human crews man the ships to that operate the systems that you are not able to from the safety of your pod

So basically the assertation of saying that Homeworld could not be developed into a MMORPE is nonsense because the game EvE Online exists.

The only difference between the two would be that the ships in HomeWorld Online would retain their Peter Elson theme which is a very smooth and trim look.

It wouldn't take a multi-billion dollar corporation to establish HomeWorld as a MMORPE.

The game could be set up where real companies invest in the game's development where they could provide funds in exchange for advertisement in the game.

For example lets say Pepsi invested in the game around 5 million dollars towards its development.

In exchange Pepsi would receive its own type of company or orbital station where it would have missions delivering its various products all across the game. Other type of advertisement would include product updates that the player could read about while they were mining a rock belt and enjoying a nice cold can of Pepsi.

There are many ways to fund such a game.

The single player enigma of the game is hooey as well. Growing up I remember playing one of the very first Star Wars and Star Trek games long before Homeworld was even thought about as game. Both games were single player only but since then have developed into full blown MMO's that attract millions to their consoles.

The reason why HomeWorld has ceased in being a popular product is because it is not being developed into a MMORPE. Just like the movies that you watch today that have been remade with new actors and technology is the way to bring a new light on those movies rather than just letting them sit there on the shelves collecting dust and only dreaming about a glory.

For this reason alone Homeworld 3 will most likely never be produced because it only has a limited number of options. Such a world no longer exists any longer as even game producers are encouraging social networking through MMORPE. Which a smart and business savy developer would understand.

Single player games are going the way of the dinosaur and if Homeworld doesn't step upto the plate and make an effort to just the rest of the gaming social networking then Homeworld will be only looked upon as a once popular game that could have been something bigger.

[Madgrenade]

Homeworld is a RTS game. Have you forgotten?

[Dryson]

In reply to Orca Commander

EvE Online's missions are like a single game setting for Homeworld.

I don't know about anyone else but when I pay money for something which I have paid the $50.00 for Homeworld 2 when it first came out, I want something more than 16 missions and a small multi-player setting where only a total of 8 players are present. I can get that type of interaction in EvE Online by going to an asteroid belt and watching as 8 pilots come and go at any one time.

You say that EvE Online is not as good as HomeWorld.

At anyone time there are 20,000 + players all engaging in a constantly evolving world.

Think of EvE Online as a single map in Homeworld where all of the little stars that you can never reach being solar systems each with their own individual personalities and soul where each of those solar systems are once again like a single map in Homeworld.

If Homeworld was developed in the same manner the total story of Homeworld could not only be told but could be interacted with as each player went about their days in the game completing missions, mining, building fleets learning, learning new skills as well as being immersed in one large single player map.

$50.00 for a single player game that offers only 16 missions and upto 8 players in a multi-player setting

or

$15.00 a month for a 20,000 + game that fully immerses the pilot in the game itself with the added advantage of earning extended game time by earning ISK in the game so that you can continue the adventure.

The problem with HomeWorld is that it is simple to click-build, click research, clic-move your ship here or there.

In EvE Online you have to learn how to build, you have to learn how to research, you have to make friends from real people, all of which requires you to use your personality and soul to achieve the goal of becoming a CEO in EvE Online.

There is no challenge - If HomeWorld were developed in this manner I am almost certain that it would draw alot of players from Dark Orbit, WoW, Skyrim and possibly EvE Online to it because Homeworld has the distiction of being one of the first if not the first RTS game.

To not capitilize on such an award is utter nonsense and is no different than taking the same award placing it on a shelf and idolizing it like its the newest thing ever.

Making Homeworld into a MMORPE would not destroy the soul and personality of the founding company but would in fact give it new life and hope in a frontier of the gaming world that is now only opening up.

Eventually MMORPE's are going to be incorporated into society so much that they will have their own life in being a worldwide community of like minded people.

A stage with 8 players on it or a world with 50k + immersed in the Homeworld Story?

[Dryson]

Homeworld is a RTS game. Have you forgotten?

Single player RTS are a thing of the past.

Game developers are concentrating on games that involve millions of people from nations across the Earth.

When people come across Homeworld and see that is limited to 8 people being able to engage each other in a virtual arena what do you think will happen?

People will say Homeworld is not that fun because it is so severely limited in what you can do.

Slowly Homeworld will be stripped of its stories and ships making Homeworld an empty map of nothing but rocks and dust clouds all because the players didn't want to evolve.

Why do you think the source code was taken when the buyout occured?

I can tell you that the days of the single player RTS is over with.

I am sitting here in a library and from the rest of those playing games all I see are Dark Orbit and other MMORPE's with 10,000 playing at one time.

10,000 players interacting at once versus 8.

I can bet that if I ask some of these kids here what Homeworld was most of them would be "Huh?"

The soul and personality of Homeworld is dieing because it will not expand into the frontier of the MMORPE. Maybe one day a pilot will come across a monument in space that reads. "Homeworld - Rest in Peace"

[Madgrenade]

Im not saying a future Homeworld couldn't have larger battles. Its just that MMO's take your life, you need to playfor ages before you can start pwning. In a multiplayer rts the game starts, gets played, and is finished. esults determined by your skill in the arena at the time. It doesnt carry on forever like a worm in your bank account.

[Admiral Breaker]

Dryson There is a game that was released some time ago, Company of Heroes, which has received the honor of being one of the most decorated RTS Game of all time. That was released in 2006. In 2007 Supreme commander was Launched which expanding the realm of RTS to a whole new level, with 1000 pop-cap/per player on 81kmx81km maps. With the fall of Command and Conquer there has been a lack of "good" RTS released. However the Total War Series has slowly filled the shoes left by the giant companies like EA Redwood, Petroglyph, and Massive Entertainment/Serria. Now we come to the year of the return of RTS, in 2013 Relic will be releasing Company of Heroes 2. Already it is set to revitalize the entire RTS genre, better yet it is not MMORPE. In fact MMORPEs are dying. THQ was forced to kill off the Warhammer 40k MMO game, Star Wars The Old Republic is dying, Star Trek Online is on life Support, need I go on? There are only 2 surviving MMORPEs (paid to play that is), World of Warcraft, and EVE Online. Difference between the 2, WOW forces players to buy the expansions at full price in order access more content, EVE Online the "expansions" are massive patches therefore free.

[Madgrenade]

^^^^ Not to mention the 50,000 people on gameranger every evening playing their old classic pc games, many of which are rts. AoK, Total Annihilation and C&C gnerals still have a 24 hr/day following. Sure hw1 aint as popular as other titles on GR, but only because people dont know that much about it. My own humble efforts have rustled up a few players, old and new, for our Homeworld Gameranger community, and that is just from a few posts letting people know where HW is played. Now we have decent, large games every night usually which for a 13 yr old game aint bad. RTS aint dead and they will always be appealing, in the same way that chess is appealing but not exactly raging popular. Fads come and go but the idea of a balanced tactical/strategic battles played from the point of view of the commander will endure, as it has since the first CnC. Why dont you get "Homeworld" sprayed across the side of your ship in eve online and let the people out there know just what they are missing out on, no monthly subscription required!

[Aesaar]

Back the fuck up.

The reason why HomeWorld has ceased in being a popular product is because it is not being developed into a MMORPE. Just like the movies that you watch today that have been remade with new actors and technology is the way to bring a new light on those movies rather than just letting them sit there on the shelves collecting dust and only dreaming about a glory.

For this reason alone Homeworld 3 will most likely never be produced because it only has a limited number of options. Such a world no longer exists any longer as even game producers are encouraging social networking through MMORPE. Which a smart and business savy developer would understand.

Single player games are going the way of the dinosaur and if Homeworld doesn't step upto the plate and make an effort to just the rest of the gaming social networking then Homeworld will be only looked upon as a once popular game that could have been something bigger.

The reason Homeworld isn't popular is because it isn't an MMO? Seriously?

1- Homeworld was never popular. It was and still is very much a cult game. It was recognised by publications as an excellent game, but it never broke into the mainstream, ever.

2- Singleplayer games are most certainly not going the way of the dinosaur. Sure, most FPS games these days are focused on multiplayer, but purely SP games like Mass Effect, Dragon Age, or Skyrim have sold very well. SP games aren't going to disappear because it's pretty much the only way to tell a story, and a lot of people buy games to get a story. What you just said is like saying books are going the way of the dinosaur because movies exist. You assume that because you enjoy MP more than SP, the same must be true of everyone. It's a stunningly ignorant statement.

Single player RTS games aren't a thing of the past because there will always be a market for them. They won't have a giant budget like FPSes or anything like that, but they'll still be there. Paradox Interactive and the Creative Assembly, for instance, are thriving companies despite catering to such a niche.

I want you to point me to just one MMO that managed to deliver a good story. And don't say EVE, because EVE is pretty much the exact opposite of what Homeworld is and should be. I loved Homeworld because of the story and atmosphere. Most of the fans here feel the same way. MMOs can't deliver the former and have difficulty with the latter. If you remove those, what's left? You'd end up butchering a good franchise to create an EVE clone. What's the point?

And while I don't think EVE is as good as Homeworld, that's comparing two very different games. Also, popularity is not a measure of quality. If it was, Blizzard's recent games would be nowhere near as popular as they are.

Honestly, if you want a game like EVE, why don't you just play EVE?

I could write more, believe me, but I just don't have the time ATM.

[jnaymie]

I think it definitely could be fun to have Homeworld be MMO but it would never be a replacement for SP storyline even though HW2's story was slightly lacking, no sense of desperation. It would be hard to work out the gameplay details though like what happens to your ships when you log off, do they disappear and leave what ever you were guarding for the taking or does the AI auto fight you battles so you can come and find your fleet destroyed? I haven't played to many MMO's so I dont have the answers to these kind of questions but no one here can say it wouldnt be cool to battle across huge spaces fighting for control over resources and tactical positions, to build an empire that will dominate the galaxy. Even though it probably wouldnt work well as a game

[fuggles]

Nope, MMO's to me are one of the great blights of video gaming in recent years - look at all those large companies that have piled thousands of monies into with no real chance of cracking the industry and then sunk without trace. One of the reasons EVE is successful is because there is little competition, start creating more and it will fragment and die. Anyway, homeworld was supposed to feel lonely and nothing ruins a created atmosphere as much as an unscripted 3rd party. For similar reasons, multiplayer STALKER would also be a step back.

Fundamentally though, would a MMORTS work? I guess C&C renegade showed potential, but don't people play these games to be in control of an army? Would somewhat suck to be cannon fodder unit or a harvester. You would have to make all units useful and create a potentially huge game where no-one really died or just cope with being dead weight.

The main reason Homeworld is 'dying' is that you can't download it from anywhere, which seems to be an unfixable situation for some reason.

[Dryson]

The reasons those companies failed was because they probably lacked substance to their games.

The reason why EvE is successfull is because it has bridged the gap between Console and PC Gaming with a Console Game called Dust514. D514 allows players in the PC environment to issue orders to players on planets within the Console Game so that the planet can be conquered for the corporation that is ordering the attack from space (PC).

Basically in the space (PC) version the corporation is looking at the planet it is conquering as nothing more than a sphere while the Console Player (Planetside) is conductiong missions to secure the planet and its resources which will then be able to be transfered to the PC corporations.

This new type of interaction between console and pc is being spearheaded by CCP and EvE Online and WILL become the next big thing in the online gaming environment where those who love any type of FPS (First Person Shooter) will be able to be of service to the gamers of a PC based environment.

[Dryson]

Okay, I will concede on HW staying an RTS.

Try this idea on.

We know that HW was very successful as a space based RTS.

Why not take it to the next level by inserting Planetary Assaults? Basically how the planetary assault would work is that during the fighting for a system several planets would populate the map. The player clicks on the map and a sub-level, the planets own map would appear. The same map creation process used to create space based maps would be used with the planet fall missions. The only real difficulty would be the transition process between space and planet fall. How the planet fall missions would work is basically the same as the space version. The only difference would be that the models would have changed to be sea, air and land models. The resources gathered from the planet could be used to build planetary vehicles which I will talk about shortly or the resources could be sent to the mothership in order to add to the resources for space conquest.



PlanetFall Vehicles

-Command HQ - Similar function as the Mothership in producing various types of units. Would not be mobile and would first need to be produced aboard the mothership and then deployed to the surface of a planet.


---------Base CHQ Production Units (Four SPA's for operation)

-Infantry - base of five foot soldiers that can receive advanced training.

-Scout Rover (Land) - unit similar in operation of the Mothership Scout

-Aerial Scout (Air) - unit similar in operation of the Mothership Scout

-Water Scout (Sea)- unit similar in operation of the Mothership Scout

-Infantry Transport (Sea,Land) Allows troops to rapidly be moved from one place to another
-Resource Rover (Land,Sea) Unit collects land and sea (surface) based resources or salvage and then returns them to either

the CHQ or Mobile Refinery Rover for reprocessing

-Mobile Refinery Rover(Land,Sea) - Reprocesses RU's collected by the RR as well as repairing the RR of damage

--------Solar Power Array - Unit designed to supply power to the CHQ and other facilities.Placement would function like that of the probe that once made mobile and arriving at its destination the SPA would anchor itself to the ground. The SPA will need to be placed within the green zone around the facility which will appear any time a SPA is selected. Each facility will have varrying sizes of their green zones as well as a total number of SPA needed appearing outside of the Green Zone. Comes in both land and sea versions.

--------Research Facility - Unit necessary for many of the Infantry and vehicle research (2 SPA)

Infantry I - Increases the speed of the infantry
Infantry II - Allows missile launcher infantry to be produced
Infantry III - Allows mortar infantry to be be produced
Infantry IV - Allows Special Forces Infantry to be produced that can plant bombs on facilities. Later training
allows them to be less likely to be discovered by enemy sentries.
Armor I- increases the hit points for all land rovers and scout craft by 10%
Engine I - increases the velocity for all land rovers and scout craft by 5%
Weapons I - increases the damage of rovers and scouts by 5%
Mining I - increases the amount of cargo space in RR by 10% (includes all types of Resource Collectors)
Mining II - decreases the mining cycle time of the RR by 5% (Includes all types of Resource Collectors)
Resource Mining Rig - Large land or sea structure that can be used to extract large amounts of resources at one
time Includes its own Mobile Refinery Rover that other RR can dock with. Cannot be moved once ithas been placed (5 SPA).
Small Tank - Combat Tank
Medium Tank - Combat Tank
Large Tank - Combat Tank
Artillery Tank - Slow moving, long range Large Tank
Combat Rover I - Scout Rover with more damage and armor
Combat Rover II - Scout Rover with more damage and armor
Special Forces Rover - Able to transport five Spec For units to their target with a less chance of being discovered.
Troop Transport I - unarmed,very low armor but very fast troop transport.(Can carry upto five Infantry, four Infantry II, three Infantry III and two Spec For units)
Troop Transport II - Same attributes as the small tank except it travels slower. (Can carry upto four Infantry, three Infantry II, or two Infantry III units)

Strike Fighter - Very fast interceptor - used against other interceptors,scouts and assault gunships
Attack Ship - Slow moving ground troop assault gunship - used against troops and troop transports, tanks and other gunships
Bomber - Long range (missiles,less damage) Close Range (Bombs,more damage) - used against facilities,troops, troop transports and tanks

Large Vehicle Transport - Can transport upto four small tanks, three medium tanks,two large tanks,or one artillery tank. Five Combat Rover I or II,or two Special For Rovers
Can also transport one Troop Transport I or II full of troops to the action rapidly.
Sentry Tower - Same function as a probe
Cannon Sentry Tower - Same functon as the Sentry Tower except it has cannons (1 SPA)
Missile Sentry Tower - same function as the Sentry Tower except it can defend against land and air targets (2 SPA)

Resource Transport Ship - Transports upto 1200 RU's to the Mothership from the CHQ.

--------Shoreline Production Facility - Facility that is constructed by the CHQ and then placed on shore of land so that water facilities can be produced. (4 SPA either land or water based)

Units Produced -
Sea Rover - same function as scout
Demolition Diver - a specially trained unit that is able to swim upto a facility or ship to plant an explosive device.
Sea Harvestor - unit that collects resources and salvage
Sea Collector - unit that is the same as the Resource Controller.
Sea Resource Collection Rig - sea structure that can be used to extract large amounts of resources at one
time Includes its own Mobile Refinery Rover that other RR can dock with. Cannot be moved once it has been placed (5 Sea SPA). Can also dock the
submersible harvestor to reprocess RU's and salvage.
Assault Boat - used to launch lighting fast attacks. Can also carry five Demo Dicks.
Assault Gunboat - larger version of the Assault Boat. Cannot carry Demo Dicks.
Destroyer I - Large sea vessel comaparable to a missile destroyed. Used to attack other types of surface surface

ships
Destroyer II - used to attack other types of surface vehicles and submerged ships with torpedos.
Cruiser - Used to attack other types of surface vehicles as well as aircraft.
Carrier - Used to repair and transport various types of air craft such as bombers and fast strike craft against sea based targets.
Attack Sub - Used to attack and defend submerged Resource Collection Operations.
Sea Sentry Tower - Same function as the probe
Sea Sentry Cannon Tower - Same functon as the Sea Sentry Tower except it has cannons (1 SPA)
Sea Missile Sentry Tower - same function as the Sea Sentry Tower except it can defend against land and air targets (2 SPA)
Depth Mine - Mine that can be placed at various depths underwater.
Surface Mine - Mine that floats near the surface to damage ships.
Minelayer/Detector - ship that deploys Depth and Surface mines as well as being able to locate surface and depth mines as well as removing
surface mines.



Determining the ocean surface and submerged areas is rather easy. The central plane bisecting line would be considered the plane. Anything above the plane would be considered land and air while everything below the line would represent the sea's surface and the underwater environment.

[Madgrenade]

^^^^^^ Try Supreme Commander or SW Empire at War. You can't hyper in a gravwell!

[Siber]

The reason why EvE is successfull is because it has bridged the gap between Console and PC Gaming with a Console Game called Dust514

That's a pretty impressive accomplishment, but it's hardly why Eve has been successful. Eve has been around for nine years, and Dust isn't even out yet. If dust was the reason for Eve's success, Eve would be quite dead.

As for planetary assaults, the question of "why not extend it" can easily be turned around to ask "why extend it?". Homeworld is a space combat game about combat in space. Planetary combat would have to either be a small thing akin to a minigame, which admittedly might be an interesting approach but doesn't seem like it's likely to work well with the atmosphere and tone of Homeworld, or it would have to be a full fledged ground combat RTS in it's own right, even a full planetary 4X game to wage a proper campaign of global conquest. That's essentially adding a whole second game to the development. And what do you gain? The opportunity for the player to do something other than what homeworld games are known for? I'd rather all that time and effort be poured into making space combat better and more diverse.

[Dryson]

That's a pretty impressive accomplishment, but it's hardly why Eve has been successful. Eve has been around for nine years, and Dust isn't even out yet. If dust was the reason for Eve's success, Eve would be quite dead.

As for planetary assaults, the question of "why not extend it" can easily be turned around to ask "why extend it?". Homeworld is a space combat game about combat in space. Planetary combat would have to either be a small thing akin to a minigame, which admittedly might be an interesting approach but doesn't seem like it's likely to work well with the atmosphere and tone of Homeworld, or it would have to be a full fledged ground combat RTS in it's own right, even a full planetary 4X game to wage a proper campaign of global conquest. That's essentially adding a whole second game to the development. And what do you gain? The opportunity for the player to do something other than what homeworld games are known for? I'd rather all that time and effort be poured into making space combat better and more diverse.

In keeping with HomeWorld Tradition Planetary Combat would be part of the overall conquering of a map or system. Granted HW is a Space Based RTS but linking the two game sessions together would not be very difficult. I forget the name of the game but it has both space based and planetary missions. You can fight in space and click the planet to begin the planet fall session.

Conquering a system involves conquering planets for their resources. A space based culture cannot survive unless it has a large amount of stable resources available to build with. Eventually you will run out of space based resources and will need a planet to continue building your ships and empire from.

The local inhabitants of the planet are not going to give the planet up to you unless they wield wooden clubs and make grunting sounds and still live in the trees. Conquering a planet in solar system requires either diplomacy where the planetary locals will allow you to mine what you need for a certain amount of time before saying its time to go or you can destroy the planetary locals and take the resources for yourself.

In the first scenario - Diplomacy - You would pay the locals of the planet a certain amount of RU's for mining rights to their planet.

10,000 RU's = three days of mining (in real time)
25,000 RU's = five days of mining
50,000 RU's = unlimited mining rights.

During the collection process of RU's (Resource Units) You would receive a bill for a certain amount of RU's to pay the local's with for the collection rights. If you decide that you no longer want to collect RU's on the planet the planetary government gives then gives you twelve hours to remove your facilities and ships from the planet. After the alotted time frame has expired all of assets that remain on the surface or on the water become the assets of the planets government.

If you decide to not leave and commit a war declaration against the planet's local population then you will be able to conquer the planet of its resources by defeating various bases created by the local population much the same way that you would win a map by defeating all of the enemies Motherships or Production Facilities. Once the planet's local population's defense forces have been defeated you can then place your CHQ's in place of theirs as well as possibly even renaming the planet.

This type of scenario plays into regular single player missions very well by adding another element of RTS to the game where the enemy (CPU Storyline AI) will also be involved with conquering planets in a system through diplomacy or aggression.

When such an event occurs where a planet has sided with the enemy you will have to defeat both the CPU enemy as well as the planets local inhabitants in order to take control of the resources in order to continue your mission goal for the map.
During this scenario when the CPU enemy has taken control of a planet through aggression the local populace will have varrying levels of aggression towards you. This type of event will allow planetary missions to occur where those against the enemies occupation could employ your services in mini missions like destroying a factory held by the enemy CPU in exchange for RU's and advanced research oppurtunities. You might even be able to sway the population to your side by taking on more missions to destroy the CPU enemy which might cause the once enemy loyalists to all of a sudden change to your side to assist you in wiping the enemy from the face of their planet.

Planetary Missions would also involve searching for ancient Relics that when pieced together provide a very powerfull weapon to defeat the enemy CPU with.

Aggression would be outright combat between the player and the inhabitants of the planet.

Becareful thought if you engage in aggression against the local inhabitants as doing so could cause them to align theirselves with the enemy Mission CPU.

Then of course there would be the shiesty planetary government that would sign diplomatic aggreements with both sides. You and the enemy Mission CPU. In such an event the inhabitants make alot of resources from each side to build a grand army from so that both sides are removed from their planet. If this event occurs then it is most likely certain that a Relic of great importance is located somewhere on the planet.


The reason that HomeWorld lost its fan base is because it would not take the next step in its evolution. People became bored with doing the same old thing over and over again as well as not being able to have a diverse range of map making options available.

Look at the Super Mario Bros. games. They are known for basically running around a map jumping and squashing and throwing fireballs at little Goomba's. If Super Mario Bros. had remained the same based upon what it was known for in its beginning then it would never have become the single most produced console game in the history of gaming.

I'd rather all that time and effort be poured into making space combat better and more diverse.

Adding Planetary Mission Scenarios would make HomeWorld more diverse because they would still revolve around Space Based Combat. If you can take and hold onto a planet and its RU's then you you be better situated to win the overall space based campaign

Changing the graphics around and adding different types of ships and a few more weapons here and there does not make the environment and space combat better in the long run. Adding content to the game like planetary missions will make the game more diverse, fun and entertaining as well as holding onto the fan base alot longer than it would if it remained the same old game except for facelifts here and there.

Something else that could be done to make the game more diverse is to reverse engineer the slipgates to be used to access other systems.

Basically each mission level would no longer be a single map but would involve upto to five maps per mission level where Slipgates would allow both player and enemy units to access each system thus expanding the diversity of the game in the manner described above. So now instead of simply pewing it out with the enemy CPU you have to actually use Real Time Stratagy and Diplomacy or Aggression to conquer each system and collect enough resources to win the mission.

This type of scenario would also greatly enhance Multi-Player playability where upto 16 humans could play at once in a four system connected map structure.

I have played HomeWorld Many times and can say that I can simply set my RU-C (Resource Unit Collector) to harvest and walk away for an hour come back build my ships and research within an hour and then mass attack the enemy CPU to win the map.

Not very fun at all

An RTS shouldn'y be that simple. An RTS should require your attention every moment like child needing rearing so it doesn't find a metal spoon and stick it into an electrical outlet.


Another question:

Has anyone tried using UDK's Free Gaming Engine to build a whole new series of Homeworld Maps, ships and missions from?

Homeworld has to evolve lest it remain the vase upon the mantle collecting dust in the closet of the HomeWorlder.

[Dryson]

Dryson There is a game that was released some time ago, Company of Heroes, which has received the honor of being one of the most decorated RTS Game of all time. That was released in 2006. In 2007 Supreme commander was Launched which expanding the realm of RTS to a whole new level, with 1000 pop-cap/per player on 81kmx81km maps. With the fall of Command and Conquer there has been a lack of "good" RTS released. However the Total War Series has slowly filled the shoes left by the giant companies like EA Redwood, Petroglyph, and Massive Entertainment/Serria. Now we come to the year of the return of RTS, in 2013 Relic will be releasing Company of Heroes 2. Already it is set to revitalize the entire RTS genre, better yet it is not MMORPE. In fact MMORPEs are dying. THQ was forced to kill off the Warhammer 40k MMO game, Star Wars The Old Republic is dying, Star Trek Online is on life Support, need I go on? There are only 2 surviving MMORPEs (paid to play that is), World of Warcraft, and EVE Online. Difference between the 2, WOW forces players to buy the expansions at full price in order access more content, EVE Online the "expansions" are massive patches therefore free.

MMORPE's are not dieing. They are the next big thing especially with CCP linking for the first time console and pc interplayability the MMORPE will become the mainstay of the gaming world for years to come.

Gamers like challenge and diversity and do not like being confined to a single map and competing against three other players either CPU or human.

Don't get caught in the undertoe of the MMORPE Genre instead rather ride its crest.

[Siber]

MMOs are not the next big thing, they're the last big thing. They've been around for at least a decade, and as far back as the 70s depending on where you want to draw the lines. The most successful MMOs date to the late 90s or early 2000s, and recent games attempting to hit the same highs have had very mixed successes. MMOs are not some rising wave or ticket to assured greatness, taking on the MMO label sets you up to compete with entrenched titans, it puts huge expectations on the amount of content your game will need and the level of infrastructure backing it.

MMOs aren't dying, but neither are they a free lunch, and the worst thing to do to a game is to try to cram it onto a bandwagon it doesn't belong on.

[Madgrenade]

While I would love to see a planet in a hw map I see no reason for teh space farers to evr have to get their boots wet. Perhaps an interesting hw map would have opposing fleets hyper in around a planet and have to take and hold orbital spots around major territories.

Relativistic velocities would come into play, you can set orbits for ships at various speeds and ships have to accellerate/ decaellertae in a new way, but you can still move about near your ms outside the gravitywell and hyper beyond a certain harddeck. Beyond a certain lower hardeckif you lose enough speed your ships willfall ont the planet, and if its fall on your city territory damage could reduce ru flow.

Orbital shipyards over captured population centres etc. It would be intense. Say 16 players per side, or maps up to 64 players. With smaller maps aswell for smaller battles, moons etc. And normal maps in a zero g feild. But with realistic manuervering say low speed maneurvering like normal then high speed manueering where you go for hard burn.

I just think playing hw around a plenet over as harddeck would be cool. If the surface rebels we use the ion CaNNonz. To hell with ground warfare.

[Aesaar]

The reason that HomeWorld lost its fan base is because it would not take the next step in its evolution. People became bored with doing the same old thing over and over again as well as not being able to have a diverse range of map making options available.

Look at the Super Mario Bros. games. They are known for basically running around a map jumping and squashing and throwing fireballs at little Goomba's. If Super Mario Bros. had remained the same based upon what it was known for in its beginning then it would never have become the single most produced console game in the history of gaming.

Super Mario Bros. has remained pretty much the same. Oh sure, they added a few minor things, but the series is pretty much the same as it's always been. IMO, they're terrible games by today's standards, but people buy them because they're easy to get into and don't require hours to play. I personally find them spectacularly boring.

Homeworld lost much of its fanbase purely because there was nowhere to go with the games. A sequel wasn't forthcoming, and modding was tough for a long time because you needed Maya 3 to get models ingame. CFHodEd changed that, but by then it was too late. Even now, what fans that remain don't talk about the game much because we've discussed pretty much all possible topics. Freespace 2 is an example of a similar cult game that's currently doing very well precisely because its devs gave the community easily used mod tools (something which HW2 lacked), and eventually, the game's source code. The Hard-Light forums are still quite active these days.

What makes you think you're able to speak for the whole gaming community? You don't know what it likes, because it's not a singular entity. The gaming community itself doesn't know what it likes. You know what you like, and probably what your friends like. Stop pretending to speak for everyone. And stop trying to tell the biggest community of HW fans on the Internet why HW isn't popular. We know why, and it isn't because it never became an MMO.

Also, what Siber said is completely spot on.

[pipnina]

@Aesaar
a sequel was not made because homeworld 2's plot was bullcrap. and did not reflect the original homeworld 1 ingame plot. nor did it reflect gameplay. (i dident even like the ship designs).
bringing the seriousness back to the conversation... it was not made because relic and sierra made a sort of agreement (from what i heard) where both devs would be needed to publish a new homeworld game. shortly after, both companies were bought out by rival companies so a new game would not happen unless someone bought the ridiculously expensive rights to the game... nuff said.




but seriously hw2 was not a homeworld game by my standards.

[Babylon]

I think this would be pretty neat. Making your way up the ranks until you command a Qwaar-Jet or a Vaygr Battlecruiser.

[Avetorian]

I'm not a regular poster on these forums, however I believe that turning Homeworld into an MMO would be a highly wrong direction for the franchise. Simply put, Homeworld was loved because of its evolution in RTS gaming. What you're asking is for Homeworld to be something that it was never designed for in the first place. It would not be an evolution in MMO gaming if it was "Just another eve online" It would also fail miserably if it followed Eve's example. I have played Eve online for 8 years, I know all about it. EVE is a completely different concept, yes its "Internet spaceships" but no It's not an example Homeworld should follow. I'd be sad if they went there. If they did an MMORTS where you're having persistent armies, like End of Nations, then you might have to ask yourself "how would I play the game?" You wouldn't be battling over resource pockets in game so you could build your ships, you'd be trying to win a game (Example shattered galaxy) With a set number of units that you bring to the table, it sounds cool at first, but then is it really Homeworld? I liked harvesting my resources, constructing huge battle fleets and protecting my assets in space. I do not want the core game to change and from the looks of it, turning this into an MMO would change the game too much that it just wouldn't feel like Homeworld.

As for the reason a sequel wasn't made, yes the story was bogus, but the game play itself was fun. I played homeworld 2 online a lot, and it wasn't because the story was crap that a sequel wasn't made. It was because there wasn't enough time for fine tuning the game, improving mod tools and having assets that support the longevity of the game. Reading Aesaar's post I'll add by saying the lack of proper multiplayer support, (Gamespy was terrible, I couldn't even host a game half the time, I hated gamespy through and through) The amount of bugs that still exist and lack of developer support killed the player base in the end. A lot of games that are successful generally have a good following to thrive on, though there are some that don't have sequels even if they had a good community like Freespace 2.

It really is a shame that when THQ acquired the IP for Homeworld they didn't atleast provide updates to Homeworld 2 to be more compatible with online play, etc. I hope that THQ reboots the series, I think that would the best realistic approach to the IP. They could set it 1000 years after the events of the first games if they want to just be in the exact same universe.

[Aesaar]

pipnina: I found HW2's story fairly good. Yes, it had a few problems, but I've spent a good deal of time looking at it for my reimagining project, and with a few tweaks, it can work very well. It had some really interesting ideas.

I wholeheartedly disagree about the ship designs, which even today, are some of the best I've ever seen. The Hiigaran ships beat the HW1 Kushan ones without exception, and can compete with Taiidan ships. On the art side, HW2 was beyond reproach, IMO. Gameplay-wise it was also an improvement, being much easier to manage. The only meaningful loss was formations (which weren't that important), and losing them was worth what we gained. Overall, I think it's the best game in the series. Certainly the one I played the most.

Cataclysm is the one I don't consider HW. Horribly ugly ships, very questionable gameplay mechanics (hello energy cannons), and a story that just doesn't fit the universe.

Also, the Homeworld license is owned by THQ (Relic's parent company), and has been since 2008 or so. They haven't bothered doing anything with it, which suits me, as I have little faith in modern Relic's ability to make a proper successor to HW2. If they made a space RTS, I'd prefer a moddable Battlefleet Gothic game.

[Babylon]

Yes Cataclysm IMO was questionable. The music always sounds terrible (no mistake, they're good tunes, but the quality is absurdly low), the difficulty was always too hard and the energy cannons defied known physics. Yes, if a HW MMO was made, it would be cool to command a Somtaaw DD, but the game was so... wrong that I think it's the main reason why much of the technology introduced in that game didn't carry to HW2, aside the anti-fighter ions (evolved into pulsars).

Bad game and prone to data corruption.

[Avetorian]

I actually liked Cataclysm, I enjoyed the thought of transforming my mothership into something that actually has a use. I also thought the support system idea was wonderful, carriers had more of a purpose then simply a mini mobile shipyard. Sure the energy cannons looked Silly and at first, but still it was a very fun game. I felt that it added mechanics that were awesome such as, crystals, slip gates, siegecannon, mothership abilities, the processor being able to defend it's workers to some extent etc. The mimic idea was kind of cool, I also liked how the voices were more human sounding, and was disappointed that we kinda just went back to the same repetitive voices in homeworld 2. Save for Makaan's voice in the Vaygr mothership, everything sounded the same. There were a lot of ideas that homeworld 2 could have taken from cataclysm that would have added more variety as to how you play the game. The other thing I loved about Cata were the sentinels, little drones that produced a force field around your ship, I mean come on that was amazing.

Sure it has smaller fleets and the hilarious beast fleet, but it had mechanics that really added more to the actual game itself. The thing that bugs me most about homeworld 2 is that motherships were once again the same as they were in homeworld 1. It makes no sense to me at all, 100 years later and you're telling me your gonna make your ship the same as it was back then? With little to no defensive capabilities? There was literally no reason to keep a mothership when you had a ship yard, okay you can produce destroyers from the mothership woo-hoo. Their strategical role was crap. Carriers were nothing more then floating production facilities. I would rather they be able to serve more of a purpose like being able to expand fleet capabilities such as, larger numbers of ships a player can have at one time, like the support system from cataclysm.

[Madgrenade]

Cataclysm has a really good multi, it is a really good game. People whine about the beast but it makes about as much sense as the damn magical hypercore story. People say it is no canon, but the only thing non canon about it is the outrageous prices of hyper in multigames. It had a great story, great fleets, and the beast wasnt a joke, it allowed a skilled player to pick a fairer side for a 1v1 against a medium skilled somtaaw

I loved the beast and dont understand why its sopposedly "non canon" lol, just because it wasn't mentioned in hw2. Well you better give thanks to Kith Somtaaw for that maties, cos they risked everything for Higara and don't you forget it! Maybe it's taboo to talk about the beast. Maybe the bentusi heard te beasts dying scream and knew it was safe to come back. Who cares, great game, get it and play it on Gameranger.

[Aesaar]

Cataclysm isn't a bad game, it's just a bad Homeworld game. The story just didn't feel like Homeworld, and it had very little of the atmosphere. The ship designs are just plain crap, but Norsehound did an admirable job of redesigning them.

I hated the diverse voice in Cata because the voice acting was cringeworthy. I actively avoided building MBFs because I couldn't stand the voice.

And no, Sentinels weren't cool. The devs seemed to have forgotten that shields don't really exist in HW. Neither the Bentusi nor the Taiidan's thousand year empire managed to create shields, but a group of miners did it in a few months, along with a bunch of other fancy tech. Please.

The only place I'd accept shields in HW is on Progenitor ships. Other than that, magnetic defense fields are it, and they don't work on ion beams or missiles.

I personally added a bunch of point-defense guns to HW2 ships, so I don't really recall how they were armed before. Do remember that the Pride of Hiigara was forced to leave dock early, and there's nothing to suggest that the ship was complete. An Carriers have always been mobile repair/production facilities, even in Cata. Cata just brought along an unnecessary support system for some reason.

I should have remembered how divisive Cata was and shouldn't have brought it up.

[Madgrenade]

"Watch us go to work on them!"

The voice acting was great. 'Specially the posh carrier commander. And the acolyte missile ignores sheilds. I think cata had all the cool specialist stuff they didnt have room to put in the first game.

In cata you get to tool around in a massive mining ship with a huge gun strapped on the side. What could be more fun than that? Lets just say in cata multi there are a few more wildcards you can play. It does have some flaws, such as te ramming frigate rendering dessies and the dreadnaught almost useless, but for skilled players it is great fun. The modules and tech tree progress in a slightly more measured way, and combat is a lot more fluid, as support limits teh size of your fleet forcing you to engage.

And yes I love the way the carriers arent expendable in cata. I just played a game of HW1 where i built a carrier and it just sat there until an enemy fleet hypered in, at which point I just crashed it straight into his h/c. That would never happen in cata. So tey same but different, and a worthy addition to the Homeworld franchise, ecspecially for those who like multiplayer rts.

[Aesaar]

The idea that Cata included stuff that was cut from HW1 doesn't hold water, because not one person involved in making HW1 was involved in making Cataclysm. Cata wasn't made by Relic. I'll say it again: Cata isn't a bad game, it's just a bad HW game, because it blatantly ignores the mood and universe (by which I mean things like technical limitations and fleet balance) established in HW1. Remove the Homeworld label, and it's decent.

To answer the question "what could be more fun than that": Just because something's fun doesn't mean it should be included. I don'y buy that a small clan of miners has the ability to rival the military capabilities of huge kiithid like Nabaal or the remnants of the Imperial fleet.

It's got nothing to do with preferring MP. Both HW1 and HW2 had a much better MP component.

[Avetorian]

Cataclysm took place 15 years after the end of Homeworld, who is to say the Kiiths didn't have time to devise forcefields or any of that sort? If I recall correctly in the intro of cataclysm it was said that the other factions were forced to purchase tech from other races etc. Keep in mind that in a matter of months the Kushan's developed the technology to build heavy cruisers, reverse engineered assault frigate technology and went from just a colony ship to a full fledged battle fleet in a matter of months. Though they were once a dominant empire pre-hw1 our exiled friends didn't have a clue on how naval space warfare works and yet they figured it out in a very short frame of time. I accepted the miners being able to fend for themselves because they are of the very same race that was a little too good at adapting to hostile combat situations. Now they had 15 years to develop new tech always under the threat of old imperial loyalists trying to reclaim the Hiigara. The miners were just doing their thing just as Kushan's were planning on a peaceful journey to Hiigara. The Somtaaw were faced with a situation that forced them to evolve rapidly just as the Kushans did.

Carriers actually served more of a purpose in Homeworld 1 because there was no ship yard, they had more health and they could build more than 1 ship at a time (same with the old MS) also provided a good strategy to dock your ships and surprise your enemy with a carrier when you hyperspace it because fighters required fuel back then. They still were mobile production facilities yes, but they felt more important.

Okay maybe the mothership was rushed, but it had everything completed once you got all those freighters docked up with it. Lets say that the mothership was indeed unfinished. Why then, would the Vaygr who had ample time to prepare for this assault have a half assed mothership barely able to defend itself? That doesn't make any sense to me at all. I don't see why the support system seems unnecessary, I think it's better than the unit cap we got specially if you could expand your fleet higher than what the default unit cap would be, which would mean there would be more of a point to having your carriers alive. Regardless it seems like they should do more then just sit there and build ships. I did like Homeworld 2's multiplayer a lot only when it worked, their MP support was just terrible.

I don't like how it felt like we were going backwards in tech, like for instance having to research ion cannon tech again, No missile destroyer for the Kushans, only 2 types of corvettes, no salvage corvette instead we use a marine frigate etc. It just seemed like a step backward in some areas and a step forward in others.

[Aesaar]

It makes no sense because neither the hyper-advanced Bentusi nor the Taiidan Empire had managed to do it. The extent of Taiidan shield tech is magnetic and only works on railguns. The Exiles developed things like heavy cruisers by reverse-engineering Taiidan examples. Their entire tech base is based on reverse-engineering the designs of others. Even if you don't capture any ships, it's perfectly sensible to assume that the game just glosses over debris salvage (seeing as how it's absent from the game), and that the stuff they found in Khar-Toba provided the tech base necessary. The only exception is cloak, which sticks out so much I tend to just ignore it.

By contrast, half the new Somtaaw technology is just developed out of the blue. The Sentinel is especially guilty of this: "We built this microship. It wasn't that useful, but then we added a shield generator to it!" is basically the extent of the description. The Somtaaw are very Mary Sue-ish. "We can do everything the big Kiithid can do, and the Bentusi are assholes to us, but then they become our friends once they see how awesome we are, and we have advanced tech that no one else has and we swoop in and save the day!"

I agree about the carriers.

As for the motherships: actual answer: game balance. But game balance isn't a good argument when discussing fluff. Other, more acceptable answer: modern carriers aren't well armed. The Nimitz-class has a few point defense systems, and absolutely nothing to deal with enemy ships outside of its air wing. HW supercarriers must be built with the same mentality.

The support system was unnecessary because it just brought along another generic RTS convention for no other reason than to have it. All it adds to gameplay is requiring you to spend a few RUs to build more ships. And the decision to not allow you to capture beyond it was stupid, considering the importance of capture in HW1. Not that captured ships in Cata were of any use, since they were susceptible to Beast infection while Somtaaw ships weren't (for a silly reason).

[Dryson]

The reason that HW failed is because of the lack of enthusiasm behind the changes made which would include developing the original storyline into MMO.

Would you rather play a game such as HW or would you rather play EvE Online which is basically HW set in a much larger and more diverse storyline setting.

Its sounds to me like HW failed because the players didn't want anything about the game to change instead where the game merely sat around on a shelf collecting dust like a Relic should.

HW failed because of the players.

[Dryson]

MMOs are not the next big thing, they're the last big thing. They've been around for at least a decade, and as far back as the 70s depending on where you want to draw the lines. The most successful MMOs date to the late 90s or early 2000s, and recent games attempting to hit the same highs have had very mixed successes. MMOs are not some rising wave or ticket to assured greatness, taking on the MMO label sets you up to compete with entrenched titans, it puts huge expectations on the amount of content your game will need and the level of infrastructure backing it.

MMOs aren't dying, but neither are they a free lunch, and the worst thing to do to a game is to try to cram it onto a bandwagon it doesn't belong on.

A game achieving a high is not like a pot smoker trying to achieve the same high the first time that they smoke dope.

Old games like HW can achieve a new high because of todays design software and graphics cards that would make HW3 completely sensational to develop and play.

If HW3 was released I am almost certain that it would draw alot of brower gamers from games such as Dark Orbit for the simple fact that most of the players were what four or five when it was released and never played it instead rather playing Dark Orbit.

There is a new fan base out there it just needs to be introduced to HW.

[Aesaar]

Ah, so Homeworld failed because its fans don't like the same things you do. Please.

Homeworld died because of two things:

1- Difficulty of modding, leading to small mod teams and mountains of work, leading to people abandoning mods halfway through (which happened to pretty much all the big mods around 2006). By the time it became easier, most people had moved on. Contrast Freespace 2, which was/is much easier to work with, and has a thriving mod community as a result.

2- The Homeworld license sat in Sierra's possession for a long time. Relic made DoW in 2004, and it was much more popular than Homeworld was. Why would THQ go through the expense of buying Homeworld from Sierra when Relic now had a perfectly good franschise that sold more? Chances are that THQ bought Homeworld for dirt cheap in 2008, but even then, Relic's time and funding is much better spent on a new DoW or CoH game, since they're almost guaranteed to sell more. Why bother making Homeworld 3?

Making HW3 an MMO wouldn't solve this. Dark Millennium was supposed to be an MMO, but they didn't think it would be successful enough to warrant the financial investment, so it's going SP (which actually makes me interested in it). If THQ has doubts that a 40k MMO would be successful, what chances to you think a less popular franchise like Homeworld would have?

Would you rather play a game such as HW or would you rather play EvE Online which is basically HW set in a much larger and more diverse storyline setting.

I don't play EVE, but I still play HW from time to time. What do you think?

[Avetorian]

I understand that game balance is a reason for motherships being the way they were, but at the same time I don't accept that they couldn't do more with them. Homeworld never failed because it never became an MMO, honestly I don't see why your saying Homeworld failed at all. Look at the ratings, from a paper standpoint all the Homeworld games did really well from critics. The games played well the ratings are near top notch even Homeworld 2 achieving good ratings. You keep saying MMO this MMO that, look at Starcraft 2, it was successful and is extremely popular. You need to realize what made Homeworld successful from the start was the fact it was a revolution in the RTS genre, it offered something no other games had. Why would you want to take that away from Homeworld by turning it into an MMO? To this day no one has built and RTS like homeworld and has made it anywhere near as good.

The reason Homeworld 2 is dying mind you is that there is just nothing happening with the franchise, the game is hard as hell to mod and as such is the case lots of promising mods never got completed. There is no support at all for the game. You can't even find a hard copy in stores anymore. I was lucky enough to get mine back in 2004 and not have to try my luck in ebay. Even though relic is a well established community the Homeworld portion isn't. A well established community for a game contributes immensely to the longetivity of the game. Stuff like that usually requires developers to continue supporting the game. If I recall correctly, Sierra just kinda dropped the ball on that one, I could have sworn there would be more updates than the 1.1 patch.

If Homeworld 2 would ever become an MMO it would have to keep the core mechanics that made homeworld great in the first place, I don't see that being possible. The players are definantly not responsible for Homeworld's current dying state. You have to go and do a history check on the events that happened throughout Homeworld 2's development, the original concept which had megaliths kinda like "Space terrain" for ships to use as platforms for building shipyards, seeking cover, hiding, etc. The scale of the ships were also something else. Some major concepts that were scrapped because either Relic decided to cancel it, or when the new team replaced the old one, they didn't want to try and make that work, even worse they couldn't. That's because it would have taken longer. Personally I would have waited another year or 2 years for the game to be polished into something better than it was. No one even knew what the changes were or what "The dustwars" were until members of Relic explained that to us after the game was released.

You shouldn't make assumptions like that without doing your homework. I think that the relic community is a great community one of the best out there I come here a lot to read up on stuff. The other problem Homeworld 2 had was the lack of a QA team, a fatal mistake in any game development was not having a QA, however Uberjumper was there to help out and because of him we still got a good Homeworld game to play. I guarantee you right now if Relic gave a questionnaire and asked for players to do voluntary concept work for a Homeworld 3 you would see tons of people being involved.

If you look around the corner you can see Siber who is the head of the Homeworld@ mod, him and his team are bringing an awesome mod to us for free putting in a lot of time and effort. Molulu brought us a very unique and fun mod "Path to Victory" Then there is Pouk's Re-arm that is looking nice, I don't know if it's still alive or not but even so some of the work you see these people do is really impressive. I really wish relic could put this game up on steam and even showcase some of these mods. There is also people willing to help you get your game working if you ask them nicely.

Back to the support system of Cata, I'm not saying Homeworld should follow the exact copy of cataclysm's support system, I'm saying that with some refinements making carriers a valuable role in terms of expanding fleet power without limitations on how many you can build could be something interesting. Who knows Carriers don't necessarily have to use this system I just wish they'd be more important.

Anyway the spirit of homeworld seems also exist in the depths of that HardWare game Black Bird is developing. Who knows what that will offer it sounds interesting as they are really keeping that under wraps.

[Dryson]

Ah, so Homeworld failed because its fans don't like the same things you do. Please.

Homeworld died because of two things:

1- Difficulty of modding, leading to small mod teams and mountains of work, leading to people abandoning mods halfway through (which happened to pretty much all the big mods around 2006). By the time it became easier, most people had moved on. Contrast Freespace 2, which was/is much easier to work with, and has a thriving mod community as a result.

2- The Homeworld license sat in Sierra's possession for a long time. Relic made DoW in 2004, and it was much more popular than Homeworld was. Why would THQ go through the expense of buying Homeworld from Sierra when Relic now had a perfectly good franschise that sold more? Chances are that THQ bought Homeworld for dirt cheap in 2008, but even then, Relic's time and funding is much better spent on a new DoW or CoH game, since they're almost guaranteed to sell more. Why bother making Homeworld 3?

Making HW3 an MMO wouldn't solve this. Dark Millennium was supposed to be an MMO, but they didn't think it would be successful enough to warrant the financial investment, so it's going SP (which actually makes me interested in it). If THQ has doubts that a 40k MMO would be successful, what chances to you think a less popular franchise like Homeworld would have?

Would you rather play a game such as HW or would you rather play EvE Online which is basically HW set in a much larger and more diverse storyline setting. I don't play EVE, but I still play HW from time to time. What do you think?

I have read through some of the Modding Tutorials that are at best fragmented and not very well laid out in their approach of teaching someone how to mod a HW scenario. They seem to be piecemeal at best. A little bit here and there and not written in an explanatory manner how a tutorial should be written.

If a comprehensive HW Tutorial Guide was written out from beginning to end where the tutorial started with a brief run down and description of mod tools such as Mission Man, HWSE, BTG, and their functionality I think more people would comec back to HW.

The chapters of the HW Tutorial would include the following:

Mission Man - Easiest way to create a HW scenario
HWSE - A Must for editing ship designs and their characteristics
BTG - A must for developing backgrounds for personalized maps.

The key to re-launching HW is too make the tutorials very easy to read where each step in the process of making a HW mod is laid out step by step and not vaguely trying to create a tutorial.

For example alot of the tutorials I came across did not go into much explanation regarding the .dist file which is a must to make a map work. It seemed like the tutorial writters were having fun with the noobs instead of actually teaching them throught their tutorial.

By the way when using Mission Man and setting the .dist attribute to a resource the easiest method is to place the .dist in your multi-player map folder go back to Mission Man click the distribution attribute for the resource which opens a dialogue box up where the modder need only click the arrow which opens the map folder. The modder then clicks the .dist file that they want to use for the resource.

[Dryson]

You shouldn't make assumptions like that without doing your homework. I think that the relic community is a great community one of the best out there I come here a lot to read up on stuff. The other problem Homeworld 2 had was the lack of a QA team, a fatal mistake in any game development was not having a QA, however Uberjumper was there to help out and because of him we still got a good Homeworld game to play. I guarantee you right now if Relic gave a questionnaire and asked for players to do voluntary concept work for a Homeworld 3 you would see tons of people being involved.

Ah concept work. Do you realize what happens with concept work delivered on a voluntary basis? It becomes the property of said company with the creator losing all rights to it once submitted which means the company can do anything that they want to with the concept work without regard to the creators rights.

Relic may not have been able to do alot of the things that they wanted to with HW because of the PC and gaming technology of the time but in this day and age with Engines like UDK the sky is the limit.

It also appears that alot of the comments relate to not changing HW but instead leaving it the way it was when HW first came out.

Gamers like challenge and depth of story to immerse theirselves in the game and world that they live in.

Not ever changin the story but maintaining the storyline the same over and over does drive people away from the game where all you have left are those who like playing the same HW SP Missions over and over again.

You have to have depth to a game even if its only an RTS. Depth that branches outward and upward from the main trunk of the tree so that the gamer does not get bored with the game.

If all you have is a tree trunk without any branches how fun is that climb up? Sure it would be easy to climb all the way to the top of the tree and then back down again but there would not be any depth for the gamer to explore when they come to a new branch.