How do you feel about starmade?

[Sabrewulf]

Release February 28, 2012 (Alpha)
It's half decade
I'm afraid it will never become more than build.

 

[Deserea]

I mean..its came a bloody long way from where it was. Yes its still just build, but the game itself has gone *far* in improving. Plus, with the small team it has, i dont expect the game to be finished quickly. its like what? 3-4 people? Yea..

 

[Gasboy]

Release February 28, 2012 (Alpha)
It's half decade
I'm afraid it will never become more than build.

Right, but Minecraft will be? All you can do in Minecraft is build and explore. Sure, the End might count as (pun intended) end content, but for something you can get to and kill in ten minutes from the start of the game, killing the Ender dragon isn't all that engaging. So that leaves Minecraft in the same place that StarMade is in: build and explore. Oh yeah, we have pirates, Minecraft has skeletons and creepers and such.

Yeah, so what's wrong with building, exactly?

Have patience or find a "better" space sandboxy game. Protip: you cannot.

 

[Sabrewulf]

Right, but Minecraft will be? All you can do in Minecraft is build and explore. Sure, the End might count as (pun intended) end content, but for something you can get to and kill in ten minutes from the start of the game, killing the Ender dragon isn't all that engaging. So that leaves Minecraft in the same place that StarMade is in: build and explore. Oh yeah, we have pirates, Minecraft has skeletons and creepers and such.

Yeah, so what's wrong with building, exactly?

Have patience or find a "better" space sandboxy game. Protip: you cannot.

Wait what? Do you want mention minecraft as example...
Pre-classic 2009
Classic 2009
Indev 2009
Infdev 2010
Alpha 2010
Beta 2010
Release 2011
Do not mention minecraft, it was odd at that period. Minecraft is immensely expanded with mods, and mods are immensely used. So do no metion minecraft as vanilla, because it's not just build but effectively rpg, fps, pvp, pve...

"Have patience or find a "better" space sandboxy game. Protip: you cannot."
Do not try to create conflict. Protip: It's not the better space sandbox

 

[Brokengauge]

I'm just glad I can build spaceships exactly the way I want them to be. I can (and do!) Sculpt my systems out and cover them in what I feel is a convincing facade, and not just slap a single, pre built module into a predetermined spot, and I'm stuck with how that looks even if it's against the aesthetic I want.

StarMade may never take off. It's features may never be adequately finished, or entertaining. But to me, those have always been, at most, bonus reasons to play. I like building spaceships. I was drawing them 15 years ago, and wanting so bad to actually get to fly one. I wanted to actually realize the ships that only existed in my head. And now I can. I even could have done it for free.

If you're frustrated with the current state, then I do hope you haven't paid for it yet(too lazy to check your profile if you did). That would be disappointing, to spend money and then not like the product. Maybe I'm falling into the trap of a sunk cost fallacy, but I have paid for it, and I'm more than perfectly happy with the current state. If you haven't, then be thankful that you merely spent your time on it, rather than your time AND your money, and just wait until it DOES become worth your money.

If you have paid for it, then that sucks that you're not happy with it. *But *alpha game is alpha, and expecting a small Indy team (of which only one is full time, if I remember correctly- someone prove me wrong plz) to stay on top of any sort of rigid, or semi-rigid schedule is a little unreasonable. They weren't trying to deceive you about the state of the game, when you bought it (if you bought it), and they're doing what they can, when they can.

Anyway, I'm rambling. I'm happy with it so far. I understand the frustration (i think) but don't agree with the sentiment. As long as I can keep building spaceships, I will continue to be happy with it, mostly.

 

[KiloZulu]

I was just giving some thought to the game's direction earlier in the week, so this thread is timely for me. I've been getting the sense, more from forum discussion perhaps than actual dev action, that the end goal is turning decidedly 4X RTS. When I first found this game (all those years ago,) I don't recall plans for either. My memory is that the game was going to be about building ships and exploring the galaxy with your friends. Fighting off pirates, exploring planets and stations, taking missions from NPC's, and trading were the driving ideas of the time. Certainly PVP was always a thing, but I think we were all thinking along the lines of pirating - faction space wasn't a thing at the time.

I've no interest in the game if it's main focus is 4X RTS. I don't want to spend weeks building ships that are going to get thrown away in combat. I can play Galactic Civ and build great looking ships in minutes. When this game starts around a player avatar floating around in their spacesuit and building a ship, I think that's where the focus should remain - the universe through the player's eyes, looking up from a planet or through a porthole. Not a strategy map.

The goal for my friends and I have always been the RPG aspects of the game, and for a long time the only argument you saw on the forums was what the balance would be between PVP and RPG. For my part, I always built my ships for strong RPG. I wanted players to have as much interaction with the ship they were crewing as possible. Logic has always been an important part of ship design for me - doors, lights, lifts, you name it. Give the crew as much immersion as possible. I've always made strong ships, too - chiefly to handle the role of deep space exploration with AI pirates, but also to potentially ward off the odd player pirate.

 

[Lecic]

I was just giving some thought to the game's direction earlier in the week, so this thread is timely for me. I've been getting the sense, more from forum discussion perhaps than actual dev action, that the end goal is turning decidedly 4X RTS. When I first found this game (all those years ago,) I don't recall plans for either. My memory is that the game was going to be about building ships and exploring the galaxy with your friends. Fighting off pirates, exploring planets and stations, taking missions from NPC's, and trading were the driving ideas of the time. Certainly PVP was always a thing, but I think we were all thinking along the lines of pirating - faction space wasn't a thing at the time.

I've no interest in the game if it's main focus is 4X RTS. I don't want to spend weeks building ships that are going to get thrown away in combat. I can play Galactic Civ and build great looking ships in minutes. When this game starts around a player avatar floating around in their spacesuit and building a ship, I think that's where the focus should remain - the universe through the player's eyes, looking up from a planet or through a porthole. Not a strategy map.

The goal for my friends and I have always been the RPG aspects of the game, and for a long time the only argument you saw on the forums was what the balance would be between PVP and RPG. For my part, I always built my ships for strong RPG. I wanted players to have as much interaction with the ship they were crewing as possible. Logic has always been an important part of ship design for me - doors, lights, lifts, you name it. Give the crew as much immersion as possible. I've always made strong ships, too - chiefly to handle the role of deep space exploration with AI pirates, but also to potentially ward off the odd player pirate.

And what exactly prevents individual players from flying around the universe exploring while big factions fight in the background?

 

[takethispie]

I played starmade for about 3k hours or so. I am a bit bored now, the game is amazing don't get me wrong and while I'll never stop playing starmade (waiting for power update to finally starting to work again on the Maelstrom) the interest is fading away between updates unfortunately.
I bought an htc vive a few weeks ago and my god starmade would be so amazing for vr !
it would have no competition whatsoever and would mostly be the first of it's kind to come to this new way to play games
I can't emphasize enough on how amazing and incredible it would be in vr, litterally the minecraft of vr
but adding vr to a game is hard work and it doesn't seem that a steamvr wrapper for java exists anyway.

 

[Crusade]

but adding vr to a game is hard work and it doesn't seem that a steamvr wrapper for java exists anyway.

There's an Oculus rift mode. Maybe try it out?
O_OCULUS_RENDERING = false

In settings.cfg

 

[Gasboy]

I was just giving some thought to the game's direction earlier in the week, so this thread is timely for me. I've been getting the sense, more from forum discussion perhaps than actual dev action, that the end goal is turning decidedly 4X RTS. When I first found this game (all those years ago,) I don't recall plans for either. My memory is that the game was going to be about building ships and exploring the galaxy with your friends. Fighting off pirates, exploring planets and stations, taking missions from NPC's, and trading were the driving ideas of the time. Certainly PVP was always a thing, but I think we were all thinking along the lines of pirating - faction space wasn't a thing at the time.

I've no interest in the game if it's main focus is 4X RTS. I don't want to spend weeks building ships that are going to get thrown away in combat. I can play Galactic Civ and build great looking ships in minutes. When this game starts around a player avatar floating around in their spacesuit and building a ship, I think that's where the focus should remain - the universe through the player's eyes, looking up from a planet or through a porthole. Not a strategy map.

The goal for my friends and I have always been the RPG aspects of the game, and for a long time the only argument you saw on the forums was what the balance would be between PVP and RPG. For my part, I always built my ships for strong RPG. I wanted players to have as much interaction with the ship they were crewing as possible. Logic has always been an important part of ship design for me - doors, lights, lifts, you name it. Give the crew as much immersion as possible. I've always made strong ships, too - chiefly to handle the role of deep space exploration with AI pirates, but also to potentially ward off the odd player pirate.

Oh, well if you're going off forum discussion, I'm telling you right now that the game is actually going to be a grand strategy game set in 1066 AD.

What, it's forum discussion. Obviously the devs who are making the game are wrong.

Seriously, dude?

Even if the goal IS something like an RTS, this will not prevent you from playing the game you want to play. You don't have to like what other servers do, you can create your own and play with only the people you want to play with. The game having RTS aspects (aspects meaning parts of the game will be reminiscent of an RTS game, not that the whole game will be an RTS and RTS only) will not prevent you from exploring, fighting pirates, and building great ships with your friends.

The RTS aspects will mainly be in controlling more than one ship, in automation, and other things like that. Doesn't mean you have to use it, you will be able to do things as you do them right now.
[doublepost=1498326683,1498325770][/doublepost]I'll expand a little bit. Let's compare the game to the Star Wars universe. Minus the Jedi, of course. And of course, we'll just focus on ships, for now.

In Star Wars (Wookiepedia is a good resource), you see a wide variety of ship builders and modders. You have large, independent shipbuilders like Corellian Engineering Corporation, and other large shipbuilders practically owned by galactic governments, like the Kuat Shipyards and Sienar Systems. You also see many smaller shipbuilders hawking their single shuttle design or perhaps a revamped version of a popular freighter line. In Star Made, the larger corps are basically factions like Vaygr and FCM, and the smaller corps are groups like myself, yourself and your friends.

Back to Star Wars. Throughout the movies, and the expanded universe created by the books, we see many large space battles taking place. In Star Made, this is where we will see the RTS elements come into play. People will play the ship they want to play, and use the RTS controls to automate the others. We can have a grand space battle, for those who want that itch scratched.

But we also see many times where it's just the heroes. The large space battle is just the backdrop. Luke dropping torps down the exhaust port, and Han Solo taking Kenobi and Luke somewhere in the Millennium Falcon. That's you and your friends. It can happen as part of a larger scene, or it can be the only scene.

Some people want the large scale stuff. Others want it to be about just them. Star Made will end up catering to both sides and everyone in between, I hope. That's not a bad thing.

 

[KiloZulu]

And what exactly prevents individual players from flying around the universe exploring while big factions fight in the background?

My only concern is that they forego that original intent to focus on the broad strokes of faction warfare. To think about it, there hasn't been much progression of the adventure stuff in years. They built a spider, did some testing of interaction with the trade shop vendor...then it all went...fleety. I've taken Schine at their word that they needed to implement this that or the other before they could go further, but it often feels to me like they've changed course altogether.

I think my concern started after a reply from DukeofRealms to a thread regarding the status of development for crew mechanics (crew positions and quarters.) Up until his post on the matter, Schine's last communique on the subject had been that they were working hard on its implementation. After I pointed him towards their dev blog he stated that they never did any work on it, and the whole idea hadn't been much more than a discussion. That really took the wind out of my sails and my participation in the game has been much reduced ever since.

 

[wanzer]

digital version of lego technic
with cannons

 

[Dr. Whammy]

My only concern is that they forego that original intent to focus on the broad strokes of faction warfare. To think about it, there hasn't been much progression of the adventure stuff in years. They built a spider, did some testing of interaction with the trade shop vendor...then it all went...fleety. I've taken Schine at their word that they needed to implement this that or the other before they could go further, but it often feels to me like they've changed course altogether.

I think my concern started after a reply from DukeofRealms to a thread regarding the status of development for crew mechanics (crew positions and quarters.) Up until his post on the matter, Schine's last communique on the subject had been that they were working hard on its implementation. After I pointed him towards their dev blog he stated that they never did any work on it, and the whole idea hadn't been much more than a discussion. That really took the wind out of my sails and my participation in the game has been much reduced ever since.

I'd have to agree with this.

Some of the most fun I've ever had in multi-player involved supply runs, rescuing stranded players, showing visitors around on my planet bases and fighting spider crabs on the old derelict stations. For combat, I specifically build smaller ships so as not to greatly outclass the NPC ships and stations in combat. Sometimes, I'd even team up with another 'small builder' to assault pirate stations. Provided you don't immediately target the faction module; it's a decent challenge to take down a Beta station in a light frigate with waves of NPC ships firing at you.


Unfortunately these days, everyone is so obsessed with PVP that they tend to force PVEers/RPGers to fight in endless wars just to survive.

It's the same old story, you'll be at your base, building something cool when some bored D-bag will show up and start firing at your home base to start a war. Then you have to either arm up and fight back or ally/join other factions and support their agenda (which may not align with your own) in exchange for their help/protection.

The other thing that happens (very frequently) is someone will download a large but less advanced build with turrets. The turrets will be set to "Selected target" but will not have a "safety" on them. They'll visit your base to check it out. They'll select something that looks cool and the turrets will fire, initiating a war declaration. That faction member will conveniently lack war/peace declaration authority and his faction mates will automatically try to kill you because they didn't get the memo that you don't want to fight.

I've had this happen several times; forcing me to build massive lag-inducing fleets. ...and these monstrosities.


Regardless of all the flak they take from the community, I think Schine does some damn good work. But on their current path, we'll have to start calling this game "WarMade" because they seem to be severly neglecting the PVE potential of this game. With all these copy-cat games popping up, this could hurt them in the long run.

I sincerely hope they understand this and are just keeping all the good stuff a secret so they can blow these copy-cats off the map.

 

[DevajC]

And what exactly prevents individual players from flying around the universe exploring while big factions fight in the background?

What should I explore?

 

[Dr. Whammy]

What should I explore?

That is the point that so many people are missing. Simply put; we explore what we create. Nothing more. Nothing less.


It is we; the players who build most of the ships, fleets, stations, and cities seen in StarMade. This is the way it's been since Schine gave us the tools to do so. All we need is something to do with all this cool stuff besides shoot at it.

When we get that, rest assured; there will be no shortage of places for you to explore.