Drawing Inspiration from Old Scifi

Hello, As I generate procedural algorithms for interesting space zones and star systems, I must be careful to make it interesting or it will get boring fast. So I am watching scifi on the side as I do day to day stuff… I started old, real old with Georges Méliès ‘A journey to the moon’ which predates copyright so can be used in games. One particular sci fi I found interesting was: The Star by HG Wells. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63rPR2nh9f0 Its not just a well done play, the voice actor in this audio adaptation is masterful.

I started to think of other apocalyptic movies from my childhood, and remembered “When Worlds Collide 1951 movie”. TURNS OUT IT IS AN ADAPTATION of HG Well’s The Star! Watch on Daily Motion: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x24k211 Now Mystery Science Theatre 3000 has ruined me on movie production acceptance, but taught me how to learn tactics and arm chair directing to make things better which helps me in cinematics in game and the future anime.

When world’s collide seemed more fun as a kid when less sci fi was around… basically its one long drawn out adventure in engineering drafting rooms, fun at the time, but now it reminds you of school. LOL. There’s a bunch of stock footage too. I also glimpses of the best score in Robotech’s play list: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbdZNHG-iSE&list=PLxZGoAiclLonKzYerxYDyl3YZxxYJnSpF&index=8 as the core rifs found in When World’s Collide in 45:16 . Anyway when I was young, I thought it was especially well written, but of course, it was HG Wells, The Star with a planet attached to the star like a morning star to collide… I’m glad they did this, and I am glad I watched it as an adult with notions on movie making and such.

2) Networking that pushes the envelope where no networking has gone before. People laugh at this like it is impossible to innovate, but I marketed it to Midway in 2003, and they laughed too. Meanwhile it was working in house as a Tekken style(3d fighter) MMO with part of what today is known as rollback code. Midway's manager was mocking what is today's standard thinking rollback and such was impossible. Infinite action players same zone, limit only by video card and other hardware, networking ain't a limiting thing anymore.

4) First MMO designed for late game. Everyone enjoys mmos until power capped and then get bored.
There is no power cap to begin with(just a log log logarithmic progression), but there are many many many other end game design elements to make it so want to keep playing end game! The grind is there, but better and more fun things are around too! You can build up a super big fleet and it get destroyed to pieces and you start over again. You have a power floor level that you can't go below so you're always building permanent power, but temporary spikes of power surges and galactic dominance for fleeting moments give a rush. The larger the fleet, the larger the fleeting moment.

8) PVP bounty system. Everyone can PVP at all times. Stakes are low if your ship explodes. If you get attacked without declaring aggressive mode or an opponent to duel, the aggressor gets a bounty on their head in accordance with the damage dealt to you. If this bounty gets high enough, and they get caught, they will be put in jail. When they log on for the next few hours or days, their character can play only in jail, and visitors come see him and such. Enjoy roleplaying being a prison inmate, or just use a different crew member on your account. Developing many crew members is a thing for when you fly capital ships.

10) Omnipotent roleplay: Earn your right into a a movie anime by great roleplay! Live game masters in about 6-12 months after the content updates roll through. We bias people with Founder's RP tokens some and good manner role players who stay in character(we have chat logs and even game logs). This promotes good role play even when not live GMing. Who doesn't want to bring their friends to a movie and surprise em with their own character in it? So stay in character for a better game! https://www.starfightergeneral.com/live-role-play/

Punky-Pulpy action, Levels, stats, skills, talents, items, fleet amassing, and great apocalyptic space plots, trippy Lewis Carrol level Mad Hatter humor along the way. It's really weird to see how this synergizes from a game design standpoint. Players naturally want to level up and power up... That's the twink min maxer in all of us. So when humor, plots, intrigue, or NPCs getting your blood boiling to action vs them happens, you get stoked, rewarded, happy and tossed off your axis. Then when resolved, you look back and get serious about powering up. The core of a RPG gamer is always powering up, it is something we can't get rid of, but the core of a game designer is to get you out of a spreadsheet mindset temporarily... And then you appreciate both more. So tacky humor, along serious pulp action and serious leveling up game mechanics... It is like a symphony of fun.