Drawing Inspiration from Old Scifi

James Sager Articles

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.

IGBH: Game Master’s Core Guide

James Sager Articles

I’m posting these documents as lore/backup for me/cryptic echoes of dimensions gone by that could reflect clues to wary lore goers/reference for me/reference for future GMs when I publish IGBH. I need to review skills to have them relevant in the procedurally generated galaxies. So I might as well scan em.

Go 12-14 year old game designer me! I already had 10 hr a day for 6 years experience at this point. You’re entering into a creative project that spans a lifetime of non stop refining of one’s artform. If you fathom the depth of this project, check out maybe helping me not be a literal starving artist

Starfighter General launch: Four things left before a minimal launch:

1) Character Creation path->Skillz
2) Proceedurally generate systems
3) Basic items
4) Bars

First Episode: Dimensional Disalignment

James Sager Articles

The dimensional portal is waxing, but the focus is not on the Prime Dimension yet. Billions of somewhat disconnected dimensions are coalescing towards the Prime. You can encounter phantom players intractable with strange phenomena and unpredictability. Enemies you encounter may not be seen in their dimension, and enemies in your dimension may be fighting against them without you knowing. Oddities and absurdities abound in the first release of Starfighter General. No one is certain what is going on in the flux that is the dimensional disalignment, but the progress is steady, marching steady, unstoppably towards a singular Prime Dimension.

The desire to acquire goods, power, resources and alliances is at an all time high now for this will set the stage for global peace, war, domination, uneasy rest or standoffs… He who controls the Prime Dimension controls all other dimensions, time, space and maybe even can explore realms outside the universe. Could mortal men peer into Heaven, Hell, and all the Salvador Dali absurdities in between? Would they remain mortal? This ultimate power cannot be conceded to anyone. It can not be trusted to anyone, or any group… especially considering every perceivable reality by which the Prime Dimension can reach can be reached by them. The emphasis for haste to control cannot be overstated, things beyond your worst night mares and best hopes and dreams are warring for control of all reality historically, rehistorically, prehistorically, and posthistorically. Will things ever be the same as they will be? Can things remain normal… Or will you find out that maybe in the depths of all possible realities, you’re not normal after all, or is normal just what people who have control are? Of things perceived and things fascinated, ones own reality when threatened by all other realities throws caution to the wind for there is no safety. Security is an illusion, even more so when the unknown threat is all threats you can imagine and beyond. The only way forward is to run and maybe gun from the hip with your best choices you can as things unknown unfold like unmet flowers of anomalies in the gardens of nebulae near and far.

Final Push

James Sager Articles

Guys,

The first MMO might not seem super awesome, but it will be pretty awesome and as updates come along, become super awesome fast and push past.

That said we’ll be live any day now, even possibly today.

Tasks:

I) Solar System layout 2 hrs or so

II) Change flight to deal with 32 vs 64 bit, 1 hr

III) Spice up Solar System with fun stuff: 3-8 hrs

IV) Multiplayer and controls fun (Wild card 2-20 hrs)

V) Items (4 hr)

VI) Chatbox (2 hr)

VII) Character Creation ( 2 hr)

Best case scenario: 1 day! Likely scenario: This week!

N’at Man Fan Fiction

James Sager Articles

This is totally unrelated to Starfighter General other than showcasing how a criminal might be portrayed and also the creativity level in this game. This is Fan Fiction from old local radio station DJs.

First a tip about Modern Day Creativity all creators should know: If you write down all your creative things you think about, sometimes you get more creative ideas than your current projects can use. We all are creative all the time, but not all of us choose to write down the creative things we think of to remember them. If you write them down then someday you simply have to organize them together and you have books, video game plots, movie scripts and in this case, a comedy skit.


For those of you who have never heard of Scott Paulsen and Jim Krenn comedy team for WDVE, they were so funny that they had the highest ratings of any radio DJS ever and well deserved. They dominated the radio and yet Scott Paulsen left and Jim Krenn got fired without them giving him a reason(hint cancel culture).


For those of you who have never heard N’At man on the radio, listen to these primers before reading my script for one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm4esb4f3Zs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm4esb4f3Zs

For Pittsburgh, that is high art! Okay, now that we got you up to speed, I present you: N’atman and the Flatulator

Mayor Brett Keisel,”N’atman, I called you here for an important financial meeting.”


N’atman,”If its about the 30 bucks I owe you from cards the other week, you know, I’m still working on it. Funds are tight lately, inflation and all.”


Keisel,”No, I’m afraid this meeting is more dire than, hey wait, ain’t you a billionaire, why you giving me that line?”


Robert,”Mulhactchy, I think he knows your real identity”


N’atman,”Of course he does Robert. Everyone in the Tri State area does. You posted drunken photos of us on instagram to try and impress some instagram models. Remember? How’s that working out?”


Robert,”N’atman, I’ll have you know, I’m personally talking to this one girl who’s so lonely that and she says I’m her only fan. I have an angle. I’m paying her money, and I ain’t even asking for anything in return. I’m just building trust.” “Hey, anyway, if anyone knows who you are, why hasn’t anyone offed you yet?”


N’atman,”Simple boy fund her. I just ran gambling debts up with so many people, they don’t want to kill me or they’ll not see their money.”


*wack is heard*


Robery,”Brett, why’d you whack N’atman?”


Keisel,”You know, he’s right. I don’t want to kill him, but he’s acting like a jag off to run a system like that.”


Robert,”Hah, N’atman, he called you a jag off.”


N’atman,”Shut up Robert.”


Robert,”Make me N’atman.”


*Another wack is heard*


Robert,”Hey, that actually hurt unlike when N’atman slaps me.”

Keisel,”I have an important unpaid mission for you guys. Are you going shutup and listen or will I have to smack you around smore til you volunteer for this public service?”


*crickets heard*


Keisel,”Okay, there’s been some foul stenches coming from downtown.”


Robert,”Oh that’s just the bus garages.”


Keisel,”No, this stench lingers even when the busses go by.”


N’atman,”If isn’t another meth lab at the Church Brewworks, only one man would dare have to let it linger.”


Robert and N’atman together,”The Flatulator!”


Keisel,”Yes, my office knows about this, but we can’t let the public know about the threat of bioterrorism. The panic might cause a public health concern as they flee to East Liverpool.”


*Shudder sounds from the crew*


N’atman,”The secret is safe with me. Robert, can you keep this one off facebook?”


*another wack is heard*


Put your damn mobile device down, we got to roll. Hey Brett, before we book it, got any tools to help us fight the Flatulator?


Brett,”Fraid not. All we have is that clothespin you put on the Piddler 25 years ago. You could save yourself in a pinch.”


N’atman,”Save it for yourself, and lets hope it doesn’t come to that.”


– *bat transition sound*


Flatulator,”Hey dynamic duo, you owe me.”


Robert,”Wow, N’atman, we didn’t even have to track him down. That takes half the fun out of our show. We could lose viewers, this could be the end for us!”


N’atman,”Indeed Robert. Flatulator, what do we owe you? As far as I know, this is the first time we met.”


Flatulator,”Last week, Queens full.”


Robert,”N’atman, he’s giving us a clue. I think he clogged the toilets in New York!”


N’atman,”Nah Robert, this is Harry Newbower, from Swissvale, we had a game in Oakland, he beat me with a full house, Queens over eights.”


Robert,”What did you have?”


Flatulator,”A flush! Now that you know my real name, just Venmo me the money. In the meanwhile, I need to blow you away that you know my real identity.”


N’atman,”Hah! Attaboy Robert! Finally you used your mobile device for good use. As we speak, Boy Wonder is doxing your info to instagram.”


Robert,”Hold on Mcatchey, I’m busy sending money to that chickado. Way more important. Hey, take a break, I got you a Sheetz coffee N’atman”


N’atman,”Well I guess if I’m going to die along side an idiot, I’ll have my last drink. Thanks Boy Wonder. You’re a real pal.”


Flatulator,”I’ll take that! I’m not going to let you enjoy any moments before you pass away from me passing gas.”


Robert and N’atman choke. cough gag.


Robert,”Oh gosh N’atman, he smells worse than your underwear after a day at Sandcastle.”


Flatulator,”Mmm, this coffee is so smooth. You say Sheetz coffee?”


Robert,”Yeah, I got a subscription, just get the app. You should try their MTO. They got a lotta good stuff.”


Flatulator,”Thanks for the advice, I almost wish I didn’t have to kill you, but I finished this coffee, and wait! N’atman, you still owe me 2$. I can’t kill you.”


N’atman,”That’s right. So turn yourself in!”


Flatulator,”I won’t kill you, but I can make your life so miserable that you’d be better off dead. “


Robert,”Oh crap!”


Flatulator,”You wish! I’m about to let one rip. And it ain’t no ordinary fart my friends. I invented a DNA altering chemical that moves from fart to fart making others farts more pungent and frequent, but it has to transmit from one fart cloud to another. You know that inflation in Giant Eagle? Think that was Biden? Think again! That was my doing! I wanted everyone poor so they could only afford beans! Now that everyone’s eating beans for every meal. At this moment there’s a latent fart haze across all of Pittsburgh from all the tooting. Once I let this one rip, it’s the big one, everyone will have my fart’s DNA and nothing will ever smell pleasant again.”


*shart sound happens*


Robert: He sharted and that weren’t no baby shart


Flatulator,”WHAT! I never lose a gamble! This is a load of crap!”


Robert,”You can say that again. We’ll swing by pants n at on the way Allegenhy county.”


Flatulator,”I still don’t get it! How could this be?”


Robert,”Oh I put Exlax in your coffee cuz you’re a dork. Hey N’atman, I you can have my cup since Harry drank yours.”


N’atman,”My powers of N’at deduction determine that coffee was meant for me.”


Robert,”Yeah, but this cup was mine, and you can have it since I’m such a nice guy n all. Remember what you said before ‘We’re real pals’. So you want my coffee?”


N’atman,”Uh, nah.”


Robert,”Me either”, throws it out.


–narrator exit commentary—

Wow, just reduced time to release

James Sager Articles

Guys, I know this will sound lame, but I will not have moving enemies on first beta release. Turrets and other players is the only enemies. Of course as things are stable, we add moving enemies asap in updates. We plan on mass updates in Starfighter General for decades

We reduced the time to release by about 4 weeks! We could release any time now!

WOOW! Get excited!

Whoa, just had a 2nd stroke of Genius: I don’t need a proceedurally generated galaxy at all! All I need is one star system to start testing! Generate Sol for the Solar System? I guess o.

Now we down to just databasing some items and Upgrading/Fleet progression…

And heck, we don’t need tons of rares and such… Just a few basic items of various quality… Whoa, thats 3 points down…

And we’re left with fleet progression of some sort… That’s it!!!! WHOA!

We could be out on the weekend… It’s outrageous how God sends breakthrough after breakthrough… I literally just minimized all the tasks for the game to get a possible weekend launch while posting this… I honestly wouldn’t expect anything for a week, but we could hammer this out ASAP!

My old 1989 Character Creation

James Sager Articles

This archaeology of my past game design is not just for fun show. It’s part of the game. I have hundreds of these quite valid game design docs helping me make the universe, characters and such. Just a glimpse, that truly, this is no joke, it is for real, a game everyone who played it says is the best PNP RPG they ever played, yet just another one of my master piece makings of a renaissance designer of 150,000 hours experience. It’s time is quickly hastening to show the world what fun truly means.

Final Tasks: Design Finalized!

James Sager Articles

  1. I realized that while I cannot add new random elements to an already proceedurally generated universe directly, I can do this: i) Do a 2nd roll for bonus things in systems ii) Generate star systems a few at a time. We’ll start with 100 systems and scale out to billions.
  2. Multiplayer Needs to be coded. I need to set up an entire room to multiple computers to test.
  3. Items need to go in.

Once those are in, as I already have character creation, the game can launch. As always, I struggle with rent, food, even water(my place has no water), so I can’t code 24/7. If you could fund me even a bit, the game would come out faster. Sometimes it takes me 5 hours to get done what would only take me a half hour at an actual house with amenities.

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Star Sectors: Clusters of Star Systems

James Sager Articles

A Star Sector is a cluster of star systems with similar traits. They may be: High in Iron, might be ruled by a faction of alien, mutant, android or boring humans. They might have nebula that give oxygen and nutrients plants can grow in. They might have neon storms. They might be very life attuning. They might have all sorts of similar features.

So when you look around the skybox at these different star sector system clusters, they will look visually similar in color, arrangement of nebula, etc… So you if you’re seeking that type of thing, you can explore the star systems around it. A Star Sector is a grouping of Star systems. You might not like every star system in that Star Sector, but maybe a few are very interesting for mining and stuff.

Right now I’m brainstorming these Star Sector biome types… Once I collect a bunch of them, I’ll be more ready to generate the systems… And then the universe. I wonder if God can help me make this in 6 days, so like we’ll see by Wed 5/11/2022.

Warp Drive

James Sager Articles

I’m looking for help on this Unity Question:

Hello, I want to generate a HDRP skybox with actual simulated positions of tens of thousands of real stars/Nebula/etc in my game, so when I hit warp, I change them from a skybox to parts in the game you can see fly by like StarTrek TNG, then when the warp is over, it is converted back to skybox. So where you are in the galaxy seems positionally changed accurately. That sounds complicated, but it is not. My question is: How do I generate a HDRP skybox assuming I have a bunch of sprites/3d meshes to place at certain points inside a sphere of 50,000.00 ish units wide?

Cool tech right?

Making a Universe

James Sager Articles

I’m making a procedural generated universe. From a software architect standpoint, this presents fun challenges. From a creative RPG maker standpoint, this is extremely fun.

My notes:

(how to keep current proceedural and add more)

Radiation zones unlock more zones

First systems are low level systems. Roll out more.

Galaxy 1 x 3,000,000 systems

Next make another Galaxy when generating stuff, say radiation zones removed

Proceedurally generate type of system:

Star/rogue asteroid/rogue planet/dark nebula/black hole

Hollwo planets/ stars

Unexplored Systems Modifiers
1 Pirate Infested
2 Resource Rich
3 Inhabited by Non Space-faring Species
4 Ancient Ruins With Nearly Illegible Pictographs
Object: Deep Sleep Pods (occupied)

Object: Automobile (unmanned)

Object: Black monolith

Object: Ancient terrestrial space probe (e.g. Voyager)

1) Factions

Stars 1-7 or 100s to 1000s
Star color, size
Red star
Orange star
Yellow star
Yellow-white star
White star
Blue-white star
Blue star
neutron star

Theme:

1) Overbright
2) Nebula
3) Standard
4) Sea
5) Dyson

Planet:
Habitable
rocky planet
asteroid belt
gas giant
metal planet
dwarf
Comet,
Debris Field
pulsar
Ring World

etc etc etc, fun stuff brainstorming. Lets see how fast I can generate this galaxy

Final 4

James Sager Articles

The Final 4 tasks before launch:

  1. Take the networking and allow non player enemies.
  2. Proceedurally generate a galaxy.
  3. Database in items.
  4. Ships and Fleet Upgrading/Progression rules.

It is quite conceivable to have a testable semi-beta out by June or earlier. I can’t assure it. My life is so turbulent it is ridiculous. When I say semi-beta, I don’t want to reset your character progression except due to bug, server corruption or something abusively redic.

Pray for me. If I can succeed, I want to help others and form the Video Game Monastery to bring arcades back. Maybe we can train online gamers to stop hating so much.