Dynamo-Softworks
TSA Game Design Overview
This repository is for the development of a game, called Proxima, for the TSA Video Game Design Competition and TSA Open Source Software Competition.
This is a top down strategy game written in C++. Currently in development, it is inspired by Dwarf Fortress, FTL, and a love of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering. This game is designed to teach players electronics engineering, prototyping, and programming, from the basics to the collegiate level in the form of a deeply immersive game.
Story: You are an unnamed maintenance AI on-board a station orbiting a newly discovered planet orbiting a star many light years from earth. You wake up from an unscheduled shutdown to find your crew missing, your station in shambles, and your own Primary Neural Core in critical condition. Repair your station. Find your crew. Reclaim your mind.
Hypothetical Game Play: Proxima is played from the perspective of a maintenance AI. The player has at his/her disposable a number of repair bots, built from circuits simulated by the game's engine, and thus infinitely customizable. Orders are issued to these robots to move around the station, repairing damaged or destroyed circuits, in a similar manner to how one manages and views a Fortress in DF. The player repairs these circuits similarly to how one uses a SPICE simulator to prototype electronics: Components, each with their own attributes and functions, are used to rebuild, replace, or upgrade systems. The function of these systems is simulated by the engine, in real time during repair and construction, and in real time, or per "turn", depending on how the direction of the game moves, during actual station management. In repairing these systems, building devices, and expanding your influence throughout the station, the player builds a network between these systems and the player's Neural Core. Components and systems constantly fail, or are sabotaged or "hacked" by an unknown force, causing the affected systems to give back false information to the Core, become rogue agents, or break/malfunction in other fashions. The player must balance expanding the network into the station and maintaining the network in existence. The player must also manage conflict with a possible hostile force sabotaging the player's operations. The player can also uncover the events leading up to the AI's shutdown through logs retrieved from networked and repaired computer systems, in the hopes of finding the AI's crew, and to come to terms with the AI's own sanity, conciousness, and the question of free will.
Features in Development: Full fledged electronics simulation, capable of teaching a player electronics engineering in the format of interesting, engaging game.
Procedural generation of stations, station systems, components, and perhaps even story elements, to make each play-through a fun experience, regardless of success or failure.
Use of procedural systems for component failure ('Decay'), hacking, and other elements of gameplay.
Simulation of high level computer systems with the integration of LUA scripts, including the emulation of MS-DOS style terminals.
Intense gameplay surrounding the management of a station with limited resources, in a challenging and rewarding manner.
Intuitive UI that enables anyone to play the game and get something out of it.
A dark, mature storyline, to give meaning to player decisions, explore the ethics surrounding AI, and provide a sense of mystery and atmosphere.
A moody, interesting soundtrack, inspired by Uncle and Richard Ashcroft, The Black Keys, and Andrew Bird.
Immersive graphics, combining elements of minimalistic and abstracted graphics, in a world inspired by the science fiction of the 50's, 60's, 90's, and today.
Dynamo Softworks Team
Nathan
Patrick
Zack
Zander