SMAC Terrain Extended

Inverse Icarus · April 17, 2003, 22:25

I've been tossing around the idea of making the beginnings of a tbs game for a while now, just to kill time and see if i could actually do it, and i've got some time this summer to actually get on it. i've taken several classes @ uni relating to games, and i made some simple 2d games like pong, snake, etc (with no AI).

anyway, enough about that. back on topic. SMAC Terrain Extended.

i played SMAC for a while, not very extensively. anyway, to summarize my take on the terrain system (elevations rather than a flat system), i love it.

now, my question is, what else can be done with this?

sure, SMAC was far from flat, with ti's bumpy landscapes, but it was all, for lack of a better word, "attached". the differences in elevation were always gradual, creating pretty hills scalable from all directions. you could always walk up a mountain / hill, and thats basically all there were, hills and mountains, plateaus too, valleys, whatever.

what about terrain features like the grand canyon? where theres a giant schism you can't cross, but you COULD walk through it if you were down there.

i am proposing a system that is essentially the same as SMAC, but allowing for non-gradual decreases in elevation. for example, say we have sea level, 0. then we make a hill or something. the elevation goes from 0, to 10, to 20, to 30, to 40, then back to 30, 20, 10 0. thats a hill. (note, no units, i'm pulling #'s out of my ass)

now we have a mountain, with a steeper slope, again at sea level. 0, 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, 120, 90, ... again, still makes sense in SMAC terms.

now, a canyon. say we are at an area of the world above sea level. for the sake of argument, say were 150 units above it. a nice flat plane @ 150 units above sea level. in the middle of the plateau, there is an area at sea level (0). it goes straight from 150 to 0. this region would be too steep to move from 150 to 0, so units could not cross it (move down or up the slope).

this would allow the creation of an entire new tactical level for terrain. it would create areas where terrain is right next to eacheother, but still impassible. it could be used to recreate things like the grand canyon, very steep mountains, isolated valleys, etc. units crossing a valley could be bombarded from above without the ability to fire back.

feedback?

Trifna · April 20, 2003, 22:21

If done well, I guess it can be nice. It could be espescially nice in a futuristic game where a planet may have lot more variations than Earth (huge canyons and mountains, etc.).

But I don't think it would be easy to make it so it'd make sense. Puting correct bonus/malus for variations and so on doesn't seem easy. But if you wanna make it for fun, go ahead!