<WIP>"Interstellar: The Endless War" (A realistic space RTS)

Introducing "Interstellar: The Endless War"!

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In the distant future human kind has dispersed into the galaxy only to find the pressures of rampant planetary colonization were too much for Earth's citizens. Now Earth and the core worlds are destroyed by internal conflict, while strongmen, prophets, and villains invoke war to gain power for themselves amongst the stars. Build a fleet and wage war to protect your people, restoring peace to what's left of humanity.

Features:

• RTS battle space, with 3D movement but 2D style control (ie StarCraft) for intense competition.
• Multiplayer battles, earn XP for your crew and capture enemy ships.
  
• Single player campaign telling the story of your struggle for survival in "The Endless War"
• Build a fleet of ships that persist over time.
• Equip ships with weapons that strike at your enemies weakness.
• Recruit officers and keep them alive so that their effectiveness grows over multiple battles.
• Control capital ships, fighter craft, and space stations.
• Board and capture ships during battle.
• Lead an invasion force and conquer an enemy planetary colony.
• Game designed to reward for strategic and tactical skill over tenure or pay-to-win.
• Use your experience to unlock new ships, weapons, troops, ship components.

View attachment 201539 View attachment 201540
More to come.... Stay Tuned!

PS: Anyone interested in collaborating (on % basis) please PM me. In need of:

• 3D Modeler/Texture Artist.
• GUI Designer/Mini-icon Artist

 

Check out my new YouTube Channel for more videos!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkibO7Yj2xOmRZyq5iQKgWQ

 

Old prototyping showing AI driven fighter motion/targeting/dogfighting

 

Here are the major ship classes to be included in the game.

Cargo Freighter (FrC)
Cargo Freighters are bulky and relatively slow, but can move large amounts of equipment and goods economically. Cargo Freighters are best used when allowed to dock at a station or larger ship.

Fuel Freighter (FrF)
Fuel Freighter ships are heavily armored and hulled but not gunned because any penetrating hit could set off a cataclysmic reaction. They should be protected at all times and kept at a distance from each other in formation. They should not be taken into combat under any circumstances. Fuel Freighters need docks to unload cargo, but can also refuel nearby ships without docking directly.

Military Transport (TrM)
Transport ships are lightly armored and gunned and should be protected at all times unless travelling in secure space. Transport ships are designed to house up to two heavy battalions with all their equipment, semi comfortably, for long duration transports across theaters of operations. An economical and reliable way to move troops. Good warp engines but slower tactical engines mean these ships should not be deployed to hostile battlefields without significant escorts as they can only unload when docked or by using its meager shuttle bay, making them easy targets.

Armored Transport (TrA)
Armored Transport ships are armored and gunned but would not be able to withstand incoming fire for protracted length of time. Designed to offload troops and equipment in hostile situations, like when establishing a beachhead.

Transport Carrier (TrC)
Transport Carriers, or (Drop Ships), are specialized ships designed to carry troops, Landing Craft, and escort fighters to planetary invasions. Transport Carriers are armored, shielded, and include a minor point defense package, but do not have a significant anti capital ship ability and should not be left unprotected. They can enter into orbit and survive long enough to unload its full contingent of military battalions in one fast drop. While Landing Craft are en route, the ship can provide additional fighter escort to ensure a successful drop.

Corvette (Cvt)
Corvettes are small, fast and pack a powerful punch. They can be outfitted with torpedoes to cripple capital ships or point defense cannons to act as flight leaders. They generally would not survive a direct hit from a Cruiser so they use speed and maneuverability to stay alive.

Frigate (F)
Frigates offer the first level of fleet support as they excel at hunting down smaller attack craft like Corvettes, boarding craft, shuttles, fighters, and bombers. They offer good mission duration so are often found engaged in anti-piracy and border patrol efforts.

Destroyer (DD)
Destroyers are small and fast but pack an outsized punch. They are the first level of ship that is truly built to be self sufficient in its capabilities. They have few gun mounts but can field a cruiser sized cannon or two or even torpedoes. They can also protect themselves against fighter craft. Destroyers also engage in boarding actions, either by forced docking the entire ship or launching an assault shuttle.

Light Cruiser (CL)
Light Cruisers are significantly larger than destroyers and can mount guns capable of crippling Cruisers and smaller ships. However they are not well armored and would not last long in a fight against more well rounded ships. Like all Cruisers, they include a significant point defense suite of weapons. Cruisers can offer concentrated fire on larger targets but would rarely be able to take down anything larger than a Cruiser by itself.

Cruiser (C)
Cruisers offer a mix of speed, durability, and firepower that make them invaluable in most fleet actions. With guns large enough to take down a Battleship and the speed to escape when it can't, the Cruiser can fit into many roles like leading small taskforces, raiding enemy logistics, adding firepower to larger fleets, covering retreats, and striking enemy installations.

Battle Cruiser (BC)
Battle Cruisers can field more larger guns than standard Cruisers and have heavier armor and shielding making them capable of successfully engaging with Dreadnaughts and Battleships. They usually are found in frontline action when engaging enemy fleets and bases and should not be relegated to patrol or anti-piracy efforts.

Dreadnought (DC)
Heavily armored and gunned, with limited speed. These ships are designed to add heavy gun support and formation protection to any fleet. Cannot chase down enemies but can keep most hostile targets at bay with its long range heavy weapons.

Light Carrier (CVL)
Lightly armored with minimal weapons. Designed to add mobile hanger space and operations support to a fleet.

Strike Carrier (CVS)
Heavier armor and weapons than a Light Carrier, with C&C functions and limited hanger space. Designed to flag a small taskforce for singular missions into enemy territory. Usually equipped with the best electronics and surveillance equipment, and fast tactical engines for quick escapes. Also usually outfitted with a special forces battalion including boarding/landing craft.

Assault Carrier (CVA)
Heavier armor and weapons than a Light Carrier, with limited hanger space. Designed to penetrate enemy battle lines and launch fighter/bombers or boarding actions at strategic targets.

Carrier (CV)
A fleet operations base with C&C capabilities. A few large guns and point defense weapons, but mostly designed to launch a large variety of flight missions over a long duration tour. Usually equipped with a battalion of marines including boarding craft.

Battleship (BB)
Battleships are designed for offensive actions against slow and hardened targets like Battle Stations. While in motion they are not easy targets for Fighters and Bombers as they possess lethal point defense weapons. If disabled however, the Battleship can become a very tempting target for torpedoes and bombers. Battleships use their long range heavy weapons to bring significant amounts of fire to the battle field. A few direct hits from a Battleship would destroy most smaller than it. Battleships can lead fleets and incursions but are too big to go undetected for long, which makes them ideal for showing the flag.

SuperBattleship (SBB)
Super Battleships have heavier armor and shields, and longer range guns than a typical battleship. They are also slower and less maneuverable. The ship of choice if the target is large, slow, and well defended.

Stellar Command (SC)
The Steller Command Class vessels are huge vessels about four to five times larger than Battleships and designed to bring significant capabilities to an invasion. Able to launch 2 fighter wings, boarding actions, and ground invasions, the SC Class can easily capture or destroy Capital Ships, Stations, and Planetary Installations. It can host an entire division of military troops, land them, and protect them while bombarding the enemy from orbit. An SC can take on an entire fleet by itself, but it should be always be escorted by Frigates, Destroyers, and mix of larger capital ships to protect it from hit and run tactics.

Mothership (M)
A Mothership is a huge investment of time, materials, and personnel, for any faction to bear, but showing up in orbit should be enough to force capitulation from the enemy. For those foolish enough to resist, the Mothership is capable of launching a full scale invasion of any planetary system.

 

Here the the small craft that are currently included in the game. These ships are carried by the larger ships and are not capable of warp jumps.

Shuttle (Shtl)
Basic unarmed shuttle craft capable of transporting up to 20 passengers. Can be used for boarding actions or planetary insertions, but would be destroyed under any amount of fire so it should only be used against disabled or unsuspecting targets.

Assault Shuttle (ShtlA)
A large armored shuttle craft with fast engines designed to allow for the transport of up to 50 passengers through a hostile environment. Typically used for boarding actions or planetary insertions of special forces units.

Fighter Tender (ShtlFT)
The Fighter Tender is a specially designed shuttle variant that is used to support Fighter missions. The FT can refuel Fighters, provide search and rescue, and provide minimal repairs. They are also outfitted with improved reconnaissance and communications equipment. Fighter Tenders generally do not enter the fray of battles and stay on the fringes to avoid taking fire.

Scout (Sct)
Fleet based scout ship designed to provide over watch and tactical intelligence. Fast, lightly armored, and unarmed they can lift the fog of battle and increase the range of the bigger ships in the fleet.

Long Range Scout (SctLR)
Long Range Scouts are designed for reconnaissance of planetary systems. Capable of warp jumping, these ships carry enough fuel and supplies for long duration missions as well as sophisticated electronics to efficiently scan entire star systems and intercept communications. These ships can be launched from carriers, planets, or star bases to provide strategic battlefield intelligence. Long Range Scout ships also are capable of functioning outside of Fleets.

Fighter (FtSS)
Fast, nimble, and lethal describe the typical Space Superiority Fighter ship. Coveted by the best pilot aces, these ships are equipped to engage and destroy most small craft and even large unarmored targets. Space Superiority Fighters typically trade less fuel storage for better armor, stronger cannons, and faster engines meaning they can't engage for very long before needing to refuel and reload.

Fighter Escort (FtEsct)
Fighter escorts trade speed and lethality for mission endurance and survivability. Staying close to their escort missions, these ships generally have the advantage of numbers and can usually chase off enemy threats. A Fighter Escort that is separated from the pack can usually be picked off fairly quickly by a skilled fighter pilot, but a Fighter Escort can also make life difficult for attacking bombers. Their extended range also allows them to support bomber missions and protect ships at a significant distance from their carriers.

Fighter Bomber (FtBmbr)
Fighter Bombers are maneuverable enough to defend themselves against enemy fighters and have the missiles to help take down larger targets like freighters and transports. However their dual role also makes them more vulnerable to dedicated Space Superiority fighters.

Bomber (Bmbr)
Bombers are larger and have longer ranges than fighters while including heavy missiles and bombs in their payload. They are not as maneuverable as fighters and should therefore be escorted as they are easy targets for defending fighters and point defense systems. Bombers can launch a variety of longer range missiles to take out weaker targets or shorter range bombs that can quickly destroy the armor or shields of a ship.

Assault Gunship (FtAsslt)
The heavy Assault Gunship is a craft designed to add maximum firepower to fighter missions. Can take on most fighter craft from a distance but lacks the mobility to tangle up close with faster ships. Useful for taking down frigates, destroyers , and other hardened targets, while picking off unsuspecting fighters.

Heavy Bomber (BmbrHvy)
Heavy Bombers are designed to strike at larger targets, like capital ships and stations, with their improved armor, shields, and large bomb bays. Heavy bombers can also drop their payloads on planetary targets. When employed en masse against large and slow targets, they can be very effective at destroying the target, if that is the goal. They should be escorted by fighters as they can be easily picked off by escorts and point defense systems.

Landing Craft (LnC)
Planetary Landing Craft are designed to transport a large amount of personnel to a planetary surface and then disembark them quickly. Ideal for establishing beachheads on enemy planets, they are armored and can survive long enough to reach their destination, however they can be destroyed under concentrated fire or a lucky direct hit. For that reason, Landing Craft are best deployed when the opposition has been suppressed or when deployed en masse to ensure at least some craft make it through.

Patrol Torpedo Boat (PT)
Patrol Torpedo boats are best when fielded in large numbers against unsuspecting targets. While fast enough to avoid large cannon fire, they are vulnerable to fighters and point defense weapons.

Fast Attack Craft (FAC)
Fast Attack Craft were created in response to enemy torpedo and bomber ambushes by fast and expendable ships. FAC squads are generally deployed to screen larger forces and offer a significant barrier for stalking fighter groups.

Mine Sweeper (ShtlMS)
The Mine Sweeper is large and unarmored and unarmed shuttle type craft carrying a lot of highly volatile mines.

 

This looks like an interesting project, I like the quantity of ship styles that's going to be created. I look forward to seeing the proposed interactions. This development is definitely on my watch list. Looking food so far.

 

Thanks, check out the updated turret video I posted above!

 

As a fan of Space themed games, I really enjoyed the likes of the Starfleet Command games, will there be any of this style of ship to ship combat in the future? It looks really bloody amazing at the moment

 

Yes, but better. Instead of commanding 1 starship, you will command an entire fleet of them, each ship will have stats to monitor (Shields/Armor/Ammo/ etc).

 

I've created a playable demo of the guns being used in the game. Go ahead and right click this link and download a copy now. Your feedback is welcome! Keep in mind this isn't the full game obviously, just something to play test the weapons being developed. Thanks!

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8hp03FKPpr6YTBnaUtYT1cwTWM

A few things to know: The scene is showing Mark 1 to Mark 6 class projectile weapons (which ballistic mass driver cannons or rail guns for short).

Caliber is the size of the ammo. Whether on a fighter or a destroyer, the caliber of weapon will use the same ammo across the range of mounts. For example, a Mk2 Heavy (Caliber=5) will fit the same ammo as a Mk3 Standard, or a Mk4 Light gun, all using Caliber 5. The largest caliber in the scene is Caliber=9, the smalles is Caliber=1.

The scene also shows two Space Superiority Fighters (FtSS) with different load outs and a Corvette (Cvt). The two large ships are a Cruiser and a Battleship for scale reference. Also there are some human sized mechoids (robots) thrown in for scale as well.

 

This seems very cool! Even with half the listed ship classes this could make a decent RTS game! But isn't multiplayer strategy, and especially at this level of detail sort of a *itch to implement?

 

@zortech - Why do you say that?

 

More like, curious. I'm not a programmer / lack general networking knowledge, but whenever I stumbled upon something multiplayer rts related, people were usually talking about implementing a lockstep system. It just seemed much more difficult than the authoritative networking model, but then again, not a programmer. Just wondering

 

Some notes on Ammo
• Sized in Calibers (1 through 10)
• Has a damage profile across five areas

•Electromagnetic Damage (hits shields more)
•Explosive Damage (hits subsystems more)
•Kinetic Damage (hits armor/hull more)
•Radiation Damage (hits shields and crew more)
•Thermic Damage (hits fuel/ammo subsystems more)​

•Area of effect?

•Direct impact
•Area damage (splash damage to nearby objects)​

•Variants of ammo can be equipped to have different effective damage (an early draft table of that attached here)

 

Just thought I would check on progress, it's starting to take shape. Thought the big barrel guns on small turrets at the back of the group look funny when firing. But otherwise looking good, keep up the good work.

 

Interstellar: The Endless War (Work in Progress-pre alpha)

Three battlecruisers go at it. Turrets and models are just placeholders and not scaled properly, using this as a test of AI targeting code and firing routines. Ammo are collider objects, not raycast, instantiating particle explosions on impact (hard to see). Turrets are all aiming/firing independently. The 2 attacking cruisers are flying in formation (offset in height from each other), and are circling the middle cruiser. His turrets aren't fast enough to keep up with their circling.

 

Clouds are volumetric. In other words you can fly through them. They are also moving (very subtle) to give a nice effect. I think I will implement a feature that effects the ships systems depending on what kind of cloud you fly through. I'm thinking that will make things more strategic.

 

Testing carrier launching in game, now I gotta figure out how to recall them elegantly, lol.

 

Testing several things here, looking at the frame-rate with an autocannon weapon is firing at a very fast rate (100x per sec). Looking at collisions happening at that fast rate. It doesn't look like any collisions are being missed. Also testing fighter ship implementation and fixed weapon implementation (as opposed to turrest weapons).

 

Testing the bullet storm. Each ammo shot is actually it's own physics collider and they are moving at 300 to 500 m/s in the game's scale. Each ammo impact generates its own impact explosion.

Interestingly enough, this is the first test video I've posted that I had to get from the actual game build. It was too slow in the Unity test environment. I need to start optimizing.

 

All the fighter ships being launched decided to launch ass backwards and form a conga line..... Needless to say, that's not appropriate behavior.... All we need now is some disco music and some martinis

 

Working on a new GUI. What do you think? There is so much information to present, ship health, name, squad role, weapon systems and ammo, critical ships modules.

 

Updated cannon shells being fired. I think this looks a lot better, and its less overhead.

 

Just got 106 ships on screen moving and firing at the same time. I'm pretty proud of myself.

 

Looking at performance profiling. There are:
~106 ships on screen (most are fighters so difficult to see
~300-400 weapons firing independently
~500 to 2000 ammo shots in flight

Each object including ammo has its own collider and is being driven by physics.

Models are to scale, which means the ammo is flying to scale which means it s moving at just north of 300 m/s.

 

You should have included this stats window in the video with the profiler about the performance issues. It shows 3k+ setpass calls with half a dozen ships on screen and nothing going on. I assume that you have kitbashed the ships from parts inside unity? There are two alternatives, that may or may not be applicable depending on certain circumstances. A) dynamic batching, only works with objects that share the same material (with the exact same settings, tweak one slider and it no longer works), and only works on meshes that have iirc less than 900 vertex attributes ( so depending on how your meshes look and what the shader needs that's like ~75 quad faces in a worst case scenario. At least I think that's what I calculated as a guideline for my own meshes. See the docs on batching, they explain all this.
B) manually merge the geometry with a script, only works if you have one solid immutable block of meshes that you can merge and they all share the same material. You can't merge moving turrets that way, they'll need dynamic batching.
I don't know how instancing shaders work, but afaik they can be used to draw higher polycount meshes in one go if they all are the same and use the same material. So you might see big benefits there if you use them for fighters and turrets if a lot of them share the same meshes.
Object pooling and avoiding GC has already been suggested. If all your projectiles have their own update loops you might want to get rid of those, register them somewhere and call your own DoUpdate() manually on them. If you use OnCollisionEnter() etc., those have a significant GC overhead in the editor, try profiling a proper build for comparison. Reconsidder if you actually need the projectiles to have those methods. Maybe it would be enough if all your ships register collisions? Do your projectiles actually use rigidbody physics and do you have them set to contiuous collision? Projectiles in my game just move forward and do raycasts every frame from their last position to their next position and then move there. I can't remember if I actually had proof that this performs better, so better do your own testing.
Show us what your behaviour updates spend time on.
How do you render your projectiles, do they batch?
Are you reusing particle systems by moving the emitter and calling Emit() manually so they stay 1 drawcall and avoid GC?
It looks like you are spending a lot of time on physics. If I remember correctly I had a tank model with colliders for body, turret and barrel, and the processing cost of moving these parts and recalculating the optimization structure for the rigidbody was huge. By just removing the barrel collider (because of its insignificance) and moving the sphere collider of the turret to the body instead (so it doesn't move but still occupies the same place) I was able to get significant improvements. If you have the same issue with all your turrets, you might be able to optimize that.

P.S.: I want to double stress that you should do your profiling in a build, not only can the overall performance differ from the editor, you might also see variance between the relative cost of different tasks.

 

Martin, I posted a reply to my other thread. Thanks for the indepth thoughts
https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/help-need-to-optimize-interstellar-wip.446830/#post-2890195

 

AI added to fighters, so now they dogfight, choose and prioritize targets, go home when out of fuel or ammo. Working on adding AI other ship classes

 

I took a few hours break from coding to try my hand at blender again. I don't think its too bad for a first go and a couple hours of learning blender. 358 verts

 

Space Superiority Fighter (FtSS). 325 Verts

 

My wife and I were watching this the other night... it looks cool but you've got quite a UI-challenge ahead of you if this thing is meant to be controlled in realtime! (I haven't played an RTS since the first few Command & Conquers, so I don't know what's normal...)

 

Thanks, yeah it will be RTS style control. However to get around the beast of micromanaging all your forces, the ships will have fairly robust AI's attached to them that will know what to attack and when to retreat. When to refuel and re-arm. Ships will also move around on their own (unless the player commands them to move somewhere or to hold position) so they will be dodging fire on their own, not just standing still taking a beating, like most RTS games out there.

 

Screen Grab, new fighter model in game, with weapons fitted.

 

Fighter Escort model updated

 

Fighter Escort 1 v0,2 in game and loaded up with missles

 

New Fighter Bomber (FtBmbr) design, let me know what you think.

 

Looks really great! I like how sleek it looks.

 

Thanks, appreciate it!