Since I started working in Unity, I’ve been at work developing an over-head RTS/RPG engine. My end goal is to create a set of tools on top of Unity that allow rapid development of RTS/RPG games similar to the Warcraft/Starcraft/Age of Empires map editors. For those that aren’t familiar with those games, their editors are extremely powerful and allow you to develop entire game campaigns using triggers and data tables.
Videos
Seeing is believing! I’ll be adding a few videos to show off various aspects, as well as some sample ‘tutorial’ style videos demonstrating how to add new units, buildings and objects to levels!
In game shots of 3 player-controlled swordmen looking at enemies. This entire ‘game’ only took 1 hour of gameplay set-up, and features melee combat against dungeon creeps.
Spatial trees for fast querying of units on field.
Fast path finding around static obstacles.
Collision avoidance of dynamic obstacles using RVO2.
Grouped movement, swarming, etc.
Multiplayer synchronization with up to 32 players.
Resources and supply mechanics typically found in RTS games.
Easy to use scriptable unit abilities.
Projectiles and weapons.
Todo
Unit buffs and status mods (ie: slow, stun, etc)
Fog of war and efficient minimap rendering.
Unit experience and levels.
Inventory system for units.
Allow map switches of groups of players without breaking multiplayer sessions.
Future
I’ve spent approximately 3 months full-time developing this engine. probably more if you count the time I spent learning Unity’s… interesting design choices. It will likely be another 3 months before the engine is complete ‘enough.’ The engine will be closed source, but extensible. Is this something that the Unity community would be interested in, and if so, what do you guys think is a fair price? All other comments and criticisms are appreciated too.
I think it’s interesting, but I wouldn’t buy it if I didn’t get the source.
The last thing I want when I buy something like this is more black-box on top of Unity’s black-box, especially when it’s a third party seller who may or may not provide good support.
For projects like that, people are going to need to look at the innards and occasionally tweak things, if nothing else to generate the right types of behaviors. For example, coding a ‘fleeing’ state and how it would work, coding a ‘run and find other monsters and bring them back here’ that isn’t just a static trigger, etc. These are the things that are going to come up really fast; if you go black-box, then you’re in the position of having to write people’s logic for them, instead of pointing them to the appropriate spot in your source, heh.
Anyhow, I can see right away that combining something like that with a few other third-party things might give people the basis for an action RPG, so I’m sure there will be much interest
I’ve thought a lot about the blackbox approach as well. As it stands, I’ve built an event-driven system like those found in WC3/SC2 where pretty much everything a unit or player does fires an event, which allows users to run custom logic and redirect movement of units. The issue with open source software is precisely that it would quickly become entirely unsupportable. If users tweak the innards of the engine improperly, the whole thing would destabalize immediately and then I feel I’d deal with angry customers who feel I’m not supporting them properly.
I suppose I could distribute the source on a ‘conditional’ basis perhaps, that voids the ‘warranty’ so to speak.
I’ll be adding a webplayer / tutorial pretty soon of the first ‘sample.’
I think the “programmer beware” approach is OK. If they’re bright enough to read the source, then they’re bright enough to reinstall if they totally trash it
Anyhow, this looks pretty darn nice; about darn time we got some Torchlight / Diablo clones moving around here
Lol. I am going to say what someone said on another thread: “Don’t sell this for $10 as you will be short changing yourself. This is worth at least $15”
Please just keep the price in the 2 digits range and I will be very interested
More so with source…
Two digit range? This is worth much more than that, it includes multiplayer support and features pathfinding. You spend $100 for Sturestones astar pathfinding, which is an amazing tool, however this includes much more.
Expecting thiscin the two digit range is most likely wishful thinking but if it does so I will be “very interested” as stated above. 3 digit range and I’ll be interrested but less so. I’m not setting the product value, I’m stating my interest value.
Fair enough MrDude, I understand your point. Hey, he could be my competition in 3 months, because I can tell how useful this could all be. I say keep up the good work, and as for price range, judge it based on the amount of time you put in by what your customers want.
But its hard to really estimate a fair price as it heavily depends on what it offers in the end. Its one thing to have a “nice looking thing” but a hell different one to have something that works well too in the end (lesson learnt from Torque RTS Kit)
EDIT: if it does halfway what it seems to do, a price in the $150 - $200 range is definitely in given it has adequate documentation and support
@gamenut: is there a chance that you can get your sig back from insany land or do you really want people to put you onto the ignore list to get rid of your 20 line bomb?
I would be very interested in this! I think I would pay around 100-150$ for this. It would be cool if you can release it now and just keep on updating it as you add a new feature. I know I would buy it right now.
And if I had to prioritize your todo list I would add it in this order. But that’s my my opinion.
Easy to use scriptable unit abilities.
Projectiles and combat refinement.
Unit experience and levels.
Inventory system for units.
Fog of war and efficient minimap rendering.
Allow map switches of groups of players without breaking multiplayer sessions.
That was about the internal priority of my list anyway
The projectiles are actually done. I’ll be working on a sample tutorial as I add a ‘wizard’ type ranged character to the sample. That will give people more insight on how the engine works / its flexibility. It will also allow me start the ability scripting foundation.
The only reason I hesitate to put out a project right this moment is because I want to make sure it passes my own standards, is properly documented AND contains good samples/videos to support its release. I’ll likely be releasing a bunch of ‘tutorial’ style demos long before the actual project itself.
I would be highly interested in this and am bookmarking it.
I don’t mind the black box approach but I would be concerned about the degree to which it is customizable. I’m interesting in kits and frameworks to use as a starting point, so I can focus on design and story rather than reinventing the wheel, but I don’t want to be locked into just re-skinning a fixed game. I want something with some flexibility.
The possibility of bugginess with no way to fix it is also a worry.
I’m not sure what a fair price would be but I would say start in the $100 range and then the value probably doubles when it is well documented with video tutorials and a good web site. Having a user forum and solid support also adds a lot of value.
@Regularly: I wouldn’t abandon customers. One thing I would guarantee is that if I ever stop development on the engine, the source code will be released into the public domain. This is assuming that I even go with a black-box approach. I’m weighing the pros and cons. As far as documentation goes, there I can say I am absolutely meticulous. Every public class, member and method is already documented.
As for your concern about “reskinning” a game, in the next few videos, I hope to demonstrate the flexibility of the engine and how you can create abilities, triggers and items. While I doubt the engine could ever be used for something drastically different (FPS, for example), anything imaginable in an RTS/RPG environment should be possible.
Thanks for replying to my concerns. I watched the video and your tutorial style is very clear and understandable. I’ll be following this with great interest.
