Crucible I 16/12/2013

Conceived 6 months ago as a prequel to a much more ambitious game, 'Crucible' is a new 4X space strategy game set in a unique and vast universe. I am currently deep in development and have fleshed out much of the lore, mechanics and art style of the game, and have decided that I would like to share some of the development process and interesting aspects of the game as I go along.

Preface taken from my design document:

Crucible will be a turn based strategy game similar to 4X games such as Civilisation, Endless Space and Master of Orion. However Crucible will focus on exploration, expansion and exploitation with extermination being side-lined. Crucible will feature more complex diplomatic opportunities than are generally seen in strategy games of any kind. War will be waged as a struggle to own territory, rather than as individual skirmishes as is typical of the genre. Heroes exist to replace traditional combat, and their purpose will be more geared to espionage and diplomacy than open strategic battles. Crucible will feature a lengthy campaign to introduce the player to the mechanics of the game, and also to act as a prequel to any games that may be set in the same universe. Crucible will feature deep and complex mechanics, but will be considerably lighter in content than other 4X games."

I envisioned Crucible as a solution to some of the issues I had with 4X games- most notably Endless Space- in that they contain far too much micro management, and that this negatively impacts on the strategy of games in this genre. I am developing Crucible to alleviate these problems- the most obvious solution that I have come up with is to make many wide-impact and irreversible player decisions. An example of this is in the planetary improvement system:-

Map of galaxy. 3 colours represent the 3 playable races. Highlighted system is shown with its name (Nepthys) and number of planets (6).

• The game map is made up of many linked star systems similar to Endless Space, and start systems contain a number of planets depending on the system in question. 
• Planets produce resources (Science, Industry and Money), which is totaled up to provide a total system output. 
• Each planet has a number of improvement slots in which an improvement can be built for a cost. The number of slots available is based on the type of planet in question (Ocean/Barren/Molten etc.).
• An improvement can occupy a single slot on a planet, and the improvement benefits the entire system rather than the individual planet. This eliminates the need to build multiple copies of the same improvement in a system.
• Over time the output increases based on technological improvements. When the output reaches certain landmarks, more improvements are available to build on the planets in the system.
• The newly available improvements have more powerful, sometimes wider reaching effects that can dramatically change the performance of an individual system, but at a much greater cost.

Screen showing first tier improvements with a cost of 50. One slot on the 3rd planet it already filled with an improvement.

When an improvement has been built in an improvement slot, it is impossible to remove it. This means that players will have to make a decision between building cheaper, instantly available improvements to boost their systems early on in the game, or waiting and building immensely powerful improvements later on in the game that could potentially turn the tide of the game.

Over the coming weeks and months I will write more articles to answer any questions you may have and to show you how the game is progressing.

NB Screenshots are not representative of the final game. Most of the GUI is horrible and purely functional, but hopefully it is possible to see what I am trying to show.