Celestial Command News

Hello, everyone.

To tell the truth, I’ve never thought that I will post this on Steam. As you know, Russia has invaded Ukraine. Our team is located in both of these countries, and the events happening now are absolutely terrible. When this war started, we froze our work, and now our Ukrainian colleague must evacuate, leaving everything behind.

We really want to continue the work on our game, and we really hope that we will make our dream project, but for now, work is fully frozen for an unexpected time.
We know that it is disappointing, in fact, we worked on this update for such a long time, but we can't do anything. We are scared, we are against this war. All money from steam sales and patrons will go to our Ukrainian friend for survival and new equipment. We absolutely understand if you unsubscribe from our Patreon.
Thanks for your support.
NO WAR!

We told that update going to be released in January, but unfortunately, there is still a lot of work to do so we need more time and the update will be delayed, sorry for that.

Another question, when it will be done?

Of course, we may say "delayed for 1 month" again, but honestly, we don't know, and we don't want to announce a date only to delay it again for another month in the future.

Generally speaking, we think it is almost impossible to specify the release date of any game unless the developer made a lot of similar games before, or the game is almost ready and only minor aspects should be tweaked before release.
Both conditions are not true for this case, so the update was delayed for an unknown time.

However, we will try to avoid long periods without posts and will inform you about progress until release, so you will be able to keep track of it.


Also some news about development.

[h2]New command modules[/h2]

Since construction will be possible in 3D, we have more freedom in the placement of command modules. So command modules are redesigned and now they have the standardized size and mounting points, which allow creating more various combinations of decorative modules around.








[h2]Background asteroids[/h2]

Now there are decorative asteroids located below zero planes.
We thought about more dense and visually interesting asteroids fields a long time ago, but considering the top-down view of the game, it had an unexpected problem - it was unclear, "is asteroids is a real obstacle, or is it located much below the trajectory of the ship"?



But we solved it by simply making decorative asteroids darker. It looks a bit weird but seems fine, and overall looks much better than without it. Also, it performs another important task, it indicated the velocity of the ship due to its shifting on the background during movement.

Here is a list of some of the changes that will be done for the next update.



[h2]Issue[/h2]
Imagine how battles of flagships look in various sci-fi movies. Until a certain point, projectiles do not cause any significant damage. When a ship takes enough damage, there are explosions in different places, causing it to fall apart.

In CC, it does not look nearly as epic. Currently, projectiles are literally digging their way through the ship, immediately destroying its modules. As a result, even if the ship survives the battle, it looks like a gnawed apple, devoid of its original shape.

Of course, shields can solve this problem. However, we would be forced to make them account for 90% of the ship's durability, which would reduce the visual variety of battleships. We would like the hull to also seem like strong armor, as it’s often portrayed in sci-fi movies.

In addition, different modules may have very different HP values. For example, if you want to place a lot of small decor on the surface of some large module, then all of it will be blown away by the explosion of the first rocket.

[h2]Solution[/h2]
Now ships will have a single HP pool, calculated from their size. Any hit will reduce this pool. When the value reaches zero, the modules themselves will start receiving damage directly, just as it is currently implemented. However, modules will have much less HP of their own, so they can be destroyed very quickly. You can think of this new system as structural integrity of sorts.



Thus, the problem described above is solved. At the same time, we have maintained the effect of ships physically losing their modules during combat.

Additionally, repairing a ship after each battle will no longer be an annoyance. That is because the HP pool can be replenished at the shipyard. Also, keeping track of the current status of any ship will now be more straightforward.




[h2]Issue[/h2]
At first, it seemed that individual storage in each container was a good idea. Over time, it turned out to be annoying, especially for a ship with many containers.

Of course, it would be an interesting concept for some kind of first-person survival game where you would walk between different chests and sort everything. But in a game like CC, it just does not work.

[h2]Solution[/h2]
Now, each ship will have only one inventory window, the maximum size of which is determined by the number of containers on the craft.



Simple and convenient.




[h2]Issue[/h2]
Currently, you can build something like this:



Such ships are very effective in combat, but they are cheesy, and so are the battles between them.

Remember the various ships from sci-fi movies. Usually, their weapons occupy only 10-20% of the hull.
In real battleships, it is similar. Below each turret, there is a large and complex system for servicing and controlling the weapon.

[h2]Solution[/h2]
There are no simulations of internal logistics in CC, so we will achieve that more easily.
Now, each weapon will require a specific amount of "weapon points.” The larger the ship, the more will be available.



Such a system will encourage building sophisticated ships instead of "a cube with cannons on each side."

3D construction in 2D space

We will start a series of posts about core changes introduced in the next update.

One of those changes is 3D physics, which is more akin to 2.5D.

Earlier, we mentioned that we would turn the game physics from 2D into fully 3D. We've already released a preview version of that new system. 3D is fantastic and delivers some great new possibilities. However, it also brings some disadvantages.

[h2]Advantages[/h2]

• The possibility to rotate and place any module in 3D provides freedom in spaceship construction. In 3D, even a few modules make it possible to create a large number of various ship designs. Also, the ships no longer look flat, and large cannons stand out when placed at the top.
  

[h2]Disadvantages[/h2]

• Navigation could be challenging. In space, there are very few landmarks that allow you to understand your ship's position. Especially if we are talking about altitude in a top-down view.
  It turned out very hard to comprehend whether an object sits above or below the ship. Is it an obstacle or not? It theoretically can be solved with good navigation tools, plus putting all the asteroids on one plane, but that leads to another problem.
  
  
• Navigation would become less fun. If all asteroids are in one plane, you can fly above or below them. As a result, the space will become empty and boring.
  
  
• Implementation of AI navigation in 3D is excessively complex. It's a technical issue, but still.
  
  
• Manual control of weapons would become redundant. Most likely, the enemy ship will be at a different altitude, so all projectiles could miss the target when trying to aim from a top-down view. Of course, there is an auto-targeting mode, but manual control still can be fun.
  
  
• Placement of engines would become finicky. Several additional engines will be required on the top and bottom of the ship to stabilize its rotation. Having to place them will be more annoying than fun.
  

As you can see, there is only one advantage but numerous disadvantages. Even though all these shortcomings are solvable, careless implementation of some solutions could turn Celestial Command into a completely different game. Something like a flight sim with a first or third-person view. Such a game will have very little in common with the original concept and resemble hundreds of similar games on the market. A solution like this is undesirable.

Therefore, we've come to the 2.5D solution that keeps the benefits of 3D while avoiding all the problems.

[h2]How it will be done[/h2]

The game will have a fully 3D construction system. All modules will be placeable on the top and bottom and rotatable. Turrets will rotate not only left and right, but also up and down.
However, all in-game objects will lie on a 2D plane. Ships won't have up and down controls. Only the yaw axis will be steerable.

Such a system will have some odd issues, but they are all easy to solve:

• If part of a ship falls off, it will be pulled slowly towards zero altitude.
  
  
  
  
• If a ship is tall and its center of mass shifts up or down, the craft will move vertically to keep its center of mass at zero altitude.
  
  
• A ship's pitch and roll axes can misalign due to external forces, but they will stabilize automatically.
  
  
• If docking ports are at different altitudes, ships will move up or down to align for docking.
  

Those plans may sound a bit weird, but the test outcomes were positive, both in orbital and planetary game modes.

In the end, we will have 3D ships with the pleasant simplicity of 2D navigation and control.

Hello!
Yes, we are know you expected an update at the end of the year, but amount of changes in the game core is so huge, so unfortunately the game is not ready for release, and we are forced to move release of update to the end of January. Sorry for that.

For now, here is some report about progress. This is not everything what will be added, because most improvements related to game-design which is better to show in the game itself, but here is the most visually noticeable changes.


We completely changed how galaxy map and regions works, so now playable regions is 5 times larger.
Here is comparison:





This is especially important for orbital game mode, because now there is much more space around the planet, tidal forces is weaker and even small burn of maneuvering engines does not changes trajectory so much as it was before, in result orbital mechanics feels more like it should be.




Added rapid fire missile defense system, and considering that rockets now may fly in 3D space, we are like how result is looks like. However it will require some more improvements for accuracy.




Rockets with nuclear warhead as advanced weapon




Several new Sci-Fi looking engines. With possibility of 3D building and free rotation, even a few new parts allows to build quite an interesting design.










Also we started to perform large changes in missions system, since it will be a core of a new game loop, and one from the new types of missions is "delivery mission" which will require a ship with specific amount of cargo holders to ferry cargo containers from one location to another, with possible ambush on the way.

With such cargo freighters this type of "space trucker" activity should be more enjoyable than standard cargo transportation inside a ship.






We are really sorry that updated turned out so extremely delayed, but will try to complete it as soon as possible, and from this point we will try to report you about a progress more often.

And happy New Year! : )