[HN Gopher] Zero-k: A libre sci-fi RTS game, with an economy bas...
___________________________________________________________________
Zero-k: A libre sci-fi RTS game, with an economy based on metal and
energy
Author : azalemeth
Score : 272 points
Date : 2023-11-19 10:43 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (zero-k.info)
(TXT) w3m dump (zero-k.info)
| JCharante wrote:
| linux support but no macos support? Aww
| v3ss0n wrote:
| Can you build from scratch?
| palmfacehn wrote:
| I didn't see a source link on the download page.
| fao_ wrote:
| > https://zero-k.info/mediawiki/index.php?title=Zero-K:Deve
| lop...
| badosu wrote:
| Games have their own distribution method, but you can
| download the source and the engine will handle it. In ZeroKs
| case (https://github.com/ZeroK-RTS/Zero-K/).
|
| The most straightforward method to compile the engine
| reliably I'd say is with the docker container:
| https://github.com/beyond-all-
| reason/spring/wiki/SpringRTS-B...
|
| Edit: spelling,links
| _flux wrote:
| Seems the support would be a realistic feature, though, because
| it's based on https://springrts.com/ that does support MacOS X.
| white_dragon88 wrote:
| Noise about macOS died down back in 2018, and seems the linux
| port is riddled with bugs. This project is basically dead in
| the water.
| badosu wrote:
| macOS dropped when Apple stopped supporting more advanced
| OpenGL features.
|
| > linux port is riddled with bugs
|
| That's... interesting... as many of the engine and game
| devs also play on linux (and a considerable part of the
| playerbase)
|
| If you're looking for the codebase Zero-K and most
| previously spring mods are based upon you should look at:
| https://github.com/beyond-all-reason/spring
| TheHumanist wrote:
| I'm 41, gamed since all the way back... but feel silly for
| asking... what sort of macros would you use in games like this?
| moribvndvs wrote:
| MacOS not macros
| LordShredda wrote:
| You can program your own widgets and have them run commands
| client side
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| They said Macintosh Operating System, not macRos, but in
| Spring-Recoil games like these, you _can_ basically program
| whatever you want using Lua widgets, and there 's a fairly
| easy scripting for commands allowing for things like <<when I
| press button X select half of the currently selected units,
| in a radius of Y around my mouse cursor, picking only the
| ground combat ones with more than Z% health>>.
| fodkodrasz wrote:
| In Supreme Commander you could have build templates for
| building layouts, eg. fortifications (point defence, shields,
| artillery, properly aligned, rotatable, etc), I relied on it
| extensively in multiplayer to quickly get foothold. (SC was
| successor of TA, these games started as clones of TA).
|
| Just tried BAR, and the build templates would be really
| handy.
| badosu wrote:
| The engine heavily relies on OpenGL features Apple dropped
| support for. The best bet would be to await for a decent
| translation layer (Zink, MoltenVK, idk).
|
| Edit: clarity
| liotier wrote:
| Is Zero-k still popular now that its cousin
| https://www.beyondallreason.info has matured ?
| dmos62 wrote:
| Wasn't aware there's a successor. Screenshots make it seem very
| similar. Anyone played it?
| jadbox wrote:
| They are similar but different. BAR is more of a unique game
| (for better or worse), while ZeroK is much closer to an HD
| remake of Total Annihilation.
| killerstorm wrote:
| Are you sure?
|
| BAR units are generally similar to TA units. It captures
| the feel of "what TA would be if it was full 3D and high
| resolution". Of course, balance is different, but TA
| balance was very odd.
|
| ZeroK seems to have terrain modification mechanics which is
| not present in TA.
|
| In BAR terrain can be damaged by big explosions, but it's
| very limited.
|
| FWIW I never played ZeroK but based on their intro video
| BAR seems to be closer to TA visually.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| It's pretty much the inverse :
| http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/29067
|
| BAR used to stand for "Balanced Annihilation Reloaded" - so
| it's sticking very close to TA, while Zero-K has been
| experimenting much more freely with what is possible in the
| Spring/Recoil engine.
|
| It's also probably a factor that BAR has spent a decade in
| development hell (under a different team than now ?), so it
| just didn't have the velocity to fork away sufficiently,
| even if it wanted to.
| DayDollar wrote:
| Eh, no? Zero-k was there first, and gathered vital info.
| The original setup for spring rollout of games was
| thoroughly inadequat to supporting large number of
| gamers. Fuck, the first lobby server wrote match infos
| into a freaking textfile.
|
| The first indicator of that popped up, when valve ended
| greenlight, and just greenlit all the things. Which
| propped Evolution RTS upon the steam front page for half
| a day, flooding the original lobby system and showing how
| inadequat the whole ecosystem was for that. The original
| Evo dev Forb learned from the whole mess after he
| returned from his day job.
|
| Zero-k then learned the lessons, developed a ingui lobby,
| started the whole matchmaking and better server
| deployment, detached from the whole "one central server"
| thing of the spring eco system.
|
| BAR did some graphical overhaul, with Floris, Beherith,
| Sprung and the whole original crew supported by new faces
| like Teifion and on and on. They optimized the Spring
| engine into a new version- more tailored to BARs needs
| and reworked alot of the stuff.
|
| Its gpl open source, so the project order and who
| invented what is pretty flowy.. everybody copies from
| everybody, one progress is everyones progress..
| badosu wrote:
| I don't think it's much about the timeline but more about
| the feel of being close to TA. In which case BAR indeed
| is closest to a some sort of TA-sense while Zero-K is
| more unique (and that's great!).
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| How does it contradict what I said ?
|
| I disagreed about <<BAR is more of a unique game (for
| better or worse), while ZeroK is much closer to an HD
| remake of Total Annihilation.>>
|
| P.S.: You might also be mistaken about EvoRTS' Steam
| release being specifically behind the motivation of
| Zero-K splitting up, since according to lead ZK dev the
| second at least partially predates the first ?
|
| http://zero-k.info/Forum/Post/236480#236480
|
| > 2012(ish): Zero-K splits off to its own infrastructure
| after disagreement with infrastructure developers. From
| my perspective they were very stubborn regarding
| extending the protocol to allow for new stuff (Eg
| matchmacking, more advanced planetwars) and would make
| sudden changes that broke our autohosts.
|
| > 2013-2014: Evolution RTS is greenlit on Steam and
| released in 2014. I don't think Steam was on my radar at
| the time, but now it looked like a possibility. Looking
| back at the dates we actually put up a greenlight
| campaign five days after the Evolution RTS release.
|
| (Lobby interface issues being another thing, but then
| IIRC EvoRTS had already tried to improve on this before
| release, though not successfully enough ?)
| killerstorm wrote:
| Yes, Beyond All Reason is a great RTS. Most people seem to be
| interested in 8 vs 8 team mode, but there's a plenty of other
| options, including FFA.
|
| I don't know how it compares to Zero-K.
|
| But it perfectly captures the spirit of the original Total
| Annihilation.
| Tuna-Fish wrote:
| Not really a successor, but as the poster above said, a
| cousin.
|
| This lineage of open-source games started from Total
| Annihilation, which had a lot of mods that ran into engine
| limitations. This resulted in a bunch of enterprising open-
| sourced devs to develop a compatible engine, without those
| limitations. This engine (Spring Engine) has then evolved
| into something much more impressive and capable. Zero-K was
| implemented on this engine. Beyond All Reason uses the Recoil
| engine, which is a fairly recent for of Spring.
| DayDollar wrote:
| Eh, the engine was a accident. It started out as a
| 3d-viewer, capable of replaying ta games by the svedish
| yankspankers (clan sy).
|
| What started out as a viewer, escalated into a 106.0
| version long engine, providing a war that consumes planets,
| each side with only one final wish - Total Annhilation at
| Zero-k, beyond all reason.
|
| Naw, the community comes and goes ebbs and flows. Its
| mostly on recoil discord, some are still on the irc server,
| the rest is on the BAR discord.
| vanderZwan wrote:
| > _svedish yankspankers_
|
| Presuming that the main code contributions also come from
| the Swedish scene I'm not entirely surprised that this
| happened. It sort of fits my impression of the
| gamer/programmer culture here (although I can't quite
| express why)
| 3seashells wrote:
| 3 months of night, either tinker, drinker or metal guy
| torching towns church(thinker).
| pashsoft wrote:
| BAR has a small but active community, they also run
| tournaments. In terms of gameplay, it is superficially
| similar to Total Annihilation but much more polished. The UI
| and unit control mechanics are a masterpiece in their own
| right. A lot of what makes a strategy game "fun" is the
| feeling that you are actually in control of your army, and
| that your decisions matter. BAR delivers that better than any
| other strategy game, in my opinion. You can control large
| armies of tiny units without feeling overwhelmed by micro,
| and still have the option for individual-unit controls when
| you need them. Give it a try!
| loufe wrote:
| It's THE game with my friend group right now. We play FFA,
| team v team, team v bossAI. Great polish, watching playbacks
| is sweet, observer seats is great.
|
| Overall fantastic experience, really impressive for FOSS
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Popularity has been waning naturally, just like the popularity
| of Spring lobbies before it, with respective peaks around 2017
| and 2010, but AFAIK the newfound popularity of BAR has been
| also bringing significant new blood to these other
| Spring/Recoil games.
|
| (Without commercial levels of advertising, a lot of Total
| Annihilation / Supreme Commander / RTS fans had never heard of
| them, word of mouth can only go so far... at least until Twitch
| streamers became super-popular ?)
| casablancatoast wrote:
| Thanks for the BAR link, I'm going to share that with someone
| who'll find it useful. Appreciated!
| Buttons840 wrote:
| To compare the two:
|
| Zero-K allows 16 vs 16 battles (and it works!), each player
| controls a relatively smaller number of units. In Beyond All
| Reason, there are 8 v 8 battles and each player controls a
| larger number of units, maybe 200 or so at the peak of battle.
| (There are some strong, but predictable AIs for both games.)
|
| Zero-K has more units that are less realistic and have more
| variety. BAR has more realistic units and less variety. BAR has
| tanks, Zero-K has flying tanks that can also turn invisible
| (this is a made up example, but illustrates the idea).
|
| Zero-K has a limited economy, you have to control land to to
| generate income, and fighting has more influence on who wins.
| In BAR, the economy is more exponential, and at high tech
| levels controlling land doesn't matter, you can generate a huge
| income in a tiny corner of the map and win because your economy
| is exponentially stronger than anything your opponents have.
| astrobe_ wrote:
| To clarify, ZK doesn't population caps like e.g. Starcraft.
| The actual limit is actually the CPU/GPU (and maybe your
| bandwidth too). ZK's 16vs16 host, the "lobster pot" as they
| call it, can barely be playable if your rig is too weak.
| rollcat wrote:
| > ZK doesn't population caps
|
| That sounds like poor RTS design.
|
| Popcap is one of the simplest and most effective "anti-
| snowballing" mechanisms. Once you're "maxed out", you
| cannot get further ahead - you must attack and trade to
| build new stuff. If you can just keep making stuff without
| ever being forced to trade, whoever gets ahead first,
| eventually wins.
|
| Supply also serves as a comeback mechanic - you were even,
| but took one bad fight, so you can immediately spend all
| your money to get a new army. Meanwhile your opponent must
| construct additional pylons before they can get much
| further ahead - they grow stronger slower than you regrow
| the lost limbs.
| remram wrote:
| BAR is more similar to the original Total Annihilation (and
| successors like Supreme Commander). It's a lot of similar units
| (e.g. tanks) with subtle variations, multiple tiers, with a
| focus on out-numbering your opponent.
|
| Zero-K went a different route. They simplified the economy
| (metal cost = energy cost) but added a whole lot of mechanics
| like overdrive grids and made every unit unique. There is a lot
| of variety with mind-control, jumpjets, shields, unit-throwers,
| self-replicators, teleports, terraforming, etc.
|
| Zero-K has been on Steam for a few years, I think BAR is
| working towards it. They are both good worthwhile games, they
| share some common elements, but they are both worth trying in
| their own right.
| liotier wrote:
| > unit-throwers
|
| Was the BAR peewee-launching gun inspired by Zero-K ?
| badosu wrote:
| This link might be helpful:
| https://www.beyondallreason.info/faq/what-are-the-difference...
| concordDance wrote:
| Not as much as BAR. I do prefer Zero-K though, it has a much
| less degenerate economy (no exponential growth) and actual unit
| AI.
| ewy1 wrote:
| So happy to see this here! I used to play this a lot with my
| boyfriend - we were pretty evenly matched, and the game allowed
| for so much freedom which made every game wild. The most
| impressive feature is - in my opinion - the wide variety of
| commands you can provide to your units and how their AI interacts
| with them. For example, if you build a crowd of fast and agile
| grunts and make them match speed with a slower tank, they will
| still avoid enemy projectiles with their superior speed.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Indeed !
|
| https://youtu.be/7qEGJlBLJSg
|
| (Most, but not all of these are shared with other Spring-Recoil
| games.)
| fho wrote:
| One of the features I used the most was the "distributed
| move/fight" command. That just made it so easy to deploy e.g. a
| line of heavy tanks in front of a line of artillery.
|
| Or mines that were actually useful. I played a game were my
| opponent got super paranoid after running into the first mine
| field.
|
| Good times :-)
| poisonborz wrote:
| It's fascinating that this grew out of a project that was
| originally a 3D map viewer for Total Annihilation.
| emsimot wrote:
| Custom games? :D I miss playing "tree tag" on Warcraft3
| Battle.net
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Kind of : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gr3RVDMJsEY
|
| Though in WC3 (and SC1/SC2) IMHO this was enabled by a very
| easy to use <<map>> editor, combined with a tremendous
| popularity of the base game.
|
| So if even, in theory, you can do even more (libre software),
| in practice what you see is not as ebulliently diverse.
|
| You can also compare it to the Spring lobby games - Zero-K has
| improved on the presentation, but something has been lost by
| not being able to easily fork the game yourself, build on it,
| and then just put up whatever the resulting mess is, start a
| game, and it being listed in the list of games :
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8by5C6dJDA
|
| Including <<Com Shooter>> FPS using the built-in <<possess unit
| and use FPS controls>> showcased here :
| https://youtu.be/MpKqQxTURik?t=107
|
| Which shows another tension in game development : more recent
| Spring-Recoil games disable that feature outright, because of
| the balance headaches it causes, and potential modders can't
| use what they are not aware exists !
|
| But modding scene does exist in ZK : http://zero-k.info/Mods
|
| (In addition to the game setup itself being typically WAY more
| open than what you find in other RTS.)
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| These types of RTSs are way less "arcadey" than Warcraft 3 or
| Starcraft, so I don't think supporting custom games is on the
| devs radar.
|
| What you're usually after in these games are huge battles on
| massive worlds with thousands of explosions leaving craters and
| debris everywhere.
| szundi wrote:
| Best game ever, other favorite is BA. Nothing to conpare these
| to.
| EamonnMR wrote:
| I wish people were slightly more up front about their games being
| Spring Engine mods.
| badosu wrote:
| From https://github.com/ZeroK-RTS/Zero-K/:
|
| > About > > Open source RTS game running on the Spring engine
|
| In the place where code is present, things pertaining to code
| are present. You don't need to throw technical details to
| potential players at your front page.
| LordShredda wrote:
| Calling this a mod would be like calling Dota a mod.
| badosu wrote:
| Historically, games made under Spring/Recoil are called mods.
| remram wrote:
| If Spring is an engine, then this is a game not a mod. What
| game does it MODify?
| concordDance wrote:
| Would you call a game that used Unreal Engine an Unreal Engine
| mod?
| ekianjo wrote:
| that looks like it's heavily inspired by Total Annihilation
| LegibleCrimson wrote:
| That's an understatement. They're effectively family.
| russnewcomer wrote:
| Zero-k is based on Spring Engine, that started as a community
| project to be a 3D engine for TA. So you are very correct.
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Would I need a fairly powerful machine to run this? I can run
| Starcraft 2, is that enough?
|
| I've toyed with Total Annihilation, but the graphics were too
| old, even for Brood War fan such as myself.
| notahacker wrote:
| I always liked the Total Annihilation graphics and think they
| passed the test of time quite well for a game that's 25 years
| old. A lot of the maps were downright pretty (especially when I
| modded them ;-) and the top down perspective was a better "3D"
| than isometric (or much of the low poly full 3D of the time).
| The lasers and build nanobots and explosions were a bit cheesy
| I guess...
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Yes, I like the terrain. But the unit designs really show
| their age.
| notahacker wrote:
| Tbf the unit designs (those solar panels!) were pretty
| weird at the time, looks like this has a similarly odd-
| looking ships and factories and the same penchant for big
| coloured panels on everything
|
| Looks like the big advantage of this is that the unit AI is
| supposed to be quite clever rather than _really stupid_ at
| how it carries out the tasks you give it...
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| They are bragging about having a challenging AI.
|
| We will see, I've just downloaded the game. Hopefully,
| the AI is better than Blizzard's 98's Brood War brain-
| dead computer :)
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Projects like these tend to attract AI programmers,
| compare SC1's native AI with what Brood War API users
| came up with :
|
| https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/01/skynet-meets-the-
| swar...
|
| Speaking of which, you might be in luck, this just
| happened this weekend, and in my on-and-off experience
| with Spring games, I don't remember seeing AI exhibition
| matches very often compared to regular human competitions
| :
|
| https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1981220857
|
| http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/36943
|
| P.S.: Don't confuse unit AI (that even players have
| direct access to) with general AI.
| LegibleCrimson wrote:
| Note that the parent poster was referring to unit AI, not
| enemy AI. Units can do a lot more with a single command
| compared to something like StarCraft and StarCraft II,
| which forces you to do much more heavy micro (because
| your units will pretty much walk in a straight line to
| their goal, not attack unless they're A-walking, and then
| stand in a single place without moving as they attack).
| APM is not as important a factor in TA-heritage games,
| and many Spring games go to great lengths to reduce APM
| as much as possible, by doing things like automating
| "dancing".
| badosu wrote:
| I didn't have direct experience with the AI on ZeroK, but
| if it uses some variation of BarbarianAI that is
| available on BAR (cousin project mentioned in other posts
| here) it's as impressive as being a decent benchmark for
| beating a human that has a borderline decent grasp on the
| game (which makes it an actually good challenge).
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| It basically came out a few years before SC2, being even less
| graphically demanding. (At which point my own PC with a GeForce
| 4 which, for comparison to today, had either 0.064 or 0.128 Go
| of VRAM, would struggle to run it.) Some graphic improvements
| have happened since then of course, and the requirements are
| now somewhat higher.
|
| Now the issue is that it doesn't have the unit caps that SC2
| does, and the number of players (now up to 16vs16 in a normal
| game, sometimes even 32vs32, while in 2009 8vs8 would have been
| the max), map sizes, and number of units (typically up to ~0.5k
| in 2006 compared to topping up at ~5k-10k today) only kept
| growing.
|
| So if you want to play big team games, and have a much worse
| CPU than the average player, you might not have the best time
| in the endgame.
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Are there any popular 4vs4 games?
|
| I will first start versus AI, then take it from there. Not
| really a competitive player anymore. Playing Brood War kinda
| makes you dislike multiplayer RTS after a while, haha.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| You might have to advertise for them in chat / forums.
|
| All games : http://zero-k.info/Battles
|
| All games with 8 players (though not only 4vs4) : http://ze
| ro-k.info/Battles?Title=&Map=&PlayersFrom=8&Players...
| jandrese wrote:
| According to the Steam page: Processor: 2.0
| GHz dual core CPU with SSE (Intel Core 2 Duo or equivalent)
| Memory: 4 GB RAM Graphics: 512 MB graphics card with
| OpenGL 3 support (GeForce 8800 or equivalent) Storage:
| 6 GB available space
|
| I would guess that you can run this game.
| astrobe_ wrote:
| If you can run SC2 you prolly can run ZK. It does uses nearly
| all of the 4 Gb specified in the minimal requirements, though.
| But if you are at minimal specs, don't think about engaging
| into the popular 16vs16 battles.
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| A fair bit above them, only graphics are a problem.
|
| Intel i5 11th gen, Intel Iris UHD graphics, 16GB RAM.
| white_dragon88 wrote:
| Still no Mac support... I know the technical reason why so not
| upset, just sad.
| shoggouth wrote:
| Does Zero-k or another SpringRTS game support "strategic zoom" or
| building structures/units with real-time debt (as in you can
| construct a unit that requires 10000 mineral when you are only
| making 600 a minute) such as Supreme Commander?
| Pet_Ant wrote:
| I mean Total Annihilation pioneered that concept and Spring RTS
| started as an open source clone of Total Annihilation so
| definitely some Spring RTS mods do, and Zero-K almost certainly
| does.
| remram wrote:
| They all do (Zero-K, BAR, and most of the games built on the
| engine).
|
| You can also reclaim metal from dead units and structures.
| fho wrote:
| I feel old now :-)
|
| SpringRTS is actually older than the first Supreme Commander
| game.
| tomca32 wrote:
| I think pretty much all Spring games support that. Zero-K and
| BAR both do anyway. Both strategic zoom and real time
| "streaming" building came from Total Annihilation and Spring
| games are TA based.
| LordShredda wrote:
| This game is absolutely insane. There's so many tricks and plays
| possible with the selection of units available. Ever seen a
| commander rocket jump and shoot down a bomber plane mid air?
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Zero-K = Noita RTS :
|
| https://imgur.com/iCUnQy6
| fergal_reid wrote:
| I used to play Total Annihilation online back when I was in
| secondary school in the late 90s
|
| We'd hang out on IRC, and people would host a game on their IP.
|
| Eventually I got into creating new units for the game. You had to
| animate them with a C-like language, and I was trying to teach
| myself C at the time so that was part of my programming journey.
|
| The 'Swedish Yankspankers' were a clan that had a channel on the
| IRC server, and my recollection, which may be wrong, is that they
| started building an app, 'TAreplay' that we could use to record
| and rewatch tournament games. People used to pass the exe around
| - not very secure, but those were the times!
|
| It's amazing to me that those players hacking little apps
| together for themselves, have spawned a lineage of RTS engines
| and games that are still going all this time later.
|
| A small but incredible example of hacker culture.
| russnewcomer wrote:
| It's still some of the same folks - SJ and some of the other
| SYs wrote the Spring Engine that Zero-K uses.
|
| I myself learned how to code writing .bos scripts and hanging
| out at Annihilated, TAU, and #gnug
|
| If you want to see some of the stuff still possible and being
| done in the TA engine, check out TAUniverse.com
| jhoho wrote:
| You'll love what the community did with Supreme Commander,
| Chris Taylor's spiritual successor to Total Annihilation:
| https://www.faforever.com/
|
| They even created a Coop-Campaign and a completely new faction.
| willis936 wrote:
| I put a lot of hours into SupCom. It was always a buggy mess,
| but I do remember it quite fondly. Planetary Annihilation has
| felt like the right progression in the spiritual series. It
| was always a very smooth experience and fixed the technical
| issues with scaling up to massive scale combat while fixing
| the balance issues of turtling. The skill ceiling is immense
| and I could never beat high level bots. The nature of having
| one to many planets also means you can play cooperatively
| with up to several friends. It's a good time.
| jader201 wrote:
| I hadn't heard of this before, and was excited that a new RTS was
| being announced, given that RTSes seem like a fading genre.
|
| Of course it's just a link to an older game. I guess the days of
| the RTS really are behind us. :(
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| It's a bit like calling Magic the Gathering <<just>> an older
| game. (<<It came out in 1993, how old, must be bad !>>)
|
| Your complaint would have more merit if the _many_ innovations
| of Spring-Recoil engine games had been adopted more widely in
| the genre, but even Supreme Commander 1 came short (except for
| polish maybe).
|
| You cannot expect RTS to become one of the biggest genres
| again, but it's still quite lively (yes, even outside of SC2
| and AoE2) :
|
| _RTS is fun, actually (and you can learn it): a video essay -
| CloudCuckooCountry_ :
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rl4myN8q_KM
|
| A list of upcoming(ish) RTSes :
|
| _The Most Anticipated RTS Games in 2023 & 2024... SO MANY! -
| GamerZakh_ :
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKujSK4FRWk
|
| (Notably, including BAR, another Spring-Recoil game.)
|
| (Yes, most of them will suck and fail, such is life.)
| brucethemoose2 wrote:
| The Planetary Annihilation devs are coming out with a factory-
| rts hybrid game akin to Mindustry.
|
| That seems the direction RTS is heading in general, hybridizing
| with other genres.
| olavgg wrote:
| link?
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Stormgate is one of the recent promising titles.
| concordDance wrote:
| I'd still recommend it though, it's very fun.
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| As someone who still watches the Korean Broodwar scene, how are
| the mechanics in this game? Is there micro? Or is it more sc2
| style where you put all your units in a single control group and
| then death ball them into the other death ball?
| Pannoniae wrote:
| The game is much less click-intensive, but you need _really_
| good situational awareness for it. It doesn 't have
| "traditional" micro, you don't need to manually queue units or
| babysit every single unit so it doesn't die immediately, but to
| win, you need to micro in key areas and most importantly,
| manage your economy well.
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| Interesting. Does managing your economy mean being efficient
| and keeping resources low or are there more complex elements
| to it?
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| More like SC1.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0lYXap5rbM
|
| Still, there are just too many differences from both SC1 and 2.
| Starting with a higher importance being placed on team games.
|
| For a similar, yet different gameplay, see Beyond All Reason.
| concordDance wrote:
| Not heavy micro I'd say, but death balls won't work very well
| normally, the composition of your ball matters a lot, as does
| how you position it.
| ordu wrote:
| The strange thing I cannot play war games any more. Not after
| Russia invaded Ukraine. War now seems Really Evil and playing
| with it doesn't seem appropriate. I wonder does anyone else feel
| like that?
| Arech wrote:
| same.
| astrobe_ wrote:
| I am OK with war games as long as there's no humans or human-
| likes in the game. ZK's sentient robots are fine for me,
| contrary to something like 0 A.D. (which even has female
| workers - maybe I'm old school, but that's even more a no-go
| for me).
| mock-possum wrote:
| Nah it's still 'just' a game for me. It would have to be
| exceptionally immersive to trigger that response - the Walking
| Dead games by TellTale for instance, caught me off guard. I
| remember there was one big moral choice that I kind of just say
| and stared at the screen for what seemed like half an hour
| before I could finally make a decision for my character.
|
| But a birds' eye view of a somewhat sci fi RTS? So far removed
| from real life and practical considerations that it doesn't
| even blip the radar for me.
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Such a strange thing to say. Are you saying war did not exist
| before Russia-Ukraine war?
|
| Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria...US instigated wars aren't
| evil enough for you?
| ordu wrote:
| No, they were far away and not my problem. It is silly from a
| rational standpoint, it is probably unjust from a Universal
| Justice standpoint, but I'm not talking about rationality or
| justice right now, I'm talking about emotions.
| wheelerof4te wrote:
| Understandable.
|
| Sorry, let's hope for a quick and just peace then.
| eric_cc wrote:
| Why Russia / Ukraine? There is nothing particularly notable
| about this conflict compared to others. War has always been
| war.
| ordu wrote:
| Yeah, I think you are right. But I didn't feel it before it
| hit me into the face. Me personally. Wars seemed too far away
| to feel real.
| Centigonal wrote:
| Lovely to see Zero-K on the HN front page.
| nottorp wrote:
| It's multiplayer only right?
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Nope, even has a campaign that can be played in coop (coop
| through Steam only) :
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfVdH02RUQ8&list=PLi9_tXwdXO...
|
| Don't expect an extraordinary story though, it's much more
| focused on being a series of puzzles showcasing various game
| features.
| astrobe_ wrote:
| Nope. There are various levels of AI that can serve as
| opponents, including an AI and game mode that sends waves after
| waves of enemies until you kill enough of its stuff that it
| sends the final boss you must defeat to win the game.
|
| There's also a _campaign_ that introduces units progressively.
| I 'd recommend to start there.
| aspyct wrote:
| This has a very strong Warzone 2100 vibe to it, I like it :)
| internetguy wrote:
| WOAH! Did NOT expect to be here. I've been playing Zero-k for
| over a year and it is so. much. fun. I play BAR (Beyond All
| Reason) and Zero-k with some of my friends.
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