Orbital Tactics
Hi :) I make games around orbital dynamics and space physics.
If that's your thing too, ☄️ sign up for playtests & updates here!
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Defend Earth from the enemy ships!
Move mouse: rotate rocket
Scroll: zoom
Left-click: fire engines
Spacebar: fire guns!
Right-click: fire torpedoes :O
Land (gently) to refuel and repair.
- a small space game by Patrick – Lithobrake Labs ☄️
Thanks Kenney.nl, freestockimages for some of the assets <3
Development log
- Torpedoes now available (v0.3.0)2 days ago
- Automatic landing assistance (v0.2.0)2 days ago
- Explosions & bombers (v0.0.17)Nov 29, 2024
- Ship breakup physics (v0.0.14)Nov 18, 2024
- Targeting computer (v0.0.12)Oct 04, 2024
- Independent gun turret (v0.0.11)Oct 03, 2024
- Bullet path prediction (v0.0.10)Oct 03, 2024
Comments
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I wish we had trajectories for bombs, although I guess that might make the display a bit cluttered, maybe a toggle?
I hear ya, bombs are hard to hit in their current form. I have a few ideas I'm going to try out about the clutter :)
A couple thoughts, definitely my opinion might not be your vision for the game or outside the scope:
I feel like landings require a little bit too much finesse, and often the spin of the moon causes a fine landing to then become an impact while I’m waiting for repairs. I think a slightly wider margin of errors for good landings and bad landings before destruction would be useful, and maybe locking in place when you land until you launch again.
I also think a “auto-docking” feature would be nice, possibly as an alternative to but not removing manual docking, auto docking would be slower but safer
For ship to ship, a little bit more fuel would be nice, right now I feel like finding a stable orbit and shifting only when necessary is the only practical way to play, but being able to use burns to try and close distances to defend would be awesome. It may be more related to the landing issue then an actual issue with fuel since it feels so risky to land burning fuel feels like a similar risk.
I also feel like, if you’re intending to develop this concept further, fewer and more dangerous AI would be an improvement over a ton of relatively simple AI, and a wave or level system would be awesome.
I love the mechanics you’ve built, it feels very satisfying to play and I keep coming back I it but I think the frustration that builds from some of the sticking points makes it hard to really immerse myself in the game. Looking forward to future updates!
This kind of detailed feedback is what keeps me going. I greatly appreciate it!
I agree landings now are too finicky to be interesting. I think it's a combination of a few things:
Fixing this is high prio right now. Once this is done I'd be curious if that encourages more landing & refueling.
More variety in ship to ship combat would be really cool (maybe with smarter AI), although this will be probably out of scope for the next update. I also have a new prototype in the works that I want to work on next (updates in the newsletter if you're not already on it :) )
What do you mean by docking by the way, I don't see any ship to dock to here so I'm probably misunderstanding?
Sorry by docking I just meant landed, so an alternate to manual landing that’s maybe slower and locks you out of controls but less risky. I’m glad the feedback helps!
Just made some changes to landing! When a hard landing is imminent, the engines will automatically fire briefly to cushion the vertical speed to a safer level.
This was a lot of fun! Keen to see what you create in the future.
It was interesting to see the bullets hit my own ship when I was at low velocities. Perhaps there is some minimum required speed before PDCs can be used in the Expanse (to avoid projectiles from going into orbit).
That's great, thank you! :) I think the small scale of the world here plays into that a lot. In most of the Expanse, orbital velocities are much higher than muzzle velocities (planets are much more massive), and there's also a lot more space, so re-encountering a bullet is really unlikely. Running into your own bullets could also be a fun mechanic to keep around (maybe slightly toned down?).
Very good game, absolutely love the target indicator mechanism and orbital dynamics element. In terms of gameplay, while aiming for hostile ships, the UI is usually zoomed out by a lot, which makes collision with tiny debris quite inevitable frustrating. Maybe considering highlighting the debris particles in the perimeter or adding an 'active ability' to clear the perimeter of debris?
Thank you! That's a good point. I'm working on getting the debris to break down into smaller pieces. Maybe once they're small enough, a laser can vaporize them or move them out of the way.