Let's Design TIE FIGHTER 2!

Vehrec · Post by **Vehrec** » 2007-10-19 02:33pm

If you were given a multi-million dollar budget, a team of Lucasarts developers, programmers and artists, and the carte blanc of George Lucas (so long as you respect that which has come before!) What would you put into a hypothetical sequel to TIE FIGHTER?

My shortlist:
Power/Heat/radiators. Every ship system generates heat, depending on how much power is moving through it. All this heat is rounded up and pumped into radiators, which move it into space. So you can go over 100 percent power for a short time, but that causes massive heat buildup, and a small fighter like a TIE has a lot of Radiator space, but very little in the way of heat sinks. If you turn the power down and just coast, you dump heat very fast. And different fighters all have their own heat generating and radiating abilities. for example, the Defender at 100% generates just slightly more than it can radiate. You have to play with it to keep it from going into the red and potentially killing you.
Imperial Factions. There are more groups in the empire than you can shake a stick at. Will you attempt to sell out your Captain to the ISB and earn the wrath of the Navy?
Thought out ships. Star Destroyers have Sensor Domes, not shield domes. They also have 6 heavy turbolaser turrets, and 2 heavy Ion turrets along with Point defense guns and secondary weapons. Home One cruisers are big. Executor class Star dreadnoughts are bigger, and everything is crazy detailed. Like they are based off the actual models or something.
Scale and speed: You will not poke around at 2 km/s. You will spend a lot of time going much faster than this. TIES have 4200 g or something, and I intend to use it (somehow). We may fly from planet to planet in a star system, or even fly from orbit down to bomb a planet's surface.

Hawkwings · Post by **Hawkwings** » 2007-10-19 02:38pm

Somehow, I'll fix everything that bad star wars writers have ever written. And get the George Lucas Stamp of Approval, saying "Everything in this game is the highest canon, except game mechanics."

Then I'd only have to worry about not making any mistakes. Oh, yeah, and making a fun game.

I want a big huge space battle with, like, thousands of star destroyers going up against, um... the main YV invasion fleet or something. Just to show off massive firepower. And the great thing about that mission is that there's so much random firepower thrown around that you die ever few minutes from being hit by a stray turbolaser.

That being said, you can save whenever you want, wherever you want.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2007-10-19 02:44pm

I want a big huge space battle with, like, thousands of star destroyers going up against, um... the main YV invasion fleet or something. Just to show off massive firepower. And the great thing about that mission is that there's so much random firepower thrown around that you die ever few minutes from being hit by a stray turbolaser.

I can't tell if this is a serious post or not.

Darth Ruinus · Post by **Darth Ruinus** » 2007-10-19 03:09pm

Uraniun235 wrote:
I want a big huge space battle with, like, thousands of star destroyers going up against, um... the main YV invasion fleet or something. Just to show off massive firepower. And the great thing about that mission is that there's so much random firepower thrown around that you die ever few minutes from being hit by a stray turbolaser.
I can't tell if this is a serious post or not.

Kinda sounds like the Battlefront Battle Over Coruscant level on Hard... well at least to me it does.

That being said, how about the ability to get out of your ship when you are not on a mission? "Loading times" are replaced with your character walking around (or whatever TIE fighters do) an ISD, and sometimes sneak attacks or whatever randomly pop up.

How about command of a fighter squadron? (dont know if that was in the original or not)

montypython · Post by **montypython** » 2007-10-19 04:07pm

Honestly, though, I'd like a Cap Ship sim just because no one's bothered doing that for Star Wars.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2007-10-19 04:21pm

Uraniun235 wrote:
I want a big huge space battle with, like, thousands of star destroyers going up against, um... the main YV invasion fleet or something. Just to show off massive firepower. And the great thing about that mission is that there's so much random firepower thrown around that you die ever few minutes from being hit by a stray turbolaser.
I can't tell if this is a serious post or not.

Addendum: Also, this would probably bring nearly any desktop computer to its knees. Tens of thousands of starships to keep track of and maneuver, plus however many weapons they carry to keep track of and target and shoot, plus the projectiles flying between those ships, plus the hundreds of thousands of starfighters and all their sundry weapons, and proton torpedoes and concussion missiles...

Then there's the graphics of it all to consider.

Jaepheth · Post by **Jaepheth** » 2007-10-19 05:12pm

I'd add an option for the player to switch on and off computer assisted flight so that pilots can pull space combat maneuvers like turning around and firing behind you while momentum carries you along your original heading.

Sidewinder · Post by **Sidewinder** » 2007-10-19 06:05pm

It might be fun to have Vader attempt to overthrow the Emperor, and to play as one of the fighter pilots loyal to Vader. The story might even have Vader ordering us (the player) to support the Rebel Alliance and keep the Emperor's attention elsewhere. Then we fly as Vader's wingmen as he attacks on the Death Star II to kill the Emperor, and... Bam! Vader crowns himself Emperor, and we get promoted to Grand Admiral for supporting him.

Starglider · Post by **Starglider** » 2007-10-19 06:26pm

Retcon Tyber Zahn to be a minor nuisance whose flagship you destroy in one of the earlier missions.

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2007-10-19 06:48pm

More rebel scum killing action.

However, being able to "rise up the ranks" from a TIE pilot to possibly "Wing Commander" directing an ISD's 72 TIEs in an engagement and designing the missions would be cool.

Example: You get given a mission objective; "destroy this ship", "seize it", and you then allocate your on board craft from the 72 TIEs, Assault Gunboats, Shuttles, etc to execute it; and then fly the mission.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2007-10-19 07:00pm

TIE Fighter. But with modern graphics and an orchestral version of the original score by John Williams and the London symphony orchestra.

That'll do me, ta.

Jaepheth · Post by **Jaepheth** » 2007-10-19 07:05pm

oh, and something a bit goofy. When you rise high enough in rank, not only be able to select your own craft and armament, but also customize its appearance and import custom decals (Decals more for assault gunboats as there's not really a good surface for them on TIEs).

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2007-10-19 07:08pm

My idea, to prevent people from going "Hurr hurr, I'll use ALL my forces, all 72 TIE Fighters to easily crush the opponent!" is that when you use a craft in a mission; it's going to have to be overhauled between missions; through maintenance; and there is only so many techs on an ISD and they can only do so many manhours of maintenance between each mission; so this would prevent you from putting together massive alpha strikes of all your craft, since you'd rapidly deplete your forces and cause them to be all out of action due to repair requirements.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2007-10-19 07:18pm

Pah. My TIE Advanced and Defender won't get a dent to need fixing anyway, and not my Missile Boat with SLAMs either.

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2007-10-19 07:57pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:Pah. My TIE Advanced and Defender won't get a dent to need fixing anyway, and not my Missile Boat with SLAMs either.

Uhm.

Link

Man Hours of Maintenance Needed Per Flying Hour
F-16C/D Fighting Falcon 22.1 Man Hours

So lets say we deploy all 72 of our fighters, and fly them for oh, two hours.

That's 3,182.4 man hours of maintenance we'll need to do; and it's going to take some time to do.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2007-10-19 08:01pm

What, no pornographic "shore leave" module?

NeoGoomba · Post by **NeoGoomba** » 2007-10-19 08:10pm

montypython wrote:Honestly, though, I'd like a Cap Ship sim just because no one's bothered doing that for Star Wars.

Well...thats really not for a game called TIE Fighter now is it?

Shep's idea is pretty good. Maybe pre-mission you can create a prioritized list of targets, choose the vectors from which the squadrons will attack from, set a timer from mission start on when each squadron engages, and what ships you hold back in reserve.

Actually, didn't Wing Commander Armada have a similar setup?

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2007-10-19 08:14pm

Okay, for one thing, I'd definitely design it around having thousands of fighters on screen at once. I'd design this thing to max out a PS3/XBox 360's processing power. I want two dozen Star Destroyers pounding on a Rebel fleet with at least 300 fighters per side on the battlefield at any one time.

I'd put a little bit more micromanagement into it (as the OP mentioned, worrying about heat) and design all kinds of little maneuvers that can be done. Very good physics system, and online play (versus and co-op). Missions and just all-out battles. And correct every SW brain-bug; you can NOT take out a Star Destroyer by attacking the domes. However, you can shoot turrets off the hull once the shields are down.

I'd want some kind of "scan mode" that lets you see shields around ships, color coded as well. So a Star Destroyer that has all green shields is strong, but if a couple capital ships start shooting at the same area that area turns yellow and then red and you know that it's coming down soon and can bomb it to help or wait for the drop so you can start shooting turrets off the hull.

Fingolfin_Noldor · Post by **Fingolfin_Noldor** » 2007-10-19 08:15pm

I would love for campaigns to be set either during the Reborn Emperor, or Post Clone Wars, or during the Yuuzhan Vong invasion.

Then it is also about time we can see thousands of warships in action fighting against some large foe.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2007-10-19 08:15pm

Huge battles like that would be rare. I could see something like that being the final mission of the game, though.

NeoGoomba · Post by **NeoGoomba** » 2007-10-19 08:16pm

Oh, since Praxis brought up scanning, how about no more fucking inspection missions where I have to fly my super futuristic space fighter 5 goddamn inches from a box in space?

Why should I have to inspect a crate when I just came out of a STAR DESTROYER!? WITH BIG HONKING SENSOR DOMES!!!!!!

Fingolfin_Noldor · Post by **Fingolfin_Noldor** » 2007-10-19 08:22pm

Darth Wong wrote:Huge battles like that would be rare. I could see something like that being the final mission of the game, though.

Admittedly few. There were at least a few involving hundreds of capital ships, like the Battle of Coruscant (the last one in the Yuuzhan Vong war) and the Battle of Mon Calamari (also the one in the Yuuzhan Vong war).

Operation Shadow Hand probably had a few big battles since some planets were probably quite well defended.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2007-10-19 08:24pm

NeoGoomba wrote:Why should I have to inspect a crate when I just came out of a STAR DESTROYER!? WITH BIG HONKING SENSOR DOMES!!!!!!

So there's an excuse to lure you out away from your star destroyer so the game can drop a metric fuckton of shit on you from a great altitude, and it can't help you.

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2007-10-19 09:04pm

Move away from "LOL You must try the mission 1,000 times until you win!"

to four outcomes:

"Epic Win" (only on some missions, like you singlehandedly beat off 2 squadrons of X-Wings and kill them all, and get awarded the Emperor's Medal of Valor)

Win (Accomplish your mission objectives; protect an entire convoy)

Win some lose some (e.g. you protected half of a convoy)

EPIC FAIL (you lost the entire convoy)

I'd definitely put the majority of my development man hours into the mission/campaign editors, so that you can rapidly build a campaign easily. Oh; and possibly make a random campaign generator; to keep interest in the game going once you beat the stock campaigns.

And DEFINITELY NO:

"Your player becomes disenchanted with the empire, and defects to the rebels, and flies a X-Wing at Yavin/Endor" plot.

OR

"OMG the emperor's kidnapped!" and "Lord Vader is flying your wing!"

While they earn temporary "geek nerd" points; overall, they just don't make sense. Star Wars is big enough that we don't need to constantly drag in all the main characters. Several of TIE 1's campaigns were good, especially where the empire ends a civil war.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2007-10-19 09:49pm

MKSheppard wrote:
Uhm.

Link

Man Hours of Maintenance Needed Per Flying Hour
F-16C/D Fighting Falcon 22.1 Man Hours

So lets say we deploy all 72 of our fighters, and fly them for oh, two hours.

That's 3,182.4 man hours of maintenance we'll need to do; and it's going to take some time to do.

Your first error is in thinking I'd be flying an F-16 of any bloc against Rebel scum.

Vendetta wrote:
NeoGoomba wrote:Why should I have to inspect a crate when I just came out of a STAR DESTROYER!? WITH BIG HONKING SENSOR DOMES!!!!!!
So there's an excuse to lure you out away from your star destroyer so the game can drop a metric fuckton of shit on you from a great altitude, and it can't help you.

Those missions are always fruitful and logical.

"Mu One, that crate needs inspecting. Inspect it, then move from Random Space Crate #1 to Random Space Crate #354. Ensure no Rebels attempt to destroy their valuable cargo of RANDOM JUNK."

"Mu One, you've discovered a REBEL SPY CRATE. Investigate further while Shuttle Group Gamma are en route."

"Mu One, the ROGUE REBEL SPACE CRATE has exploded, damaging your already pathetic shields and taking out your launch tubes. Also, our engines are suddenly dead. And so is Shuttle Group Gamma's. And your wingmen all collided with another crate of SPACE BANANAS. Yes, all of them. Use your TIE Fighter to defend the oncoming REBEL DEATH SQUADRONS of 300 X-Wings and those shitty knock-off Z-95s. Use caution when attacking the MC80 that just hypered in on your position. All three of them. Good luck!"

"Your request for reinforcements has been denied."

"You have chosen to quit the game."