Welcome to the Galaxial development log for March!
Early Access Thoughts
My plan all along had always been to release the game only when it was completely finished, so as to perfect everything before it is played for the first time.
However... recently I have been thinking it may be more suitable to use an early access development model, due to the size of the game, the time it is taking to develop and also to provide some extra feedback during development.
Tentative features for the first early access release
I have made a list of the minimum amount of features that I would be prepared to release the first early access version of the game with. Most of the items on the list are near complete or at least half way done.
- Random galaxy generation
- Planets, asteroids and trade resources
- At least one playable faction
- Colonisation
- Basic empire management
- Population management and migration
- Colony buildings
- Asteroid mining
- Research
- Ship design, production and reserves stockpile
- Essential ship modules, ship hulls and research projects
- Galaxy exploration and jumpgate travel
- Ship AI and combat
- Fleet hierarchy and orders
- Pirate faction
I think this would provide enough gameplay and most importantly replayability to begin with, allowing players to build up huge empires in a mostly unpopulated galaxy. Computer factions will come later in development when they are completely ready. The pirate factions will be there to provide some threat and encounters, and to see how ship battles work.
I don’t have a definite time frame for when the first early access version will be yet, and of course some features may change or additional things added depending on how things go.
Features that will be added gradually afterwards
- Computer factions and high level AI
- Diplomacy, wars and trading
- Planetary invasions
- Fighters and carrier ship types
- Fleet hierarchy leader characters
- More races, factions, research projects, ship and module types
- Salvaging
- Revolts
- More TBD…
Once the first early access version is released, development will continue for a long time afterwards. All of the remaining features will be added (assuming they don’t need to be significantly redesigned at some point) plus everything extra I have planned for Galaxial.
