Archive: 4 posts

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I am making a top-down shooter/RTS in which there are four planets that the player must capture and defend using their own ship as well as ships made by their captured planets, and I'm trying to think of a good control interface that can be used to give orders to your ships. The only controls I've already used up is the left stick for player movement. Like I said, this is also a shooter, so I'm avoiding a cursor interface. Some commands I'm thinking of including are Go To Planet, Escort, and Take Control, in the event the player's ship is destroyed. There will be a limit of four ships generated by each planet. If you have any advice, perhaps on how I should wire up the controlinator, or if you have a question for me, then please reply.

2012-04-08 20:55:00 Author: ThisDudeRufus Posts: 170

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I'm trying to think of a good control interface that can be used to give orders to your ships. If there are so few orders that you can reasonably map each one to its own button (say, if you're not using the D-pad for anything else), then do that, otherwise radial menus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_menu) (like weapon selection in RDR) are quite efficient for analog stick selection.

2012-04-08 22:33:00 Author: Aya042 Posts: 2870

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You could use right analog stick for a cursor, otherwise, you might wanna try proximity selection, as in, only command the ships near yours. Without using a cursor, you can fire different beacons to tell them where to go, where to shoot, or what to support/follow. If the level's going to be fairly large,I would hotkey each planet to a dpad direction, although you'll have to create some path logic so the ships know how to get there. EX. left analog - move/strafe right analog - joystick rotator tap circle - select ship/planet nearby(hold then release for a wider area) square - take control of a ship(closest or random if multiple are selected) R1 - shoot L1 - "go here" beacon L2 - support beacon R2 - attack beacon dpad up - 1st planet, dpad down - 2nd planet, etc. X/triangle - up to you, I would have it be the confirm/cancel buttons for when you want to make more ships As I'm writing this, I'm thinking the beacon idea isn't the best if you want to pinpoint the exact location. You could have it choose the distance where it'll stop depending on how far the right analog stick is tilted, but that's pretty much a cursor, and it's hard to make. Or simpler, judge the distance based on how long the beacon button is held. Or have the beacon keep going straight until the button is released/pressed again.

2012-04-08 22:56:00 Author: Unknown User

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Ooh, I think I'll use the D-Pad. Thinking... It seems a typical breakdown of the command system in the RTS is Select Unit, Select Command, then Select Target. In that case the first step will be done by pointing to the units with Right Stick and selecting with L1 until Right Stick is released, selecting command with D-Pad, and selecting target with Right Stick. Thinking... Also, during unit selection, the camera will move in the direction the Right Stick is pointing, this will make it possible to select further away units and will be a hint for those who don't read up on the controls. Alternatively, the player could quickly command single units by pointing their ship with the Left Stick and using L1. Thank you to everyone, I may not have directly used your ideas but they were very inspiring - I haven't been able to figure this out explicitly for a while.

2012-04-08 23:01:00 Author: ThisDudeRufus Posts: 170

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