#stellarinterface

We are proud to announce that Stellar Interface has been finally submited into Steam Greenlight!

You can check and vote for our project by clicking right here.  Make sure to check out our awesome action-packed Greenlight release trailer!

The game I’ve been working on is finally on Steam Greenlight!

Please vote vote vote and share!! All your support is welcome!

You can vote here:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=669314764

Hey there! I'm sorry I haven't been here for a while, but it's for a good reason. I've been working on a game with two cool guys and it'd help a lot if you could share and follow our work if you like it! You can follow us here: Facebook || Twitter || Youtube || Google+ || Reddit Or you can just check our official website

STELLAR INTERFACE is a rogue-like, permadeath space shooter with randomized perks, providing the player an unique experience every run!

The backbone of any game, behind the graphics, sound, gameplay, is the code. As seasoned app developers we are used to play with the application architecture, to experiment and try different things, making it easier to reuse or modify the source in the current and future projects.

In games things aren’t so easy, the shear size of the code is ridiculous. Up until now, the biggest project that we ever worked, in both code size and feature length, was Pages Manager for Facebook. But StellarInterface is easily ten times bigger both in code size, features and complexity (and it is only about half done!).

Looking into it, it is quite simple to understand why we didn’t make a rogue like Space Shooter, but made an entire framework to make Space Shooters. Despite of its complexity, adding content to the game is very easy: most of our favorite perks are made with less than a dozen lines of code, we have a complete game, run, level and wave cycles automatized, one can even change enemy behaviors without changing a single line of code (configuration FTW :D).

It was probably a mistake, and we talk about it a lot, to make such huge infra-structure, but the liberty that we gained, to pretty much implement anything that comes to mind, is very powerful. Specially in game design where testing ideias quickly is a must in order to proceed forward.  Dividing our game in the classic three layer architecture will yield the following.

Data Layer

Our database, can be divided in three components: resources, configurations and game generated data. 

The resources are what one would expect: strings, spritesheets, audio, etc. The configurations have all the data about the weapons, enemies (and their behaviour). Finally the game generated data is simply the usual saved games and the metric database.

Most of our database is access through data storages, which transforms the raw data into objects that our game know how to work. 

The SLAM (Statistics Logging Achievements and Missions) is a “super” data storage that reads/writes metrics and transforms them into knowledge. As an example, an event logging a projectile hit will obtain information such as average damage taken, how many times it destroyed a spacecraft, what spacecraft does it hits more often, etc. All this information will then be consumed by the rest of the SLAM system, the one that actually “listens” to data updates and act when certain conditions are met (and voila an achievement and mission system).

The application layer is a little more complex and looks like the following.

Here we have our framework. The logger is pretty much the producer of data, used across all the game. The level generation deals with the graph generation, what spacecrafts will appear on the next level, how will they appear, how will they act (Pathing) and what will they fire. The features (base name for the perks and consumables) is one of the most important aspects of the game (that is why we already have more than 80 perks implemented!). These services offers the foundations for the perks/consumables activation, configuration and overall handling.

The controllers are the hard workers of the game, they handle pretty much everything that need to be done. They work directly with the DAL and the service layer in order to expose the game features and logic the graphics components.

Finally the presentation layer.

This is a crazy layer, mainly because we really didn’t understand how to work with it at the beginning and are still figuring out all the details (the game loop is a scary thing xD).

Everything that you will see, hear and feel, the graphics, the audio, the SPX, all the physics, collisions and overall behaviors are in here.

In the near future we will probably dive deeper into this awesome technical adventure that we called Stellar Interface, until then, follow us on the usual places:

It's on! A rogue-like-ish space-shooter, STELLAR INTERFACE is on the way.

Run and explore through space, with a permadeath mechanic breathing over your neck! Find and install numerous software-perks which will boost your spacecraft.

Well, it might not always boost... we currently developed nearly one hundred perks, and the fact they are beneficial is not consensual! Some perks change the game play mechanics radically and need some time for adjustment. So, if you are in a tight spot, they might not be the wisest choice... but once you master them, you will certainly gain a big advantage.

With countless weapons of different types to assemble in your spacecraft, your strategy must change quickly in your deep-space run. And the symbiotic nature of the perks will scale even more the uniqueness of game experience.

Of each weapon type (cannon, missiles, mines, among others) you will find dozens and dozens of variations. However, we intend to take you out of your comfort zone: even if you feel comfortable to play only with cannons, are you gonna ignore that +1000% Grenade Damage perk? Or when you get some different drone perks, you might even don’t care what are your weapons!

Our internal "spacencyclopedia", the Stellar.Net, will provide you numerous objectives to complete in the STELLAR INTERFACE's vast universe: collect, kill, try, explore. Stellar.Net is your informational Hub to check your progress, what have you seen and, maybe, what you still have to see.

STELLAR INTERFACE is scheduled to launch in Steam’s Greenlight quite soon. After that, Early Access is right on the corner. We wish to involve the community in our development process. We are currently a team of three (two programmers, 1 designer) who has been developing the framework for almost 3 months. But we want your input, your opinion. You are the player, the game is for you. By providing an Early Access to the community, we will be able to present the best end-product possible.

Plans for a X-Box One version and PS4 are in our pipeline, and even a mobile version of STELLAR INTERFACE. That, of course, will depend on the reception of our game and on what you think.

Stay tuned for the latest developments, and your comments and input are certainly warmly welcome!

https://www.facebook.com/stellarinterface/