Vegastrike:Project

Project Information

About

Vega Strike is an Open Source 3d Space Simulator. Work is proceeding on both the Vega Strike game engine and a Vega Strike Universe game data set. Both, engine and data, are in a playable state, but under continuous development.

The Vega Strike engine serves as the foundation for the Parallel Universe, Privateer Gemini Gold, Privateer Remake, Vega Trek, and Pi Armada projects, whose websites can be reached via the sidebar to the right on the project web page.

Vision

We enjoy the futuristic genre, and we enjoy creating content for this genre in an interesting, vast, and profoundly complex but believable universe with endless expansion and enhancement possibilities.

We want to create a generic, open, and free space simulator game of outstanding quality, both in technology and content.

We want to be the vehicle for the creation and recreation of other space games and provide the possibility for users to create their own stories.

Mission

We have three development drivers:

• The Vega Strike Game as
• The Modding capability
• The Engine that enables both

VS (the engine) is a vehicle for groups of people to produce content in a set of genres that they enjoy creating and playing.

The particular universe (VS game) that the Minister of Information (jackS) has been working on for some time now should be the target game, to help focus and separate required features from nice features. We also want to create an entangling, profound, and believable space game whose story is set in the Vega Strike Universe.

We want to maintain close relationship with and provide to the freedom loving community a moddable open source space simulation engine that can be used to create other independent space games.

We develop feature sets for the underlying content that requires those features: a campaign, a story, a well defined economy model, well defined game play mechanics, modding requirements.

Our approach is not myopic because of a particular perception as to what resources/technology will be available.

Users can write their own stories for the universe and share them around - and if they're good we can include them as well. Think of it as universe supporting easy-to-make fan-fiction (which can include mod-based fiction).

Factions are given the ability to make their own decisions ... God's (campaign) commands are suggestions ... the campaign evolves as the players force it, and the goals need to be written to handle that.

Shortly, Vega Strike will become a space combat/simulator game and engine with fully dynamic universe creation, scriptable ai responses with dynamic decision ability, completely non-determinant campaigns, fully functional economic system that responds to the real-time gameplay state of the universe, shader-fied openGL graphics with nifty special effects.

"One universe, infinite possibilities"

Features

See Vegastrike:Features

Responsibilities

Project Leads and Lead Developers

• Daniel R Horn aka hellcatv,danielrh (overall coordination, lead programming, ...)
• Patrick Horn aka ace123 (lead development, multiplayer, python, forum support)
• Jack Sampson aka jackS (Minister of Information, VS Universe development, art directing)

Programmers and Developers

• Klauss Freire aka klauss, klausfreire (engine and python development)
• Ed Sweetman aka safemode (engine development)
• aka pyramid, pyramid3d (art development, python scripting, documentation)

See also: Vegastrike:Credits

History

I read it somewhere but can't find the text right now.

In any case, it was hellcatv who started it all. The first news entry on the project page is from March 1, 1998 with news about flight engine completion, basic AI functionality, and 4 available ships. This suggests that development was going on already before that time.

Roadmap

See Development:Roadmap