Terra Centauri: Last Stand BETA 0.5!!

[Ishmaru]

TERRA CENTAURI BETA 0.5 is currently out!!! Download Below!

From the creator of Annex: Conquer the World. A new unique MG based game. While game shares a similar art style to Annex, this game has radically different gameplay and much higher quality models. Check out screen shots below! Also check out TC's Indie DB page: http://www.indiedb.com/games/terra-centauri-last-stand

Description:

Battle across multiple worlds as the Valkyries, in their fight to save their kind from the brink of extinction. Or play as the Devourers, worm-like parasitic organisms that travel from world to world consuming all in their path.

Features

-Game is centered around randomly generated scenarios. Each play through would be different from the last.
-Large maps with plenty of treasure, Environmental bonuses/hazards, animals, and tech buildings to discover and exploit.
-High Poly/Resolution models with great animation.
-Large diversity of units
-Two radically different factions

Factions:

Valkyries

Artificially created by god like beings,
known as the ORIGINATORS, as slaves.
A handful survived the cataclysm that
caused the disappearance of ORIGINATORS.
Since then, they inherited the knowledge
of their creators and repopulated the world.
Valkyries remain fiercely loyal to their
creators, worshiping them as deities.
They valiantly fight to protect their world
against the Devourers in hopes they
will return.

Valkyries are very resource dependent, lots of base defenses, and use of vehicles and technologically advanced weapons.
Valkyries depend on Crystals for currency and Energy, and Ore for building materials. Many units and structures depend on energy generated by a Energy Core.

Resources:
-Crystals --- blue crystals that are used as both an energy source as well as currency
-Ore  --- Needed building material for structures and vehicles
-Energy --- Useable crystal energy, needed for all advanced units
-Housing--- Population cap

Devourers

Its unknown where they originated from, but its
believed they travel from world to world by meteors.
They can survive in the most hostile environments.
Devourers come in numerous forms but are actually
one single species. There are a few Valkyrian
researchers who even suggest that the Devourer
individuals may actually be "organs" of one single
massive organism. However that is a topic that is
currently debated.

Devourers, are cheap + fast to produce, yet are quite strong. Require only organic matter as a resource. Organic matter is obtained from consuming trees, animals and even Valkyries. More focus on Offensive melee units.

Resources:
-Organic --- Food/building material
-Housing--- Population cap

Supporting Development

I'm also announcing that I will be releasing the game for free! However, I have a Patreon account for those who would like to support its development! I will be releasing the game in "Expansion Packs", map packs with added units or tilesets. Basically, the more financial support I get for the project the more I can add to the project, and continue to make expansion packs. Patreon works in that you pledge to give a donation amount per Expansion Pack. Once the initial game is complete I hope to have these expansions released every 2-3 months. And of course there are rewards for pledging over certain amounts. You are by no means forced to contribute and you can stop whenever you need. A beta will not be ready for a while, but when its is anyone who contributes $10+ will get access to the closed beta when its ready.

Media

Game still in early development, so much of what you see is subject to change.

Video:

Support Terra Development!:

http://www.patreon.com/terra

Special thanks to anyone who donates, and thanks for the interest in Terra Centauri!

Download 0.5 Beta Standard:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/2744242

Note: Those who pledge $10 or more has early access to 3 extra stages for next release!

[MoLAoS]

Explain environment hazards and tech buildings?

[Ishmaru]

randomly placed objects that hurt or impare your units combat abilities.  For example volcanic vents, quicksand, etc.
by tech buildings I mean abandoned structures that can spawn on a map . you can use them provided you give them an energy source. currently I only implemented missile silos that automatically shoots a powerful missile at a random devourer every few minutes. but others are planned as well.

[Ishmaru]

Just want to say that dispite me posting this on April fools day, this project is real. I'm working to have a playable map for the Arizona Indie showcase 2, which will be on the 6th of April.

[Tiel]

Well, fuck me. I've been working so undiligently on a sci fi mod and this just absolutely blows what I have out of the water.

Thanks for crushing my hopes & dreams 

Seriously though, those screenies are bloody amazing. How are you going to do a commercial release while open source, though? It seems like indie games that don't make it on Steam are wildly unsuccessful these days.

[Ishmaru]

Well, fuck me. I've been working so undiligently on a sci fi mod and this just absolutely blows what I have out of the water.

Thanks for crushing my hopes & dreams 

Seriously though, those screenies are bloody amazing. How are you going to do a commercial release while open source, though? It seems like indie games that don't make it on Steam are wildly unsuccessful these days.

Didn't mean to crush anything

I dont fully understand how it works, but from what I hear it is possible to release open source games to Steam. I'm still weighing all my options so i cant say for sure what system i pan on using.

PS: Video added to first post!

[Omega]

I dont fully understand how it works, but from what I hear it is possible to release open source games to Steam. I'm still weighing all my options so i cant say for sure what system i pan on using.

Steam Greenlight is where indy games must be submitted. The gist of it is that it's an approval system for literally "greenlighting" your game to appear in Steam (although it's imperfect, judging from some of the crap that gets through). It does not restrict open source games from being greenlit, and a small number of open source games have appeared in Steam. Here's an example.

Steam provides a major source of visibility, but it also has disadvantages. You need to reach some level of popularity to pass greenlight (based on user votes) and there's a one-time $100 fee to prevent spam (although that goes to charity).

I don't hear much about how pricing works, but I'm under the impression that you don't get full control over pricing your game. And naturally, Valve takes a small cut of the revenue.

At any rate, for an indy game, you can't depend on Steam being the only point of distribution, since you'd want to be able to distribute your game while it's still in greenlight. There's no guarantee of passing greenlight -- although it's fairly lax from what I've seen. It's also a somewhat slow process. Finally, games that you can already play do better in greenlight than early concepts (which are allowed).

[Tiel]

Well, here's something for you. Evolution, a mod for SpringRTS, just passed Steam Greenlight, so that's something.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/291150/?snr=1_5_9__205

It is however free, so that does leave more up to debate. There are commercial Spring mods, but none of them have made it on Steam.

[wyvern]

NICE!
It looks like you got turrets and garrisons coded in, or is that just an idle animation or something?
And yes, I haven't been on in ages, which is depressing, school is driving me insane, and I haven't gotten to post or mod/develop(much). Glad to see you're still going strong Ishmaru, and can't wait to see how this develops.

[Ishmaru]

Sorry for the absence everyone, I've recently been to a Indie game showcase, showing off an early alpha stage Terra Centauri. While the turnout at the event was small, Terra still got some good positive feedback!

I'm also announcing that I will be releasing the game for free! However, I have a Patreon account for those who would like to support its development! I will be releasing the game in "Expansion Packs", map packs with added units or tilesets. Basically, the more financial support I get for the project the more I can add to the project, and continue to make expansion packs. Patreon works in that you pledge to give a donation amount per Expansion Pack. Once the initial game is complete I hope to have these expansions released every 2-3 months. And of course there are rewards for pledging over certain amounts. You are by no means forced to contribute and you can stop whenever you need. A beta will not be ready for a while, but when its is anyone who contributes $10+ will get access to the closed beta when its ready.

Check out my Patreon Page:
http://www.patreon.com/terra

Special thanks to anyone who donates, and thanks for the interest in Terra Centauri!

@Omega + Tiel
I would consider a greenlight campaign only if I generate enough interest. While I know Terra is good enough quality to be on Steam, I don't want to risk $100 unless I have some reassurance it will go through.

@Wyvern
Thanks! No I didn't code turrets in, its just a part of the animation, the garrisons do work however, giving units an increase in attack power and armor to those within. They are not build-able and spawn as a pre set neutral unit with an attack boost.

[wyvern]

Does anyone know how many people are on our forums? about 5k, give or take the last time i checked(a couple years back, admittedly)
If we could get them to vote, I'm pretty sure we could get Ishmaru's project pushed through on Greenlight, there are a lot of not so good games, many of which are nowhere near done that get greenlit. In comparison to most of these Ishmaru's looks amazing.
Also, as a question, considering Megaglest has a donations link, has there ever been any consideration to release a game to make money for megaglest development, possibly with some sort of added features or something, to fund MG development?

[MoLAoS]

Does anyone know how many people are on our forums? about 5k, give or take the last time i checked(a couple years back, admittedly)
If we could get them to vote, I'm pretty sure we could get Ishmaru's project pushed through on Greenlight, there are a lot of not so good games, many of which are nowhere near done that get greenlit. In comparison to most of these Ishmaru's looks amazing.
Also, as a question, considering Megaglest has a donations link, has there ever been any consideration to release a game to make money for megaglest development, possibly with some sort of added features or something, to fund MG development?

Main MG devs have real jobs. They haven't time to release a whole new game on top of their real jobs and given the current state of 0AD and Spring, its impossible for an open source project as small as MegaGlest to raise the money to fund full time developers.

As far as Greenlight, after the account purge there are currently 918 members, of which 50 have enough posts/activity that they might see a message to vote for Ishmaru's game. Then you'd need to consider that some don't care for the art or game style, some don't use MegaGlest, and some don't have Steam accounts.

[Ishmaru]

As far as Greenlight, after the account purge there are currently 918 members, of which 50 have enough posts/activity that they might see a message to vote for Ishmaru's game. Then you'd need to consider that some don't care for the art or game style, some don't use MegaGlest, and some don't have Steam accounts.

At the moment the forums are quiet, when compared to 3 years ago when I started Annex. I don't think I can get enough support for a greenlight campaign as of now. We see if the game can get more popularity after release.

Game wise I'm working on a new menu for game. Changing the from old glest layout to something more unique.



The background is a pre-rendered, looping animation. These changes were done pre cgui, just by editing glest.ini. The overlay and logo are actually, one png file and are considered to be one of the Extra Logos. Logo.tga tweaked so would appear invisible. 

There you can define the positions and sizes of all graphical objects in the menu.

EX:

MainMenu_buttonNewGame_h=75
MainMenu_buttonNewGame_w=200
MainMenu_buttonNewGame_x=575
MainMenu_buttonNewGame_y=350

MainMenu_labelVersion_visible=false

Little side thing, I made this for the indie game showcase last week but wasn't able to print it. Its a quick start guide showing some of the notable objects you can see in the map.

(click to show/hide)

[Ishmaru]

Here are some new things being implemented into Terra Centauri:

-Stun Drones Valkyries can build these small drones for scouting or defensive purposes. While unarmed they emit a sound frequency which hinders Devourer movement. Great for trapping and holding Devourers allowing you to kill them without putting your troops at risk. They also can be used to slow down Devourer unit production when over a spawning unit.
They are very fragile however, so be weary of anti aircraft attacks.



-Shield Generators Part of the Valkyrie defense arsenal are shield generators. These substantially reduce the amount of damage taken of any unit within range. They require a large amount of energy resources, as well as needs to be built near a source of energy to generate the EP it needs to function. Assuming it has an energy source the shield generator will activate automatically when an enemy approaches and will remain active until the enemy presence subsides or the energy source is destroyed.
Attacking outside the sight range of the generator will prevent its activation.



-Air Transport Certain units have the ability to call for airlift at any time. Useful to move units around quickly and over obstacles. Be warned however, the unit is vulnerable during lifts and drop offs and defenseless while being transported.



-Drop Pods These are randomly positioned in various locations across the map. Attack to open the Pods. Pods can contain special buildings, vehicles, and if your unlucky a Devourer Ambush...

[tomreyn]

Exciting news! Looks like Terra Centauri will allow for a bunch of new tactics and a new gameplay.

[Ishmaru]

Exciting news! Looks like Terra Centauri will allow for a bunch of new tactics and a new gameplay.

Yes, And there is even more I haven"t even talked about yet 

[Ishmaru]

More Updates!

Recharge Drone

Recharge Drones are special units that self destruct on command, releasing its stored energy that replenishes HP and EP of units below. The charge lasts a few seconds. Can also be used to charge the ep of the special structures spawned on the map or in Drop Pods. Recharge drones are produced in the Energy Core.

Battery

Normally to get more energy you produce more Energy Cores. However sometimes you need only a little bit of energy, and you don't want to spend the resources to make another Core. In this case Energy Cores can produce Batteries to increase your energy reserves. These only give a small amount of energy so its not the most economical choice for large energy needs. But good for supplementing energy to help squeeze out a unit or two when energy is low.

Orbital Uplink

Inside of Drop pods you can find an Orbital Uplink. When given an energy source (an adjacent Power node, Energy Core, or Recharge Drone) it will begin to generate EP. Once EP is maxed the uplink will automatically scan and reveal the entire map for a limited time.

Alpha Devourer

Certain types of Devourers can mutate into larger forms referred to as Alphas. As expected, alphas have higher stats then their smaller counterparts.

[Tiel]

I really love the quality here and the direction you're taking your gameplay; my only concern is that your second faction seems a mite generic and could very well end up being underplayed. I'm not advising to copy them wholesale, but Starcraft's Zerg seem like a good reference point, at least as far as making them as intriguing as they are.

[Ishmaru]

I really love the quality here and the direction you're taking your gameplay; my only concern is that your second faction seems a mite generic and could very well end up being underplayed. I'm not advising to copy them wholesale, but Starcraft's Zerg seem like a good reference point, at least as far as making them as intriguing as they are.

at the moment the devourers aren't playable for this reason. later on I plan on expanding the devourers to give them the same level of complexity.

[Tiel]

If I may ask what purpose they serve atm?

[Ishmaru]

A difficult opponent, which sends endless waves. they do have a diverse set of units so they can surprise you.

[Ishmaru]

Devourer Unit Classes:

Note All names are subject to change

Digger

Name WIP

Diggers are special devourer class that travels under the surface, till its just under its target and surfaces to attack. While underground diggers are immune to most forms of damage, but also has limited vision. Weapons with a high firing rate works best, otherwise careful timing is needed to attack them just as they lunge out of the ground.

Mother/Pest

Name WIP

Mothers are large devourers that carry a large nest and colony of pest type devourers. When a Valkyrie is spotted a swarm of pest types leave the nest to attack like a school of Parana. While weak individually they rely on numbers to overwhelm their prey. Pest are quick and are resistant to heavy weapons. Melee and Gatling Guns weapons work best.

Pests also have a short life span outside the nest.

Shocker

Name WIP

Shockers are a special devourer type that is spawned with crystals on its back. It uses these crystals to release a powerful EMP pulse that not only damages all enemies around themselves, but also drains them of their EP, stripping their ability to fight back. Any unit who's EP drops below 0 will be completely paralyzed.

Alpha

Name WIP

Special class of devourer with heavy stone armor. Resistant to small arms fire, these massive monsters are only vulnerable to explosive weapons, and mines. Beam weapons have a moderate level of success against Alphas.

Flier

Name is WIP

Fliers patrol the skies attempting to eat anything they come across. While dangerous to any fling unit, they are defenseless against ground attacks. Also they make great scouts.

Spitter

Oops no image

These small critters spit acid at their targets. While they do no do a lot of damage they are the only devourer unit able to clear mines and attack air units from the ground. Only a threat to lightly armored infantry, and air units when in  large numbers.

Hunter

The default offensive devourer. Fairly quick with a decent amount of HP. They attack by eating their target. Very dangerous to infantry.  They also can be morphed into a larger/stronger variety as well.

Devourer

Oops no image

Default Class these eat organic matter (trees) for resources and develops the home nest. Unlike normal Glest workers they can harvest indefinitely without ever needing to return to base to drop off resources. While less HP than the Hunter, these too can also be used offensively.

[Ishmaru]

Native Creatures

There are a few indigenous species that you will encounter. These creatures are harmless, and do not have any useful qualities to the Valkyries. However, Devourers can consume them for extra resources. They can spawn randomly as individuals or in groups. They will usually flee when encountered by a Valkyrie or Devourer.

This shot depicts a school of Sand Gelfish.

Basically this is Terra's version of Glestimals done using Lua. A neutral faction by setting the team to 9 (observer)

[Tiel]

I have to say I really love your UI. Any procedure in particular you used there?

[titi_son]

Looks great
why is tiel the only one commenting here
I did not because i was nearly not active and wont be the next time
So great mod hope it will be balanced. Because thats most important i think
Just dont forget annex release ...