Week #6 Game Design - "Terraforming"
04/03/2011
Race to the Stars
Terraforming (according to Wikipedia): Terraforming (literally, "Earth-forming") of a planet, moon, or other body is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying its atmosphere, temperature, surface topography or ecology to be similar to those of Earth to make it habitable by terran organisms.
Bit of a misleading title. Race to the Stars is a game in which the players (up to four, human or AI) are pitted against each other to see who will be the first to claim a new “home-world” before the resource-drained Earth shrivels into planetary dust. These new worlds will be planets or moons in orbit around other planets in this solar system, and in relatively close proximity to Earth – Mars, Venus, Europa (a moon in orbit around Jupiter), Earth's Moon, etc.
Although the game will be played out in a RTS style of gameplay, there is one key difference from most RTS games – there is no main base to destroy, and no player elimination. The main goal is not to wipe the other players from existence, but rather focus on building up your own resource base to reach your goals before the others.
This is not to say there will be no war or conflict or violence – far from it. Play will take place over several phases, during which, the players will be competing for resources that may be extremely limited due to mankind's over-extraction of Earth's resources. The conflicts over territory here may play out in a similar fashion to an RTS, however, players must also manage their production of units carefully.
In many situations, the player may need to forego the production of ground units, in favour of storing resources or exporting them to the new home-world. These resources may be too valuable to waste on war-machines.
The Game:
4 different factions – each with the dream of setting up a new home-world, outside of Earth.
The first faction to do so will rule will gain the most followers and create the largest colonies. This faction will control the new galactic human race.
Each faction believes a different planet or satellite (moon) will be more suitable for terraforming, and the re-colonisation of the human race.
Selecting a faction effectively decides the player's target home-world – Mars, Venus, Europa (moon orbiting Jupiter), or the Earth's Moon.
Each home-world has a different set of processes required to terraform it for human colonisation.
The player can achieve some of these processes in a number of different ways.
Resources are a key ingredient to most of the processes that are required for terraforming – unfortunately, they are very limited.
For example: Resource A is very rare, but will assist in multiple process, and make the processes much easier and quicker to complete; Resource B is comparatively more abundant than A, however, is not as useful, and may take longer to acquire or synthesise for use in terraforming processes.
Larger, more effective units – ground or air – take longer to make and require rare resources.
Attacking bases will not destroy productions or eliminate other players, however, it may severely hamper, impede or slow down their effectiveness in terraforming the new home-world.
Resources may also be acquired from the new home-world, once an initial base structure has been set up. They will be much more abundant than the resources that can be found on Earth – allowing the production of newer technology, bigger and better ground / air units and advanced space units.
The battle over resources eventually be fought in space – pirating and pillaging – all in an attempt to set up a new habitable land for your human colonies.
The Phases:
The start of the game will see the players scramble for the limited resources on Earth.
There may be 3 or more different resources available, some of them rarer than others.
Sometimes it might be easier to leave one resource for others to fight over, and take monopoly of one that is less desirable and easier to get at.
The players will be collecting resources to create units, buildings and transport ships to get resources to the new home-world.
As well as transporting resources, the player should be focused on setting up the initial stages of starting an atmosphere on the new home-world.
The player should have regular transports containing resources, travelling to the new home-world in order to build and maintain base structures.
These imported resources will allow new resources to be mined from the target planet / moon.
The base structures will allow the production of mining factories, space units, and the initial stages of the new-world atmosphere.
Conflicts will continue over resources on Earth, however, supplies should start drying up at a much more rapid pace.
Terraforming processes will begin on the new home-world in order to create an atmosphere suitable for humans.
The new home-worlds will now have a thriving atmosphere which will allow for the insertion of an initial workforce colony. This will greatly speed up production and processes.
The final phase is based around stabilising the new atmosphere to create a permanent, liveable environment for human colonies.
The processes required to complete this phase will revolve around the last few precious resources found on Earth, as well as the resources mined from the new home-worlds – or pirated of enemy players.
The conflicts over resources will take to the sky in this phase. Players will have access to new space technology and units, allowing them to raid other home-worlds or enemy transport ships.
The player will still have two main hubs – one still on Earth, and one on the new home-world, however, the later will be of a greater concern.
Getting a city structure up and running, alongside a habitable and fully stable atmosphere is the last step to completing the final goal of terraforming and colonising the new home-world.
Once this is ready, the first settlers of the new galactic human race can be transported, and a new life away from Earth can begin.
Example Terraforming Processes of Mars (once again, thanks to Wikipedia):
1. Building the atmosphere, water content
An important step in building the martian atmosphere would be the importation of water, that can be obtained, for example, from ice asteroids or from ice moons of Jupiter or Saturn, beyond the water ice already present at the Martian north pole.
Sources of Water – Dwarf planet Ceres; Ice Asteroids; Moons of Jupiter / Saturn.
Carbon Dioxide Sublimation
Ammonia Importation
Hydrocarbon Importation
Hydrogen Importation
Using Fluorine Compounds
2. Adding Heat
Adding heat and conserving the heat present is a particularly important stage of this process, as heat from the Sun is the primary driver of planetary climate. As the planet would become warmer through various methods the CO2 on the polar caps would sublime into the atmosphere and would further contribute to the warming effect. The tremendous air currents generated by the moving gasses would create large, sustained dust storms, which would heat (through absorbing solar radiation) the molecules in the atmosphere.
Orbiting Mirrors
Albedo (the reflective surface of the planet dispersing heat)
Asteroid Impact
3. Stabilising the Atmosphere (Keeping the Heat in)
Adding Magnetic Field
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