Project Simerge

Blog has moved

alesto — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 11:54:55 +0000

Hello,

The project blog has moved to the regular site of Simerge:
http://www.simerge.com/blog/

Please update old links to this new url.

Importing starsystems from IW2

alesto — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 12:16:19 +0000

I’ve finally managed to import a starsystem from IW2 successfully. These starsystem maps are already populated with all sorts of habitats, stations and mines. So they are an ideal playground to develop the AI and an artificial life engine.

First AI routines

alesto — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 12:05:33 +0000

I’ve newly implemented my first AI routines which will be used in very much cases. Not only by NPC ships, but also by rockets and in autopilot mode.
Because the AI isn’t reading controls I want simply bypass the physics engine and define tracks instead. For this purpose I’m going to use splines (special type of curves). But in some case an AI driven object will be switched back to physics engine, for example if a collision occurred.

First orbital stations

alesto — Sun, 04 May 2008 20:37:41 +0000

I’ve finally managed to import station models from X3. They always look very pretty. Even then when I don’t use much shaders on them and not much effects. The designers of the game X3 did their job very good.

In near future I plan to implement a first person mode in Simerge. For this purpose I’m going to develop a portal engine with indoor and outdoor connections. And room to room connections. On this way I promise myself to render all geometry fast.

About Simerge

alesto — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:50:02 +0000

Some people asked me about this work and I’ve taken some time to create a small description. If you’re interested to see it you can follow this link

First Simerge game testbed

alesto — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 09:33:08 +0000

I’m currently working at my first techdemo of Simerge. I’ve temporarily overtaken the design of the game I-War2. That’s because it gives me some sort of satisfying feeling when I see its beautiful magic being set up by my game engine. And of course, I get that necessary motivation I need to go on

The user interface of the demo consists of transparent and anti aliased vector objects. The anti alias effect gives the user an intention of smoothness and is very eye friendly. The interface can remain very simple while attracting the player.

In this demo the player is able to fly in a solar system with a velocity above the lightspeed. The solar system is procedurally generated by using three random numbers. The generated information are planet types, positions and names.
Currently the planets are rendered very simple. In next versions I will finish the conversion of my planetary engine for this techdemo to give them a detailed look.

Flying in the orbit of a planet

A starmap, where player can choose travel destination

Some quick shots of the planetary engine

alesto — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 08:54:53 +0000

One year ago I’ve created my first working planetary engine. Here are some screenshots of it I’ve posted at gamedev.net and different forums. This engine uses procedural generated heighmaps for planetary terrains and should give the player a feeling of total freedom by discovering endless unique worlds.

The planetary engine itself is a little bit outdated and uses DirectX 9. Simerge will use a fresh new OpenGL based planetary engine. The new engine will be optimized for better rendering performance and lower memory consummation. Additionally I’m going to use a multithread supported out-of-core paging.

Dry river

Sun is going down

Approaching a planet

Simerge blog launched

alesto — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 08:13:12 +0000

I’ve created a blog for my experimental space game project called Simerge. The name stands for “merged space simulations”. My aim is to create a mixed genre space simulation game which contains elements from games like X3 Reunion and I-War2. Additionally I want to implement seamless atmospheric flight on planets.

This blog should serve as a provisional presentation site. I will post news and screenshots about Simerge regulary.

Hope you will enjoy your stay and, of course, post comments.