Feature Focus: AI and Unit Creation

[Philip Devine]

In the clip below, you can see a couple things going on. First, the AI are building units, expanding into different systems, purchasing technology upgrades, and voting in a political agenda. These are just a few of the AI capabilities we have implemented, and will continue to improve on to make them challenging for players.


Also, you can see the process of building units. A player must first construct an Orbital Construction Facility (OCF). This unit requires you build it on a planet you have conquered (not bartered with and not simply discovered). Its construction capacity is also based on the resources of the planet. So a planet with few resources can only build a few ships per turn. Last, it cannot create units on the same turn it was created, which is why the player waits until their next turn to create new ships.

 

[Mario]

what about ship design? Will we have ti and so on. Check stardrive which has it awsome.

 

[Philip Devine]

Hi Mario, there is no ship building in Falling Stars, and at this point I don't plan on having it. One of the major downsides to having a ship-designer in an AI-driven strategy game is that at higher difficulties they need to be developed to take the most optimum design or else the AI will lose every battle. A side effect of this is that players are immediately presented with the optimum design and will know that they are only shooting themselves in the foot if they build something other than that.

In "Empire Simulation" games like Star Drive, it definitely makes sense since there aren't as many set goals, and it's kind of one big sandbox.