If you go to bitbucket you can download Mike's code for Supremacy.

https://bitbucket.org/mstrobel/supremacy

In the mstroble-supremacy...>Mainline>SupremacyCore>Combat there
are .cs files with the code for combat in Supremacy.

Using Unity will be a matter of working with this build.
Still I hope to have a standalone game so a menu will be needed
that enters the variables Supremacy would be providing.
Then there would need to be a simple combat AI to build on
the AutomatedCombatEngine.cs that Mike already coded.

I will have a look

did either of you actually compile the whole game?
loading it with vs11 (2012) I get a ton of errors and warnings, missing libraries, lots of stuff....
Is there any useful documentation on the code at all, beside comments within the source itself I mean?

No, I didn't even try because I was expecting something like that. First of all make sure you have the latest .NET (I think you need at least v3.5). About the other libs, I don't know, but if you post some of the errors I will have a look. But my experience is in scientific programming and in any case I'm not a programmer of Mike's caliber

Regarding the code documentation, I guess most of it is in Mike's head... A hive mind would really come in handy right now

You need .NET 4 , plus both the Visual C++ 2008 and 2010 Runtimes.

.NET 4 and VC++ runtimes you need to run the game, for compile there's more you need.
And it's strange when you need both 2008 and 2010 runtimes when compiled yourself.
Not going to look into this now, maybe also some version incompabilities, just was a bit curious whether one of you got it work.

Baby steps - This is running in Unity
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJbtGxoyz-A&feature=youtu.be

OMG, freaking awesome!!!!

I wouldn't call that baby-steps by the way. Giant leaps is more like it

One thing I need to come up with is a good set of star field images for the skybox. (Six sides, seams that lineup in the box, higher res, sexy look...)

I may be able to help with. Can you specify the dimensions of the images exactly?

I was thinking of checking the NASA (*) archives for ideas/samples ;-)

Also, I will have a look at other Trek games and in particular Star Trek Invasion (a 3d space combat simulator) and Star Trek Legacy, to see how they deal with the background.

Cheers

(*) All NASA photos are free to use.

nice start, looks like you completed tutorial one or so
but that's just like it starts and having read some on unity recently you'll have good progress with it.

The most important problem however is how to integrate it.
You really should clear this first before progressing and finally ending with a complete and funky combat you just cannot use with Supremacy!

For Supremacy you'd have to show combat and then close or hide it again many times and eventuelly also show embedded windows for object database and such. Loading up unity as a seperate application each time would be terrible.

I made a quick search on it:
http://answers.unity3d.com/questions/87 ... ject-.html
http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/74793- ... pplication

if nothing changed on this, with luck you might integrate a windows activex web player to then embed the unity web player and finally your combat. Not sure but this does sound cumbersome to me.

So while you probably can't try with supremacy right now, check how to do it with a plain .Net application. Further, eventuelly Unity can be launched in parallel with inter-process communication to disable/hide it on need, I dunno.
Clear this with Mike and ask Unity people to get sure.

GL

Thanks VinculumOne
I was about to bring that up with Mike and this helps.

I did bring up the integration issue with Mike but he has not gotten back to me.

It was encouraging to see that the game Endless Space used the Unity engine for combat. It is a 4X space game like Supremacy but it was designed with Unity from the ground up. In any case I will push ahead with making a stand alone combat game. If something works out with Supremacy that will be nice too.

I want to get the feel of DS9 and Birth of the Federation style fleet action combat. For now I am designing the main menu. You will have to pick the ships you want to see in the fight until or unless there is a 4X game to build around it.

Ok man...if you need any help please just ask. It could take a few days for me to make something I used to do in a day...but I'll help as much as I can.

Same thing here

Thanks.

Some of the work you guys have already done for Supremacy could be used. If I need more I will let you know.

Well, if there's general programming questiones you can talk me too ofc.
But regarding integration, as far as I read that's a real problem with Unity.
It's not build as a library you can integrate, but as a whole application you just can extend by included mono c# and Javascript interpreter.
And when there's no tricky workaround or they changed mind, your only option is a full game in Unity.

I find that sad as I clearly have to agree that Unity is a cool engine with lots of cool tools and more handy development than with other engines I know.
But integration sucks it seems.

Nonetheless, collect some experience and consider eventually moving on later.
HF

P.S. BTW, BotF combat will get updated in time.

So if I build a BOTFII game in Unity the star map could be 3D.

Combat would still be much as it was in the original with a 3D view seeing ships moving around.
The alpha quadrant star map would be at some orders of magnitude larger.
Think about how ships would move and intercept in deep space in a turned based game.
Code that in java or C#.

So far there is a java “fly” script added onto the main camera in Unity. This lets the user fly around the 3D space like Superman to see the map area.

Next will be a grid that cuts the space into cubes, quadrants of space, similar to the square spaces map of BOTFii and Supremacy. Make the dividing walls translucent, add a few stars and there is the basic map. Then I can make a video or better yet save it as a “game” to let you put on your PC and fly around in.

It will be easiest for game mechanics to have the ships move quadrant to quadrant as in BOTFii and Supremacy. With any luck I can find Mike’s code for the movement. If not there are examples of code online or someone here can help.

sounds cool, but please say "javascript", java is a complete different thing

Sorry, you can tell I am coming at this from the CGI side of the universe.

To help keep the user oriented I will put in a sky-box with galactic center seen and named on one side and galactic rim opposite that. It would say beta and gamma quadrants on the other two sides. I guess it would be galactic north and south for top and bottom.

I will need some help improving the camera fly code so it works better.

It is also very helpful when using these 3D programs to be able to jump to an orthographic top down and side on view. This will mean adding in at least two fixed cameras or fixed camera locations you jump to with key press.