Again, best of luck!
Have you tried the Freespace Open Mods? Some of them are really quite excellent ... and the open source engine is nice too :)

But yeah ... fresh blood in space sims is a very, very good thing!

the class system and customizable loadouts are what interest me

i want awesome spaceship stuff i might want to go and play older games i already have

but when i read about creating my own pilot with some perks or abilities or whatever you guys want to do there so i feel a little unique and can create something that suits my playing style - you got my interest

It's a nice idea, but unless there are at the very least bots I won't be purchasing it. I detest online multiplayer. I haven't seen anything like this, though, so...uh...go for it?

Good to know, thanks :)

Thanks, it is an unofficial intention to add bots and perhaps a small SP campaign after release. Due to the ambitious nature of the project though, it would seem to make sense to release with the MP and then add the rest as free content.

That's something we're throwing around atm so I can only speak of general intentions. Certainly not just death match. CTF or some variant perhaps. We are playing with the idea of the team 'base' being a big carrier ship and winning involves blowing up the core via small shafts and what-not. Somethings that gives a slightly reminiscent feeling of BF2142 titan mode (CTF - conquest style followed by pushing through corridors to blow up the core etc). Very much an unsolidified area though. Would be happy to hear any suggestions/desires/hates you have regarding this.

I quite like the Battlefronts concept (I'm sure they weren't the first to do it) of having to occupy a region for a length of time in order to conquer it. Perhaps having some carrier / occupier ship you have to escort and protect in order to actually capture it. You could even have a special role as the pilot of that ship, and people in the turrets.

Ever played Star Wars Battlefront II? They tryed something somewhat similar in some of the levels. That was quite fun and I can really see how this can work with less troopers and more ships.

This is true. I have little to no experience with multiplayer development, and I rarely play multiplayer games... so I'm not much of an expert on how to balance it :3.

Roughly, I was thinking in terms of the system that Section 8 used (a highly underplayed title, and a perfect example of why multiplayer games are something of a gamble)... although it didn't have earned perks. You could just build different classes by combining different powers/bonuses. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure how that would work out with earned perks. There probably would be a big disadvantage to newer players. Unless the stuff you earn doesn't give you more of an advantage as much as it allows you to modify the strategy to your personal tastes (i.e, starting equipment gives you a functional "assault" class, but further equipment would let you change it to a glass cannon, stealth fighter, long range "sniper," or whatever...)

And right there is where it fails for me.

First of all, I don't like to be dependent on others in order to play a game I bought.

Secondly, a multiplayer-only game has to be quite successful in order to make it at all. The chances of that happening with a self-funded indie game from a totally unknown three-man team are minuscule. This means that if you sell less than, say, 20,000 copies, then all those people will have wasted their money, because the game will be dead. Look at how many multiplayer-only mods have been made for various games, and how many of them have failed completely, because the player base just wasn't there.

It's a vicious circle. A small player base means that games are hard to find, especially without a lot of widespread hype beforehand, to ensure that lots of copies will be bought on release. When games are hard to find, most players will soon look elsewhere for their gaming fix, making games even harder to find. And so, the game dies.

I understand why small devs prefer to make multiplayer-only games. It means you don't have to code all the really difficult bits, such as enemy AI, and spend time on making a campaign structure. Just understand that it's a gamble, and that chances are you'll lose. And so will your customers.

I'm going on the assumption here that this is going to use some kind of central account system/MMO-like progression.

Any attempt at doing a game like this is going to be met with claims of "why should I not be playing EVE Online instead, which is a much more well established MMO?"

And they'd be right. You only need to look at the numerous attempts to create multiplayer-only games on Steam to realise how hard a lot of these projects fail. Crank up a game like Penguins Arena (which is utter toss anyway and deserved to fail) or Dino D-Day and you'll see how dead the servers are.

When EVE Online came out people were clamouring for an online version of Elite; David Braben had dropped the ball several times by continuously postponing Elite 4 and CCP picked it up by filling a market hole. By releasing an online space combat game, you'll effectively be competing not only against EVE itself, but its community.

Solely multiplayer games are a very chicken-and-egg affair, because you won't gather any interest without an established community, and you won't establish a community without some kind of hook. EVE Online, as I say, had the aforementioned market gap going for it. Battlefield and Call of Duty have established brand names. World of Warcraft, dare I say, was only really successful on the strength of the Warcraft and Blizzard names and being one of the first major 3D MMORPGs, again catering for a market gap.

I can't help but feel that what you're trying to do is manufacture this market and that will not work. There is no real demand for an online space dogfighting sim, and you don't really have an established community, brand or reputation to fall back on.

My suggestion would be to focus on creating a good single-player experience with a strong story and mythology to try and establish a "franchise" as it were (so get a good writer on board), try and gather interest in that franchise, then collect feedback from your customers on how they would find a multiplayer version of that and go from there.

so this is going to be some sort of ace combat in spehs? (i mean in terms: controls are easy to learn, moves still look impressive)
sounds pretty awesome, especially if the battles with giant warships are done well (battles with huge enemies always give a feeling of awesome, see older ace combats) so i like the idea of a gamemode where the goal is to destroy the enemy carrier vessel.
if you use a loadout progress system don't forget to take care of matchmaking

maybe you should have certain ships that are weak, but help others by being near them (ex: a ship that boosts shields of all ships around them)

if you feel a bit troubled about singleplayer, perhaps at least include botmatch? i know that AI is one of the most difficult parts but still...(i actually played battlefield a lot vs bots while it was MP intended cause i could actually win from the AI...)

i think one advantage of singleplayer is that you can have these completely unfair starting situations (you a few ships, opponent 3 carriers) and more varied objectives and scripted events

(keep in mind that i have NO experience in programming or making games so some things here might be a bit obvious)

one question: are all ships going to be 1 player controlled or are there going to be larger ships (frigates and such) that have 2 player control like battlefield vehicels (one steers and uses small guns, other main guns)

wish you the best of luck, the idea sounds awesome

Sounds like an interesting concept, make a single player story mode and I would play it. Or, rather play the demo and see if I dig it! I'm afraid I have very little interest in any games that are MP only.

So will it be a little like "World of Tanks" in space?

By the way WOT had a great idea to get critical mass of a massive multiplayer game and that was to make a limited version free to get a lot of players and charge for extras and extended content.

Ugh. I had a massive post responding to everyone individually and for some reason it hasn't gone through. For now I'll just summerise:

Thanks all for the feedback. Many constructive comments and ideas. We are going to have to take a serious look at SP possibilities among other things.

You guys rock ;)

Good luck with it if you decide to go ahead with the game. For me I will not buy anything that doesn't have singleplayer (atleast against bots). So you will also go up against competition like Starfarer, SOL Exxodus and EVE so think about that and make your game different from them.

I some times play the game Post Apocalyptic Mayhem that is a fun little racing game that focuses on MP but has SP against bots and I enjoy it like that but MP is completely dead and it it wasn't for SP against bots I would have wasted my money and be angry.