Spring 2006 - Rawhide Frontier – CSE 788.14 Game Design
Design Document for:
Rawhide Frontier:
The BIG West RTS
Version # 1.00
Monday, April 10, 2006
John H Scott
Jordan Lemiller
Aaron Cardwell
Paul Betts
John Battagline
Kyle Moore
Table of Contents
Rawhide Frontier: 1
Design History 4
Version 1.0 4
Game Overview 5
Philosophy 5
Game Design Goal 5
Common Questions 5
What is the game? 5
Where does the game take place? 5
What do I control? 5
How many characters do I control? 5
What is the main focus? 5
What’s different? 5
Feature Set 6
General Features 6
Multiplayer Features 6
Editor 6
Gameplay 6
The Game World 7
Overview 7
Rendering System 7
Overview 7
Game Engine 7
Overview 7
Object Management 7
Map Management 7
The World Layout 8
Map Details 8
Overview 8
Resources 8
Camera 8
Overview 8
Camera Movement 8
Game Characters 9
Units 9
Buildings 9
Upgrades 9
User Interface 10
UI Details 10
Musical Scores and Sound Effects 11
3D Sound 11
Sound Design 11
Multiplayer Game 12
Overview 12
Max Players 12
Servers 12
Customization 12
Internet 12
Saving and Loading 12
Victory Conditions 12
Character Rendering 13
Overview 13
Character Rendering Detail #1 13
Character Rendering Detail #2 13
World Editing 14
Custom Map Designer 14
Design History
This section covers the high level details of the major revisions of the game.
Version 1.0
Version 1.0 of the game contains the base framework that the rest of the game will be built upon.
1. Introduction logos completed.
2. Introduction music added.
3. Interactive Main Menu started.
4. Basic game states created, including Introduction, Play, and Pause.
5. Temporary win/lose conditions created.
Game Overview
Philosophy
Game Design Goal
Rawhide Frontier is not meant to be a historically accurate portrait of the American West. Rather the theme is meant to be taken in a more satirical sense. For inspiration of locations, cultures and people in the game, we want to draw more from cultural references instead of historical accounts.
Common Questions
What is the game?
The year is 1863. The flames of civil war are still raging in the east, and you are the mayor of a frontier town in America’s Wild West. You explore and conquer the unforgiving dessert wasteland, encountering other towns and other mayors—all competing for the same precious resources. Outlaws, cowboys, crooked deputies and many others are invading your territory, looting your lands. You must fight for your right to live. You train a powerful army of cutthroat warriors to ward them off, knowing that, when the day is finally won, only one nation can stand alive beneath the setting sun of this Rawhide Frontier.
Where does the game take place?
This game takes place in 1863, located in the American Wild West.
What do I control?
You are the mayor of a western frontier town. You oversee the creation of your town by creating buildings, such as saloons, stables, and blacksmiths, and command a wide variety of units from gold diggers and sheriffs to cavalrymen and the feared outlaws.
How many characters do I control?
Since you are in charge of creating and maintaining expandable towns, you are capable of controlling dozens of units at a time.
What is the main focus?
At the start of the game, you focus on gathering resources, expanding your town, and creating and training various units to defend your city and to attack your enemies. This is a multiplayer game, so the player vs. player aspect of the game is heavily emphasized.
What’s different?
While we will draw from some traditional elements of Real Time Strategy games, we aim to make a few notable differences. First, we want the peasant production for the town to be dependant on the buildings constructed by the player. The number of villagers will only grow when there is enough housing to support them. The player will then need to balance their use as soldiers or as workers.
Feature Set
General Features
3D Graphics
3D Sound
Custom Map Maker
OpenGL and DirectX support
Multiplayer Features
One vs. One online competition
Real-time online play
Editor
Custom map creator and editor.
Gameplay
To come…
The Game World
Overview
The game world will essential be the series of maps that the players can battle on. The maps should be expected to contain at least two starting locations for players, and near them, a mine for workers to gather gold from. In addition there will be railroad tracks for players to build stations at to gather resources from.
The world will be represented by tiles that will be pre-generated in a custom map editor. Each tile will contain a 3d mesh to represent the terrain on the square of land. Inside each tile, will be contained “WorldObjects” which may be things such as buildings or units.
Rendering System
Overview
We are using Ogre3d to handle the rendering of our game. This allows for either an OpenGL rendering or DirectX 9 which can be dependant on player capabilities or preference. For more details of the Ogre3D rendering system, visit www.ogre3d.org
Game Engine
Overview
Our engine will consist of two major sections to represent the game state. First will be Object Management which should manage all the objects in the world that are dynamic, like Units and buildings. Second there is Map Management. This will manage details related to the map, its terrain, and which portions are visible to the user.
Object Management
Each dynamic object like buildings and units will be represented as a WorldObject class. Although the WorldObject will contain several functions common to all objects, most instances of these objects will be in inherited classes specific to the type of object they represent. A Building object will contain members to store the actions it can take, the training order, and so on. Units will contain a Queue of actions that they have been ordered to take, available orders, and so on.
At the beginning of each frame, these objects, stored in a linked list, will be iterated through to perform their game logic. The code to control the AI for each of these objects will be in Python scripts so that it can be edited without needing to recompile the actual game code.
Map Management
The map will be represented by individual tiles which will be predefined from a file. These maps will be created in an external editor. In game, the tiles will also be used to partition the rendering so that not all the objects and tiles need to be draw each frame, instead just the ones visible. The tiles will also contain pointers to the WorldObjects that reside in them. This will allow for the objects to search units nearby in a time that should be faster than iterating through the entire list of World Objects.
The World Layout
Map Details
Overview
Since the location of this game is in the Wild West, much of the game world will be in an arid desert location. Many areas will have scenic terrain, such as mountains, oasis’s, and gulches; however, many of these areas of the map will be impassible. The interactive portion of the world map will be a flat 2D plane, with the camera positioned a set distance above the world.
Resources
The maps will have two different locations for gold to be gathered. Workers can pan rivers and streams for a steady amount of gold, and certain mountains can be found that contain rich gold veins.
Camera
Overview
This game uses a birds-eye-view camera. That is, the camera can only travel up, down, left, and right on a plane parallel to the game world. Moving the camera in and out will not be allowed.
Camera Movement
Players have two ways to move the camera. There are eight directions the user can scroll the camera by moving the mouse to the edges or corners of the screen. For example, if the cursor is moved to the left edge of the screen, the camera will scroll left as long as the cursor is on that edge. If the cursor is moved to the upper left corner, the camera will scroll in that diagonal direction.
The second option for camera movement will be via clicking on the mini-map. This will allow the user to jump the camera to specific areas of the map quickly.
Game Characters
Units
Townsfolk – The basic unit which trains/upgrades to the rest of the units that can be created.
Workers – Unit dedicated to gathering resources and the construction and repairing of buildings
Lawmen – A close ranged, pistol wielding unit
Marksmen – Long range units
Calvary – A fast melee range horse-mounted units
Cannons – Siege unit with the highest damage vs. buildings
Outlaws – Complex end-game unit
Buildings
Houses – Allow for the creation of Townsfolk. Each house supports a set number of units.
City Hall – Used for training workers. The base building needed to construct all other buildings.
Jail – Used to train Lawmen.
Gunsmith – Trains Marksmen and builds Cannons. Also allows various unit upgrades.
Stables – Trains Cavalrymen. Requires a Gunsmith in order to be constructed.
Saloon – Trains Outlaws. Requires a Jail in order to be constructed. This building is also used as a resting and healing point for damaged units.
Upgrades
To be determined
User Interface
UI Details
Under Construction
Musical Scores and Sound Effects
3D Sound
The sound API we are using is Fmod-EX. More details to come as we learn about this extensive toolkit.
Sound Design
The goal for sound in this game is a Country-Western style. By Country-Western, we do not mean mainstream Nashville-based songs, but a calmer, folk Western camp style sound.
Multiplayer Game
Overview
In order for the multiplayer games to start, one player creates a new game, which starts a server session on his local computer. The second player then connects to the first player’s server, and once a connection is made, the game can begin.
Max Players
Currently, the multiplayer system supports 2 players.
Servers
The multiplayer design will be based off of a client-server model. The player creating the game (host) will be acting as the server and a client at the same time.
Customization
Players will be able to choose a “team color” for all of their units. This will help distinguish friendly units from enemy units. Players will also be able to use the map editor and send their maps to friends and play on their own custom designed worlds.
Internet
Currently deciding on the format we will be using. Debating between using a TCP/IP format or a UDP format.
Saving and Loading
Multiplayer games cannot be saved. Every time a new game starts, each player starts from scratch, with only a City Hall, a house and a few Townsmen.
Victory Conditions
A player wins a multiplayer game when he destroys all of the opponent’s buildings.
Character Rendering
Overview
Under Construction
Character Rendering Detail #1
Character Rendering Detail #2
World Editing
Custom Map Designer
Currently, we are developing an application to allow users to create new maps and modify existing maps. Once made, these maps will be able to be immediately used in the game.
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