Chat with Cornutopia about FLATSPACE by Game Tunnel

This month we chat with Cornutopia head Mark Sheeky. Mark has been hard at work on his new game Flatspace. This chat was really broken into two sections as first we got some more background about the history of Cornutopia, which is fascinating to say the least, and then we moved on to questions about the new game...Flatspace! For an exclusive look at current pics of Flatspace, click here!

How many years has Cornutopia been creating games?

I always enjoyed writing games more than playing them, but my main motivation is still to play the end result. I started writing games initially aged about 11 or 12 on the Dragon 32 and later moved on to the Commodore 64 where I wrote in machine code (not assembler!) but none of those games were worth playing.

I started writing shareware games in 1991 on Amiga with a game called The Challenge of the Matrix, the grand daddy of Yinyang. That was under the title of Scorpius Software. I had 25 releases on Amiga, including a few that made it to publication but I got ripped off a lot by unscrupulous publishers. I switched to PC in one go in September 1998 and changed the name to Cornutopia soon after. The name came from a tune I entered into a mod authoring competition... it came second!

How many games has Cornutopia released?

I've had 12 PC releases since 1991, some shareware, some freeware, some nowhere: Thermonuclear Domination, Arcangel: The Legacy Of Peace, Roton, Martian Rover Patrol, Trax, Noise Station 1, Radioactve, Breakout Velocity, Bool, Yinyang, Outliner, Noise Station 2, Firefly.

If you count Scorpius releases too, the total is 38.

How many people have worked on your games? (engine/sound/graphics)

Artist Andrew Cashmore did most of the graphics for Hilt 1 and 2 on Amiga but for the rest I do it all myself. I find it more efficient that way. Certainly progress seems to slow down with more people involved. My good friend Andrew Williams serves as a consultant on any game design issues but even he doesn't see a game until it is complete.

Have you ever contracted out work on your games?

No. Sometimes it's faster to learn how to do something yourself, and it's always cheaper. Never say that you can't do something. Learning something new and doing it is much better that getting someone else to do it.

Not including the game you are working on right now, what is your personal favorite among the games you've created?

On Amiga, Hilt 2. On PC Radioactive, then Outliner, then Arcangel. Game design can be a hit and miss affair. I'm not 100% happy with any of my PC games so far. Noise Station 2 though (which is music software and not a game) is definitely the most wonderful thing I've done. After the merely 'okay' version 1 got pirated without selling a copy I decided not to release NS2 but I use it for all of my albums, game music and sound effects.

Not including the game you are working on right now, what was the most ambitious game you have created?

The one that made it is Arcangel. It took 18 months and that included buying a PC, learning C++ and DirectX (I programmed in Assembler on Amiga) and 3D rendering lots of graphics. In the end the game turned out okay but by the end I was already too tired with the project to care much. The game play is still on par with Hilt 2, it's predecessor but the graphics and effects look a little primitive. I wasted about 2 years chasing a publishing contract with some of my old Amiga days contacts. The game finally went on sale on my website a year ago but by that time it was looking dated. If I did something similar again I would make a lot of changes.

The most ambitious game I didn't create was The Heart of Aorkhan in 2001, a rogue clone that used fully 3D graphics and had more monsters and objects than even ADOM. I didn't have a PC capable of running the 3D engine so had to design and texture the graphics without seeing them. Every monster and item was scripted using a language I had to invent. The dev folder is 35Mb. A year later when I got the new PC, the graphics were done but they didn't look very good. I couldn't cope with having to redo them so at that point I vowed never to do a big game again and decided to make small games and try to sell them myself online. Up until that point I was still handing things to my (bad) publisher.

What got you involved in making video games?

Hmm... I can't remember not doing it. Of course on old computers when BASIC -was- the operating system, programming was easy for anyone to try.

How much time does a typical game take for you to do?

Most of the small games, Bool, Radioactive, Firefly and that sort of thing take about 4 weeks full time. Outliner took 10 days, because the simple graphics took just one day. Graphics and level design are the real time-eater, that's why Arcangel took so long.

What in your mind sets Cornutopia games apart from other games?

Nothing. Although I always make sure the AI can do everything the player can and does not 'cheat' (like give the computer privileged info that a human opponent would not get).

How much time do you spend playing other Independent company's games?

About an hour a week, only as a reviewer for Bytten. I don't play many games period but play console games for a couple of hours on Sunday afternoons. Strategy (particularly turn based) and simulation are my favorite genres but not enough of those sorts of games are made nowadays. I still play the odd C64 game on emulation. Airbourne Ranger for that platform is still one of the best games ever. I play Shogi Variants sometimes too (freeware: look it up!).

What do you think when you hear the words "Independent Game?"

A fair trade game, where the developer gets the profit not a middle man. 5 or 6 of my Amiga games got published but I didn't get any money. I'm sure everyone falls for those crappy royalty only deals but a few of my games appeared, and still appear, on shelves without any deal at all. They get cloned and sold illegally. I'm sure it happens all of the time.

FLATSPACE

For those unfamiliar with Flatspace, how would you describe it to them?

The game is set in the distant future, about 100 trillion A.D. when the universe has expanded so far that planets and stars have disintegrated. Humanity (which for some reason has not evolved) still exists in space stations.

It's a top-down Elite like. That is the game is viewed from above with rotating spacecraft. The aim is to make money by various means. Starting with a small ship, you can trade from space station to station or mine rocks, or act as a hired killer, or play the space pirate and grab cargo from other ships, or rescue prisoners or capture criminals, or join the police and bring the felons in. The game is very open ended.

There are no planets (that wouldn't suit a top down viewpoint) but there are different types of space stations to move between. Ironically, the removal of the planets made the game more interesting because I had to add more variety to the stations.

What has influenced you to do Flatspace?

The primary game influences are Elite II: Frontier, Outliner and Starscape. I wanted to make a game like Frontier but with dogfights like Outliner. The dogfights in Frontier were notoriously rubbish. Starscape didn't influence the game play much but it's gorgeous graphics as well as having fun with that game early on in the year became the initial kick that got me going. It convinced me that a top-down game could be 'serious'.

I've tried to make it realistic and called on elements of television sci-fi to make the space pilot experience a good one to have. Press launch on your command carrier and lots of fighters shoot out from the bays like vipers in Battlestar Galactica. Police ships look like cars ala Bladerunner and have wailing sirens. Missiles can be jammed, or out maneuvered, in a way more akin to a flight sim than a shoot-em-up. The amour and damage system bares some relation to the Battletech board games. The high score table details how you died and who killed you, as in most rogue clones. Indeed Nethack is a game influence too.

What audience are you targeting Flatspace to?

Those who played Elite or Frontier and loved either, or anyone who wants to be a space captain. There is even a button for 'red alert' that you can press at any time. Cool huh?

What was the most ambitious aspect of creating Flatspace?

The other ships in the universe are all monitored. That is every one of the several thousand traders, pirates and space stations are in memory and moving through space. Each ship has a crew, modular equipment layout, stock (in the case of space stations) and fighters (in the case of carriers). The ships though are stored in a very compressed way using random seeds so that all of that data can be stored with minimal impact. Storing the ships this way allows things that Frontier didn't have. For example you can dock with a police station and see a list of the 'galaxy's most wanted'. These are actual ships that are in the universe now, have real crew and have earned their way to the top of the wanted list. If you hunt them down, you can claim the bounty on the captain, even capturing him/her alive if you want to.

There are lots of ambitions things. The crew have duties, more akin to star trek than most games. You can eject workmates into space (if you have a Darth Vader moment), give them a job in a gun turret or as a fighter pilot if you've got a ship with a hangar. Every crewman is named and has a skill and sub-skill, and there are a few elements of humor in there. Good sci-fi should always have humor. You could have someone with Grade III Laser Weaponry skills or a more highly paid Grade IV Hair Stylist. A ships counselor might be less useful to a rich bounty hunter than a cosmetic surgeon or masseur.

What is the most exciting feature in Flatspace?

The size of the game and freedom the player will have should be the best aspects of the game. There will be a lot of ships and power ups and unlike Frontier, the universe is hidden at first and must be explored. You can set it as random or seeded if you tire of the default one.

The ships and weapons are not yet designed so I've not played the game yet myself.

You seem to have spent a lot of time working on the AI in Flatspace.� Why did you focus so much time on the AI?

Well it demanded some attention. Most game AI is very simple because most of the things you can do in a game are simple. Even a real time strategy game like Command and Conquer is generally a matter of making lots of unit x and path finding a way to the enemy base. I decided to control all of the enemy ships so I needed to make them work. Traders had to ferry cargo between bases, police had to chase pirates, pirates had to attack ships, miners has to hunt for rocks then scoop them up and military ships had to launch attacks on the enemy. The AI isn't very complicated but it does it's job well.

It sounds like there will be a lot aspects to Flatspace that players will need to keep track of.� How are you keeping the game manageable while still being as in-depth as you wanted?

I'll try to answer those together. Making the game easy to use was always a big priority because it is sometimes a justified criticism of my other games. The game will be much more of a simulation than Outliner, or Starscape. There are less controls than the space shuttle, but there is still going to be a lot of keys... but most of the controls take care of themselves. In action parts for example, none of the keys are required apart from the standard steer and shoot.

The trading/menus part has become the most time consuming element of the programming but they should be very easy to use despite being the most complex part of the game.

How long will it take someone to get into Flatspace?

I'd like to think that people can pick it up and play instantly, and yet a year later see something that they hadn't seen before.

What do you expect those who play Flatspace to come away thinking/feeling?

Like Buzz Alrdrin, Carl Sagan and Captain Kirk all rolled into one.

How does Flatspace provide a unique experience that gamers haven't had elsewhere?

Few games are unique now... I've not seen a top down space simulation before but I'm sure there is one somewhere. I would like the game to be as engrossing, and as different each time you play as Nethack.

What does Flatspace share in common with other games you have created?

Like my recent 3D games it uses the same graphics engine, Hector, but most of the game is new ground for me. Most of my other games are re-hashes of those on Amiga:
Here is an evolution chart:
Roton -> Xenex -> Outliner ->   Roton(PC) -> Outliner(PC)
Taskforce ->   Hilt II -> Arcangel
Matrix -> Yinyang
Hilt 1 -> Blade -> Aorkhan
Global Thermonuclar Warfare -> Thermonclear Domination ->   Radioactive
Overlander -> Martian Rover Patrol

What aspect of Flatspace should gamers appreciate most?

Depth... Freedom...

Complete this sentence: I will be perfectly happy with the release of Flatspace if...

it sells over 100 copies.

A big Thanks to Mark Sheeky for taking the time to answer questions. You can keep up on Flatspace as it nears completion on the Flatspace section of the Cornutopia website.

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By: Russell Carroll
Posted: Monday October 27, 2003