TLDR

Built in tutorial uses sound, so read the tutorial here if you can't hear it for whatever reason (it is also more complete). The camera movement behaves slightly differently compared to other 3D games, will probably feel a bit weird at first. The jar is cross-platform (I hope, testing later).

TUTORIAL

Overview

You are a drone tasked with defending a transport ship (giant simplex sphere, can't miss it). You need to prevent incoming asteroids from hitting it, and you need to keep it powered. This tutorial is similar to the in game one, but will be a bit more complete. I am not super proud of the in game tutorial, but it is there.

Controls

Movement

W - forward

A - left

S - down

D - right

Abilities

RMB - fire projectile

Q - match velocity

E - highlight asteroids

Lose Conditions

• you can get clobbered by an asteroid.
• the transport ship can be destroyed by asteroids if it is low enough on energy.
• the transport ship can run out of energy.
• your drone can run out of energy.
• you can lose your connection with the transport ship by going too far away from it.

Ability Details

fire projectile

if the projectile hits an asteroid, it will slowly convert the asteroids mass to energy, and then fly at you, giving you the energy. If the projectile hits the transport, the energy will just be given to the transport, this is how you power it.

match velocity

when activated, your autopilot calculates the impulse required to change your velocity to the object your cross hair is on and applies it, using additional energy.

highlight asteroids

the transport ship helps you see the asteroids more clearly, highlighting all the asteroids in blue, and shows asteroids behind the transport ship.

CAMERA MOVEMENT

In most normal 3D games, your mouse movements directly change your pitch and yaw, resulting in a camera that will only spin around when looking directly up or down. In space its harder to define an "up" or "down", and the inconsistency of the camera can make things difficult in some orientations, so I used a camera system that moves the camera relative to where you are facing at the moment. It is a bit hard to explain exactly what the differences are, but it will probably be apparent when you jump in. I remember it being a bit confusing when I first used it, but I find it more effective in space based games.

I normally do, but I didn't end up adding a keyboard based roll. You can replicate that by moving your mouse in circles, try it out if you want to roll!

CROSS-PLATFORM DETAILS

My engine should allow the jar to be cross-platform, but I don't have easy access to a Linux computer, and while I am writing this I haven't tested on mac. If your platform isn't listed, it should work for the windows jar. Let me know if it works or not so I can either update it here or fix it!

THANKS FOR PLAYING, AND HAVE FUN.