Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

RTS for Agents

getagentcraft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 47 posts

Re: RTS for Agents

#11

Post by Folcon »

anonymous908213 wrote: post #10
Folcon wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question to you as someone who's been building in this space, what would you want / need to play a game as a programmer? An API? An SDK? An in-game editor? Tutorials? Or is this more a "I want a factorio-like"? I've been building economic engines and simulations for the last few years now and over the last 3 months in my off time I've been getting increasingly in the weeds about how to design a game that fits…

There is some prior art of this nature, such as screeps, that you might find useful as reference material (if you aren't already aware of it).

I am thank you, however the reason I'm engaging here is that what's being asked for from what I can see is a very different experience to screeps, for example screeps is top down much more programmer designed and has specific affordances and design to create the automated experience via being a developer

The reason I'm comparing it to factorio is because that game though still top down is designed specifically with a player in mind automating their labor and then slowly taking on a complex logistics game as they go and doing so fully in the game, the play is in laying out structures within the game

Satisfactory for example has different choices that lead to different gameplay as it's first person 3d, the play is in setting up and managing logistical structures and hitting production targets

That is interesting, however for my tastes both of these are a little too static an experience for what I want to build

I'm still working out the details of what I'm putting together, but I have a decent high level idea of what my goals are =)

What I want to know is, if people play this kind of game, what are they looking for / wanting?

What's a good "MVP" or minimal gameloop that would feel satisfying?

I want to quickly work out if I can serve either the gameplay desire or the gameplay fantasy or if it is just too hard to provide a fun experience for this kind of play in which case I should table this and focus on what I'm currently doing

However I'm still engaging with this because I would like to create a fun playspace here I just don't know what other programmers would want especially in the context of what the GP was asking, which is a mix of manual intervention and programming / automation

Re: RTS for Agents

#12

Post by anonymous908213 »

Folcon wrote: post #11
anonymous908213 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is some prior art of this nature, such as screeps, that you might find useful as reference material (if you aren't already aware of it).

I am thank you, however the reason I'm engaging here is that what's being asked for from what I can see is a very different experience to screeps, for example screeps is top down much more programmer designed and has specific affordances and design to create the automated experience via being a developer The reason I'm comparing it to factorio is because that game though still top down is designed specifically with a…

I can't speak for all programmers, but as a game developer myself, my take is: your very job as a game developer, above all, is to find the fun. This is especially prudent if you're making a game for other programmers. If I already had a solid idea in my head for what would be an amazingly fun programming-oriented game, I would... program it myself. I don't have such a concept in mind. I believe finding those concepts is something you have to find out by tinkering with ideas, building prototypes, working out the implementation details and seeing what you yourself enjoy.

Re: RTS for Agents

#14

Post by MattRix »

Folcon wrote: post #4
bob1029 wrote: post #2

I think this is a really cool idea. What would stop us from making it multiplayer and having two or more human players compete over common resources & goals?

To be honest as far as I can see the answer to that is nothing I've been getting increasingly interested in trying to work out what this would look like

I don’t know if this is a joke but isn’t the answer just… a regular RTS game?

Re: RTS for Agents

#15

Post by Folcon »

anonymous908213 wrote: post #12
Folcon wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am thank you, however the reason I'm engaging here is that what's being asked for from what I can see is a very different experience to screeps, for example screeps is top down much more programmer designed and has specific affordances and design to create the automated experience via being a developer The reason I'm comparing it to factorio is because that game though still top down is designed specifically with a…

I can't speak for all programmers, but as a game developer myself, my take is: your very job as a game developer, above all, is to find the fun. This is especially prudent if you're making a game for other programmers. If I already had a solid idea in my head for what would be an amazingly fun programming-oriented game, I would... program it myself. I don't have such a concept in mind. I believe finding those concept…

I don't disagree with any of that =)

It's what I've been doing, I'm asking what I'm asking to see if it surfaces anything that I've been missing / not thinking about and trying to work out what people would see as table stakes

In the same way that I know that playtesting reveals flaws and gaps in my design and thinking, this is a earlier version of that process that has in my experience helped me when building non-game related things

It may very much be the case that this is not the kind of thing that I should do when focused on building a game, but I don't think it hurts to ask

Re: RTS for Agents

#16

Post by bob1029 »

Folcon wrote: post #4
bob1029 wrote: post #2

I think this is a really cool idea. What would stop us from making it multiplayer and having two or more human players compete over common resources & goals?

To be honest as far as I can see the answer to that is nothing I've been getting increasingly interested in trying to work out what this would look like

Perhaps it's not a competitive game. Maybe the better approach is to have all players cooperate against the environment.

Re: RTS for Agents

#17

Post by alexpotato »

whs wrote: post #5

I wish there's a RuneScape server for bots. A game where it is both fun to play manually, and automated. Quests, for example, is a one-off thing where it could be fun for the player and not really useful to automate since it is a one-off task (unless you're running bot farm). I don't think the main game would encourage that - the more obscure the protocol, the less bot in the actual game (even though I don't think it…

This is basically Factorio.

You start out very manual and then automate more and more parts of the game.

There is even a "signal network" function that can be used to program.

You can continue to do things in manual ways even later in the game.

EDIT: changed to "manual ways"

Re: RTS for Agents

#18

Post by Finbel »

MattRix wrote: post #14
Folcon wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest as far as I can see the answer to that is nothing I've been getting increasingly interested in trying to work out what this would look like

I don’t know if this is a joke but isn’t the answer just… a regular RTS game?

One fun thing would be to raise the abstraction level of the game.

How would it feel to only interact with your base/economy/army via prompting and face someone doing the same.

Would words per minute replace APM, what would the meta look like etc. Would you be able to adjust the system prompt for your "army" to suit your play style?

Re: RTS for Agents

#19

Post by modeless »

MattRix wrote: post #14
Folcon wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest as far as I can see the answer to that is nothing I've been getting increasingly interested in trying to work out what this would look like

I don’t know if this is a joke but isn’t the answer just… a regular RTS game?

Like a regular RTS except instead of pointing with the mouse you have to plead with and threaten your troops to get them into battle?
Post reply on HN