If there will ever be I-War 3...

Quote Chessking: it would be possible for there to be a "destroyed" ship, but it is still in one piece.

Exactly!
I was thinking, considering the ring-based reactor systems in the game, that this would actually happen quite a lot. Those rings are barely within the confines of the ship, so if a barrage of shots takes out the shields and tears up the hull, then naturally they could target the ring and blow a hole in it with a couple shots. All that fuzing plasma in there would blow out, ripping a whole in the ship a good fifty meters long if it's a corvette. With the reactor down, the ship would be a cold hulk with a debris cloud until repairs are enacted, and the reactor may not be repairable for hours. Not to mention it is totally dead in the water, and unethical foes may continue firing to make sure they whole crew is dead. (Not something I'd do...)
The force of the explosion would also accelerate the ship somewhat, and the explosion would kill some of your crew. If you know beforehand that you're going to lose the reactor and you know where it'll blow, you can point that spot at your enemy if he's close, but it won't do much and is very hard to get right.
Of course, there are special systems to prevent reactor breaches, such as giant plates to quickly slide over and clamp on a breach, very fast-acting auto-repairs, and ring shut-off valves. All this would make it a delightful challenge to destroy a ship.
I have good news, Chessking. I can't make an I-War3 per se because of copyrights and all that, but I can start my own game. It will take years, but it's worth waiting for a good thing, and I've already started work. You should check my 'New mod coning soon!' thread if you haven't already. Most of the stuff listed there will be in my game. (My teeth just clanked like knights in armor because of that embarrassing typo. Please ignore it!)
(Ignore it? Who am I kidding? With me bringing it to your attention so much, how can you ignore it?! )
BTW, a first person ability to walk around the ships, stations, and planets (and blow stuff up! ) was practically number one on the to-do list. I was aggravated by not even being able to look around the cockpit in I-War2.
All in all, my definition of 'destroying a ship' is this: Render it permanently unable to accomplish the purpose for which it was constructed, and permanently no longer a threat.

--IronDuke

P.S. I'm glad you like my ideas. Asking an older brother for his opinion is apparently not a good idea... :silly:

Wow. Reading through all of your ideas makes me want to play this game for the rest of my life! I really hope that you will finish it. It sounds almost impossible for a single person.

I actually removed the typo from your thread. Nobody ever saw it! :whistle:

I wonder what would have happened if you've worked for Particle Systems back in the day!

Being unable to enter ships or look around in the cockpit is a thing I miss, too. In Diaspora, you can look around in your cockpit and you are even able to land on the Battlestars. You can't enter them directly, but it's a huge step forward.
Landing on a planet and running around on it would certainly be the killer feature.

There are techniques to generate these. For example, the game "Rigs of Rods" uses tools to generate landscapes and vegetation randomly, even water with a toolkit called "Hydrax". And I've seen this a while back:

boxcar2d.com/

It generates cars with some algorithms and evolves them. This thing adapted to space ships could make a new I-War really unique! I wonder if it will ever happen, though. It's been a long time...

If Particle Systems has the copyrights to I-War, would it be possible for them to take on the idea? (Perhaps if your idea will become your own game, my idea could be used for I-War 3.) All of these ideas are exiting!

You removed the typo? What typo? I never saw no typo! Seriously though, thanks.
You know what would have happened if I worked for Particle Systems when they made this game? The Chaos aliens would have been made of Jell-o, and your PBCs would fire banana flavored tootsie rolls. Seeker missiles would of course explode in a shower of sprinkles, and anti-matter would have donuts under the sprinkles.
I was three when this game was released.
I first played it when I was seven, in 2005. It was the only game I played then despite the possession of nearly twenty others. Good game you know. :lol:
You can tell I loved candy, huh?
I'm pretty sure procedural generation is easily possible for spaceships. I've just never done it before, so learning how might be something of a hump. It wouldn't be the only thing I've learned from scratch, though. I learned to code through trial and error. It's doable, but I don't recommend it.

--IronDuke

:ohmy: IronDuke, you're only a year older than I am.

IronDuke, remember how I mentioned Limit Theory in the old I-War2 forum? Well, LT has procedurally generated ships and stations, too. Boarding (in an isometric perspective), however, is something that The Mandate (another successful Kickstarter project) will have. Also, you might want to look at Angels Fall First (has been Steam-Greenlit recently), which supposedly has fleet command as well as FPS boarding other ships as well. Check out their YouTube video for more.

All in all, while I love your ideas, I'm not sure if it all will be feasible, especially for one person alone. That does NOT mean that it won't be possible for you to make your own space sim - in fact, Limit Theory and Banished are living proof that a well-organized and talented programmer can do wonders - but to put all what you envision into one game might be a bit too much. From a programming perspective, from a conceptual perspective, and from a gaming perspective as well.

Still, I'm very much eager to be pleasantly surprised. Please do not hesitate to post screenshots of your work here. Also, I'm pretty sure that the founders of Particle Systems are open to your idea. You'd have to check that, though. Ravenger and Soupdragon are the people to ask, or have a look in the forum to find out if it was Glyn Williams or Michael Powell who hold the rights to Independence War.

Best of luck, mate!