Living Dead Galaxy: Space Pirates And Zombies 2
A dynamic galaxy
Ignore the acronym if you possibly can because we shouldn't dwell on an irritating title when there's so much else to discuss. Space Pirates and Zombies 2 looks like it might be an absolute corker, an heir to the sensational Space Rangers 2, built around a living galaxy that exists and develops no matter what the player might be doing elsewhere. Read this and salivate:
Two hundred persistent Captains that are able to do everything the player can, including forming dynamic factions, building structures, controlling territory, and going to War.
If Minmax pull that off, Space Pirates and Zombies 2 might be an unexpected and unlikely true single player alternative to Elite: Dangerous. Space wars! There's much more, including a trailer and details about randomised ship parts below.
I'll just quote the most exciting parts here:
A true living galaxy that is not player centric. It will develop differently each game through the interactions of the agents.
Time based galactic story events that happen whether the player is ready or not. These events add new threats and tools to deal with them. The Galaxy will need to find a new natural equilibrium each time a new disaster is unleashed.
Randomly generated modular parts. Build the mothership that suits your play style, on the fly, in seconds. Every part has its own unique stats that contribute to the mothership. Every part has its own hull integrity and damage states. Every part is a real, working, ship component.
Strategic ship building. The mass, location and shape of parts all matter. If a part blocks a turret, it will not fire. If a ship is too long, it will turn slowly. Too many engines will mean too little power for weapons. Every design choice counts.
A fully physics based 3d environment where everything is destructible, takes damage from impacts, can be grabbed and even thrown at enemies with the tractor beam.
Those words? That's essentially the print from the choir sheet I like to sing from. I love the idea of the galaxy attempting to return to equilibrium as zombies flood across it like a virus infecting its host, or whatever other disasters are in store. It's not just that the idea of AI pushing and pulling at systems is a great thing to live in the middle of, it's that the effort to return to a state of equilibrium sounds believable. A thing that these dynamic agents will be able to achieve rather than an impossible claim.
Plugging ships together like Lego is appealing as well. It should be out early next year.