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Infinity is an upcomming space MMORPG, currently in development.
It has some amazing features:
- The Galaxy: Over 200 billion star systems containing planets you can actually visit!
- Loading Screens: You can fly in space and land on every planet (heh, unless it's a gas giant), without any loading screens or unnatural transitions between space and planets!
- Newtonian Physics: Spaceships are manually controlled with keyboard or joystick. Everything will be real-time. Te Newtonian spaceflight is automatically adjusted by a navigationcomputer in order to make ships flyable by the average gamer.
- Astrophysics: The Milky Way is realistically being modelled: You will find moons and asteroids in orbit of larger planets, themselves orbiting their star(s). your ship will be affected by the gravity of large objects near you. Your navigation computer (combined with Anti-grav engines for larger ships) will adjust your thrusters to avoid a crash. That doesn't necessarily mean you can't crash into other ships.
- Open Ended Gameplay: Unlike about any mmorpg, Infinity will advance in the story in-game. Read further at "story".
Infinity is being developed by a small team. Flavien Brebion(also known as InfinityAdmin - IA) is the founder of Infinity and the only programmer. Amongst the other developers there's a concept artist, a planetary texture artist and a few active modellers. But that's not it: Infinity is in open development. Because of this, everyone can contribute to the game in means of Models, Textures or Music.
The main reason why the development team is small is because there is no real company making this game. It's started by a single man with a dream. IA already had experience with gaming development. Some have failed because of lack of activity/motivation in a large team. Others became playable but never were a real hit because the organisation usually sucked. If you have multiple programmers, they must work together. Since the contributers come from all over the world, it requires too much time for the head-designers to lead everything. IA decided doing all the programming himself was the best thing.
Sounds interesting so far? I'll try to give some information on how everything will work:
1) The Galaxy
So... You weren't planning to manually model every system, if you ever plan on having over 200 billion, are you?
No. Infinity: TQFE uses the Procedural Generation technique. This technique actually generates the galaxy "on the fly", meaning you generate your environment (planets, stars, asteroids, ...) while you're flying towards them.
But... this is a MMO, how are 2 players going to see the same thing??
Procedural Generation can be compared to a function with a fixed seed. E.g. if I take y = 2x, and I tell everybody that x = 5 (fixed seed); Everyone will see that Y = 10, right?
This means that a whole GALAXY will be generated when you're playing. If you would start playing right now, you still wouldn't be able to visit each planet for 1 second!
Currently there are 2 servers planned on release: one in the US; one in the EU. They will use a different seed to avoid problems with the story.
How does it look like? We've all seen pictures of it, but here's a WIP of the in-game one!
2) The Story
Infinity Website said:
Official Storyline. This is the released version. Many questions will remain open until the release of the beta.
3) Gameplay
Infinity will NOT feature any skills or attributes.
Everything will depend on your own skills: Maneuvring, shooting, it all happens in realtime, so there are no skills involved.
Is it not a limitation on gameplay? I think not: You'll be able to be a trader, miner, mercenary, freelancer, Pirate, etc.
The Game is open ended. If you wish to start a civilisation, all you need is money and a planet. Finding a planet shouldn't be too hard, the money is going to be a pain in the ass though... So why don't you start a corporation with some friends? Before you know, you'll be assembling ships and putting them for sale to other players! Many ships (the largest one is over 5 km) will have to be assembled by players rather than buying them from NPC's or looting them from a boss. Buying a Flamberge will be quite impossible, considering the huge upkeep. So if you want to become powerful, you'll need a corporation. Technically, it'll even be possible to take some players with you (amongst a ship full of NPC's) and start a new civilisation on one of those planets out there!
It won't be easy though.
4) Graphics
Time for screenshots.
The graphics will be stunning! Any pictures shown here are only WIP's, not the final product. Most of them are meant to show 1 specific aspect IA has been working on, and thus lack in other aspects.
early screenshot
early screenshot
A screenshot showing the current implementation of clouds.
Recently, IA decided to implement overhangs in the terrain. No models are involved, something like this isn't seen much in games! Only one texture has been used.
No, this is not a skybox. It's actually 3D!
Gas giants often are surrounded by Asteroids.
Most buildings will be modular, making room for nearly infinity combinations of structures. This picture has been taken in a Dome, often used on inhabital planets.
One of the various concepts made by Koshime, one of the nicest concept artists I've ever seen.
This screenshot features rain, a wheather effect that's most likely to be implented in the final game.
A Medium sized ship made by one of the various contributers (Irashi). This one has been made by the Centaurus, one of the 3 largest civilisations known in Infinity.
Ships of this scale can carry a certain amount of fighters (as seen in the rain screenshot) in it's hangar.
A screenshot of the back of the Flamberge, the largest ship in Infinity. the texture is still a WIP.
A render of the "Halcyon" on a conceptual background
5) System Requirements?
No real minimum requirements are known yet. There's a min. requirement listed on the website though.
I'd say, if you can play the ICP on medium settings, you should be able to play the whole game on low settings. Considering the fact the game will not go gold before 2009, I wouldn't worry about it.
6) Download?
Currently Infinity is in Development. An open beta has been planned for the end of 2008. This date is in no way final.
In order to test the networking and the twitch-based combat system, an ICP (Infinity Combat Prototype) has been released, and a newer version was made soon after.
The Carrier (last picture) is the biggest ship flyable in the ICP. In the final game, You'll be able to fly anything you want.
Note that the ICP is in no way a demo of Infinity, it doesn't contain all features mentioned above, since it's only meant for early testing. It's fun to try though! Play it and imagine what the final game must look like!
The Final game will most likely not be free. Servercosts (especially for a twitch-based game) require an upkeep that has to be payed. A Price cannot be told, and perhaps you'll be able to download a free account with limitations. But nothing has been set in stone, it's simply too early to think about this.
Combat Prototype Page
Note that some mirrors might be broken/corrupted.
Serverlist. Green servers are online
7) Links
The Official Website
The Official Forum
Please note that no spamming is allowed. The contributionsforum is there for music/textures/models contributions ONLY. Questions should go in Gameplay or General. But, please search first if you have questions.
Moddb link. Let's not confuse you: it's not a mod, it's a standalone. But It's registered at moddb.
FAQ
Videos:
Official ICP Trailer
Fan ICP Trailer
Infinity Nebulae
Space Rain. (Rain not in space, but the video was made in space to make it easy)
Entering an Asteroidbelt
Video on a planet
Another one
I'm not a representive of this game, and what I said here might not be completelly correct, but I think this game is worth your time!
If you have any questions, you can ask here if you wish.
