Miner Wars

UnsungToo

Hello,

I've come across a very cool looking game to play. the devs are planning the game and an indie hub around it. I've been keeping an eye on it and have blogging about it for some time now. It's one of the few games I have been excited about in a long time that I can actually play on my current system.

The game hasn't been relased yet but they are very close to releasing a fly through, and  tech demo very shortly, and a beta shortly after that.

Miner Wars is being deemed an MMO, but I'm not sure it qualifies here as one as it will hold 300 players per sector not 500. It is also going to the Xbox 360, but I'm not going to go spamming the console section as I'm personally only interested in the pc version.

As I mentioned I am keeping a blog about it and you'll find any updates and insider info that come to me there. But without further chit chat/ado here is what the game is about.

 

About Miner Wars

 

Overview

Miner Wars is a 6DOF underground and space shooter played in a fully destructible environment and is a combination of single player story game and MMO.

As a player, you operate an advanced mining ship in an open world asteroid belt area. You dig kilometers of tunnels, harvest the ore, travel the solar system, fight your enemies and discover mysterious alien secrets.

Game play is led by an epic story and is a combination of a single/multi-player game, cooperative, or you against everyone.

The story will introduce you to many types of missions: rescue, exploration, revenge, base defense, theft, transportation, stealth, search and destroy, pure harvesting, racing or just flying around and destroying everything you see.

High quality rendering and special effects, realistic physics, unique 'destructible engine', and game area with no borders make this game a real life experience.

Release date: 2010

Platform: Windows, Xbox 360 Live Arcade. Active internet connection needed!

 

Destructible Environment

Miner Wars is played in space filled with asteroids. Some of them are large--almost 10 kilometers. You can dig in any direction through any of these asteroids, and do so without any constraints.

Physical engine calculates all changes in real-time in regard to material resistance. Yes, some materials can be non-destructible by standard explosives.

Environment changes are persistent - you can blast a new tunnel, travel to a distant sector of the solar system and even come back after one month and your ‘work’ will be still there. Or maybe not, as other players might have 'finished' your tunnel.

There are places where no man has been. These virgin areas are ready to be explored and harvested. Of course there are also high demand areas where you have to fight for every piece of ore.

 

Story

It is the year 2061. Earth resources are scarce. The actual world production requirements could suffice for a maximum of 10 years. On the contrary, resources located in the asteroid's belts could suffice for millions of years.

This is the reason why space mining became the ultimate opportunity for modern adventurers. Space miners get rich or die trying.

The game will lead us to brothers Marco Polo and Mario Polo. They too decided to try their luck in this harsh place. They focus on researching mysterious alien artifacts, instead of harvesting the ore, minerals, or gems. During one of their research missions they are attacked by a squad of Space Peace activists. This is when your story begins. You play as Marco Polo, the older brother.

Alien artifacts - Their purpose is still unknown but they are certainly not made by humans or by nature. They are found randomly, no actual radar can detect them. Some are found in alien tunnels, some only after digging into the asteroids.

Space Peace Activists - A self-made group of young people who advocate 'man have no right to plunder space'. They patrol the area and attack everyone. No one likes them!

 

Game Play

The aim of the game is to harvest as much as possible while trying not to die and to find the final answer to the mysterious alien artifacts.

The player can join any one of the existing factions (ENFOR - Earth Nations Peacekeeping Forces, Space Rescue, WASA - World Aeronautics and Space Administration or many other corporations and Black Market Dealers).

The player's story moves as he completes missions. Some are single player only, some are multi-player. The player decides if he wants to fight alone or in cooperation with his faction members.

 

Vehicles

The player controls a medium-size mining ship aimed for movement in narrow tunnels and open space. The mining ships differ in weight, loading capacity, engine power, armor power and equipment.

 

Game Area

Game is played in an open world area. The player can travel from one sector to another in just his mining ship or he can use one of the large cargo transporters. The mining ship can move in outer space and underground tunnels. The area has no borders.

 

Replayabillity

Thanks to a unique 'destructible environment', every time the player plays the game new situations arise.

 

Learning Curve

Operating the mining ship is very intuitive and the player can start instantly. The player's spatial orientation is supported by a real-time navigation system with integrated radar.

 

Richness of Possible Actions

•Revenge missions

•Rescue missions

•Exploration missions

•Defending the base

•Transportation missions

•Theft missions

•Searching for and destroying enemies

•Searching for the enemy's base

•Searching and harvesting ore, minerals or gems

•Equipping the mining ship according to your own wish (buying weapons, shields, engines and so on)

•Digging a secret tunnel and sneak attack

•Creation of traps

•Speed race

•Dig tunnels of unlimited size and length

•Open world area - travel from one sector to another

•Or just flying around and destroying everything you see

Game Elements

•Unique mining ships: 10 (from smallest to largest, fast and slow, large cargo, huge shields...)

•Weapons: 20 (volcano cannon, guided missiles, mines, gravity bombs, tunnel buster...)

•Ammo: 20 (armor piercing, explosive, high velocity...)

•Drilling devices: 5 (pressure drilling, thermal drilling, saw, nuclear drilling device...)

•Equipment types: 50 (various radars, jammer, X-ray, engines, enhancing drugs, armor, med kit, auto targeting...)

•Factions: 20 (ENFOR - Earth Nations Peacekeeping Forces, Space Rescue, WASA - World Aeronautics and Space Administration or many other corporations and Black Market Dealers, ...)

•Ore types: 20 (iron, uraninite , helium 3, gold, diamonds, ...)

•Asteroids: millions to billions, nobody can count them...

•World size: unlimited in every direction

Release date

2010

 

Platform

Windows PCs with an active internet connection.

Xbox 360 Live Arcade - in development too and will be released right after the Windows version.

 

Minimum Requirements

•CPU: 2.0 GHz

•RAM: 1GB (1.5GB on Windows Vista)

•Graphics Card: NVidia GeForce 6 series or better, ATI Radeon R520 (X1300-X1950) or better, Intel GMA X3000 or better. Requires at least Pixel-Shader 3.0. More info

•Video Memory: 128 MB

•Hard Drive: 1 GB

•Sound Card: DirectX 9.0c Compatible

•Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Microsoft Vista

•DirectX: DX9.0c or DX10

•Network: Active internet connection during installation and during game play!

Anti-Piracy

The game will not utilize any sort of DRM protection, nor activation code. To play the game you only need to download and install the package and enter your login/password. As the game interacts with our servers during the game play, we periodically check for suspicious users. The game isn't locked to your computer, so you can play it from home or work

 

Age Group

All

 

About The Team

Miner Wars is being developed by the independent software company Keen Software House Ltd. We are passionate gamers, who love developing games and we want to make games that people like to play.

 

Powered by the In-house Game Engine 'VRAGE - Voxel Rage'

•Destructible environment

?Memory storage for extremely large voxel maps - 1024x1024x1024 voxels or even bigger

?Real-time modifications

?Level Of Detail – low & high detailed versions look almost identical when viewed from a distance

?Multi-material blending

?Seamless texture mapping for free-form surfaces

?No visible texture tiling on far surfaces

?Import custom 3D models (MAX files)

•Dynamic ambient occlusion lighting

•Unlimited light sources

•Custom per-pixel materials - wet, reflective, shiny, dirty

•Post-process effects: HDR, bloom, film grain

•Volumetric dust

•Powerful particle systems: explosions, smoke, etc.

•Realistic physics (rigid body, vehicles, particle system physics, fluid buoyancy, destructible objects)

•Single/multi-player

•3D sound with Doppler, panning and reverb

•Windows XP/Vista, Xbox 360, DirectX, Microsoft XNA

 

Miner Wars Website: www.minerwars.com/

voyagervsbor

 If I can make a tunnel and plant a trap in it, going back to find myself some dead people in there, I'm all in.