WW2 game, that I hope to start

Well i'm new here so hi.

I've been thinking about making a freeware WW2 strategy game. A freeware would take awhile but it can be done, www.wildfiregames.com they are making two freeware Strategy games that are more original than most games, and they look great. This is where I got my inspiration to try and start this.

The problem is I dont have any comp skills like programming modeling etc.., so i can only be a game designer. But i do have some good ideas that could be done with the right people and motivation

Features I hope to have:
- A game engine that "tracks" bullets like an FPS, so units will have a chance to hit or miss their target (also like the close combat series)

- Smarter soldiers that will take cover when fired upon, such as hiding behind trees or piles of rubble.

- Realistic damage, tanks that get shot from the side could get immobolized, depends on how much armor there is on that part of the tank

- A resource system thas gathers requisition points (but different than DoW's ststem, not completely sure how to do this)

- Limited base building and more focus on combat

- Units have limited ammo, which means you need to have supply lines, to do this make a truck at your main building(probably HQ) and (either make a supply depot or theres one the map?) then right click on the supply depot. The truck goes off the map and comes back with ammo and dumps them off at the supply depot, does this unless told otherwise.

- This could lead to more tactics like cutting off somenes supplies then attacking.

- Soldiers come in squads (dropped off by trucks, so it looks more realistic)

- Soldiers can dig trenches and foxholes and make sandbags

-Combat Engineers are the builder unit which can plant mines build brigdes etc.. Mechanical engineers make changs to units like tanks, such as changing a regular supply truck to have a mounted machine gun on it

- Three time peroids to play, Early, Mid, and Late

- Each time peroid will have units and tanks avialible ot that time.

- Many different types of units (mortars snipers machine gunnes..... but not for just one civ)

- Five countries, U.S.A. Russia Germany Great Britain and Japan (maybe only three or four, five could be too much work)

- I hope to include railroad guns somehow

Weather that affects units, rain can cause mud which can bog down tanks, cold weather can freeze certain tanks nd not others

- Units that can surrender and have a certain morale, Units gain expeirence as they fight more, new recruits might flee if their morale gets to zero

- Soldiers can ride on tanks, to use them like APC's

- Infatry that can actually stand a chance agianst tanks, using a Bazooka, panzerfaust, AT rifle etc...., or just flanking it jumping on top and dropping grenades into the hatch., so there wont be any tank spamming, infantry becoming obselete or just sending a tank into the middle of a base and expect it to win

- A destructable environment, buildings collapse, trees get knocked over, craters made by shells, then using them as cover, etc......


I really would like to be a game designer since i dont have any computer skills like coding and modelling.

If you want to join or help out I could use so game desingers, a project leader since I dont think I can handle this whole thing by myself, Researchers, Someone who can make a website, and maybe some historions to write articles on WW2 weapons, tanks, battles, etc...

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

im willing to help out on researching firearms of WW2 if thats any help, but otherwise i cant help sorry

 

I'm certainly no computer programmer myself, neither am I a professional researcher, however like dave I am reasonably knowledgable in some areas of WWII. My speciality is Aircraft, I am certainly no expert and make no claims to be, "Fairly knowledgable Amateur" is probably fairer!

I could help with information and research for the Aviation side if you chose to include that.

One observation I would like to make is that when it comes to engineering units I would separate them into two distinct types, Combat Engineers (Mine laying/Clearing, Bridge building, Demolitions, etc) and Mechanical engineers (Vehicle recovery and repair) since the two are in reality distinct and separate disciplines. Mechanical engineers are rarely trained in Combat engineering and vice-versa.

In all honesty I would probably omit the rail-road guns unless you're going to try and include everything, these were relatively few and from what I can gather for the most part largely ineffective due to their limited deployability (Is that a real word? :lol: ), Guerillas and Partisans as a separate troop type would be a more useful addition. If you're going to try and include everything, good luck, you're going to need it!

If you're going to restrict yourself to a certain number of countries I would chose a theatre or maybe two, rather than try to cover the whole war. For example: Drop Japan, add Italy and you can cover North Africa and the Mediterranean, European and the Eastern Front. Or Drop the Soviets and Germans, add Nationalist/Communist Chinese and you can concentrate on CBI and the Pacific.

The choice is up to you.

 

Yeah i'll probably drop Japan, and the railroad guns will most likely be a scenario editor unit. And I didnt know bout the two types of engineers, i'll include that.

About planes, I dont plan to have all types of fighters and bombers in the game, put I plan to have an ability to call in paratroopers and planes to drop supplies at a certain cost.

 

If you're going to do that I think you ought to at least have a generalised ability to call in an airstrike. You could relate the cost and accuracy of the airstrike to the relative availability and capability of the crews, then treat it largely as an artillery attack. For what you're trying to achieve I think including specific capabilites for each aircraft type would probably be unnecessary, but considering the impact of aircraft on WWII I think an airstrike factor is a must.

 

Its just that in most RTS airplanes are annoying, You dont want to spend so much resources for lets say a PanzerIV and then have it blown up from an airstrike at half that cost, but then if you increase the cost theres no point in taking out light vehicles and armored cars :-?. I've seen some games that worked fine without any form of aircfart. I plan to have some planes but they wont be a major part in the game. An airstrike might be able to fit in the game but as of now I'm not sure whether or not to inlude it.

@Dave, I could use you as a researcher somone who knows about weapons would be very helpful

 

The secret is to get the balance right. A friend of mine played a WW3/1980s game where his entire army consisted of a single Landrover, the enemy would place his army, he would place his unit, then reveal that the rest of his points had been "Spent" on Tactical Nuclear Weapons and obliterate every feature of the map on his opponent's side. Good way to win, not much fun for anyone though. So that's the kind of rule/game loophole you'd want to avoid.

Air power was almost ineffective against late model Panzer IVs and upwards, have a search around this forum for Tony William's posts on the actual effectiveness of Allied Air Power Vs the likes of Tiger Tanks, I think the hit rate for Allied Rocket Projectiles ran at something ridiculously low like 0.5%, or 1/200!

Yes, if a projectile actually hit it could be devastating, but statisctically you'd have to have 25 aircraft with 8 RPs each to get a single such devastating hit...

Actually the trick would be to call in strikes against vulnerable targets such as trucks and armoured cars that could be damaged by such an attack!

I'd personally say not including Airstrikes is the easy way out, especially if you're going to include air-supply and para-drops, but at the end of the day it's your game and your decision. That said if I were playing such a game I would wonder why air-transports were available and strike aircraft weren't. I'd say either ignore airpower altogether, or factor the lot in.

Factor in weather, range and night then factor in the actual capability of the aircraft to hit and damage their targets and all of a sudden Airstrikes wont seem so useful.

 

Touche. I'm used to playing were the plane hit its target no matter what and does a certain amount of damage for every vehicle, but if the things like weather and capability were added like you said it could actually workout nicley, not too overpowered and very realistic which is what I want.

 

im no weapons expert its just something i enjoy researching/ using firearms but im willing 2 help out with details

 

Thats good, we have two people willing to help with firearms and aircraft, now we need two-three more researchers for tanks, and field guns/artillary.

But I also need people to help with game designing and someone who could help lead this project.

 

sorry im no gd there, any thing thats not fired by hand or bi/tri-pod i dnt now much about

 

Thats ok, you can still help out with firearms

 

o right kk when can i start?
how much detail about the firearms do u need are what type for which countries?

 

Ok, so I've decided to drop Japan, that leaves the U.S., Germany, Russia, and Britain.

I'm going to start a unit list starting with Russia. I need info on what weapons the squads below used, amount of members, ammo carried, how many Grenades, years they were used, anything will be useful.

-Basic Rifle Squad
-SMG Squad
-Light Machine gun Team
-Meduim Machine gun Team
-Heavy Machine gun Team
-Light Mortar
-Meduim Mortar
-Heavy Mortar
-Flamethrower
-Sniper
-Medic

Eventually we will need an official site for all this to stay more organized.
I'm going to right all this down and then type it up.

Right now though i'm making a list of features which will be implimented in the engine, and then a list of gameplay features. Once thats done and if I have any Game designers we will discuss and improve the ideas.

 

have you got an email address that i can send info to?
u didnt just have smg squads it was a mix, in an american squad for example (9-12 men) you would have 1 BAR a couple of SMGs and the rest rifles, the onli exception would be japan who didnt reli use SMGs and russia because at the end of the war they were mainly equiped with SMGs and of course germany when the war was in its final stages could only hand out a few rifles and panzerfausts

 

Ok then so I guess we could drop SMG squads for some countries, I was pretty sure though that Russia used SMG squads behind their tanks :-?
and my e-mail Crazy_Thumbs@hotmail.com

 

im no gd with computers but isnt there a way of haveing a mixed squad, with, smgs, rifles and lmgs?

 

Yes it can be done and I like having mixed weapons in squads, I just thought that they had certain squads dedicated to SMG and rifles, with a few mixed weapons
And if you cant send it to me just post it on here i'll put it into microsoft word.

 

sorry i mis-typed, the russians near the end of the war to my knowledge were maily equiped with SMGs, i heard at 1 point entire battalions were equiped with SMGs

 

ok then, i'm alomst done writing about the game engine, and then i'm going to start the gameplay ideas.