Spent the better part of the night porting the data and code over from C into something a little more manageable in Python for Star Merchant 2. Everything appears to be progressing nicely so far. The commerce aspects of the new game are a little different now, which I will explain.
After going through all of the code, I realized that there were only 38 possible types of cargo that one could carry on their ship. I say possible because in Star Merchant you only had a maximum of 20 cargo bays and 200 ton weight limit. Some of that has changed.
The number of possible types of cargo is now expanded to about 50. This number may fluctuate as testing progresses, but I’d like to give a more diverse cargo catalog in the new game for players to purchase and sell. Think of it as one small part of the game universe growing.
The other aspect that is new to SM2 is making each Starport unique, with its own personality of a sort. This also includes the amount of cargo that it may have, along with affinities for certain types and better trade factoring that results in more unique, localized prices that you can buy and sell at. And of course, there will be more Starports for you to visit.
Just tinkering with the idea of taking that even further and adding in a “Galactic Currency Market” where every Starport has its own local currency which you have to use to buy and sell your cargo with, which means you have to use the conversion rate at that time for that particular Starport’s currency. Might be a bit too involved.
SM2 also introduces the idea of different types of ships, which also carry with it leasing (like in the first one), or buying, depending on the size of your wallet. Damage is still a factor to consider, which, if you played the original you’d know if you bought faster engines (less travel time) it increased your odds of taking random hull damage.
I also wanted to bring in a storyline, something more than just a screen at the beginning explaining what you’re doing. Which also leads into the concept of space combat in the game, something the original didn’t have, but one BASIC version of it from way back did. It will probably be on par with the combat in Master of Orion II.
Since I am still in early development of the game engine, I’d welcome any suggestions from players of the first Star Merchant as to what game mechanics they’d like to see enhanced, fixed, or removed for this one. Keeping in mind that SM2 will be graphical rather than text, of course.
