I had a dream last night...

[Jodo42]

...and I thought it might create some interesting discussion here. It was about KSP, of course.

It was about the future of the game. Not THE future, but A future. One I'm not completely sure I'd want to see, but an interesting one. I had envisioned the game to where it had been greatly expanded upon. Science was completed; there were biomes on all the planets and moons, there were asteroids and more planets to explore (I remember a ringed gas giant vividly), and there were more experiments to do. Currency was introduced, and experiments also generated money. There were more parts (I think), the tech tree was a lot more complicated, there were better aerodynamics, with deadly re-entry. There were resources, which could be used to build launch sites on other bodies, build and refuel rockets, or just make money with. The game was beautiful, and massive.

I remember spending a lot of time messing around with stuff like that (it was a lucid dream), going to Duna and mining up some ores with a big mobile rover, sucking up nuclear fuel from Eve's oceans, and other things I don't remember as well. But progression was very different then it is right now. You got a grant at the beginning of a career save, with a good amount of cash to do a couple missions. As I said, experiments also generated cash, but in the beginning it was about getting new parts and going to the Mun and Minmus, and exploring biomes. But as that grant money ran out, and you needed to start making your own cash, and parts were getting more expensive... things got interesting. I started to do science not for the research, but to fund missions deeper into the Kerbol system. Things got bigger and bigger and more and more intricate as more parts were unlocked. I developed this gigantic system with shuttles between bases on other planets and Kerbin to dump supplies, massive mining rigs digging holes into a moon big enough to see from a (dangerously) low orbit. Pumps running everywhere, running around with Kerbals doing maintenance and just admiring things. It turned from being about exploration to being about money. To building an empire. To making bigger, better, and crazier contraptions, and making them go farther and farther, and then designing things to get what they made where they needed to go. Everything got stupidly complicated, and interconnected. It was crazy.

And then something else popped up in my dream. I saw a new button on the main screen, one that many players have been dreaming of since the game got popular. I saw (mods please don't hammer me for this) a Multiplayer button. There were servers, hundreds of servers. Some were dedicated to exploration and discovery, some were noob oriented, and some were full on tycoon servers. I remember joining that last type, and there were 2 different groups. The first was a lovely one where players built a company and sent themselves out into the depths of space, building themselves bigger and bigger and crazier just like in singleplayer. And once you got big enough, you could join in with other "big" companies and work together, for more profit or more fun. It was about cooperation, and everything was a mess of trade routes between companies and planets, and mining rigs and science vessels and...and...

The other subtype was darker, and very different from the first. It was about competition, not cooperation. The same basic concept was there; build an empire across the solar system and make as much cash as possible. But you couldn't see other player's actions. There were no ship or base icons, there were small little pads scattered across Kerbin and a few other habitable planets in the system. Raiding bases was allowed, and so things were generally either very small or very well protected on the surfaces. But in space, things were different. There were fleets of ships surrounding stations, there were battles, there was rampant militarization (note that there were no "weapons" per say, but rather people re purposing engines and fuel tanks), and there were debris clouds. Sometimes things were slow paced, other times it rushed and close-quarters. It was harder to get started on those servers, and harder to stay on top. It was anarchy, pretty much. But it was a very different gameplay style, and I enjoyed it. I also remember some servers (in general, not just these "war" servers) limiting time warp significantly, so things were much slower paced. That was a whole other deal.

It was probably the best dream I've had in a while. Do you guys think that KSP will ever get like that? Will most of the features I mentioned even get introduced? Do you think that imperialism and colonization will detract from the exploration and science part of the game, or add to it, and give it new life and purpose? Do any of you think you'd be a tycoon on a career game? Or a scientist, forever exploring a vast and complex Kerbol system? Or do you think that Sandbox will be king?

Sorry for the wall 'o text; I tried to break it up a bit. Thoughts?

[Commissioner Tadpole]

Awesome dream! I'd obviously prefer the first tycoon server, though.

But I can barely get to the Mün, so I'd be probably dead weight.

[Joel Dryden]

That sound's pretty awesome. The beggining portion sounds very much like how I play already with mods, Mission Controller for a little extra (Not that it's needed) Science earned through missions and cash to keep things balanced.

Doing the set missions for funds, or the occasional "Government"/"Weather" sat for funds, as cheaply as possible, to put up my own small Kethane bases/Extraplanetary Launchpads. FAR is pretty good for the aero-drynamics, can just glide without the engine and re0-direct your momentum, heating up works a little different and looks nicer as different speeds are allowed in atmo, deadly re-entry (Scaled to however you want, if things break too easy) combined goes really well. The Warp and NearFuture mods also add some nice parts (Capacitors at the start are good to have some saved charge, etc) for new forms of exploration.

Shuttle networks, idk so much about though, think people have talked about mods that allow you to have automated paths, but idk if that'd work (To have a shuttle that goes back and forth from docking wtih a mining rig, to a station with fuel etc).

Also, there is a mod with a Purple ringed planet that recently came out, pretty sweet might like to check it out.

But I am very much in the same boat of thinking that this would be sweet. The Tycoon and Military, can imagine small factions with quick saved sub assemblies, for cheap missiles, harvesting resources about meteors, while keeping watch of others to fire said missiles at, dog chases through the atmo or between debris fields, etc. Would be kinda sweet, but again, pretty sure all that "fighting" stuff isn't their priority, I mean it's our sandbox you can re-arrange your toys to make them deadly, but I don't think they're going to make guns and shiz.

Also, with that KMP mod for multiplayer what you said could be a possibility for the near future of KSP mixed in with its fan base.

Really just keen to see wherever it goes, quite a wonder.

Get's peoples imaginations going.

[RocketPilot573]

Once I also had a dream, it was about a distant, small, snowy planet with huge cracks in it's icy surface. About a month later Eeloo was added, now imagine the look on my face when I saw the new planet for the first time!