A Salvager for Overdrive

The design work is moving ahead for the spaceships for Overdrive. There is much to say about the development of the lore (Sure, it's the same star system of Full Spectrum Dominance, but the setting got a lot quirkier!), the game mechanics, and the graphic design.

But, for now, let's just look at a new ship.

Law of Salvage

The design - and the role - of this new vessel really hints to the changes the game is going through: it's a smaller Capital Ship compared to the Opulence Class Freighter, and has virtually no heavy weaponry on board.

On the front, a set of mechanical arms are there for ...things. I can see them repairing a patch in the hull of an Interstellar Ship (the kind of vehicle that is at least one order of magnitude larger than the ships in Overdrive, and that would hopefully be the backdrop the game is set in), or chopping an asteroid in smaller chunks for processing.

Behind, protected by the space debris and dust, a small industrial quarter where workers can finely process scrap cutouts, repair ships, or fit extra cargo for transport.

Clearly this is not a warship. Neither was the Opulence, of course, but this one really shows how the game will focus more and more on objectives, resources and terrain manipulation. We're in space, afterall: if we can't move a rock around the table here, where?

Design

The concept for the ship is from Brennan, which keeps helping me developing the game while building his own cool range of spaceships.

It started as a literal doodle

...followed by a quick volume mock-up from me, and a more detailed paintover from Brennan.

This kind of design is precious. I really benefit from having a guideline, even though, after many iterations I end up with a design that is fundamentally different in many ways.

And the initial concept was so novel that it really made all the difference.

Principles of Modularity

Another aspect of the game that really affected the workflow designing the ship is modularity.

To be clear: I have NO intention to make ships that can swap modules between them - but each individual ship class should have enough options to make it into ...a ship class, rather than one individual model. Even if each player in the group decides to use the same ship (which is odd) in ther fleet, they should all look different enough.

So:

First - Cosmetic Choices

Ships are designed to be multi-part, mostly for ease of printing and, if people want to, painting. The added advantage of that is that I can create 2-3 variations for a part, and 2-3 variations for another, and you already get 4-9 unique combinations for your ships. Depending on the complexity of the vessel design, this can be easily expanded, to the point that every ship gains its own identity, even if by minor differences in their looks.

If you look at the two ships in the cover photo, they have variants of the right and left part of the hull (it's already 2x2 combinations), and both the light turrets and the engine muzzles will get variants later on!

Then - In-Game Effects

As a hard rule, parts of the ship that reflect a System during the game and that have multiple options, need to have corresponding printable piece to reflect that.

Since you can change the loadout of the ships between battles, every optional system (at least the ones that affect the look of the ship) is magnetized. This means that while the look of your ship will be unique because of your choices of unique tiny bits that you picked when assembling it, you will also be able to select the role of the systems by placing magnetized parts in slots.

This means a lot, and I mean a LOT, of mecanical design choices while sculpting. There needs to be space for the magnets (my usual 2x2 cylinders), the parts need tolerance but also must fit in tightly... it's a fun challenge, and so far it worked well.

Assembly

Lastly, I decided I needed an assembly guide for this kind of ships. It's fairly easy to combine, but that's coming from someone who poured dozens (hundreds?) of hours in designing the various parts.

Here we go.

As pointed out by others - this has a very ...Swedish vibe. I think it's clear enough, but i HAD to lean a bit more on that, even as a simple jest.

Bonus points to whoever got till this point, and can recognize the eight language on the image!

I leave you all with this, for now, while working on FSD and several other side-things. Everthing is progressing. Slowly but surely.

Jack