Sandbox space sim Limit Theory has been cancelled, six years after a successful crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter, because main developer Josh Parnell is simply exhausted from working on it for so long. He's spent, he says: emotionally, mentally, physically, and financially. "Not in my darkest nightmares did I expect this day to ever come, but circumstances have reached a point that even my endless optimism can no longer rectify," Parnell said on Friday. He plans to release the source code for folks to poke around but makes clear "it's not a working game." The dream dies.
]]>Until February, development of the successfully Kickstarted open-world space sandbox Limit Theory had been extraordinarily well documented. Creator Josh Parnell has been enormously vocal with backers and followers, posting detailed updates to the KS page and the game's forums. Then, in early February, the usually active Parnell went quiet. Last night, we got in touch and received confirmation that development is ongoing and that regular communication will resume in the near future.
]]>I'd almost entirely forgotten about ultra-pretty, hyper-ambitious procedural space-sim Limit Theory until the ghost of Craig Pearson came to me in a dream. In the spirit of Halloween he informed me there was a neeeeew viiiideeeeeoooo before disappearing in a puff of saltires. Thanks Craig.
In one of his largest updates yet, solo dev Josh Parnell details the work he's been doing over the past two months. A lot of it involves the custom scripting language he's built to both design the base game and enable easier modding, on which he goes into detail. There's also a half hour of absolutely gorgeous footage.
]]>When this column first started there were a dozen devlogs to choose from which had been running for years. Now, to avoid repetition, the column hungers for fresh meat - new games, new developers, and untold stories of variables and arrays. Perhaps there is value in holding up older, previously covered games as examples, though. Perhaps they might act as loss-leaders, luring in the timid and fearful who might be otherwise put-off by the unknown.
I'm featuring Limit Theory this week, is what I'm saying, because everyone asked for it.
Fantasy cartography! The best of devlogs! Programmer art!
]]>Someone needs to tenderly stroke the asteroids and wing tips of the latest Limit Theory development diary. If Craig was here, he'd probably be bouncing up and down with excitement about the game's procedural ambition, its electric-coloured interface, and developer Josh Parnell's relaxing voice. Craig isn't here though. Instead you've got me, and I'm trapped in a post-bank holiday mental fug. I'm going to stumble through this introduction like I've never written a paragraph before and quickly point you to the new video down below, which shows the newly implemented simulation of the game's commodity market.
]]>"I would not be exaggerating if I were to say I think this is the most influential month of development so far," says Josh Parnell. I've been used to letting the Limit Theory dev diaries just play, letting gaming's equivalent of Bob Ross talk and relax me. Perhaps that's why I'm so happy the game is being made? He's pulling some sort of high-level vocal massage trick. Well it didn't work in this update, because he's very excited about this month's work on his Elite-like space game. It was the month where he decided to focus on simulating the economy: creating a swarm of NPCs ships in a single sector and examining how they react to supply and demand. He's breathing life into his gorgeous universe.
]]>A bunch of the RPS posse are hitting up GDC, so the remaining blog squad coaxed me into the Forbidden Chatroom Of Mystery 2.0 as cover. They did so by tying my favourite piece of string to a string and dragging it along the floor, trapping me at the CMS and threatening to give me a paper cut. I am making the most of it by watching the latest Limit Theory dev update, and being gently lulled by Josh Parnell's relaxing manner. Nothing in the world is bad when I can watch an open-world space game come together in blindingly pretty monthly lumps. It's a good one as well, because it's probably the first time we get to see what the game will be like to play.
]]>I love it when developers talk about their user interfaces. Not their personal buttons, which I'd rather not push, but the systems that they build as a means of communication between players and games. A good UI, like strong visual design, creates a sort of language all of its own, and Limit Theory's node-based interface has an elegant grammar. In the latest dev diary, Josh Parnell covers the spiffy customisable HUD and the most attractive scanner since Michael Ironside.
]]>As regular readers of my "Craig is far too excited about Limit Theory" posts are aware, I hang on the Limit Theory developer updates like Sylvester Stallone hangs on to ropes. Josh Parnell's open-world space game is plodding along in development, and each month he releases a new video that completely floors me. If I am in a position to share it with thousands of pairs of eyes, I shall. That means you get two updates in this post, as the RPS CMS has been hidden from me for a few months, and I'll be gone again come Tuesday. Watch these, and also demand that I am brought back at least once a month to share them with you*.
]]>To recap: Josh Parnell's lovely looking Limit Theory is a space game in the style of Elite: trade, shoot, live, SPACE! He releases a monthly dev diary charting his progress, and each video has thrilled me. This, the tenth in the series, is probably the most exciting one yet. To put that in context: previous videos have shown how the game will procedurally generate the universe in a Dwarf Fortress story-building fashion, and a morning's worth of work that generated planet surfaces. This video talks about the tech tree and the modding UI, and you just have to watch it. He's procedurally generated tech-trees, and the modding interface is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.
]]>Tired, irritable, stressed, smelly*? Don't worry, we all get like that from time to time. Don't suffer, though. Each month the developer of the open-world, procedural space simulation game Limit Theory releases a video of his game's progress. In it you'll see the latest tweaks to the engine that his made, and watch as the potential for his Elite-style space game becomes grander and more exciting. No matter what Josh Parnell is talking about, be it the first smear of a lighting system or the initial drop of the AI code that will turn his static world into a living universe, he does so with tone and of a Jazz FM DJ at 3am. His words are a pillow for your brain. Don't operate heavy machinery while watching this video.
]]>Oh wow. I can't not get excited whenever I poke my head into Limit Theory's devblogs. Developer Josh Parnell is so casual and relaxed about building a space sandbox that sits alongside Elite, Eve, Star Citizen, and X Rebirth. He really should be more full of himself. In the first video below, when he's showing off a procedurally generated planet surface, he points out that until a few hours before he hadn't ever attempted to code water. He was flying over a lake. I nearly wept procedural tears. My joy was short-lived when he pointed out that players probably wouldn't be able to fly on planet surfaces, which makes the level of detail both laudable and ridiculous.
]]>I have a theory about Limit Theory, the ridiculously handsome game of space that's being developed by a small team. It looks too good for a two-man team to be making it, doesn't it? Suspiciously so. But I don't think developer Josh Parnell is lying when he claims it's a small team making it, despite italicising 'suspiciously' for effect. It's just that he doesn't realise that his work computer actually has a Quantum Hard-Drive. His elegant space game is being developed by a multiplicity of Procedural Realities, coding across universes, turning out an Elite-ish space game across dimensions. That's why it's so impressive. I hope our Josh Parnell isn't the evil one! He seems so nice in the videos below.
]]>You know how you are always wishing that there were more space-based RTS games? Well, there's at least one happening thanks to the Kickstarters, and its backers will no doubt it abundantly pleased that the game now has a playable prototype. It's looking particularly fancy, given that it's basically the work of one man, and that man - who I previously spoke to here - has put out a tutorial video for his prototype-users. This video conveniently acts as twenty minutes of gameplay footage for everyone else, and you can see it below.
]]>One-man procedural space RTS/RPG Limit Theory is one of the most intriguing Kickstarters currently on the block. Boasting an "infinite" procedurally-generated "open-world, sandbox universe in which you can explore, trade, pirate, mine, escort, hunt, defend, build, and more," it certainly grabbed my space-attention. Needless to say, I got in touch with the programmer behind the project to find out who he is, and why he's making such an ambitious game.
]]>Oh, this is good news. This is very, very good news. While big names like Star Citizen and Elite: Dangerous are bringing back space games with budgets that eclipse the number of stars in the sky and - in the latter's case - startling amounts of vagueness, Limit Theory's the exceedingly impressive product of one very dedicated guy. Unlike the aforementioned genre titans, Limit Theory basically came out of nowhere, but with plenty of gameplay footage and a highly detailed Kickstarter page. And now it's reached its semi-modest (in the grand scheme of things) $50,000 goal in just under one week, because there is justice in the universe after all. To celebrate, creator Josh Parnell's synthesized up some new gameplay footage using the space-age techno-magic of some basic video capture software and YouTube.
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