Equinox.space
fragmede · 2 years ago
83 comments
fragmede · 2 years ago
83 comments
guigui · 2 years ago
Author here. Happy to answer any questions!
Some background info on the project: https://littleworkshop.fr/projects/equinox/
fragmede · 2 years ago
I'm blown away by being able to drop in on it on my smartphone seamlessly! My phone got noticibly warm during play.
guigui · 2 years ago
Thank you! Yes, making it available on mobile devices was one of our priorities from the start (even though the desktop experience remains the best one). Phones do tend to heat up when rendering complex WebGL applications.
OccamsMirror · 2 years ago
Looks amazing but unfortunately I couldn’t get sound to work on my iPhone. Tried toggling sound off and on and still no go :(
hackton · 2 years ago
Removing the Silent mode with the left button was the trick for me (like with most mobile game btw)
taberiand · 2 years ago
I played through on my phone (Android) too and it was very smooth, suprisingly it didn't seem to cause significant battery drain or overheating - it performed really well.
petepete · 2 years ago
It's amazing, thank you. I really struggled without mouse inversion but got there in the end.
Broussebar · 2 years ago
Looks awesome, nice work. I have an unrelated question, on little workshop's website I can see a pétanque game that I couldn't find online. Is there a way to play this game or was it available only during an event?
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you. The petanque game was only available for an event and not publicly anyway, only for the client company's employees.
felixarba · 2 years ago
This is beautiful and very fun
izolate · 2 years ago
Excellent! I had originally planned to give it a quick glance, but I was so captivated, I had to see it through the end.
For those aspiring to become creative developers, could you share any tips on which areas they should focus on?
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks! Congrats on making it to the end. This is too broad a topic to cover here, but I'd say the most valuable skill is the ability to constantly learn new tools and techniques.
davedx · 2 years ago
For me babylonjs was a bit of a leap forward. Great engine + tooling. Nice documentation with tons of examples for how to do things. Besides that, experiment lots and lots! Be very curious. And don't be afraid of 3D math.
supermunny · 2 years ago
This experience was created with Three.js, if you'd be interested in learning that then this is a great resource https://threejs-journey.com/
larschdk · 2 years ago
Could you put in an invert mouse Y-axis for us old farts?
ta1243 · 2 years ago
What do you mean? I move the mouse (well trackpoint) up, and I see the ceiling, same with the trackpad
masfuerte · 2 years ago
In a plane you pull back on the joystick to go up.
ta1243 · 2 years ago
I played 3D games back in the days of Quake and Duke Nukem 3D and have never had a "move mouse down and view goes up"
Joystick sure, but the last joystick I had was a 15 pin DIN
mmh0000 · 2 years ago
Here's the `invert mouse` setting from Quake2[1], though, I know for certain that Duke3D and Doom had the same option. I feel like every FPS I've ever played has had it as an option.
Now, to be judgemental, anyone who enables the invert option is an obvious psychopath. Although, to be fair, everyone thinks I'm a psychopath for using Mouse2 for Forward.
adastra22 · 2 years ago
Oh come on. I’m a pilot, or at least I spent a good deal of time in flight training when I was younger. I’d rather not mix systems, that’s all.
wkat4242 · 2 years ago
Yeah screwing with your muscle memory is a really bad thing to do for pilots because that will be there for you when you need it the most.
Narishma · 2 years ago
Doom didn't, since it didn't support looking up and down.
rzzzt · 2 years ago
"Shearing" was added for up-down look in Heretic, for the non-Doom engine descendants Duke Nukem 3D and Rise of The Triad supported it as well. I don't remember if it could be bound to mouse movement in any of these games.
MisterTea · 2 years ago
They were bound to keys for the DOS versions from memory. Forget when the mouse look was supported but the view was highly distorted so mostly useless until later ports enabled proper 3d rendering.
tslater2006 · 2 years ago
No need for a plane, works that way for my head in real life too :) tilt your head back and you look up
remram · 2 years ago
This game has no plane or joystick though.
squarefoot · 2 years ago
Some people are more comfortable with mouse inversion, that is also my case; I read years ago somewhere that it is subjective and depends on how we "see" the scene in our brain, like 1st person or projected 3rd person (or something similar, don't take my words to the letter) anyway the number of people that would find games without mouse inversion next to unplayable is very high, therefore adding the option makes sense, and many games in fact have it.
wigster · 2 years ago
i always thought it was people of a certain age who required inversion (i include myself here) because the first 3d games were flight sims, so pulling back on stick/down goes up etc.
seanhunter · 2 years ago
Yeah it's not an age thing. My wife does the inverted thing whereas I do the correct way and we're basically the same age.
dustyduster · 2 years ago
> do the correct way
Careful, with that attitude you might not have a wife for long.
natebc · 2 years ago
or friends!
everybody knows inverted is correct anyways.
recursive · 2 years ago
I've never really played a flight sim, but I can't get my head into non-inverted. Maybe if I spent a dozen hours, I could do it, but why would I?
burntwater · 2 years ago
At least for me, I've always associated preferring mouse inversion with growing up handling BB guns. When you're lifting a rifle up, you are pulling back/contracting on the right arm. When aiming, to go up you nudge the right hand down, or nudge up to point down.
recursive · 2 years ago
To look down IRL, I move my head forward. Makes sense to me.
ijxjdffnkkpp · 2 years ago
I got used to normal look controls with practice but lots of 2005ish console games have inverted controls as defaults. I started a playthrough of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess on Gamecube to find that is has inverted left/right camera controls as the default. Also, GoldenEye 007 for the N64 has inverted up/down camera controls (if I remember correctly). If you're a certain age, you lived through a time when there was not an accepted default control scheme so console games just picked defaults and moved on. We got used to those defaults. There was a period of time where choice of selection of up/down inversion was seen as a must-have to even play a game (multiplayer split screen) and zero discussion or complaints would arise over 2-3 minutes of everyone (all 4 of us) setting their controls after every console reset. Eventually non-inverted controls became the accepted default. This likely happened during a time that many of us gamed less so we might not have the muscle memory of relearning the new defaults. That's my experience on the whole thing anyway.
tslater2006 · 2 years ago
I could see this. Like obviously I live first person, and when I want to look up I pull my head back, to look down I push my head forward. Similarly I expect pushing my mouse forward (up) to look down and pulling my mouse back (down) to look up.
adastra22 · 2 years ago
That’s the opposite of how a real life joystick works, so some people don’t find it intuitive.
MisterTea · 2 years ago
If I grab your head and pull back you would be looking at the ceiling. If I pushed your head forwards you would be looking at the floor. This is how mice should work. Touch devices screwed that up and are heresy.
Brian_K_White · 2 years ago
There are two ways to define "natural".
One way is as though you are moving the observer. You move (yourself) up to look up.
Another way is as though you are moving the object. You move (the scene) down to look up.
Both are perfectly natural in different contexts.
Everyone perfectly naturally turns their head up or lifts a telescope up in order to look higher.
Everyone also perfectly naturally slides a paper down or rorates a globe down in order to see higher parts of it.
guigui · 2 years ago
Yes, sorry. That's one of the many little features that we wanted to add but didn't make the cut. We may add this in a future update.
tambourine_man · 2 years ago
Excellent work, works great on mobile, which is rare for a web game
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks, making it available and actually playable on mobile was definitely a challenge. One of our inspiration for the mobile controls was the iOS version of the game The Witness.
cloudking · 2 years ago
Amazing work! How did you get the 3D engine to work so smoothly? Is this three.js?
guigui · 2 years ago
Yes, it's running on Three.js. This comment from co-author Franck roughly sums it up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40114297
iainmerrick · 2 years ago
I’m really impressed by the visual and audio design, and the graphics and audio implementation too. It’s great that it loads quickly - far too many online 3D games are stuck behind lengthy loading screens.
How big was the team and how long did it take to make it?
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks, this was done by a team of only 2 people over a span of 1.5 years, working on it intermittently between client projects, totaling approximately 5-6 months of work.
iainmerrick · 2 years ago
Wow, my guess was more like 4-6 people for a year. You guys are impressively multi-talented!
Jugurtha · 2 years ago
I booked first class but your system is buggy and put me in economy; now I'm stuck because I wasn't in the escape pod!
Someone should start a space ride hailing service. I bet the pod was yellow.
leetrout · 2 years ago
Lots of great projects. How can I experience TRACK in VR? I opened the site in my Quest 3 browser but it says webvr not supported.
franck · 2 years ago
About TRACK, sorry, the experience was released in 2018 and we need to update it so that it works with the WebXR API.
leetrout · 2 years ago
Ah! Ok, thanks for the reply!
donbrae · 2 years ago
Ah, you also did the Transmit 3D truck for the Panic website. Nice work!
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you!
modeless · 2 years ago
Unfortunately it is very stuttery on my Pixel 7 Pro, looks awesome though
guigui · 2 years ago
Sorry to hear that. That's weird, because we tested on a Pixel 3 and had decent performance.
modeless · 2 years ago
Yeah, it's not due to poor rendering performance. I can see it running at full frame rate between stutters. It may be some kind of timing issue? Here's a video of the problem: https://x.com/modeless/status/1782432663649087917
MartinoPalmitos · 2 years ago
I have the same phone (Pixel 7 Pro) and I have the same issue
tried Brave + Chrome with same results
01HNNWZ0MV43FF · 2 years ago
Oh weird. My pixel 4a on Firefox felt like it was not hitting 60. The audio was fine and it was playable but I couldn't find the cockpit so I gave up
BHSPitMonkey · 2 years ago
Seems great on my 6 (Firefox).
Gr4phTh3ory · 2 years ago
Could you increase the range for the mouse sensitivity option? I'm finding that even maxing it out results in painfully slow look speed.
kevincox · 2 years ago
I've found that `localStorage.mouseSensivity = 4` (the default max is 1) seems to set it to about the right amount. However mouse movement is now very jumpy. It seems that individual mouse events are visible and mouse acceleration curves cause very unpleasant behaviour.
Maybe it is something to a high resolution screen, so one CSS pixel is actually quite large?
arendtio · 2 years ago
Thanks for the hint. I like 8 even better.
3840x2160 with 150% Scaling, Firefox on Wayland (KDE) on Arch Linux.
Somehow, the mouse is not just slow but has a hard downtrend. After swiping 5 times left to right and back again. I look at my feet. The downtrend increases with higher mouse sensitivity.
RDaneel0livaw · 2 years ago
Same here! My mouse arm is getting a workout lifting and recentering 5 times per turn lol.
aledalgrande · 2 years ago
I guess it depends on your system settings. I have my Logitech set up to almost max speed/acceleration so it felt very natural to me.
jlund-molfese · 2 years ago
On a Mac/Safari, I noticed that looking around while holding the left mouse button down made it normal
paulrouget · 2 years ago
Hey :) I see you guys everywhere nowadays. Congrats, and happy to see you keep on doing amazing things!
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks, old friend. Always a pleasure to build cool stuff for a web browser, like in the good old days. ;)
franck · 2 years ago
Merci Paul :) happy to see your comment!
russdill · 2 years ago
On Linux/Chrome mouse look keeps snapping back. It's really frustrating and makes it unplayable for me
loeg · 2 years ago
I'm also on Linux Chrome but not experiencing that.
guigui · 2 years ago
Sorry about that. Does it happen also on this three.js example? https://threejs.org/examples/?q=pointerlock#misc_controls_po...
You can try to change the controls mode in the in-game menu (ESC key).
russdill · 2 years ago
The threejs pointer demo works great. Here's what I'm seeing in game:
https://i.imgur.com/YX2OqXz.mp4
Not sure if it matters, but I have multiple monitors
c0t300 · 2 years ago
it also happens to me, but not as bad as that. I'm on windows 11, rx570 and 3 monitors
madacol · 2 years ago
it happens to me a little bit too, but I am low on RAM, so I suspect is a performance issue
tkunk · 2 years ago
I'm on ubuntu 20/firefox using WASD controls, and the mouse always wants to look down unless I'm already staring straight down.
Great game!
smarri · 2 years ago
Love the project. How long did it take for you to conceive and launch? What tools or platforms would you recommend to use for anyone interested in a similar project? Thanks
guigui · 2 years ago
It roughly took 5-6 months in total over a span of 1-2 years (we paused development several times to work on client projects). I recommend diving into Three.js (or other WebGL libraries), and learning Blender or similar to create your own 3D scenes.
smarri · 2 years ago
Thank you!
iamcreasy · 2 years ago
Thank you for building it. Did you guys use Unity? The startup time is very low.
guigui · 2 years ago
The project runs on Three.js, a JavaScript WebGL library, which explains the low startup time.
Operyl · 2 years ago
No, they used Three.js among other things. Startup time was fast here, it’s probably just how long it takes you to download the game assets that determines speed in the end.
drittich · 2 years ago
Someone else mentioned babylon.js in this thread. Did you evaluate that and choose three.js over it?
guigui · 2 years ago
Babylon would have been a perfectly good choice to build this experience, but we have a preference for the three.js API.
rkagerer · 2 years ago
Played on Chrome on my Android phone in portrait mode, and the whole game I felt it was too zoomed in.
I was suspicious of that AI the whole time. Like, did it get sent into this asteroid field on purpose to destroy it because it was a threat? Were there other unconscious passengers locked in those rooms and if I died following some risky instruction would it simply wake the next one up? How could it practically see through my eyes and would I turn out to be an automated drone?
Would have liked a bit more subplot to explore. Eg. Fix the spinning satellite to utilize the Comms station. Gain access to the third floor in the lift. Poke around the AI control room to uncover sabotage.
Maybe I just missed some discoveries on my playthrough.
guigui · 2 years ago
All valid points, and I completely agree that the narrative could have a bit more depth to it. I really wish there were more puzzles to solve. However, at the end of the day, we had to keep the scope under control, which was already quite large for a two-person team.
yayitswei · 2 years ago
Congrats on shipping! I enjoyed my playthrough. I suspect it's the perfect length for blowing up on HN, since there's an emotional payoff for completing the game and if it were any longer, less people would complete it.
GuB-42 · 2 years ago
I also found the AI suspicious for a different reason. That is that it has its own agenda and is using me to do what it is not allowed to do. For some reason, the AI is not able to initiate a hyperspace jump, cannot bypass access, but can maneuver the ship through an asteroid field. As if it was not completely trusted.
And now, everyone else is gone, and I am getting ordered around by an AI, maybe because the AI considered me the easiest one to manipulate, maybe the AI deliberately entered the asteroid field to that goal.
Edit:
And I don't think the game really needs more content. It is not a big budget AAA production after all. What it could benefit from however is maybe some hints to something bigger. Things like personal items, messages on screen, maps, ads, writings on the wall, etc... It doesn't have to connect to a big story, but just hint that there is something, even if it is all bluff.
aledalgrande · 2 years ago
Haha a whole subreddit could spawn from the different lore hypothesis...
Drakim · 2 years ago
Especially when the AI told me to NOT look into the other passenger's rooms as they had already departed. Super sus.
csunbird · 2 years ago
The AI gave me the vibes of Umbrella Corporation, they are randomly kidnapping humans and replacing their recent memories with memories of this journey and testing the human behavior and competence through these subjects
dcormier · 2 years ago
I enjoyed it, but in Safari on iOS there was no sound at any point. I checked my device volume. I toggled the game option for sound on and off.
It just occurred to me that it may be because I have my phone ringer set to silent. That is indeed what caused it, which is not great as I don't want notifications to be making noise.
It also felt slightly too zoomed in (I even attempted to zoom out using my fingers).
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks, we'll keep this in mind for a possible future version.
joemi · 2 years ago
> It just occurred to me that it may be because I have my phone ringer set to silent. That is indeed what caused it, which is not great as I don't want notifications to be making noise.
I'm pretty sure that's the way it should be, isn't it? Whenever I want something/anything/everything to not make noise on my phone, I set it to silent. It's been that way since the very first iphone I ever owned (I think it was the 4).
weikju · 2 years ago
I can still listen to music and videos, with sound, while the ringer side button is set to off.
joemi · 2 years ago
Can you do that on webpages (which is what equinox.space is) without first pushing play or unmuting them? I know on youtube you have to unmute it first. I don't really go to any other music or video websites on my phone, so I'm not sure if they're all like that or not, but in my experience, webpages respect the ringer side button unless something is clicked to override it.
weikju · 2 years ago
Sure, within the website I have to unmute it and up my volume to hear anything, but it's still playing without me having to switch off the physical DND mode button on the side of the iphone. My phone remains in DND mode and I still have no audible notifications.
gr8r · 2 years ago
fantastic work!
also game is tough? waiting for the walkthroughs lol
armanr7 · 2 years ago
Super impressive. I wish I could play any video game on the web like this. How long did this take to build?
guigui · 2 years ago
Thank you. Answered here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40114774
sgt · 2 years ago
I can't wait 2500 years, are there hibernation pods anywhere on the ship?
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
Nope, but there is cafeteria :-P
sgt · 2 years ago
There's always the chance of being picked up by someone who figured out your trajectory. Here's to hoping!
grdeken · 2 years ago
Really impressive, congratulations. How many hours of TLC went into building this?
b112 · 2 years ago
Running firefox + linux. Mouse works fine in mouse only mode, in gamer/keyboard+mouse, the mouse is out of control. Often, moving the mouse in any direction, moves the mouse continuously left (for example). Other times, the tiniest twitch moves the screen in crazy flying loops.
Tried the speed setting down to 10, barely made a difference.
Not sure if other FF users are experiencing the same thing?
edit:
Just finished it... Good game! I hope you expand it, because you've definitely got something fun here.
yetihehe · 2 years ago
Tried it on firefox on linux and windows, both work good in gamer mode.
GiorgioG · 2 years ago
That was fun - thanks!
FrustratedMonky · 2 years ago
Really nice, smooth. If this is hobby project, it is amazing. It is pretty good for an indie game. Real half-life/portal feel.
adamredwoods · 2 years ago
Super cool escape-room-esque game! I wish though, that the click-to-walk was a bit more pre-defined paths. For example, If I click on a spot thinking I could interact with it, I walk to the wall and am now so close to the wall that it becomes disorientating, and I have to click back to view the room.
quicon · 2 years ago
Congratulations, I really enjoyed it. I never play videogames and I'm on mobile, but I engaged instantly.
windowshopping · 2 years ago
Maybe you should play videogames....seems you would enjoy them.
bdastous · 2 years ago
Please add a "reverse y-axis" option for mouselook!
qwertox · 2 years ago
This was awesome.
I was concerned that it would continue after the warp, because I knew I would not have been able to stop playing. 100% pure fun while it lasted.
guigui · 2 years ago
Thank you, glad you got to enjoy our little warp visual effect!
_HMCB_ · 2 years ago
This is the most amazing experience I’ve ever had on the web. Bar none. I’m blown away.
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you for your kind words, we really appreciate it.
wkat4242 · 2 years ago
Thanks for sharing this here! I'll try it tomorrow as it's late night here.
Sorry to see this post is getting spam bombed for some reason :( Because it's one of the most interesting things I saw in the last days
BalinKing · 2 years ago
A bunch of other posts on the front page are getting bombarded with these spam messages too... I figure dang is probably aware by now (although idk what specific measures HN has against this sort of thing).
appel · 2 years ago
I'm probably showing my age, but I'm just at awe what is possible in a browser in this day and age. Well done, OP. I'd love a hashed out, full length version of this, but with the same vector graphics.
torginus · 2 years ago
I mean, WebGL was released in 2011, so this kind of thing was possible for like 13 years. If you go back once again as much, to 1998, the web has barely existed back then.
There were things, like Epic Citadel, a full port of Unreal Engine to the browser (using asm.js, a technique of compiling assembly to Javascript) a decade ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KRBuVBjVo
And yeah even that somehow feels futuristic today.
nickjj · 2 years ago
I especially liked the "Connecting..." sound. It's inescapable even in the future!
aledalgrande · 2 years ago
It was such a big let down. How could the AI make a mistake in the route calculation?!
Seriously though, amazing implementation and vibe! (and a lesson to not let GPT drive your spaceship)
ellis0n · 2 years ago
Amazing demo! This reminded me of the spaceship my friend and I made in the level editor of Duke Nukem 3D. Unfortunately, my legendary map got lost along with my old disk.
elorant · 2 years ago
I'd like it to save my progress with some cookie instead of having to play it all from scratch every time.
remram · 2 years ago
It's 10min long...
natkiny · 2 years ago
Nice work !!
hackton · 2 years ago
I am very much impressed by this project. The smoothly rendering on the browser, stunning graphics and captivating music create an immersive journey. And I always love to discover some Easter eggs. Bravo!
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks hackton. Really appreciate it!
While creating Equinox, it frequently felt like we were working on tiny details that hardly anyone would notice. But ultimately I believe that immersion largely relies on the accumulation of all these small additions.
desdenova · 2 years ago
The sarcastic remarks from the computer were definitely great.
timClicks · 2 years ago
The dial-up modem sound was gold.
the_real_cher · 2 years ago
very cool! it delayed me getting out of bed for 15 minutes. worked great on android phone.
great atmosphere music graphics and sense of humour.
is 3js the only technology you all used to make this?
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks for the feedback! We used the Three.js WebGL library and a custom-built game engine for the various interactions, pathfinding and game logic. We modeled the scenes in Blender and SideFX Houdini, and also baked lightmaps with Blender.
abj · 2 years ago
Amazing job! Any specific settings in Three.js you used to get the great mobile performance? Really interested in seeing anything you'd like to share about how you optimized performance. Amazing work!
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks!
Nothing specific regarding mobile but we worked on rendering optimizations quite a bit to make the experience smooth. Most notably the render pipeline is based on MRT (Multiple Render Targets) which renders multiple frames at the same time, which is great when doing post-processing stuff. Also we made sure to keep the number of draw calls quite low by merging static objects. There is also a lot of culling going on, hiding rooms that are not visible.
We'll probably post more technical details on X in the coming days/weeks, be sure to follow us if you're interested.
the_real_cher · 2 years ago
Awewome thx for the info. Its inspiring.
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
I've noticed that pathfinding works on mobile mode!
I was impressed that it is present there. I would expect camer to fly directly to target location.
franck · 2 years ago
The same engine runs on both desktop and mobile, pathfinding performance wasn't an issue on mobile. We knew from the beginning that it was important for mobile controls to be "smart" and to assist the player as much as possible in getting around.
ryukoposting · 2 years ago
At breakfast so I can't play right now, but those are some buttery-smooth animations on a new Android running Firefox. Nice work.
mikae1 · 2 years ago
The only thing I'm seeing is a spinning globe on FF for Android. Smooth, but I guess I'm missing something...
KineticLensman · 2 years ago
I had to switch to Edge to get it to work.
Can't find that damned access token though.
alalp · 2 years ago
Check the storage room accessible from the main "hub"
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks for the bug report. We'll have to figure out what could be causing this issue.
mikae1 · 2 years ago
To be precise, Mull browser (a Firefox fork).
burkaman · 2 years ago
Mull probably has WebGL disabled as an anti-fingerprinting measure.
bscphil · 2 years ago
I experienced this in Librewolf as well, it happens when WebGL is disabled. Should probably present a visible error to the user when this happens.
alje · 2 years ago
That was also the case for me (FF for Android), and I eventually found that I have WebGl disabled by default. Everything worked as expected after I resumed. FF animations run quite smoothly. Good work for developers.
reaperman · 2 years ago
Delightful experience from start to finish. Thanks for showing what web apps are capable of at the moment. It would make sense to title this "Show HN: "
asicsp · 2 years ago
Show HN is for authors submitting their own work...
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks! About "Show HN:", we would have done so but someone else posted it so we have no control over the title.
echoangle · 2 years ago
It would only be Show HN if OP were the creator, which they are not, I think.
carlnewton · 2 years ago
This is amazing! The visual style is stunning. This actually comes very close to a style of game I've wanted to exist for a long time. The premise being this: You're on a ship going between destinations, but there's no light-speed shortcut, or jump-cut to the destination. Instead, you have to maintain the ship for the entire duration of the journey. Making sacrifices in power and computing ability to resolve problems that occur throughout the ship.
ta1243 · 2 years ago
Just had a few seconds, A/D is strafing as I'd expect
carlnewton · 2 years ago
I just opened it again to make sure I wasn't imaginging it. Oddly enough, A works to strafe left for me, but D doesn't work to strafe right. I'm using Firefox 121.0.
Edit: ignore me! It's one of my plugins!
cess11 · 2 years ago
If someone is using Vimium or something similar and aren't aware yet, entering input mode, usually 'i', will let key-presses slip by the plugin input parser and go straight to the web page.
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it! I like your idea a lot, I would definitely play this.
peddling-brink · 2 years ago
That sounds similar to a sub-plot in Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Very interesting book!
carlnewton · 2 years ago
I've never heard of it, but I'm on the lookout for a new sci-fi read, so I think I'll get it! Thanks!
SamBam · 2 years ago
Don't read it if you're terrified of spiders. Otherwise, it's a great book.
joshstrange · 2 years ago
I hate spiders but I was able to get past it for this series. That and A Deepness in the Sky.
RA2lover · 2 years ago
See Tharsis (https://store.steampowered.com/app/323060/Tharsis/) and Seedship (https://johnayliff.itch.io/seedship).
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
Wow. I didn't know that Seedship is available in browser.
Played it on Android long time ago.
rom16384 · 2 years ago
This game reminds me of the 90's FMV game Mission Critical [1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission_Critical_(video_game)
FragmentShader · 2 years ago
> you have to maintain the ship for the entire duration of the journey. Making sacrifices in power and computing ability to resolve problems that occur throughout the ship.
There's a multiplayer game where you get in a match and play tiny minigames where you fix the issues of the ship, and once you fix them all, you win.
The twist is, there is an assasin among all players, and his goal is to sabotage your ship even more and to kill everyone, without getting caught. So the duration of the journey is only based on how quick you either fix the ship, find the impostor or die.
Wish I could remember the name, it was pretty popular during the pandemic.
TimSchumann · 2 years ago
I think you're thinking of Among Us.
FragmentShader · 2 years ago
Yeah! Thanks :)
daelon · 2 years ago
https://spacestation13.com/ maybe?
ZeWaka · 2 years ago
Yeah this isn't the right game, but is much closer to a full game based on that idea than among us.
0xEF · 2 years ago
Are you thinking of SpaceTeam? We had a ton of fun with this game at a previous job.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sleepingbe...
0xEF · 2 years ago
Scratch that, I missed a paragraph in OP's post about the assassin. Definitely not SpaceTeam and more likely Among Us.
Give SpaceTeam a try anyway. You have to love a game that bills itself as a "cooperative shouting game."
rzzzt · 2 years ago
Spaceteam also exists as a physical card game, the mechanics seem to be a bit different from the app (not sure which one of them was released first) but is still lots of fun and shouting.
rkagerer · 2 years ago
Among Us.
I tried it once and was looking forward to it, but it was just a bunch of kids running around with no coordination whatsoever killing each other. After a few plays I asked Steam for a refund. Maybe I was doing it wrong and should have tried it with friends.
OkayPhysicist · 2 years ago
Yeah, random lobbies are absolutely unplayable. Lobbies that are coordinated in some public Discord server tend to be a coinflip if they're going to be passable or not. But the game really shines when you have a core group of people to play with that all engage with it in good faith.
Of course, all those groups burnt out on the game after playing way too much of it over the pandemic, so it is what it is.
helboi4 · 2 years ago
I've only played among us as in private lobbies with friends to have fun during the pandemic. That's why it was so popular. Would never think to play it online with strangers. There's really not much to it its just about as complex as a simple boardgame. It was just a way to easily socialise with everyone you knew even if they weren't a hardcore gamer during lockdown.
bombcar · 2 years ago
Online boardgames is a good way to look at it - https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/products/red-november/ and similar for example
FragmentShader · 2 years ago
I played mostly with friends and it was fun.
When I first got into public lobbies - yeah, everybody was a kid and the first color shouted into the chat would get kicked.
The trick I found was to switch the search language to English as I was in European servers with my native language. That way, I would match with Europeans that manually changed their language to English as well... or just british kids.
Anyways, it got way better, no more "red is sus" and then kicking without proof. But then everyone was too rude. People always got EXTREMELY angry when I found who the impostors were by either using the cameras or just remembering who was with who + kill spots + behaviour. Like, we win the game because I confirmed the users were impostors based on actual proof, then they cuss me and ban me from the lobby!
So, yeah, I kinda not played much in public lobbies for these reasons. But with friends it was fun!
michaelmior · 2 years ago
Not the game you were thinking of, but Spaceteam is a very fun game with a related premise. You're flying a ship and the ship is breaking down so you need to activate the right controls to keep it moving.
The ship will tell you what controls need to be activate, but the catch is that each player only has access to a portion of the controls, but will receive instructions for all them. Cue lots of yelling back and forth to try to communicate the appropriate directions :)
FrontierProject · 2 years ago
Space Station 13 is a much deeper take on a similar premise.
remram · 2 years ago
Event[0] is much closer
nmarinov · 2 years ago
FTL: Faster Than Light is sort of similar to your premise but the style is very different - it's a roguelike RTS.
https://subsetgames.com/ftl.html
> In FTL you experience the atmosphere of running a spaceship trying to save the galaxy. It's a dangerous mission, with every encounter presenting a unique challenge with multiple solutions.
> What will you do if a heavy missile barrage shuts down your shields?
> - Reroute all power to the engines in an attempt to escape?
> - Power up additional weapons to blow your enemy out of the sky?
> - Or take the fight to them with a boarding party?
Matumio · 2 years ago
Warning, FTL can be addictive. It has a heavy luck dependence that makes you want to try again.
That said, the game mechanics are really well done and give you options for creative problem solving. For example your pilot increases the chance to evade missiles. Unless he is busy extinguishing a fire in another room. So instead you can open a door to space and power down your own oxygen supply. And use that power to charge a second weapon.
jrrv · 2 years ago
I have pages of notes for a game like this that I've been thinking about since university, largely inspired by Battlestar Galactica and The Expanse. This game reminded me of it too, maybe I'll get to it one day.
buzzy_hacker · 2 years ago
> You're on a ship going between destinations, but there's no light-speed shortcut, or jump-cut to the destination. Instead, you have to maintain the ship for the entire duration of the journey.
Neptune's Pride [0] is a fantastic real-time strategy game that has this feature without the maintenance part. You play the game over the course of days instead of minutes or hours. And it may take hours for your ships to reach their destinations. A ton of fun with friends.
gr8r · 2 years ago
had my vote at the landing page
davidw · 2 years ago
> the entire duration of the journey
Sounds a bit like 'Desert Bus'
https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/desert-b...
LanternLight83 · 2 years ago
Sunless Seas and Sunless Skys are two narrative-driven games in the Fallen London universe which otherwise hit a lot of these beats.
taink · 2 years ago
I can recommend Tin Can, which is somewhat similar to what you're talking about.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1315980/Tin_Can/
You maintain an evacuation pod for as long as you can to survive the small journey (I think it can take as much as 30 minutes?) between the ship you're escaping and safety.
It's not perfect but it might scratch your itch.
alisonatwork · 2 years ago
You might enjoy FAR: Lone Sails. I was a bit frustrated by having to spend most of the game running around fixing stuff, but if that mechanic appeals to you then it's surely one of the prettier running-around-fixing-stuff games there is.
I also started a game a while back called Still There which seems like that's what it's going to be, but I haven't completed it yet so don't want to pass judgement. You're on a space station and not a ship, though, and it's point-and-click.
Gulthor · 2 years ago
A finely crafted piece of art. Out of curiosity, do you plan to make this project open source? I'd be curious to learn about some the technical details.
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it. We have no plans for open sourcing it at the moment. We'll tweet more details on how we made it, soon-ish.
desdenova · 2 years ago
Looks amazing, great work.
One suggestion: add the option to invert the touch camera controls. It feels weird to rotate the world rather than the camera in a first person game, and I'm constantly rotating in the opposite direction than intended.
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you! This is a feature we are planning to add in the near future. We used the same controls as Google Maps street view but perhaps for a game it can feel a bit weird.
gamebak · 2 years ago
amazing to see this working with decent frames in the browser, congrats!
ydnaclementine · 2 years ago
Really good, and the music after the first thing that doesn't go as expected is particularly good.
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks for the music appreciation, it means a lot!
soci · 2 years ago
awesome piece of work. ai can’t find the cockpit though.
franck · 2 years ago
Thank you. Hint: look for a door which doesn't look like the others in the central hub.
addandsubtract · 2 years ago
It's not in the hub, though. You have to go past the hub first.
enigmashot · 2 years ago
i found the little yellow thing in that room and i was expecting it to enable the elevator but no luck.. what am i missing?
efilife · 2 years ago
behind the "restricted door" you will find another door that leads to the cockpit
soci · 2 years ago
I tried to open another door with Restricted title in it and didn't open. I assumed all "restricted" doors would have the same fate.
soci · 2 years ago
Thank you. While I really want to check your hint, I won't. Since there's no way to save progress this would be my fourth attempt to play the game from the start [1]. Maybe saving status would have it make it different for me. Please, don't take me wrong, the game looks amazing, reminds me of the old times of Mac Classic gaming, but I'm no gamer.
[1] I'm on an iphone, and I always tapped back to get to HN again so I lost progress every time I tried your game.
tmilard · 2 years ago
Very nice graphics and design. I wonder who would ne the client for such a 3D game. And how much (about) it cost to build such a game.
tarr11 · 2 years ago
here’s another one by the same studio
promiseofbeans · 2 years ago
Wasn't this on the front page of hn a day or two ago?
hammock · 2 years ago
Hollywood level storytelling ,visual and sound design. Nice job. The music was great
jordemort · 2 years ago
I'm sure it's not the fault of the game, but this straight-up crashed my machine after about a minute of play. Screen froze, everything went unresponsive for a couple seconds, then I got about half a second of a pure magenta screen, and my machine rebooted. M1 Pro Macbook Pro, Sonoma 14.4.1, Firefox 125.0.1.
jordemort · 2 years ago
Doesn't seem like the crash is repeating itself. Now it is running fine. The first time through, it died right after I was told to open the door but right before the door became openable.
rafram · 2 years ago
> then I got about half a second of a pure magenta screen
That's an Apple hardware classic. Sorry to report that your GPU might be shot. (Hopefully it was just a one-time fault, though.)
Ono-Sendai · 2 years ago
Nah probably buggy Mac OpenGL drivers
jordemort · 2 years ago
It would be a shame, just a tragedy, if this machine suffered catastrophic hardware failure with 3 months left on my AppleCare contract :)
dev-tacular · 2 years ago
Oh no! How will you ever recover? /s
swozey · 2 years ago
I'm on a 14" M1 Max from 12/2021 and my AC+ expires in 2025. I'm pretty sure you can buy it right before your warranty expires to extend it. But maybe you bought 1 year of AC+ and can't extend it after?
This was my first AC+ purchase.
Also my battery has been at 79% Service Battery health for about a year. I forgot to use AlDente to limit the battery to 80% but do it now and it hasn't gone down.
edit: Jesus I just realized 2025 is next year. Totally thought I had like 3 years left.. nevermind..
rvba · 2 years ago
Reminds me a bit by "mystery of time and space" flash game. That someone is rewriting in html5
jeroen79 · 2 years ago
very nice concept!
elwell · 2 years ago
Music reminded me slightly of Perfect Dark.
Waking up on a spaceship reminded me of The Journeyman Project.
mare5x · 2 years ago
The music reminded me of Super Hexagon.
franck · 2 years ago
Oh I loved the Journeyman Project as a kid and I didn't think of it at all when creating Equinox, but thanks to your comment I'm now starting to think it had some unconscious influence!
whitepaint · 2 years ago
I never play games but this was actually fun. Are there PC games that have a similar concept that can run on not a very powerful laptop?
degenerate · 2 years ago
You would likely enjoy Myst: https://www.gog.com/en/game/myst_masterpiece_edition
Related HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18058991
timnetworks · 2 years ago
Stanley Parable / Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist are two (from the same devs) that stand out in recent memory. Myst (and Riven and there are like six total ending with a fully 3d Obduction) are cult classics and already referenced.
qingcharles · 2 years ago
There's a few like this on Sandbox that work fine on my 13 year old Lenovo PC:
alisonatwork · 2 years ago
Depending how powerful your laptop...
- Californium
- Electric Highways
- Fugue in Void
- NORTH
- Off-Peak (and sequels)
- The Station
- Tacoma
- They Came From A Communist Planet
- TIMEframe
These are all sci-fi walking sims, which is the genre of "wander around a strange place trying to figure out what happened and/or how to get out". Some walking sims have more of a traditional narrative and some have less, some are short (under an hour) and others are longer, some are comedic and some are more serious. There are lots and lots that aren't sci-fi too.
Probably the most accessible here is Tacoma, but it can get pretty rough on Intel graphics. If you want a free one you could try Electric Highways or Off-Peak, or if you don't care that they're not sci-fi you could try Gravity Bone, A Bewitching Revolution or Dr. Langeskov (suggested in a sibling comment).
nexoft · 2 years ago
bien joué!
workingdog · 2 years ago
When I learned my fellow passengers had escaped, I knew this game was for me. I love a bit of fun without ghoulish death.
ijontic · 2 years ago
That's so good! I haven't played a computer game in ages. But the atmosphere here, the graphics, the sound captivated me from the beginning. And soon enough, I felt that desire again, to solve the next puzzle... just like the last time in the 90s... um... with Simon the Sorcerer. Thank you for that!
franck · 2 years ago
Wow thank you, this comment made my day. Really glad that our little project could make you experience that feeling again! Adventure games from the 90s definitely played their part as an inspiration for this.
the_duke · 2 years ago
If this was a demo for a full-fledged game, I would have bought the game immediately.
duckmysick · 2 years ago
> Simon the Sorcerer
Well done, I haven't heard that name for close to 30 years. Brings back good memories.
thomasfromcdnjs · 2 years ago
Exactly the same for me.
ikt · 2 years ago
this is amazing
anyone have a solution for turning the power generator on? I matched the squares with the tetris style symbols on the power generator but then nothing happened :S
jasonsb · 2 years ago
You have to match the colors as well.
ikt · 2 years ago
ty!
SamBam · 2 years ago
It's a classically-done puzzle with a classic hint. One of the colors is correct, so if you just put in all the shapes that are in front of each console, one core starts spinning. That triggers you to understand that you're part-way there but are missing something.
It's nice when puzzle creators take the time to scaffold their puzzles.
w-ll · 2 years ago
I had to come to the comments, i was looking for the hint, but the shape being the same drab blue made me miss it. i noticed the rings colors, but not the shape
linuxguy2 · 2 years ago
Did you match colors too?
simne · 2 years ago
I've tried few things, even written script to show all possible configurations.
But once, I seen tetris style symbol on sector illuminated by red color.
I remembered symbol and check consoles until found red console, and enter there shape....
simne · 2 years ago
BTW just for fun, my perl script:
perl -e 'for ($num = 0; $num <256; $num++) { $width = 8; printf("%*b\n", $width, $num) }'
harpiaharpyja · 2 years ago
It sounds like other people have gotten this to work. For me it just hangs on "Launching..."
stockhorn · 2 years ago
I had to reload the page on Android FF, then I got past "Loading"
Oras · 2 years ago
That modem sound!
lxe · 2 years ago
Very polished throughout. I wouldn't mind playing a full length puzzle adventure like this in the browser.
ilvez · 2 years ago
Was playing in mobile and constantly wanted to zoom out, because the view was too narrow.
jasonjmcghee · 2 years ago
Bug report:
On iOS, I rotated to landscape and then portrait and it became permanently zoomed in. (even when I rotated back to landscape)
guigui · 2 years ago
Thanks, we'll look into it.
justsomehnguy · 2 years ago
Got me Von Braun flashbacks.
4k rendering is slow on the integrated Ryzen 3 machine. Any way to lower rendering resolution?
Mobile FF just hangs after trying to load.
999900000999 · 2 years ago
Great performance running on Android mobile!
I'd legit pay 10$ for this, let it be an episodic adventure!
nathell · 2 years ago
Where do I donate to the authors?
timnetworks · 2 years ago
Runs right in a browser, Linux/Firefox. Game devs, take note!
nharada · 2 years ago
Really awesome, well done!
thelittleone · 2 years ago
Oh damn.. I played it out... got me invested in this guys soul.... and ready to hand over some $. Was engaging and fun. Super inspiring.
maerF0x0 · 2 years ago
Sierra/Vivendi/Activision/Microsoft should revive the Space Quest brand and make something like this.
Edit: also have you considered doing a how I made / tutorial series on youtube ?
guigui · 2 years ago
We sure hope that game publishers/studios will find Equinox inspiring.
We're working on some behind-the-scenes content that will most likely be published on X and LinkedIn. You can follow us if you're interested: https://twitter.com/glecollinet
masterkram · 2 years ago
amazing, reminds me of the opening scene of jedi knights of the old republic.
sonicrocketman · 2 years ago
I thought exactly the same thing.
benreesman · 2 years ago
This thing runs hot shit on a generation-behind iPhone.
That’s tight code.
ambicapter · 2 years ago
Every time I hit 'W' Firefox highlights the letter, meaning the help menu comes up.
Perseids · 2 years ago
You probably have Find As You Type enabled? http://kb.mozillazine.org/Accessibility.typeaheadfind
It's probably pretty rare nowadays, since it's off by default and rather hidden in the settings dialog ("Search for text when you start typing"). I had it activated up until (quite) a few years ago, and I think I switched it off, because of bad JavaScript interactions.
ambicapter · 2 years ago
That's weird, I don't think I've ever turned it on. Thanks!
mcoliver · 2 years ago
"if only your economy pod included an escape pod"
lagt_t · 2 years ago
I'm surprised by the performance, I've seen lighter 3js projects slower than a powerpoint.
todotask · 2 years ago
Adding a torch light would be helpful, especially if you work in these situations.
devmor · 2 years ago
That was so fun and cool. I found myself wanting more. I would kill for a Myst-style game with this setting and feel.
Klonoar · 2 years ago
Probably the most impressive browser-based game I've played in my 20+ years of being on the web. Hats off to the creators, very nicely done.
Parts of it gave me Metroid Prime vibes that I haven't felt since I was a kid.
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks a lot for your kind words! Metroid Prime wasn't a direct inspiration but it may certainly have had some influence on us, as we loved playing that game when we were younger.
steve_adams_86 · 2 years ago
I really want to keep playing. Well done! That was a lot of fun.
TimCTRL · 2 years ago
How are y'all turning on the generator? I'm stuck.
pmx · 2 years ago
The patterns
qingcharles · 2 years ago
What patterns??
Edit: I see them now. Tiny little embossed patterns on the round parts with the lights inside the generator.
mikebrockman · 2 years ago
excellent job making an intuitive game map! I was nervous I was going to get lost looking around the ship
darkwizard42 · 2 years ago
Wow, what an amazing escape game!!!
ed_mercer · 2 years ago
Alien Isolation flashbacks…
not_a_dane · 2 years ago
good game :) I just initiated the warp system but had no time to play more.
SamBam · 2 years ago
That was the end (as far as I can tell).
yreg · 2 years ago
This is beautiful.
I noticed something: The player character feels really tall to me. Or perhaps the doors are short? I subconsciously kept looking downward. I'm not a particularly tall person, but I don't remember feeling this way in a game before.
Has anyone had a similar experience?
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks! About the character height, it's set at 1.6m and all the environment is supposed to be at the right scale, but perhaps we made the doors a bit too short. We tried to convey a bit of claustrophobic feeling, especially in the lower level, as you would expect in this kind of spaceship.
iamsanteri · 2 years ago
The craziest thing is that those AI assistants coming up early in this game don't feel so far off anymore...
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
That's amazing!
And it weights only 45 MiB! How did you achieve this? And most of it is sounds, what looks like.
It's built with babylonjs?
guigui · 2 years ago
Three.js.
Why it weighs only 45mb: the 3D environment isn’t that detailed, and we use Draco compression on the model files which has huge benefits in terms of file size. In addition, the art style requires few textures, and we use KTX2 compression. The audio files are indeed the largest assets.
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
I really liked art style!
Looks great with minimum textures :)
Great job!
SuperHeavy256 · 2 years ago
If this is your idea of "isn't that detailed"... please make a full game that isn't that detailed.
More detail would actually subtract from the experience. Keep it like this. This feels just right.
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
Why are so many users gushing over this games 3D environment? It's empty and cel shaded, it's about as normal as normal gets but people are eating it up left right and centre.
It reminds me of standard indie games with cel shading.
efilife · 2 years ago
Because it looks pleasant
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
Just looks like most cel shading games except you don't need shadows, complex details and everything has been run through a soft glower.
Reminds me of old flash games, just with high resolutions.
swah · 2 years ago
And that shader that makes everything glows... most of us aren't checking gaming releases on Steam so it just broke a barrier maybe.
meheleventyone · 2 years ago
Art direction > technical prowess.
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
The art direction is non-existant here. I think people are just liking the technical smoothness of it but it uses a 3D library for that?
meheleventyone · 2 years ago
Strong disagree, art direction is about how the game looks. For example this is their choices for how to render the scene and how they achieved that technically: https://x.com/glecollinet/status/1783805898428715070
I honestly don't understand how you could look at something with that strong a visual style and think there was no intention.
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
Just because you use the standard graphics development blocks of a game does not mean it has significant art direction.
Why is there a couch with no real TV, why is there an opening at the top with no couch or seat looking out, why are all the development techniques just base level shader passes? Why is there no new take on what space ship interiors look like? Why is there no detail?
meheleventyone · 2 years ago
Ahh, okay you just don’t know enough to know enough. None of those complaints show that the game lacks art direction, some even have extremely little to do with it and some of them are really obvious artistic choices.
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
I know enough, and they do.
alisonatwork · 2 years ago
This is the thread that is here to remind us that lots of people in the tech industry aren't gamers, and especially not PC/indie gamers.
simne · 2 years ago
Cool.
I only could suggest, for hackers don't show hints of code shapes (for engine consoles), just make less buttons, so for example, just 64 possible variants, so real hacker could just find code by brute force.
Other possible idea, sough harder to implement, to use rotating dials and issue some shake of screen when approach right number on some dial.
chrisan · 2 years ago
manual brute force doesn't really sound like a fun way to "hack"
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
That was a point, for player to notice code.
Brut-forcing won't be fun.
To be honest I didn't notice glyphs at first.
arcastroe · 2 years ago
This is amazing. The movement is very similar to movements in VR worlds. Would be awesome to integrate with the VR web apis to play this on an oculus as well.
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks. I guess a potential issue would be rendering the outlines because it's implemented with post-processing and I'm not sure how it would look in VR.
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
With that art direction you can release game on Steam!
There are some games made in JS with Electron.
And I wish your team luck with your consultancy bussines and making interactive experiences.
But I think you can achieve something in game dev as well!
franck · 2 years ago
Much appreciated, thanks! Releasing a successful game on Steam would be amazing of course but it's not easy, to say the least. I hope we'll manage to do it some day!
vendiddy · 2 years ago
Want to give this a try later but just wanted to say the artistic style is beautiful. Good work!
aetherspawn · 2 years ago
Well done, the aesthetic is excellent.
reimertz · 2 years ago
amazing work, I could not stop playing. I wish there was more after the warp.
franck · 2 years ago
Thanks a lot. I wish there was more too, but we unfortunately had to keep the project's scope under control! Lots of puzzle ideas and content were cut.
winnie_ua · 2 years ago
Only bug I've noticed -- you can move through doors before they fully opened. (using keyboard and mouse mode)
Cockbrand · 2 years ago
This is a thing of great beauty, even on a phone. Congrats!
yayitswei · 2 years ago
This is a hit, congrats on your success! My favorite part is sound and music design: the SFX and music mesh well, the transitions are seamless and intentional e.g. when the warp stalls there is also a breakdown on beat.
rangerelf · 2 years ago
I absolutely loved it, thank you so much :-D Had to close the window tab because if I didn't I'd still be there, too immersive, so much fun.
Again, thank you!
akaike · 2 years ago
Amazing small game, visuals and sound! Love it. 11/10
lacoolj · 2 years ago
Imagine if a company used something like this to advertise their product.
Not sure ROI would be there but maaaaaaaan would it be a cool ad to play with
jomsk1e · 2 years ago
Nice! I'm drowning in a sea of backlogs and this is the first thing I saw this morning. Totally worth it! Only thing I can feedback is to add a jump action using spacebar. Overall, it is awesome!
SuperHeavy256 · 2 years ago
I love, love, love the visual style of this game. It's so aesthetically pleasing!
But even more than that, the game felt crisp. Movement, Mechanics, Voice Acting- all done fantastically. Just a 10/10 demo.
Now make a full game like this! I assure you, it'll take the internet by storm.
seoulmetro · 2 years ago
It's just standard cel shading? Maybe I didn't play enough but it just seemed like a standard game. The mouse movement was good though.
lukejagg · 2 years ago
Wow, this is an amazing project. The 3D rendering runs so well. I'm curious how they got it to look so good with high performance on web.
SushiHippie · 2 years ago
Really awesome! Normally when games are posted on HN I don't give them much attention, but for this one I grabbed my headset, and I' do it again!
One nitpick, the mouse speed is IMO too slow, I've set it to 100 in the game settings but I still needed to drag my mouse way further than normal to rotate the player. I grabbed my trackball mouse so I don't need to move the mouse itself that far and then it was a bit more playable.
Would it be possible to increase the mouse speed further than 100?
xvfLJfx9 · 2 years ago
Very cool! I hope you expand on this, maybe by introducing some sort of alient threat that is aboard the ship? Great demo, I enjoyed it!
xyst · 2 years ago
webgl is truly under utilized. this is a great display of what is possible, especially for games.
xwowsersx · 2 years ago
This was absolutely incredible. I was completely immersed. Now sitting back and enjoying the cafe.
anonzzzies · 2 years ago
Very well done! Enjoyable and just short enough to do before work!
system2 · 2 years ago
Incredible work. Reminds me of the VR Game holoball, mixed with Star Trek and Elite Dangerous. This was amazing. Sucks that I am stuck at the cafe for a long time though. :D
lynguist · 2 years ago
I don’t know how to activate the power using the three colored 3x3 fields…
Edit: The correct symbols are right in front of you when you face the 3x3 fields.
siraben · 2 years ago
Smooth experience! I loved the details such as the assistant getting a bit annoyed when you go to the vending machine for a drink or “I regret to inform you…” when you try to use the internet terminal on board.
sebastianconcpt · 2 years ago
I loved it! The ambience, music voice acting and rendering style. Fantastic work!
wishfish · 2 years ago
That was quite nice. Would love to see a full game in this environment one day, but I'm also happy this particular one was short. Perfect length for showing off this team's talents.
It's funny how many of us distrusted the AI. I guess games + movies have taught us the AI is always up to something.
guhsnamih · 2 years ago
Loved everything except the controls. I must be the only one who found it impossible to navigate.
artemonster · 2 years ago
why is this lagging in chrome, but works fine on phone and firefox? do I have something wrong with settings?
agnosticmantis · 2 years ago
For a moment I thought Andrej Karpathy was the voice actor for the AI Assistant in the game.
baobabKoodaa · 2 years ago
I have never seen a ThreeJS project as polished as this one. Everything was spot on! Pacing of the storytelling, difficulty of the puzzles, art style, synchronization of audio to events in the game... everything was just so good. As other commenters have noted, I do hope you move from corporate advertisements into game development! (No judgment on corporate advertisements from me, it's just that I would love to play games made by you.)
ezekg · 2 years ago
Did anybody find a credit for the vending machine? I was hoping there was one somewhere, or another easter egg, but I couldn't find one. Regardless, great job. I was captivated through multiple play throughs. Reminds me of another short game called Xibalba[^1] that I enjoyed just as much.
Makes me want to give Bevy another spin and try doing a short story-driven FPS as well.
p.s. it's impressive that this was written in THREE.basic, judging by the cockpit monitors. :)
