HMS Sunflower

Box Text

People live in giant craters surrounded by impassable mountains on a planet without oceans. The Okistan militaristic empire attacks the Niland Kingdom, known for its farmland. An overwhelming fleet of flying battleships crosses the mountains between craters and makes rapid progress. A significant part of your homeland crater is occupied. You, the captain of the unique prototype flying battleship HMS Sunflower, are tasked with a special mission.

Will you be able to repel the invaders?

Gameplay Overview

RPG Elements

• Explore a branching story: some branches are decided randomly at the start of a new game, while others are locked until you reach a particular ending.
• Power up: you can blitz through the story or explore to rank up your crew and unlock new perks, find new items for your character, upgrade your ship modules, or acquire better ammo and fuel for your ship.

Reference (Stories: Path of Destinies): All possible endings screen with 4 "truth" on the right - 4 unlocks of new branch options.

Arcade Bullet Hell and Platformer Elements

• Side view shoot-'em-up: pilot your ship using physics-based thrusters, fighting against gravity and inertia to dodge, and aiming to hit critical parts of enemy ships.
• Switch to your character: run around your ship to fix damaged modules or fight off boarding parties. Do not forget that the ship is still maneuvering and the battle is ongoing!

Reference (HighFleet): Arcade battle with physics based thrusters and dodging

Art Style

Environment

Hard sci-fi, WW2, early 1900s aesthetic. De-saturated colors with primary colors blue and white - blue skies and white clouds, brutal flying armored battleships painted light gray and white. Cities with skyscrapers in classic architectural style surrounded by grasslands and sunflower fields. Age of chemical and heavy manufacturing industry. Simple plastics, radio, but no digital computers or radars yet.

Arcade Battle

Resembling naval battles.

Lots of smoke - white from your guns blasting, black from ship fires. Lots of debris slowly falling from explosions. Bright gun blasts lighting up smoke and clouds. Low bass, loud guns. Rich and messy impact sounds. Deafening explosions.

Main Game Element - Ship Building Optimization Puzzle

Each run starts with the ship design phase.

You just drag and drop engines, guns, fuel tanks, crew quarters, and connect them to the bridge. Try out the ship in a mock test, and iterate until you are happy.

It is an optimization puzzle.

• You need to balance thrust vs. mass and thrust center vs. center of mass.
• Power consumption vs. generation
• Connect load-bearing frames and utility corridors of modules.
• Fit the budget
• Fit the design to run challenges - opposing fleet composition and current run weather conditions.

Reference (Kerbal Space Program): Iterating ship design and testing in KSP supported by direct launch from design interface, and dedicated button to return to designing from test failure screen.

Main Project Objective

You build your toy and then play with it in as many ways as possible - including power washing your ship. Designing your ship is the game. The rest is just a demo of your creation.

Focus on the ship is maintained in the story as well - the ship is the main character.

The war may end, but it is not an end of the ships story. The captain may die, but the ships story will carry on. On other hand if the ship is destroyed - the game is over.

Technology

• Single player
• Unreal Engine
• Steam
• GitHub