Ships in Capital Command can fly themselves, you just have to tell them what you want. Or you can take direct control and fly like an ace. Your choice!
In space, things move differently. Without friction, ships don't slow down to a halt, unless something else is slowing them down. Engines push you ahead without any practical speed limit, but inertia is unforgiving. A careless pilot might find himself unable to stop where he intended, or through lack of experience misjudge the boost required for a particular change in trajectory.
On the other hand, in the heat of battle, a captain won't always have the time to fly his ship manually. Especially in large vessels, weapon management, damage control and situational awareness take up so much effort and concentration, that flying hands-on is just not an option.
Enter the Navigation System: you tell the ship what you want, and it takes care of the dirty work of actual flight. The different navigation settings are designed so that the whole game can be played entirely without using manual control.
To be sure, automation can never replace skillful ship handling. Well-timed maneuvers and boosts, awareness of the vehicle's capabilities and limits, as well as experience and human intuition, let a talented pilot pull off the right moves at the right time to gain the tactical advantage.
The game currently has six nav settings, including manual; more may be added in time, if either the author or the players come up with more, useful flight modes.
- Attack: probably the most important nav setting. The ship will perform flybys of the target, orienting itself so all weapons have the best firing angles.
- Rendezvous: another useful setting. The ship will approach the target and halt when it arrives.
- Evade: the opposite of Rendezvous. The ship will move away from the target as fast as possible!
- Cruise: the most flexible setting. You aim your camera in a direction, engage Cruise, and the ship will fly in that direction relative to the current target. If no target is selected, the ship will fly at cruise speed relative to the local jump velocity.
- Match Velocity: the "stop" button. If a target is selected, the ship tries to stay at that target's velocity, so it's effectively stopped relative to it. If no target is selected, the ship matches the local jump velocity, allowing it to jump away and ensuring it is stopped relative to any other ships who jump in nearby.
- And last but not least, Direct Control. This is the manual setting: captain has the conn!
That's it for the first Progress Report, bringing you details about new features implemented in Capital Command. The plan for next time is the reveal of the single player campaign, Capital Command's primary game mode! Don't forget to leave a comment and wishlist the game: it helps a lot!
Thanks for reading and fly safe
The dev