ClaytoniousRex

All of the code for the game is already highly portable, running on 5 operating systems on 3 different hardware architectures, so don't worry that it will also run on the new Intel OS X machines from Apple; it will probably take us only a matter of days to do the port when we get our hands on one (and we do not expect to require you to run through Rosetta either.) Apple's switch to Intel CPU's seems like wonderful news: personally, I'm sick and tired of watching my expensive, dual CPU G5 systems run games slightly slower than much cheaper Intel Pentium 4 systems. I love and work with OS X for many reasons, but I don't love the hardware it runs on. IBM hasn't been able to deliver the higher speeds they've been promising, so Apple switched to someone who can. That's competition at work, and we the consumers are always the winners when competition works. I'm sure glad you only asked that one question about Apple.

It's quite extensible, but there are plenty of things you can't change just by modding. There has to be supporting code for basic behavior, but you can mod with XML and models for content. For example, since the physics engine already has code for wheeled vehicles, you can create new wheeled vehicles, with any number of wheels in any configuration you like, from trikes to 18-wheeler rigs to funky spheres with wheels on top and bottom like some of the exotic designs for Mars Rovers, etc. without a problem. But since the physics engine does not have any code for, say, walking units, you could not create a new "mech" type of unit by simply modding. So, in other words, you can mod to create new or changed versions of existing types of units, but you can't create entirely new types of units (usually, anyway, depending on how creative you are.) The physics engine itself is also extensible, though, so you can expect us to be releasing new types of units in the future (which would then be available to you for modding.) You also can't do very much with types of scenarios by modding. You can create your own scenarios that take place on any kind of planet, tweaking the gravity, atmosphere, topography, foliage, and fluid parameters to your heart's content, but you're pretty much stuck with the "game types" that the supporting code understands. For example, you would not be able to create a scenario with an objective of "Kidnap the enemy dignitary" unless the underlying code already understood that type of objective. On the other hand, with modding you could easily introduce, for example, a set of authentic WWII AFV's with correct driving and combat performance characteristics, and in that sense play an "entirely different game". But due to the "game type" limitation I listed above, you might see some players dropping their Sherman tanks from dropships. This might give you a Historical Bifurcation Seizure, which can be deadly, so don't do it.

This decision is up to you as the player. If you want to go entirely "hands-off", you can even serve as your team's commander, spending your time issuing orders and deploying defenses instead of directly fighting. This involves giving direct orders to the AI players on your team, who are very obedient, and also trying to coordinate the efforts of human players if you are playing online (or a mixture of both.) There are also some other features relevant to this that are being finalized right now, so hopefully we will be able to update the website with a clearer description of this style of play soon. I don't say that to be evasive, but I want to make sure these features are actually going into the release before promising them to you.

No, this is not a "resource gathering" RTS game. This is a game of tactical combat. Each team deploys units from their orbital Liveship onto the battlefield below. You fight to achieve the specific objective of the scenario, not to "mine gold" or dig up vespene gas with which to magically create new units out of thin air...

Since there are still a few features remaining to be implemented and much optimization work to do, it would be premature to give a final answer to this question, but I can tell you what we've observed in testing so far. The lowest-end Mac we've tested on is a Mac Mini (a single G4 processor running at 1.4GHz) with 512MB RAM and that barely adequate Radeon 9200 that they ship with - this is your basic $500.00 low-end mac. This machine plays the game well, as long as some of the optional graphics are disabled (such as extra particle effects, slightly reduced view distance, etc.) On the other hand, G5's seem to eat it up without much trouble, and the big dual-CPU G5's even use both CPU's intelligently (with one CPU pretty much devoted to AI tasks.) So right now, it's looking like the minimum will be something close to the Mac Mini described above, but at the minimum spec you don't get as much eye candy. When we're feature complete and optimized, we will provide a final, specific answer. Yes, there are various configurations of the different basic platforms, representing different "generations" of evolved fighting units by the Liveships that manufacture them. They're mostly in Mu Arae space (see the starmap on the site), where higher technology is still involved in the raging civil war there. Liveships have long since lost the ability to manufacture them, but there are probably still a few serviceable ones in The Rim. We've laid the groundwork for infantry, including the basic design and initial artwork for squads of power armored infantry who can handle the game's various environments, but as Stan said they probably won't make it into the first release. The scenarios in the first release are built in such a way that the lack of infantry makes sense for the situations at hand. Since DropTeam is so extensible, it's a safe bet that infantry will become available in due time.