The Story With the advent of practical nanotech in AD 2095, humans begin to colonize the solar system, carving out huge chunks of matter to make into spaceships and orbiting habitats. Much of the Earth's surface has been built up and tunneled under to house the planet's ever-expanding population. Multinational corporations sprout skyward within huge arcologies, entirely reliant on the hovercraft traffic that flows beneath them through a network of underground transporation tunnels. The insatiable demand for molecular construction soon begins to outpace the rather finite supply of nearby asteroids. Before long, disputes arise among the major corporations over asteroid mining rights, and grisly hovercraft combat ensues. As the sole employee of an independent armored transport company, you have no choice but to protect your territory and expand your holdings. Even if that requires a micronuke or two. The Game Hover Carnage is a multiplayer 3D action/strategy game for Linux and other Unix variants. Controlling a hovercraft vehicle with a variety of projectile weapons, you are thrust into a world where players speed through subterranean tunnels, delivering valuable payloads of raw matter and information. Whether you choose to become an armored courier yourself or partake in activities a bit more disruptive is completely up to you. The Status Hover Carnage is currently in an early coding stage. The portal engine is fairly complete and functional, the physics engine works quite well, and collision detection code is in the process of being put together. Tunnel generation works for simple tunnels, and we're now expanding it to support tunnel intersections and branching. For more information on the game's status, see the features page. The News New Model Import Tool -> New Models Mon, 27 Jan 16:45:05 -0800 Some new models have arrived from our two artists, Richard Bruce and Matt Helsley. We've got some high quality renderings of them here. Blowing Out 2002 with An Explosion of Development Tue, 31 Dec 00:52:04 -0800 Hover Carnage has made a couple improvements in appearance recently. Here's a screenshot of the new/fixed/tweaked code in action: Improvements include new texture coordinates for the hover craft model, better tools to convert the existing models from OFF to XML, tweaked lighting parameters, and numerous under-the-hood improvements. Taking Advantage of the Holiday Vacation Mon, 23 Dec 15:31:19 -0800 New code to grab mesh data from XML data has been added. Also new are some file conversion tools and an OFF viewer hack. Here's a screenshot of the new mesh code in action: As you can see, objects can now be shiny or transparent. The Work Continues Thu, 12 Dec 20:21:46 -0800 Recent Changes: Hud Widgets Hud_string - displays a string Hud_pixmap - displays a pixmap/texture Hud_status_display - an orthogonal projection of the craft (not new) Hud_2dgraph - displays a graph of floating point data (currently the force on the craft) A good deal of API/Code cleanup work BUG fixes A texture prioritization system A new craft model XML Output Sat, 08 Jun 05:09:19 PM -0700 Hover currently outputs an XML formatted drescription of the world. The goal is to move the world generation functionality into a new application, export to XML and have the hover executable load the XML. Currently, we are planning on using the Xercesc parser. Nothing big just... Thu, 18 April 2002 01:52:18 -0700 Hover now: Makes some attempt to handle collisions correctly. Compiles in GCC 3.0.4 (had to switch to using namespaces) Most of the recent changes have been code cleanup, or a variety of other improvements that may or may not improve stability. The World of Hover Carnage Wed, 23 May 2001 00:33:47 -0700 I've just updated a development page with some more ideas about the world and story of the Hover Carnage. Additionally, it should give you some idea of what the general gameplay will eventually be like. Note that the document is indeed in very rough form, so take it more as a public brainstorm than any sort of final word. I welcome your feedback. Hover Ported to Windows Tue, 15 May 2001 22:20:48 -0700 You heard it here first -- Hover Carnage has been ported to Windows. We made use of a stylin' gcc cross-compiler to build Windows binaries on Linux. These will be available for your consumption when we make our next release. If you can't wait until then, send me an email and I'll set you up with a little Hover on Windows beta testing. Witness the Carnage -- Live! Tue, 17 Apr 2001 02:45:20 -0700 Hover Carnage will be descending upon Lugfest 4 this weekend (April 21-22, 2001). If you'll be in the Los Angeles area then, please do drop by and see the game in person. You'll have the opportunity to chat with developers and hear about upcoming features. Hover Carnage 0.0.6 (Fizz Gig) Sun, 25 Mar 2001 14:05:04 -0800 We're proud to announce another release. Here's the changelog: greatly improved hovercraft controls: keyboard and mouse chase camera now more closely follows movement and tilt of hovercraft rocket extension and retraction works correctly fixed segment texture alignment problems improved lighting Proper craft/tunnel collision detection didn't make it into this release, but the vehicle hovering and general user control is much improved over version 0.0.5. And now for the first time, we've actually managed to make Hover Carnage RPMs and DEBs. So head on over to the download page at your earliest convenience. Improved Lighting Sun, 11 Mar 2001 01:22:23 -0800 I just realized that the last release went out with lighting disabled! Oops. So now the tunnel is really lit, and here's a screenshot to prove it. Camera and Controls Code Sun Jan 28 22:24:47 PST 2001 Both the camera and the hovercraft controls code have been thoroughly overhauled, and movement of the craft around the tunnel is now not quite as painful as before. I've implemented something I like to call "inertial braking," which means that the craft no longer slips and slides all around the tunnel from every little keypress. Try it out and let me know how you like it. For previous news items, please see our News Archive.