elfl0rd
commented
4 years ago For the large majority of places these essential utilities are needed, requiring meter sized ports be attached to objects is impracticable from both an art and gameplay perspective.
In addition to this, instead of "wireless pipes" (or something) you can use same path as implemented in Rust (game). - https://store.steampowered.com/app/252490/Rust/ Free placement of pipes\wires.
At this screnshot you can see two systems, electric (generation, storing, distribution and control) and water, (pumping salt water, desalination, plant watering)
Engimage
MishkaFur
keegan-o
SatsukiShizuka
Power, Liquids, Gas, and Electricity Infrastructure
Right now in Eco we have various world objects that require input and output ports for pipes that allow them to require water being supplied for crafting and smog being outputted for a crafting waste byproduct. Water supply and smog output, along with electricity and other liquids like oil are all very important aspects of simulating a contemporary civilization-wide infrastructure. The big goal of Utilities is to funnel all the inputs and waste outputs of energy, liquids, and gasses in Eco into a coherent organized physical system that players can manage, direct, and monitor.
Many different types of objects should require these infrastructure hook-ups that do not currently have them, and many objects we add to the game in the future should require some or even many of them. In addition to this, there are many smaller, less industrially important objects that should none-the-less exert a draw on the infrastructure for electricity, water, and oil, and potentially produce waste like sewage. This is relevant for housing where I think a good housing value should be dependent on having basic utilities. A basic lumber house with plumbing and electricity should be worth more than a similar size composite lumber house with only electricity, if housing points reflect value reaped by the inhabitant(s) for the sake of skill point gain. ‘Market value’ would be a different story, and that could also come back to have a big impact on total points, but water, sewage disposal, and power utilities hooked up to inputs and outputs should be more or less required for a competitive score.
For the large majority of world objects for which these essential utilities are needed, requiring meter sized ports be attached to objects is impracticable from both an art and gameplay perspective. It would render many domestic settings into a nest of pipes which would be ugly and very hard to arrange, especially with pipe ports often only fitting on different sides of the same world object, and often not in a visually appealing way.
Thankfully there is no need for this. The best solution to both these problems is to create a Utility Hubs system for properties. Buildings should be able to draw infrastructure needs from and output waste products to Utility Hub world objects that can be located nearby (it should be flexible and not required to be inside is the main thing, we want players to be able to put them underground if they want to, as they often are irl). See Additional features below for an idea about how we could still keep things physical, using a universal 'supply pipe' block going from the hub to the walls or floors of rooms.
Having utility consumption linked to a whole property or designated square meter area via the Hubs should have a great impact on possibilities for laws as well. Players will be incentivized to create and control utility hubs for their crafting carefully, since they will likely be the means by which laws might affect them or their waste output.
Utility Hub Features
Core Feature: Utility Hubs would essentially be a rack of complete input ports, and a rack of complete waste output ports plus one potential unique 'all-in-one' output port for the 'all-in-one' supply pipes described in Additional Features. This single set of inputs and outputs would act as the inputs and outputs for all crafting tables a the given area of a single property.
Additional Features:
Non-wireless supply: I know completely 'wireless' connection between Utility Hubs and the objects they serve is not ideal. I have reserved a spot on the designs for Utility Hub world objects to have a 'Supply Pipes' port which at some point we could have be a kind of pipe that can go inside player built building's walls and floors, and thus act as a universal input connection that just needs to be in the walls or floors of a room to connect up everything in that room, or which can be connected physically and directly to large industrial objects that might require it.
Monitoring: Utility Hubs should be able to record the throughput both ways, and thus be a way to keep track of water/electricity/oil use and waste output for a given area. This is a big thing that could tie into laws.
Overflow Storage: Utility Hubs should ideally require modules for extra temporary storage when their throughput goes beyond a certain threshold. When you have a Utility Hub for a given area that contains tons of mineral processing operations going through tons of water usage and outputting tons of liquid waste, liquid storage tanks should be required near the Utility Hub. Without the required storage modules, crafting should get backed up/not able to continue.
This need for temporary storage does not have to be part of the utilities system, it could be added to piping or crafting in general, instead. A simpler version could be that all Utility Hubs have limited throughput and to get more throughput you simple build another Hub. To avoid being silly with branching and re-connecting pipes, this feature probably would require throughput limitations being better enforced on pipes (I wouldn’t call this dependent on that though)
Utility Hub Upgrades: This is where we could give players important modules like air scrubbers to reduce CO2 emmissions, and all sorts of other things to help pre-process or alter waste products, since all the waste products of the civilization will generally flow through Utility Hubs.