A web-based 'fantasy sports' game where you play the coach of a futuristic sports team. Build a team, draft and manage players, and schedule matches against other teams. That's the basic idea, although there's much more to it than that, even now when the game's still only in Alpha.

For those interested, Hypersphere is an idea that my friend Matt Patterson and I have been kicking around for quite a while. It first made an appearance in our Nebula:2130 MUSH/MUD hybrid, as a automatically run sports simulation which would be broadcast throughout the game world. This new incarnation is a web-based game, where players manage teams of players, their funds, equipment, training, play style, and various other things, while the game's artificial intelligence uses all this information to generate game results.

--=[ NEWS ]=--

08-27-04

I just created a demo video in Flash showing the first 120 moves of a recent hypersphere match. This was created from a collection of screencaptures that the simulator is able to output automatically when the simulation is running in video mode. I'll probably be posting a full match video soon, since this one seems to have worked out so well.

Again be aware, this is a video of the match simulator, not the game itself. This is what I see when I'm working on the players' AI and the game mechanics. None of this is visible from the website yet... though it may be one day, in a more user-friendly form ;)

• View Simulator Video
  

04-15-04

Posted some screenshots of the Alpha version of the website. It's not currently open to the public, so I'm not posting the address yet, but you can at least see what it looks like so far.

03-24-04

The game is running on it's own now. Players are going after the ball, passing, shooting, blocking opponents, getting stunned/knocked-out/killed, teams are scoring... all kinds of stuff happening. I'll see if I can find some way to create a little mpg or avi showing the action and post it here. Meanwhile... I'll be working on integrating my program with the real project website (I'll post the address to it when it's ready...), and hopefully the game will be fully playable soon.

02-24-04

Added some new screenshots showing the pathfinding engine at work in the game.

The players are now moving around the field, chasing the ball or the ballcarrier, and blocking opponents (they prefer to block the ballcarrier if he/she isn't on their team, but they'll try to block other enemy players if they can).

I have the basic AI for the Goalies and Guards. Forwards are currently using a temporary "zombie" AI to just follow after the ball no matter what, though they also can block at times, just not very intelligently.

I'm currently working on code for passing and finding possible pass receivers and possible candidates on the opposing team for making interceptions when an AI decides to pass. Code for allowing them to take shots on the goal should come fairly quickly after all that (it's just a "pass" at the goal, rather than a teammate). Then I should have the very basic version of the game running and can start on the more interesting rules and abilities the players can have...

01-12-04

I just uploaded a few shots of some of the debugging tools I have built into the match simulation engine to help with developing the game's AI and game mechanics. Check out the screenshots page to view them.

12-19-03

As usual, the project continues to be behind any schedule I try to set for it. I'm still plugging away at it though. There are now at least 1 additional person working on the project, helping out with Macromedia Flash-based components to the user interface.

The core game code is still a ways from being ready for anything, but I can at least see some light at the end of the tunnel. I hope to at least have some pictures up soon of some of the development tools I've made to help with parts of the AI I've been working on.

--=[ Downloads ]=--

• Hypersphere Overview Presentation
  The presentation given by Matt Hayes and Matt Patterson at the 2nd Annual Game Development Workshop at the University of Texas at Austin, October 22nd, 2003.