Universal Combat – Hostile Intent, UCHI, is a pure combat focused game based on the Universal Combat core engines; but with the improved graphics and AI engines from our next-generation title due out next year, Universal Combat – Hold The Line (working title).

Unlike our previous Battlecruiser and Universal Combat games which feature extensive gameplay and much complexity due to the massive universe, vast gameplay options as well as micromanagement when playing the advanced Commander career, UCHI features all our engines but minus all the adverse complexity.

For many years, we’ve heard gamers, publishers, the media etc tell us how we let our vastly advanced technologies languish under the weight of our complex
“Battlecruiser” games (of which Universal Combat was just renamed from Battlecruiser Generations upon the request of the publisher, Dreamcatcher) while other publishers and developers crank out popular run of the mill games with lesser technologies and sub-par and repetitive gameplay.

Our company’s rule of thumb has always been to stick to the path and to cater primarily to those gamers who are fans of our game series and who continue them. With the next big game not due out until 2005, we recently had requests to consider doing an action focused game that didn’t have the complexities of our previous games but with all our advanced technologies.

After thinking about it and assessing where the revised and improved technologies (e.g. AI, dynamics, graphics etc) for next year’s full blown title, Universal Combat – Hold The Line, UCHTL, stood, I decided to move forward with this plan and to see where it would lead. The result is Universal Combat – Hostile Intent, UCHI (working title only; subject to change).

Our goal has been to focus on building a fun filled action game which features all our vastly more advanced technologies and seamless game worlds than that offered by the competition. The process of this product is if you can imagine a third party licensing our engines to create their own action game which has very little in common with the core games we develop using those same engines.

The first thing we did was rip out the more complex Commander career and ALL features associated with it. This move immediately reduced the complexity of the game by almost 80%. Features such as ship micromanagement, crew management, power allocation, trading etc were all gone since the first playable build of 09-06-04. The emphasis is on ease of use, fast and decisive gameplay in both single and multiplayer.

The map below is the final space and planetary world in which the game takes place. In multiplayer players will be able to seamlessly move between space and planetary areas using our seamless world transition technologies. The smaller planetary areas make multiplayer a lot more engaging and fun while battles rage on the planet below as well as the space region above.

The multiplayer servers are designed to host 128 players per server and we will have several servers available for the demo as well as the final launch product.
A demo is planned either shortly before release or shortly after. The game will be available for purchase online at sites such as Trymedia’s
www.trygames.com as well as other online games-on-demand portals. It will also be available in boxed form in the retail channels worldwide; though the download version will be released first.

The MSRP is currently $29.99 UCHI is a complete stand-alone product.

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