@DMRawlings: I love these ideas. Especially love the notion of adapting a tower defense and territory control gameplay mode into it. I think 360-degree rotation on the ships is a foregone conclusion today, but I would absolutely love to see Stardock turn Melee into a much more comprehensive and diversified experience that extends far beyond two teams of ships going at each other one at a time. So many games these days have different modes to play and there are limitless variations on the Melee theme that could be made into distinct modes, from MOBA-inspired battles to tandem 2v2 / 3v3 / 4v4 combat to ladder-ranked leagues like in StarCraft. A lot of my experience with online matchmaking is admittedly based on Blizzard games, so my thoughts are modeled around that.

I was also thinking recently: what if there were a deckbuilder aspect to melee, similar to trading card games like Magic and Hearthstone? Every player will have an online profile and as you win matches (whether against AI or other players) you collect new versions of ships (like rare cards) with extra features and bonuses. In SC2, you simply had ship slots to fill up to create a team, and some ships had more point value than others. You could create a whole team of Ur-Quan or Chmmr ships with a very high point total, but there were no other matchmaking or handicap features to even out how fleets were were built other than trying to get the point totals to be similar.

I think one important feature for online matchmaking would be to have a handicap that allows only so many points to be assigned to each "fleet deck" you build, and the ships you choose must come in under that power point total. You could conceivably have a fleet of just two or three powerful ships that can go against a fleet of a dozen less powerful ships, even though the point values are similar.

Players can then also choose whether they'd like to compete against someone of higher skill on the ladder with a point handicap, e.g. a higher-ranked player with a 100-point fleet taking on a lower-ranked player with a 200-point fleet, etc.

I imagine that someone with a deck of less powerful ships would gain significantly more experience points for being at a handicap against a more experienced player, or a player with a more powerful deck.

Combat is certainly one of the core elements of Star Control. Initially I had mixed feelings about top-down vs full 3D but I’m starting to lean towards the idea that top-down combat would probably be more fitting even though modern tech certainly allows for gorgeous 3D fights. 3D battles Homeworld-style naturally award the feeling of grand scale but as we lack any knowledge about the mood and theme of the coming game, it’s not necessarily necessary at all.

Will the game be more lightweight and gamey or more immersive story-heavy epic? Remains to be seen. I’ll live either way but I think the classic top-down view would be more in the spirit of Star Control. It offers some benefits over 3D as well. Actually the only bone I've to pick with the classic system is that as previously mentioned, ships flying to combat 1 by 1 don't really give that feeling of big battles. Scale and immersion aside, the bonuses of top-down are many. Here's what I'm thinking:

Pros:

• Retro!
• Simple to make that ‘easy to learn, hard to master’ feel
• Probably easier to design and balance than 3D
• Good for casual “just a super-melee quickie”
• Perfect fit for multiplayer
• Good action value

As for complexity and depth, who’s to say it has to be just like 20 years ago? There’s plenty of room to expand the original concept. Most of the things I'd like to see have already been suggested but nevertheless here's my list of cool stuff:

• Multiple ship combat along with 1v1 (just imagine the multiplayer).
• Issuing commands & formations to wingmen (story-mode AI ships).
• Boss fights. Motherships, starbases, space monsters.
• Enhanced damage system. Personally I’d go with something like MOO2 style of shields, armor, structural systems.
• Enhanced zone elements. Asteroids, comets, (big) planets, solar winds, nebula dust, space critters(?) etc.
• Massive amount of different guns and tech, unique ships of course.
• Partial ship customization.
• Debris salvage, power ups? Maybe in additional game modes.

Super-melee could also feature a healthy bunch of different game modes. First ones to come to mind would be:

• Capture the flag(ship)
• Plant a bomb
• Protect a supply line/ship
• King of the hill
• Time attack
• Survival mode
• Endless survival mode etc.

Star Control should definitely remain a top down space combat game.  This is the great forgotten action genre of computer gaming that needs to be brought back.  The Star Fleet Battles board game is the original top down space combat game, top down space combat in slow motion under a microscope, and there is over 30 years of tactical knowledge from that game that completely dissects how top down space combat works.  Done right, top down space combat can be many times better than any first person shooter.  Space War, Asteroids, Star Castle, Star Control... many of the best earliest games were top down space combat games.  Subspace was among the most successful of the earliest online games.

Nobody has ever done top down space combat truly right in a computer game.  It is a special area of expertise of mine that I hope to have the opportunity to impart to the development team as a founder if I am chosen.  In general, and to be brief for now, I would say that Star Control should definitely remain a top down space combat game but use a different balance than the original series.  The original Star Control games used what I call a "Nemesis Balance"... modern game designers call this a "Rock, Paper, Scissors Balance".  This means balance was achieved simply by making sure that each ship had a nemesis ship that would easily defeat it, this is also a big reason for the way super melee was structured to use different ships in succession.  I think the new Star Control should use what I call a "True Balance", where all of the ships are roughly balanced with each other, although a slight nemesis balance might still exist within that framework.  So I think it should definitely remain a top down space combat game, but with a different balance than the original had.

Much more can be done in this genre than has been done before.  In previous top down space combat games all weapons have always been "direct fire" (i.e. unguided, aimed by the player).  It is possible to use guided weapons and other ship systems that require tracking and a lock-on, and make that work in a simple way and still be very fun.  Star Control could use this to vastly enhance the combat experience in this game compared to all those that came before it.  The top down space combat genre dissapeared after Subspace, lost in an industry dominated by tech types who want to push technology more than they want to make classic games.  So this genre died because it wasn't first person 3D and the programmers and artists couldn't show off with it.  So it never developed beyond it's most primitive state in computer games.  Star Control has the opportunity to create the first modern top down space combat game, and if they do it right you will be blown away by just how fun this kind of game can be.

I'm definitely in the top-down view camp, but i think even more important are the ship controls. Back when SC2 was out, it was accepted that you played using a keyboard or maybe a joystick and the gameplay seemed to suit that with the firing directions etc. Now that every computer has a mouse and it's an accepted requirement for gaming, i think combat should make use of it and ditch the firing direction limitation. 

I'd like to see the introduction of strafing into ship combat, if not for all ships, at least the smaller nimbler ships. I'd like to imagine the ship combat could be like the combat in Battlestar Galactica, especially taking inspiration from the hyper-maneuverability of the Viper class ships. It would really give that modern day 'arena combat' feel that I think Star Control 2 had in its time. It could also be another element for ship balancing much like ship speed, inertia and turn rate were for prior SC games.

I guess I'm not super fussed whether the SC reboot comes with multiple melee modes or support for large numbers of simultaneous players. It would be great if it did, but in my opinion the strength of SC ship combat is really in satisfying that 1v1 competitiveness 

Top down is a must. That was the most engaging and memorable part of the original. It was a sphere but also a plane, why else could you fly off one edge and back onto the opposite? Gravity wells and asteroids should return too. Such a small thing as an asteroid affected so many battles when I played. There was nothing quite like seeing a parade of 10 Ur-Quan fighters coming at you, and then WOOSH! a passing asteroid destroys 9 of them. That was always a fun occurance.

Keeping top down limits the directions involved, which simplifies combat and makes it doable outside of a cockpit. It also keeps complexity down in favor of a melee mode that you can jump into over a lunch break, or for a few minutes with a friend. That was a big part of the original appeal too! Keeping melee half way simple would be a good choice. Make the campaign as complex as you want, but keep the melee game straightforward.

I agree that 1 primary and 1 secondary ability was the way to go then. It made comparing ships easy, and controling them easy. Especially, when you consider that you could jump between 16 different ships in a 10 minute melee. The less you have to remember when switching ships, the better.

Someone replied about having different ship classes. Is that going to be part of the design process? Are you going to set out to make, for example, 6 large, 12 medium, and 10 small ships?

On the subject of multi-ship melee fights, the game Starscape was heavily inspired by SC2 and has multiple ship battles or rather the player has his sole ship  agains multiple ships.  There are no planets in the center for gravity whips though.  During battles he must also protect his large mother ship.

This video shows some space fights from that game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZybT_l5lTFI