Ellestar

[quote who="b0rsuk" reply="15" id="2185717"] Dominions3 is a niche game, but in no way a failure. *** Dominions 3 is a very good game for its intended audience. [/quote] I think it fails. Customers think it fails. Hardcore fans think it isn't, so what? From what i saw, Stardock actually cares about sales. Well, they're making games for their own money instead of someone else's money, so there is no surprise here. [quote who="b0rs

To continue the discussion, on a Sirlin's site i found an interesting link to an article that explains why some games just fail (*cough*Dominions 3) and how to make a better and more popular game. It's an article by another professional game designer "link: All genres are Doomed" that perfectly explains why Dominions 3 is the epitome of a niche game with all it's complexity and th

[quote who="SimRex" reply="12" id="2178262"] Python was fast enough to script a third-person RPG (with perhaps the best real-time swordplay combo system I've ever seen in a game) as early as 2001's Severance: Blade of Darkness, and a 3D space sim, Star Trek: Bridge Commander, in 2002. In both games, all of the actual game logic is in Python. In 2003, Stackless Python (a variant) was used, and continues to be used to this day, for the server and client of EVE Online.

[quote quoting="post"] You have gameplay scripting. We are using Python and that is where the rules of the game itself are modded. You have the AI scripting. Again, using Python, that is where the AI behavior is modded. [/quote] It's nice that gameplay and AI will be moddable but look at Civ 4 modding. AFAIK even some parts of Fall From Heaven mod were re-written so to use C++ instead of Python as Python is much slower. And IIRC Lua is faster than

[quote who="SnallTrippin" reply="25" id="2176488"] The differences are quite apparent. I have control of and can check and exe or other file I download. Also I know that the patch came from the game company, baring a complete takeover of a website/fileserver for a VERY short time that would effect relaitively small amounts of consumers. On the other hand if a company/server had the ability to access and change files whenever I was playing a game...well...yeah.&nbsp

[quote who="LDiCesare" reply="12" id="2176166"] So when the game has options like declaring peace, rights of passage, mutual protection pacts like Civ4, or giving gold/gems/magic items and sending text messages like Dom3, it's no longer metagame. At least, it doesn't fit with the 'simple terms' definition.[/quote] You don't just send an in-game offer about mutual protection or something, right? If you make an out-of-game agreement, it's metagame. And that agreement doesn't even r

[quote who="LDiCesare" reply="10" id="2175601"] You might want to read again what I wrote. I never said Dom "sucked by itself". I said it's not balanced. YOU translate it as "not balanced = sucks". Diplomacy is not metagame when playing MP. IT's one of the funniest things in MP. And ins trategy, diplomacy is key too. YMMV. Why Dominions? Because it's got more features inside than any other game and is way more fun than Risk.[/quote] Yes, I translate it as "not balanced = sucks".<

[quote who="SnallTrippin" reply="11" id="2175722"]And I'm saying that would allow companies insane access to your machine. Not to mention what I'm sure some smart person would distribute viruses that way. But yeah, you're an IT specialist...you know what your talking about I guess. /S[/quote] Well, yes. If you launch any game with an exe file, you're already giving all access you can possibly give to that company. They don't need anything else besides that exe file if they

[quote who="SnallTrippin" reply="4" id="2175256"] Server side games? I would NEVER play a game like that. (Except on a console maybe) The security issues are HUGE. I don't trust anyone with that kind of access.[/quote] Server-side hosting of games. And there are no extra security issues at all because of it, i'm saying it as an IT specialist.

P.S. And that stupid forum doesn't work well if you format the quotes for your liking... I'm sure i didn't make any mistakes there, and now i can't even edit it. Preview option should have been nice to have as well.

[quote who="b0rsuk" reply="21" id="2173647"] This is going to be low: how about American soldiers in Iraq ? The treatment of prisoners etc ? American soldiers were supposedly the good guys. It's certainly possible for a 'good leader' like G.W. Bush to not be able to keep army disciplined. Would things be different if there was harsh punishment for breaking human rights (prisoners)?[/quote] Since when a bloody militarist like Bush become a 'good leader'? Maybe i missed something?

[quote who="LDiCesare" reply="8" id="2173573"] Looks like you missed the smiley. I know it got botched, but your argument is the game is balanced, not that the game is a balanced strategy game. Balanced games aren't necessarily strategic. Dominions is very unbalanced, and still the best MP strategy game I know despite that. Balance is really important only for duels or when there are a few opponents. When there are 10 players struggling, unbalances don't matter much because looking weake

[quote] Fear: - army is more disciplined. Mutiny is rare. There are fewer willful commanders who compromise your orders for personal gain. Soldiers are less likely to act on their will and plunder, rape etc. (unless explicitely allowed) [/quote] Isn't "evil" army more likely to plunder and rape than "good" army? And "evil" commanders are more likely to overlook it. [quote] - population is unitied in support for you. Your cities are harder to inf

[quote who="Kitkun" reply="17" id="2171855"]Hmm...I like the ideas here. Although I'm not so sure about what exactly feared and loved should entail. For example someone who is feared will likely have plots against them. But if there is no plots, then someone looking for them through sheer paranoia will start finding lots of them. Secret police, citizens vanishing, etc. Some people just plain follow orders, no matter how deranged. Some people do things

[quote who="Frogboy" reply="5" id="2171556"] Given all the...fun we've been having dealing with Demigod's MP, I think it's safe to say that I would rather not have Elemental's fate determined by factors that are very difficult to predict pre-release.[/quote] Civ 4 had about the same problems with GameSpy and P2P. The difference is that Civ 4 is singleplayer game, not an MP-only like Demigod. [quote who="dionisus1122" reply="2" id="2171335"] And again we see the dange

Starcraft 2 Majesty 2 Elemental

[quote who="Dale_" reply="7" id="2127248"] Not necessarily. Civ has never been able to resolve the 40 city MM nightmare through UI. That issue stems from a city-based architecture and has nothing to do with UI at all. To resolve THAT MM nightmare you'd have to convert to a Empire-based architecture and eliminate the City-based, thus redo the entire engine not the UI. CTP2 make great inroads down this line of thinking, but it's a shame that this was set back again

[quote quoting="post"] Anyone played this? http://fantasywars.1cpublishing.eu/index.php?page=home http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SA60vgeMq7s&feature=related Looks more Fantasy General influenced, whereas Elemental is more Master of Magic influenced. [/quote] Fantasy Wars is a classical wargame, Elemental is 4X TBS. It's a completely different genre.

I prefer online multiplayer but that requires streamlined gameplay without the fluff and micro nightmare. After all, the more time it takes to finish an online match, the less popular it is. Unfortunately, streamlined gameplay doesn't seem to be the focus of Elemental :( Well, i hope there will be some game modes catered to online multiplayer.

1) Star Control 2 2) Elite 3) Master of Orion 4) Master of Orion 2 5) Descent: Freespace 6) Space Rangers 2

I remember that one of the definitions of a good AI by one of the game AI developers is that "AI shouldn't do stupid mistakes and it should lose to a player in a beautiful way". Or something like that. In other words, AI shouldn't do something that makes players believe only AI is stupid enough to do it. When a player sees such mistakes, he understands that he's playing against AI, not against the alien mastermind or the wise king of the magic kingdom so such AI mistakes break the pla

[quote who="psychoak" reply="10" id="2002339"] If I have to play phone tag with EA reps for a week to get my game reactivated, how am I not being forced to prove my innocence in a crime they can't even prove is hurting them? I've already explained this in multiple previous posts, piracy isn't a one way street. Pirates buy games because of piracy, this is as inarguable as the fact that some pirates might have bought instead of pirating, for the exact same reason.

[quote who="Spartan" reply="24" id="2001217"] You know nothing about my academic background and profession but you completely dismissed my position trying a weak ass appeal to authority and yet you never question the original arguments validity. A serious logical error there my friend. For all you know I could hold several degrees in the social sciences and be a practitioner of sociology & psychology dealing with matters of ethics, judgment and understanding daily - just sayin'...[/q

[quote who="Vandenburg" reply="16" id="1969467"] So I'll reword what I'd said: You argued that StarDock won't make a good AI because it's easier and cheaper to just give the AI bonuses (like the CivIV AI got) to make it competent and thus StarDock should make its AI routine open source so that the community can fix it. I then said that StarDock won't be cheapskates and will ship the game with a good and competent AI. I.e. I argued that your basic premises were wrong (Elemental

[quote who="Luckmann" reply="22" id="2001196"] Wow, talk about having an iron rod shoved up your ass as a replacement for a spine. Sarcasm, much? Edit: Also, if you really want to pick a fight, I could always raise the argument that life is in no way essential.[/quote] Exactly. Sarcasm is not a valid argument, so you lose. No, i'm not interested in trolling so i don't want to discuss if life is essential or it isn't.