commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) (05/31/91)
I am about to begin work on a new version of Spaceward Ho! (version 2.0 or something like that). Goals include (1) speeding up net play, (2) decreasing galaxy file sizes, (3) improving computer intelligence (especially end play), and (4) making battle reports more interesting and helpful, among others. I have been following most of the Spaceward Ho! comments on this newsgroup over the past months and have seen numerous suggestions for changes/new features. Now that everyone has played it some more, I've decided to officially ask for suggestions. First, before you hit that "R": read on. 1. Be brief. 2. Don't reply to me; post to the newsgroup. 3. Before you send a suggestion, read all the remaining articles to make sure your suggestion hasn't already been made. I'm looking for ideas and am not asking for votes. Things I'm curious to hear about (but please don't limit yourself to these): 1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier? 2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, what do you want to send? And how would you do it? 3. Battles. Does it make sense that every battle is fought to the death? Would you like to retreat, fuel remaining? What would you like in a battle summary? What would make a battle more fun to watch? Thanks for the input. The new version will probably be available in August or September. As it will be a "major" upgrade, we'll probably ask a minimal upgrade fee for current users. -- Peter Commons commons@cs.stanford.edu Computer Science Department, Stanford University
bskendig@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Brian Kendig) (05/31/91)
Well, I've played it a little bit on a friend's color Mac II, and I
think it's just an incredible game! There are, however, a few things
I'd suggest:
- Use the System 7 Help Manager for help, instead of the little help
window? I've noticed that even when you close little help windoid,
the disk still does a lot of accesses as you move the mouse around.
- I borrowed the game disk and tried to play it on my SE -- and found
this endeavor painful at best. The only way I could find to tell
between red and green planets is to look for the little line that red
planets have in the windoid where you set how much money you're giving
to planets. And (most annoyingly) the screen is far too small to see
the bare minimum of what you need to see at once! Perhaps think up
some less-cluttering way of allowing access to the necessary data and
windoids?
- I haven't tried a multi-player game, but from what I've heard about
them, it seems that in a ten-player game you'd need to wait for 45
minutes before you can spend your five minutes on a move! If this is
true, I'd suggest thinking up some way to let all players input their
moves simultaneously; if it's not true, forget I even mentioned it. ;)
- Perhaps allowing IAC between the copies of the game running on the
net would be a more viable means of keeping a multi-player game going;
perhaps not.
I hope these suggestions are helpful -- I really haven't played the
game much, but it looks great!
<< Brian >>
| Brian S. Kendig \ Macintosh | Engineering, | bskendig |
| Computer Engineering |\ Thought | USS Enterprise | @phoenix.Princeton.EDU
| Princeton University |_\ Police | -= NCC-1701-D =- | @PUCC.BITNET |
"You gave your life to become the person you are right now. Was it worth it?"wildfire@aix01.aix.rpi.edu (Douglas B Rusch) (05/31/91)
1. Multi-Player Games - No suggestions. 2. Messages - Yes, this would be nice. Especially if the computer could send some during a multiplayer game, just to keep players on their toes. 3.Battles - Retreating would be nice. Either that or have battles take more than one turn to complete. In the first case, maybe having admirals for fleets who are responsible for their fleets safety. Better admirals make better choices and can be given general missions (such as just scout [if there is any enemy strength just retreat] or assult [fight to the death]). If the fleet dies, there goes your admiral. As admirals fight and win, they get better. In the second case the slow battles allow players to bring in reinforcements, retreat, or whatever. I think there should be tankers, fleets should not have to return to a base to repair (or sit on some God foresaken world for centuries waiting for a colony ship to stop by). Colony ships should not always be lost first. It should be possible to defend colony ships with a loss of some offensive ability. Such defense should not be complete (thus making the colony ship the last to die), but partial allowing the ship to survive a little longer. Repair should not occur in the middle of no where, it can take centuries to make a ship, but no matter how badly damaged a ship is, it is always fully repaired at the start of the next turn. Maybe bases should be added, a location where ships can be refueled, repaired, and built. This would add some objective to fleet movement. Now, since ships can be built anywhere the only difference between planets is the metal it has and it population (or productivity), things that aren't seen till a planet has been captured. It also limits the speed with which new fleets can be brought into play. The different players should have different colors, not just different hats. Its hard to tell them apart, especially at the greater scales. Also, maybe it would be possible to name the computer players. This would add some personality to them. Finally, more options should be added. Most of what I have just described could be optional (especially repair or long battles). Maybe metal could be made replenishable as an option. More options make each game a totally new situation to play against. As for computer strategies, there are several problems I have noted. 1. The computer often runs out of steam towards the end (or metal?). 2. The computer stops exploring, and often fails to explore the regions near the edge of the map fully. 3. Since the player knows its against a computer, the computer should know its against the player, and take actions to deal with the hopefully more dangerous human mind. 4. The computer should not resort to sending out a dozen of its best ships to check out a dozen different worlds. Since they can't colonize those worlds themselves, they should be sending cheap ships. The ingenious player often has a higher tech than I do, but wastes his metal by sending really good ships against ten of my not so great cheap satellites. He dies, and I just rebuild the cheap satellites. If he sent these ships together with a colony ship, they might very well overwhelm all but the most heavily defended worlds without losing the colony ship. Well, thats enough for now. I have many other ideas, but I'll wait and see what others say. Anyways this is enough for now. Hope this helps, and I look forward to the next version, because I like the game alot right now. But most things can always be made better. Thank You.
plague@milton.u.washington.edu (Jack Brown) (05/31/91)
In article <1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU> commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) writes: >1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier? I think this part of the game is just fine. It really doesn't need improving. >2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, > what do you want to send? And how would you do it? Novelty. Not necessary. Amusing, but not necessary. >3. Battles. Does it make sense that every battle is fought to the death? Would > you like to retreat, fuel remaining? What would you like in a battle > summary? What would make a battle more fun to watch? I like the battles to the death. Mainly because currently, you cannot really tell if you are fighting a computer or human player. If you gave a retreat option, the two human players involved in the battle would both have to look at it and decide to retreat or not, making it obvious you are fighting a human and not the computer. I very much like the idea of not knowing which you are fighting. It adds all sorts of intricacies to the game.. What I think would make the battles more fun to watch and more informative is to use something like the following scheme: Line up the opposing ships with some sort of generic icon to indicate relative size, etc. Then they shoot at each other and disappear when destroyed. x x x X X X F F F C g g H H H k k s s s Something like tha above. Then shows a quick "laser beam death weapon" ray go from say, the first g to the first X, whichever is getting shot at. Just do the beam zapping and removing of dead ships until the battle is over. Those are my two (thousand?) bits. -- Jack Brown aka plague@milton.u.washington.edu Make sure the milton part is in there. Else it goes to another system where I won't see it for months...
cem@cs.brown.edu (Charles E. Moylan) (05/31/91)
I'd like to see two things:
1. Some way to retreat from battle, but done in such a way
as NOT to give away who is a human player and who is a computer-controlled
player. I think that this could be accomplished by allowing players to
set a percentage value in the individual task force "destination" window
that represents the percentage of casualties that the task force
will take before it retreats. Thus, it's handled in a very deterministic
way _before_ battle, which will facilitate computer-control, the hiding
of computer/human identity, and network games.
2. There should be more of a tangible difference between the effects of
shields and weapon technology. As it stands, there is no reason to
develop one over the other, because all battles are to the death and
it's really the sum of these two values that determines a ships
combat effectiveness. However, if the "retreat" system above is
implemented then it might behoove some non-warlike players to develop
high shield tech and then retreat from fights. This would also work
well for players in a sparse galaxy where they may want to have heavily
SHIELDED but not heavily weapon-laden colony ships traveling around.
(I realize that one can simply build ships that don't _use_ the available
weapons tech but it would be neat not to have to build weapon tech up at
all and see how much you could colonize by being pacifistic but well-armored
for defense and not spending the money on weapon tech).
I'm not saying this strategy would necessarily win games but it would
broaden the choices of strategy for players. Maybe other
differentiating characteristics between shields and weapons could be added
as well?
--
Charlie Moylan (cem@cs.brown.edu)conty@cbnewsl.att.com (The Conty) (05/31/91)
In article <1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU>, commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) writes: > I am about to begin work on a new version of Spaceward Ho! (version 2.0 or > something like that). Goals include (1) speeding up net play, (2) decreasing > galaxy file sizes, (3) improving computer intelligence (especially end play), > and (4) making battle reports more interesting and helpful, among others. I especially like item 2. As I don't have access to a network, I can only play a multiuser game by the disk-swapping method. Related item: did anyone volunteer to write the modem play code? :-) > First, before you hit that "R": read on. > 1. Be brief. > 2. Don't reply to me; post to the newsgroup. > 3. Before you send a suggestion, read all the remaining articles to make sure > your suggestion hasn't already been made. I'm looking for ideas and am not > asking for votes. Sorta like a user brainstorming session? I like it!!! > Things I'm curious to hear about (but please don't limit yourself to these): > > 2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, > what do you want to send? And how would you do it? Someone already made the perfect suggestion. Select a destination, and type the message in a dialog box. Messages are sent at the end of the turn. > 3. Battles. Does it make sense that every battle is fought to the death? No. Unless it is one of those "you were destroyed before you could gather any info" kind of events. The poor chumps were so surprised they never knew what hit them. > Would > you like to retreat, fuel remaining? YES!!! If you want, you can add some penalty to the "emergency retreat" option (possible navigation errors, ships lost, or extra fuel expended, take your pick). > What would you like in a battle > summary? I don't use them. I watch the battles for the info. You could include a list of the ships encountered (not an enumeration, just type and quantity). For example, say you found two 12/10 sats, four 5/4 fighters, and one 2/2 colony ship. > What would make a battle more fun to watch? Fun? Ship animations when firing weapons. Or show reduced icons of all the ships in the battles, with icons dissapearing as ships go up in flames. More ideas later... -- E n r i q u e C o n t y The Amazing Man-With-No-Life jester@ihlpl.att.com
dth@reef.cis.ufl.edu (David Hightower) (05/31/91)
As far as battles go: DEFINITELY add the retreat option. Realistically, if you are outgunned by your opponent, unless you are suicidal you will always attempt to retreat. This, of course, should be fuel based....what about attempting to retreat even if you don't have enough fuel.....your ships would be marooned between planets (apologies to Heinlein) and the only way to retireve them would be to send tankers to them. Tankers....yeah! Someone else posted suggesting that--it would be a good idea. I have seen situations where I send a scout to a distant planet, but there's nothing there....I come back EONS later, and the crew (and ship) are still alive and well! This seems rather odd... Ditto with the "instantly repaired ships". It's frustrating to throw lots of ships at a planet, only to be destroyed by the last enemy ship...yet you come back next round, and the enemy ship is fully repaired! How about being able to pick your targets? Designate targets for each of your ships, which would allow the option of ganging up on the heaviest enemy vessels, or taking out the light defenders first. I don't agree with being able to divert ships while they are in hyperspace. According to the way this game is designed, that would be impossible....how would you contact them? Another thing: all your metal is pooled...so you can build ships on planet 'A', when the only metal in the universe is on planet 'B' all the way across the galaxy. Yet, as soon as it is mined, it is available to planet 'A'. How about being able to build only on the planets that have metal.....or maybe have some sort of time delay (to allow the freighters to carry the ore). Captured technologies, maybe? If you defeat an opponent whose tech levels are higher than yours, could you acquire some (or all) of their technologies? In the game, you are given your opponent's shield and weapons tech levels at the beginning of a battle....how do you know this? Just my $0.02 (1965 dollars, adjusted for inflation). Dave _________________________________________________________________________ Dave Hightower | opinion? I'm allowed to have an opinion? dth@cis.ufl.edu | well, if I DID have one, it'd be mine, all mine! --------------------------------------------------------------------------
alexr@apple.com (Alexander M. Rosenberg) (06/01/91)
In article <1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU>, commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) writes: > > 1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier? "AppleEvents, AppleEvents, AppleEvents!" Network ability comes for free. Also, a cleaver person could write an application (hell, even a HyperCard stack) to control a copy of the game, and create their own automated players. Kinda like rogue-o-matic. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Alexander M. Rosenberg - INTERNET: alexr@apple.com - Yoyodyne - - 330 1/2 Waverley St. - UUCP:ucbvax!apple!alexr - Propulsion - - Palo Alto, CA 94301 - - Systems - - (415) 329-8463 - Nobody is my employer so - :-) - - (408) 974-3110 - nobody cares what I say. - -
Gibson.Bill@AppleLink.com (Bill Gibson) (06/01/91)
In article <1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU>, commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) writes: > > I am about to begin work on a new version of Spaceward Ho! (version 2.0 or > something like that). Goals include (1) speeding up net play, (2) decreasing > galaxy file sizes, (3) improving computer intelligence (especially end play), > and (4) making battle reports more interesting and helpful, among others. > YAY!!! He's refining my favorite addiction. I may never see my wife/kids again! > Large amounts of stuff purged < > 1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier? In the Budget window you list the icons representing the other players. It would be cool if their name were used as well. I'd like to know that player 3 was "Jeff" etc... Make a simple addition to your file format that would do a checksum on each players resource... we had a couple of really crafty types "helping" themselves out with resedit. Couple million $ here couple million metal there... > 2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, > what do you want to send? And how would you do it? Yes, but make it available as a Startup option when a new galaxy is created. Full communications, communications between only contacted foes, none. > 3. Battles. Does it make sense that every battle is fought to the death? Would > you like to retreat, fuel remaining? What would you like in a battle > summary? What would make a battle more fun to watch? Lots of others seem to have cool ideas here. I echo the sentiment that more graphics would be nice. Bits of your ships blown away. Perhaps damage should diminish the various tech levels of your ship, or different weapons tech levels would make different sounds when used. Other ideas would be to create more than 5 areas for technical research... a stealth characteristic (along with a counter statistic that sats could use) A way to probe a distant system (maybe an expensive goodie that you would buy, the range stat could be how far it could see...). Change the way metal works i.e. One races idea of metal may be different than another, so stripmining planets isn't a guarantee that the planet isn't valuable to an opponent. a given world may have 16k worth of metal to me but be only worth 4k metal to player one and worthless to player two. Perhaps the loss of several profitable planets should drop your tech levels. And finally, consolidate lots of windoids into a reasonable dialog/windoid that double-clicking the planet would produce. > Peter Commons Thanks Peter. ps. are you open to a little constructive screen redesign. I'd be willing to provide some samples, done in Color MacCheese, of course. Bill Gibson Apple Interface Guru Gibson.Bill@Applelink.com These opinions are mine, MINE, all mine... ah haa haah
wildfire@aix01.aix.rpi.edu (Douglas B Rusch) (06/01/91)
Here are some other ideas I just thought of : 1. Besides just 'removing' the inhabitants of a world, why not allow players to capture worlds. A captured provides more income but would require a garrison against a possible revolt. Also, you should be able to destroy worlds about to be captured inorder to prevent the enemy from using it. (Much like the Germans did in WWII). 2. When really high tech ships fight wimpy ships, they should be able to blow several away in one turn of combat. This would help when one world is defended with 1000+ satellites, and very difficault world to crack just because they can nip even a large (about 50 ships) fleet to death easily before you can do much damage. 3. I'm not sure how others feel about this, but I don't like it that usually one ship alone takes damage until destroyed before another takes damage. It seems that most ships should be damaged at least a little each turn of combat. Some ships might be picked on more than others. Well there are a few more ideas, more may still follow.
conty@cbnewsl.att.com (The Conty) (06/01/91)
In article <28857@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU>, dth@reef.cis.ufl.edu (David Hightower) writes: > > Ditto with the "instantly repaired ships". It's frustrating to throw > lots of ships at a planet, only to be destroyed by the last enemy > ship...yet you come back next round, and the enemy ship is fully > repaired! [...] > Another thing: all your metal is pooled...so you can build ships on > planet 'A', when the only metal in the universe is on planet 'B' all the > way across the galaxy. Yet, as soon as it is mined, it is available to > planet 'A'. How about being able to build only on the planets that have > metal.....or maybe have some sort of time delay (to allow the freighters > to carry the ore). These things are not instantaneous. Remember, each game turn lasts 10 YEARS! -- E n r i q u e C o n t y The Amazing Man-With-No-Life jester@ihlpl.att.com
wildfire@aix01.aix.rpi.edu (Douglas B Rusch) (06/01/91)
Just thought of a new idea : 1. Instead of having tech be universal, have tech levels associated with a particular planet. That way old well developed planets would have high techs, better defenses (satellites) than newer worlds. The starting tech would be related to the tech of the colony ship that colonized it (or the people on the colony ship). This would make the core worlds very important and could be a way to avoid using bases since most players would want to build on their high tech worlds rather than their low tech new worlds. 2. Also the idea of freighters carring metal instantly around the galaxy (a problem in some ways I think) gave me the idea of fighters or transports. Why not have little ships that cant go through hyperspace (like satellites, but weaker maybe) but can be carried. Or why not have transports that can move satellites from secure inner worlds out to the not so secure outer worlds. 3. How about an option to limit the values of tech. Limiting the maximum range tech would have definite effects on how you can attack someone. For instance a max range of 6 would prevent the enemy from ever attack your more distant worlds so you wouldn't need to protect them. Also there may be bottlenecks on the map that have to be captured to assult further into the enemy. I know I've had more ideas about this game, so when I remember them I'll post the. Boy, this is almost as much fun as playing the actual game!
bjb@pyramid.com (Bruce Beare) (06/01/91)
References:<1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU> <1991May31.143519.14309@cbnewsl.att.com> One *very* simple change that I would like to see is an indication that a planet has ships queued to be built. Frequently, I build at a bunch of planets and have to go and check each of their queues to see whether they have finished. Perhaps the budget window could have a digit that gives the number of ships currently in the queue. Bruce
dth@reef.cis.ufl.edu (David Hightower) (06/03/91)
In article <1991May31.180103.24654@cbnewsl.att.com> conty@cbnewsl.att.com (The Conty) writes: >In article <28857@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU>, dth@reef.cis.ufl.edu (David Hightower) writes: [stuff deleted about "instantaneously" repaired ships, etc....] > >These things are not instantaneous. Remember, each game turn lasts 10 YEARS! It doesn't matter if the turns are 10 years or 10 centuries.....the point I was making was that the ships are repaired in the next turn. If each turn were one year, then taking ten years to repair a ship would be meaningful; it takes only ONE TURN, though. _________________________________________________________________________ Dave Hightower | opinion? I'm allowed to have an opinion? dth@cis.ufl.edu | well, if I DID have one, it'd be mine, all mine! --------------------------------------------------------------------------
rotberg@dms.UUCP (Ed Rotberg) (06/04/91)
From article <157332@pyramid.pyramid.com>, by bjb@pyramid.com (Bruce Beare): Peter; I would like to see the retreat feature you mentioned. I believe the higher the SPEED the better chance that the fleet could retreat. I like the suggestion that the retreating fleet cannot get the last shot off. Retreat is only effective if the fleet has the range to get to another planet. Speaking of that, where will the ships retreat too? The nearest planet, the closest planet, your nearest colonized planet, ...? I think a better suggestion than communication, if it is every man for himself, is to allow "rumors from traders" or "spies" that would give you info on fleet concentrations or unexplored areas or metal rich planets, etc. There is no way at the moment for multiple players to fight against other teams of players in a team style event. I think this cooperative concept is worth considering. I also liked the suggestion to leave the metal from the players just eliminated at the last colonized planet he was at. His red planets should die off and kill all the colonists. Don't you just hate it when you scrap a fleet at an uncolonized planet and the game doesn't warn you that you will not get the metal? If you later send a colony fleet to the planet, you will need to mine it just like raw metal! How cheap. I have often scrapped fleets in hyperspace and sometimes the metal appears to come to me and sometimes ends up elsewhere. What is the algorithm for this? I don't think you should be able to scrap fleets in hyperspace. I have so often added ships to the build queue but then forgot to allocate money for ship building. Can't the game warn me that I have not allocated money? Similarly, I would like it to warn me the first time I create a new ship/sat but forget to start building it! Usually I have allocated money but I have not placed it in the queue. I do not want to see the warning screens about my fleets that are no longer in existance. Especially when I just manually moved all the ships from the fleet. I want the planet money allocation window to CORRECTLY show the red (underfunded) planets. I have often eliminated a planet and ignored the warning message but later found out that another planet was also underfunded even though it shows as adequately funded in the window. I do not like to see 800K files for my large universes. The file sizes must reduced! I am tired of waiting several minutes per update for large worlds when I am the only human player in the game. My MAC has the memory, so why doesn't Spaceward Ho just leave the file in memory and write the file after it has updated the screen (in the background) or every so many turns. As it is now it must read the file in and write it out every turn. Consider the time to read and write a 800K file, not to mention the wear and tear on my disk drive. I would like to see the player number in the summary window, so that I do not need to keep reviewing the battle to see who it was. I would like to see the planet budget window not reduce the money for a red planet below the minimum unless I specifically move it below for that planet. ie if I am increasing spending on tech, I don't want my red planets to be underfunded. I would like to be able to construct my own model of a computer opponent and then play against him. If this would be possible, then we could all use our own models to fight against each other to determine who has the best algorithm. Robot Wars!!!! Ed Logg
cfranz@iiic.ethz.ch (Christian Steffen Ove Franz) (06/04/91)
In article <1991May30.185345.10261@neon.Stanford.EDU> commons@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Peter Commons) writes: > >Things I'm curious to hear about (but please don't limit yourself to these): > >1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier? There's nothing to add that nobody mentioned before... >2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, > what do you want to send? And how would you do it? Yes, I really would like that. How about another windoid where you select the player you want to send a message to? Then a dialog appears and you type in your message, click OK and off it goes. The recipient doesn't HAVE to answer, but in (yet another) windoid called "Communication" or the like, the message will appear. >3. Battles. Does it make sense that every battle is fought to the death? Would > you like to retreat, fuel remaining? What would you like in a battle > summary? What would make a battle more fun to watch? > How about making a more detailed battle optional? like little icons fighting each other (see below in fleet organization)?. And yes, PLEASE add a battle statistic which tellst you how many ships of what type you lost. Then I would like to see a different way of organizing your fleets. Instead of using lists, use a window for each fleet. In this window you would place an icon for each ship and much like moving files to different folders in the finder, move these icons from one fleet-folder to another (or, maybe make this optional). Of course, there should be only two fleet-folders open at any time. This of course requires that you also supply a different icon for each shiptype one can create, but maybe you do this by writing the stats at the top of each icon or (again the finder analogy) below it (like filenames). Then, how about some random global events, like "World abc lost because of epidemic, every one died" or "World xyz declared independance"? These events would happen at the end of each turn. And then I would like to see the possibility of alliances with other Players. These could be talked about with the communication facility and if both players choose "Propose alliance with..." at the end of the same turn, in the next turn, these players will have an Alliance until at least ONE of them chooses "Break alliance" from the menu. In an alliance, the other player may land on a planet that belongs to his partner. He stays in command of his fleet(s) but will be refueled. If the alliance breaks, each planet with fleets from both players will have to fight it out. I think it best to limit alliances to two players, i.e. no player can have alliances with two or more players, only with one. >Thanks for the input. The new version will probably be available in August or >September. As it will be a "major" upgrade, we'll probably ask a minimal >upgrade fee for current users. > >-- >Peter Commons >commons@cs.stanford.edu >Computer Science Department, Stanford University OK, so maybe these changes are to big to implement. Anyway, i just *love* the idea of being able to suggest improvements. Here's to You, Peter! Christian. --- Christian Franz cfranz@iiic.ethz.ch ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Christian S. O. Franz | cfranz@iiic.ethz.ch ETH Zuerich, Swizerland | vismgr@rz.ethz.ch
mrx@dhw68k.cts.com (Mark Murphy) (06/04/91)
One suggestion.... please speed up updating the game in multi-player,
networked game! If the resource fork is being used to store player and
game data... switch to using the data fork! It would be much faster!
--
Real Life: Mark F. Murphy | What kinda beer do you like?
The Net: mrx@dhw68k.cts.com | Heineken!? Intercourse that doo-doo!!
The Desktop BBS: 714-491-1003 | Pabst Blue Ribbon!!!es2j+@andrew.cmu.edu (Edward John Sabol) (06/05/91)
>1. Multi-Player Games. What can be done to make them easier?
I personally would really like support for multiple zones. It seems
every single network game that has come out for the Mac cannot handle
multiple
zones. It's really aggravating. All of my friends are in different zones
than I am!
Disclaimer: I've only played version 1.02 briefly. If there is a version that
does do zones, please ignore.ajauch@bonnie.ics.uci.edu (Alexander Edwin Jauch) (06/05/91)
Well, Here's my feelings:
1. New types of Tech, Sealth, Anti-Stealth, Espionage, etc.
2. Mission orders. I would like to set the reaction of the ships when
they encounter enemy forces. Sort of fight or flight.
3. Love the concept of "Your Fleet Was Destroyed Immediately." Do not take
it out, would ruin the game.
4. On viewing explored stars, I would love to see a sorting option. I am
forever trying to figure out which planet has the gravity closest to 1
or which planet has the most metal so I can strip mine it.
5. Some sort of "Set Spending to minimal" setting. I loose thousands on
planets that aren't profitable yet but I don't want to abandon. I can't
seem to get the spending to exactly what is required to maintain it.
I usually just mine it minimally, but when it has been completely
terriformed and mined, I can't stop wasting my money. I don't want
to build ships just to use the money, so it just goes to waste.
6. Profiles. Perhaps create some standard opponent profiles like Risk
or Ancient Art of War. I like the unknown aspect, but sometimes I'm
in the mood for a particular type of game.
7. Allow players to form alliances. I suppose this would only be possible
with human players, but it would be great. Of course, you should be
allowed to break them at any time! HOO BOY!
Love the game, completely addicted to it.
--
Alex Jauch
*ajauch@bonnie.ics.uci.edu |"If all you have is a hammer, then the whole*
*ajauch@orion.oac.uci.edu |world looks like a nail" -- Stolen *mshields@nurslab10 (Mike Shields) (06/05/91)
In article <29190@neptune.inf.ethz.ch> cfranz@iiic.ethz.ch (Christian Steffen Ove Franz) writes: > >2. Message Passing. Do you want to send messages to other players? If so, > > what do you want to send? And how would you do it? > > Yes, I really would like that. How about another windoid where you select the > player you want to send a message to? Then a dialog appears and you type in > your message, click OK and off it goes. The recipient doesn't HAVE to answer, > but in (yet another) windoid called "Communication" or the like, the message > will appear. > How about something like in netrek for X windows. You have 4 extra windows. One where "GOD" puts little tidbits about team mode and such. Another where your teammates can communicate amongst themselves and one for messages to everyone. This would of course be modified since there aren't the teams. Unless there was an alliance option where official alliances were extended where two or more people could become a "team"??? Sounds like an idea?? Mike /***************************************************************/ /* Mike Shields TA-extrordinare ( Yea, right-sniker, sniker :^)*/ /* Students: "You need to show us how to use */ /* <insert _any_ application here>" */ /* Me: OK, glad I found out :^) */ /***************************************************************/
kenh@eclectic.COM (Ken Hancock) (06/07/91)
In article <ocGy3yS00VoR492J0O@andrew.cmu.edu> es2j+@andrew.cmu.edu (Edward John Sabol) writes: >I personally would really like support for multiple zones. It seems >every single network game that has come out for the Mac cannot handle >multiple >zones. It's really aggravating. All of my friends are in different zones >than I am! That's because most of the networks games are semi-real time. The amount of traffic that these games generate can be unbelievable. If you allowed them zone access, it might well bring the network to its knees. In the case of SH, this might be more plausible since it doesn't require constant status polling. Ken -- Ken Hancock | INTERNET: kenh@eclectic.com Isle Systems | Compuserve: >INTERNET: kenh@eclectic.com Macintosh Consulting | AOL: KHancock | Disclaimer: My opinions are mine, | your opinions are yours. Simple, isn't it?