Zep and Pylon really added the point to make. Even though multiplayers should be fast and furious most of the time doesnt mean it has to be like that.

Just take Star Craft for instance. Just cause everyone play it at Fastest doesnt mean there arent options for playing it Slow pace. Sure you dont get almost anyone to play with but the option is there.



Zep attacked one big issue of the civ-series. There are not good ways to manage your empire in civ in lategame. This makes me in MP-games become very aggresive just because it will take a shitload of time in order to manage through a turn or two in an hrs time. Think of 4 ppl having the same kind of empire since they started on different continents...



4 turns - 4 hrs...



To work around this id suggest that one was able to set up a buildorder (that one can predefine a couple of) and thats followed through without having to manage it.

Say I have "Pop-increase", "production", "militaristic", "diplo/intelligence" as my four buildorders. Then if I choose pop-increase then I can be sure they build in accordance with that.

To build and micro your first two systems might be interesting... to do it with your 31st is just tedious as you have 30 others to manage aswell..

This will also make it easier on the AI since in order to increase difficulty its easy to copy most used buildorders in order to counter them. ^^

The mother of said 14 year old when she realizes he is out there after 8 PM!

1 14 year old withe a deathstar thozlow

znork wrote:
A 14 year old withe a nuke?

2 14 year olds with a nuke ?

maceman wrote:


Nothing worse than a 14 yr old with a big gun.

A 14 year old withe a nuke?

One of my favorite multiplayer games was Rise of Nations... like a good MP Civ which you know will be done in about an hour. Send another nuke!



I agree with many of you. MP should equal fast action (plus lots of trash talking, socializing and trying to Kirk alien chicks) while SP has more depth potential so you can, if you wish, micromanage the early-going critical empire development stages... then delegate it all once it gets too big and complex.



but there's the opportunity. Every empire has imploded at the point it became too big.



I absolutely love the Crusader Kings II model where it's based on human traits and intrigues... with your new wife trying to kill your son so her son can be heir... but she gets stabbed first by your brother who had the same idea... kinda like how the real world runs... with Humans.



in a 4X space game that might be a tad too detailed but I always prefer a SP game with true race traits, espionage and big tech differences (somehow balanced) rather than just MP Red vs Blue games. MP could have complementary or competitive race traits but they're still played by people with their own individual traits.



Nothing worse than a 14 yr old with a big gun.

Well I enjoy long-winded games too, but not necessarily in a multiplayer setting.



In fact, I prefer multiplayer sessions to be quite short now, which is the main reason I quit MMORPGing, not enough time to do everything

skamaks wrote:
Looks like a lot of people agree with you on this!

Anyone still interested in marathon games? Anyone?

I do, I still play games like Dominions 3 and Space empires 4 that last for months .

I agree with Alderbranch.



You can have predefined set of orders which makes the micro-management unnecessary... Like Focus on producing food, focus on research, on industry, focus on military build-up, or simply be a cash-cow to help other systems get their feet under them faster.

What is also nice is a building queue, of course.



What I would like in ship design is a possibility for a given class of ships to be automatically upgraded under certain circumstances, like being in a system with a major defense base for example and being in dry docks for 1 or 2 turns, would be a nice touch, particularly if crews gather experience through fights. :-)

I totally agree with Alderbranch. In Rebellion, one can ask the "agent" (the IA) to manage the production of your planets in order to always have an excess of processed material and maintenance (build automatically the good balance of mines and reffineries) + the basic defense management of every planet by building a reasonable number of the best defense unit you have. Meanwhile it is still possible to "customize" your planet (build shipyard / troop facilities, shield generator etc.) instead.



I really like Alderbranch idea, having a set of buildorders to give to planets, and it can help to speed up and avoid the redundant (boring ?) process of doing x times the same thing, moreover because once you got your own building habits, you usually repeat it on every cities / planets / colony / castle / things you have.





Talking about Civ-5, another thing I do not like at all in this game is how the game communicate with you to warn you about something (production finished, units attacked and so on). There is no dedicated interface to easily sort the messages which sum up the main idea of the messages in just one glance, and you spend a lot of time clicking on that infinite list of icons to really know "what the hell is happening in my empire ?"

The past few years I came accross quite a few ideas in different games that I would like to see bundeled into one. These are:



- A 3d map of the galaxy. I want to go up, down, hence and forth to colonize: I was very disappointed by the 2d environment in Galactic Civilizations (GalCiv), while I admire the 3d map in for example Sword of the Stars (SotS).

- Let each race have it's own way to travel faster than light (like in SotS). Or, alternatively, offer different options that all can research, but if you won't focus into one you won't get far.

- Have - besides a couple of major races that compete with you - some minor ones that probably won't go out colonising other planets: like city-states in ancient Greece. A thing I like from GalCiv.

- Have multiple planets in one system that can be colonized by different races. Maybe you can race X want totally different planets (you a lush green world, X a gas giant) and your empires can be intertwined.

- Have a complex tech tree. I like the idea in SotS that some techs are each game randomly available, but I actually prefer to have a system like in Hearts of Iron 3 (HoI3) where there are só many techs available, that it will be impossible to research them all, and you'll have to choose what your focus will be. For the people who are not familiar with the kind of complexity I'm referring to: in HoI3 you can not only research different kinds of tanks, but for each type you can also research several upgrades for the engines, for the hull, for the gun etc, and also research better doctrines that lead them into battle.

skamaks wrote:
Looks like a lot of people agree with you on this!

Anyone still interested in marathon games? Anyone?

I think there's room for both, and perhaps it'd be more a question of game setup. I love a good marathon game, and if it's play by email, then all the better.



In regards to setup, perhaps there could be game variants...things like accelerated research, unlocked or semi-unlocked tech tree, set or prebuilt fleets, specific victory conditions that don't require massive expansion or the usual prerequisites found in things like GalCiv and whatnot for a "faster" game, as it were. Maybe simply a point victory or a turn-limit?



But don't kill off the marathon games, because that's one reason I love the 4X sub-genre...it's that massive march towards victory. That said, smart automation toggles for everything (or most things) should be considered, as it can allow for players to hand off aspects of the empire management to the AI OR to directly control each function. Either way, I think there're smart ways to dodge the hour-long single turn preparation.

skamaks wrote:
Anyone still interested in marathon games? Anyone?

I am.



I mean, you can have both choices depending on the settings of your game. In SOSE for instance you can choose small to huge galaxy, slow to quick building time, slow to quick research time and so on.

Imho, you can't have a 4X with deep, complex but interesting mechanics for a multiplayer game that lasts less than..let's say...three hours, at the very least, just because they won't be the time to waste on them.

In the end, a fast paced 4X game (understand : 1hour of gameplay for a "medium" would be just a "regular" strategy game.



Another thing :

The problem with Civilization is that, when the game is well established, it can take 30min for just one turn. Nobody wants to have a game session of 30min / 1hour with just 2 turns in a turn based game. It's frustrating.

There should be a way to reduced the amount of time required to achieve a turn in order to not having the player frustrated and give him the feeling of "well, you did a lot of things during your game session, now you can't stop and continue later".

Something like SWR, Empire at War or....Final Fantasy, with the ATB : Turns were actually in computed real time and a turn can last let's say...5 minutes. Thanks to this system, players were not forced to wait for the others because the game was synchronous, but not really in real time so they have the time to think about their actions before the "tic" (5 minutes) was reached to resolve the actions (in SWR just the mission, production and travelling duration was affected by the turn based system. If you ordered a unit to go from A to B, you were not able to go undo what you did if he had to travel between planets).

People can argue that, if you have a large empire, it would be difficult to manage it entirely in a fixed amount of time. Well I would answer : that's the drawback of big empires, bureaucracy and administrations have a more important inertia, unless you find (YOU, the player, the Big Boss of this empire) find a way to improve it



Hope this was understable. Writing thins is not the best thing a can do at 1am...

xord wrote:
yea and guys what is important it's that a (mulitplayer) game dont last for houres .... (1 hour and dont count on me)

Looks like a lot of people agree with you on this!

Anyone still interested in marathon games? Anyone?

I really dislike the 3d map, does not really add anything to the gameplay and just complicates the galaxy map. anything a 3d map has can be represented in a 2d map just as easily and much cleaner/user friendly.



Maybe the game could have a 3d mapmode and a "flattened" mapmode to appease both side?



current mapmode from the screenshots looks great!

you should try the Gratuitous Space Battles too... it's a top down view simple idea executed well. circa 2009 i believe

Hia all,



well my best space game would be not a 3d map.. as I have troube finding my way in Sots

also I dislike in gal civ that a diplomatic victory is easier then the combat one...



what I do like are the 3d space battles....



multiplayer is fun but not the major factor for me . unless the game can be is dumbed down(with options) to a SpaceWardHo game... quick and easy and lots of fun

and lan preferred ... or make it for multiplayer turn based with a server from amplitude running the turns yes indeed a good old PBEM game..

it works and you can ask some extra cash for it... atm I hoping on some total deal package for distant worlds which is now too expensive .. and playing VGAP on www.planets.nu

hmm could also help against piracy etc.... but mainly it provides a platform on which I can play with my friends and all on their own time...



hmm will go and read now which features are in this game as I have only seen the trailer which I found at: http://www.spacesector.com/blog/tag/4x-game/

and allready I am like.. wanna have and wanna play

hahahahaha

LOL starting it up slowly you mean...

I train mine on Wii. That works like a charm.