I love the idea. Quick question though, do you want to keep working this at more of an abstract level, or is it ok to start discussing resources and such that the game engine would need to model?

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I don''t see the need to balance anything until there''s something to balance. You''re shooting at nonexistent things here. If we could first lay out some preliminary game elements and mechanics, then we might have something to balance.

Preliminary game elements and mechanics? Isn''t that what you have been posting about? player communication, tradeing/disperseing information, purchaseing satelite services, newspapers...sounds like some preliminary gameplay elements to me...

quote: Original post by MSW
Preliminary game elements and mechanics? Isn''t that what you have been posting about? player communication, tradeing/disperseing information, purchaseing satelite services, newspapers...sounds like some preliminary gameplay elements to me...

That all sounds very preliminary to me. I can''t possibly see what to balance at this point, until some well defined mechanisms are in place.

If you want to offer suggestions for balance, I''m open to them.

quote: Original post by ThoughtBubble
I love the idea. Quick question though, do you want to keep working this at more of an abstract level, or is it ok to start discussing resources and such that the game engine would need to model?

I would love to hear about resources and elements. It''s just that I always find it necessary to explain, justify and point out how different this concept is from a standard RTS.

Back to communication, hierarchy, organizations, information flow and the like, go to the library, walk around, do searches, there are books on the topic and people who make their living faciliting the flow of information within and in and out of organizations. The library I went to had some old books, and this one was no exception, dating from the 70s, but the book is called Organizational Intelligence.

quote: Original post by MSW
...and how is to REALY know that it''s pointed at planet X...If player Z manufactures the satelite technology to sell to player A, then how does player A REALY know he is buying the correct technology to look down at a planet?

Business relationships are based on a certain trust. Not trust in the conventional sense of the word, but trust in the sense that you (the supplier) wish to sell me good product because I (the consumer) will likely return to you for more product. Take a look at any industry in the modern world; they track occurence of repeat customers.

If you purchased a spy satellite in real life, wouldn''t the first thing you did be to test it on events you knew were happening? Once you''ve confirmed the veracity of its reports on a number of test scenarios, you then feel confident to roll the sat out in "production" situations.

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...and could Player Z manufacture satelite technology that can mask his/her own agents if caught in the spyscope?

Sure, and if Player Z is never caught then that''s a tactical and political advantage for that player - the ability to feed highly-valued disinformation.

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what happens if Player A is offline, but Player B is online? does player B still recieve the satelite images? and if Player A is offline, can Player Z make a "service call" on the satelite technology? Would such mechanisams as satelite technology always function, or could they break down as in real life?

Those are all interesting questions and will constitute a major portion of the practical mechanics of the game - continuity, persistence, permanence...

A game that is similiar to this, but also like simcity multiplayer is a game called Star Peace.

Do not remember the url off the top of my head, but it is something like starpeace.com or .net or .org anyways

It was originally published by monte cristo games I believe, but they dropped it due to conflicting interests. But anyways, when I read the general idea, this game popped directly into my head.

How about an economy/stock market simulation?

Each player can own as much as possible, but a player can only be a manager of a limited number of company locations (a company can have more of these). Poor AI managers are available, and managers can only be changed at fixed intervals, when the stock owners vote to elect a new manager.

The map is made of cities and states (a state is a set of cities). Graph-like connections between cities are provided (describing the infrastructure, terrain between the two cities). Resource levels are provided for each city. A state is described by a governing policy, which is a collection of tax rates (customs, profit, etc.), and funding rates (for police, infrastructure developing, etc.). At fixed periods of times, players propose policy variants, which are voted by all players who own a more than a certain welth level in that state.

The main action of a manager player is establishing contracts. More contract types exist (transport contracts, production contracts, advertising contracts, loans). A contract will specify duration of the contract, price, penalties for delays, etc. Contracts are game objects, and the game actively enforces them. Copies of contracts can be sent to other players. Contracts can be kept secret, or made public. NDA clauses will force a penalty on the player that distributes copies of the contract (all players owning an ilegal copy can submit it to the (game-controlled) authorities - resulting in the automatic penalty - the penalty is described by the governing policy).

The micro-management gameplay is mainly combining processing units as lego blocks. Many different product types exist, and each processing unit will be able to take a certain input and produce a certain output in a period of time (steel + energy = kitchen sink style). Processing units are products as well.

The research model is what I call static progress. It''s not that new products are better in any way than the old ones once were, but the old ones become obsolette in time, unable to perform. Research is needed just to stay at the same level. A technology unit allows an already existing processing unit to produce a different product. Technologies are also products, and can be traded like all other products. They work like software upgrades. Buy a licence to a certain technology and upgrade a certain processing unit (no piracy please).

The stock market works by automatically processing requests of the type "buy x units of stock y at a price less than z".

The game would use standard communication methods like forums, chat rooms and mailing lists, perhaps even external to the game.

What would be the goal of playing anyone but a state leader? The state leader in typical games would be trying to take over the world. But what would the goal be for the ''lesser'' players? It seems like the same problem with MMORPG''s, everyone wants to be the hero, so you need NPC''s to run the shops and inns. That''s why I phrased the idea of the press as more of an NPC.

Another thought, if you have human players in many different roles, the interface is going to need to be very flexible. I haven''t yet played it, but the new Romance of Three Kingdoms might be a good game to look at. You can play different roles from peasant to general in ancient China. I don''t know how the implementation turned out, but it looks interesting.

Jack

quote: Original post by bishop_pass
I would love to hear about resources and elements. It''s just that I always find it necessary to explain, justify and point out how different this concept is from a standard RTS.

I can understand how. The most important portion of the game is all between players, and the computer is more of an arbitration device.

Manpower strikes me as important to this. Who do you have, and what can they do? It strikes me that the player doesn''t need a really clear amount, just a ballpark figure. But if someone wants to manufacture satellites, then they''ll need engineers. And if someone wants to attack someone else, they''ll need soldiers. So as the head of an orginization, you need to have some idea what the limits and capabilities of the orginzation are.

Income strikes me as another important resource. Income sort of translates into future manpower in my mind. If you need more engineers, just trade in some money and hire some.

Hmmm... I''m not sure what to call this category, infrastructure maybe? The idea is that you allready have capabilities and technology at your disposal. This could be like a printing press, powergrid, or exisiting satellite system. You''ve allready got it and it''s allready working. I guess the difference (in my mind) between this and manpower would be that manpower is the capability to make something new, while infrastructure is the ability to do waht you''ve always been doing. Of course, in Didor''s static progress setup, the difference is pretty much nullified.

Somehow, I get the feeling that I''m still looking at this a bit too close and from a bit much of an RTS standpoint, but I hope it helps.