hello, at schhool, while really bored, I came across an idea that could improove the gameplay of some RTS games. What do you think about haveing the ability to slow down/speed up the game speed easily, and as part of the gameplay? It seems that right now, the ratio between the time to build units and the time it takes to start and finish a battle is rather off... I have found myself, at times in games such as AOE and AOM, starting a battle with an army and having the rescources to send a steady stream of new units just as fast as they are killed which is at times, fairly quickly. I just thought that, especially with games against the AI, letting the user slow down the speed in which battles are faught and speed up when waiting for units/buildings/reasearch to complete. Right now, games seem to try to find a happy medium in which you don''t spend much time waiting for units to complete and battles are not rediculously fast. By slowing down the battles, you will also have more control over your armies at your disposal. If the game speed is to fast, you sometimes dont have enough time to react to events that occur in a battle. Although this is somewhat realistic, in more recent times, it is quite realistic at all. commands can be given to units on the ''line'' nearly instantly. Information about the battle can also be sent at the smae speed, nearly instantly. Anyway, what do you think about easily letting the user slow game speed when more control/precision is required and sped up when less vital. I do know that in many games you can change the game speed through some kind of options menu, but it isn''t really designed for this purpose, and I havn''t heard of people using it like I am suggesting... maybe they do... mor ethe reason to make it easier for them what do you guys think? Thanks Dwiel

Can''t you change the game speed in all rts? I used to be as simple as pressing the + and - minus buttons to change game speed. It used to be a common and standard feature. Don''t the newer RTS games allow you to do this?

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I''m pretty sure that the original Warcraft had a keystroke that let you change gametime. Building a castle? [++++] Getting attacked? [--------] Nothing to it. It was a very handy feature.

Most RTS''s do a good job of slowing themselves down when you get into a nasty death-orgy anyway. My dual CPU Pentium 3 1.3ghz system gets choppy whenever I''m playing Frozen Throne and my enormous army collides with someone else''s.

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Good is the enemy of excellence.

The auto-time-change idea is good but I would suggest putting it on a time-out. If the user doesn''t do anything after X seconds, then speed up the game until the next event or user entry. When an event occurs or if the user inputs anything, then slow down the speed until the next time-out.

But then again, is simply selecting a unit to view a property sufficient to slow time down? Or should it only slow down after to choose an action?

Obviously we are talking about single player only, but it would be interesting if time slowed and sped in multiplayer too. You are then wondering why time just slowed down and what the heck your opponent is about to do to you!!!

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it would be interesting if time slowed and sped in multiplayer too.

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Right, but if I''m building and he is on the attack, that seems hardly fair that my build time is slowed because of my opponent''s action.

Thanks for the info about how this idea has already been implemented in many games... I guess I''m just that avid of a gamer... Will use next time...

On the line sof multiplayer, I thought it might be interesting if a player was given something like 3 ''time-drag''s where time slows, for the entire game for say 30 seconds. It would allow for players to better manage their units durring battles while not slowing down the gameplay the rest of the time when playing at that speed would be slow and borring.

Not sure if it is good though, because if you realise you''re getting suprise attacked, you will have an easier time managing everyone... although, your units wont be able to get to the point of attack, assuming its a surprise, quickly anyway... ...BAH... I guess surprise attacks would pretty much be just as effective...

On the auto-speed up... maybe the game would slow down depending on the number of ''attack'' command you have given... or something like that. Possible some function of the number of different types of commands... such as attack, move, spy, covert mode, etc.

Could also be as simple as the player pushing a button that toggle battle-time on and off...

The plus and minus thing is nice to... I guess it might help if it was a little more advertised for infrequent gamers like myself..

The autospeed has a little work, as does the multiplayer time configuration...

hmmm

Dwiel