Multiple worlds at once would be a micromanagement nightmare in my opinion. (and it isn't new either - Earth 2050 I think it was called...) You would have to constantly flit between worlds and make sure you aren't getting your ass kicked on each of them.

The idea that your units behave like human beings rather than mindless cannon fodder is a good one though. Morale is an important factor in combat yet underused in most RTS games - instead we have godlike control over all our men and they will happily die for us.

The hard part is balancing the morale system such that it becomes an accepted gameplay factor, rather than annoying the player with loss of control.


[edited by - Sandman on April 29, 2002 12:49:32 PM]

The multi world would not be planet flipping, bacause the base is on your ship, and you can bring aloth of units aswell... you can also only control the planet your base-ship is on... so its not about building a base on ewery planet, its about creating a super base-ship, by moving betwean different planets.. maybe just 5-8 of them... 1-3 have aloth of resorces, and the rest are just stone?
Think of the space betwean the planets as the rivers and mountains in ordenary RTS...
of course, the interface will be smooth and fast.. i also hate the MicroMicro Uninportant Managing...

The living units is eyecandy, and will not change the RTS standard by itselfe!

quote: Original post by uncutno
The multi world would not be planet flipping, bacause the base is on your ship, and you can bring aloth of units aswell... you can also only control the planet your base-ship is on... so its not about building a base on ewery planet, its about creating a super base-ship, by moving betwean different planets.. maybe just 5-8 of them... 1-3 have aloth of resorces, and the rest are just stone?
Think of the space betwean the planets as the rivers and mountains in ordenary RTS...
of course, the interface will be smooth and fast.. i also hate the MicroMicro Uninportant Managing...

I still don't understand how this improves the game. If one planet has resources and the others don't, then everyone just fights over the planet with resources. If all planets have equal resources, then.. everyone just mills about the planets as they please, occasionally having a fight. And since half the fights will be on different planet to that which your opponent is on, you spend most your time fighting the AI rather than your human opponent.

quote:
The living units is eyecandy, and will not change the RTS standard by itselfe!

Uh, no, if you implemented it properly then it affects the way the units behave, not just the animation.
And this could have a big difference on the way the game plays.


[edited by - Sandman on April 29, 2002 1:08:09 PM]

Sandman:

Because the planets will be realy smal, and insted of having 50 missions to choose from, some of the missions are in the same systems so when you enter a system with 10 planets where there are 3-6 missions around.. from simple to hard... This way, the player are more free to choose tactics and so on... It will remove linearity of the missions, and instead give you 5 systems with 5 missions in each, gives you 25 missions to choose from, do at the same time, or skip! ... thats why it will improve...

And please tell we how Living Soldiers would do major changes in the gameplay...

quote: Original post by uncutno
Sandman:

And please tell we how Living Soldiers would do major changes in the gameplay...

Who can forget Dungeon Keeper 2''s ability 2 slap your minions around! :-)



bangz.

quote: Original post by uncutno
Because the planets will be realy smal, and insted of having 50 missions to choose from, some of the missions are in the same systems so when you enter a system with 10 planets where there are 3-6 missions around.. from simple to hard... This way, the player are more free to choose tactics and so on... It will remove linearity of the missions, and instead give you 5 systems with 5 missions in each, gives you 25 missions to choose from, do at the same time, or skip! ... thats why it will improve...

It is an interesting way of presenting a campaign, but it doesn't seem to make much difference to the core gameplay. Also, how does this work in multiplayer? A lot of RTS players couldn't give a damn about the single player game.

quote:
And please tell we how Living Soldiers would do major changes in the gameplay...

The player no longer has godlike control over his units. Instead, he must consider the morale of his own troops as well as the morale of his opponents.

I've not played it, but I am told that Sid Meiers Gettysburg has a good morale system. Troops which are getting their asses kicked will run away, but may be able to regroup and return to the fray later. However, surround some troops with sufficient forces and they surrender, effectively taking them out of the game permanently. Apparently the better players can wipe out most people's armies without even killing a single man. Manouvering your troops becomes an important factor - if your men are routed then they may be out of action for a while, but they come back. If you let them get completely cut off however, then you might lose them for good.






[edited by - Sandman on April 29, 2002 1:36:15 PM]

Well, actually its more like, tell me what living soldiers would not change in the gameplay...

If the battlefield becomes alive.. If you feel the fear in your combatants eyes.. If you see an explosion ripping off ones arm.. I belive this would do some changes to your aproach to a RTS. Units would be important for real, not because they carry a big bazooka, but because you care.
Watching the playfield in a good RTS should be like watching a good war movie. You should be able to just watch a soldier for hours as he''s sneeking around in a village, without being bored. If theres panic on the screen, you should feel it!

This is not about graphics.. It''s about giving the game life, a spirit of its own. A realtime game like this would create new standards.

(I''ve got these incredible scenes of it in my head... It''s kinda hard to get it down in text.. Hope you understand anyway..)

Ok, i understand, and i agree... a living game would be great..

My point is... if we take it to the basics, we replace units with boxes, remove sounds, and replace the interface with simple wireframes and text.... now what you got is the gameplay... you dont got the realism, and i guess it would be a boring gameplay but anyway...

In standard RTS you tell your unit to attack, and it attack until it dies, or target dies...

In living RTS, you would tell you unit to attack, then A: it would attack, or B: it would not attack, based on factors like fear, panic and sutch...

The difference would be that its imposible to do bad commands... It would be imposible to loose an army in a fight, because the army would surender and they are not part of the game anymore...

RTS standard:
Smal Army Attacks Big Army = Smal Army Dies = Smal Army out of game...

Living RTS:
Smal Army Attacks Big Army = Smal Army Surenders = Smal Army out of game...

Of course i understand what a great plessure it would be to see the troops react like humans would, but the result would be the same...

RTS stadard:
Big Army sorunds Smal Army = Big Army Kill Smal Army = Smal Army out of game..

Living RTS:
Big Army sorunds Smal Army = Smal Army Surenders = Smal Army out of game..

You understand my point?

Isnt it realistic that comanders send their troops into fights they cant win? I agree that some soldiers would escape when the understan they are going to die...

But it would be unrealistic if soldiers calculated the chanse for victory, and escaped if chanses was to small...

If a soldier saw another soldier lose its arm, would he panic, or would he be so angry that he attacked ewen stronger?

These are the reasons i say Living RTS wouldnt change that much of the core gameplay....

Also the dungeon keeper example:
You tell minion to do stuff = it do it slow = you slapp it = it do it fast...

is it realy different in gamelogic to:

You tell minion to do stuff fast (by a button) = it do it fast...

Living RTS is just a way to make it more realistic, but your caomands , and the results are basicly the same..

Not really.

I actually downloaded and played the Gettysburg demo this evening. The interface takes a bit of getting used to, and there are a few things that could be improved, but it is very different from your run of the mill RTS.

Wiping out a regiment is difficult. Regiments tend to flee long before they get wiped out, and although this takes them out of the battle for a while, they are free to come back later once they have rallied. An enemy who fails to take this into account might find himself in trouble as units he thought were gone manouver to his flanks. However, a surrounded unit which surrenders REALLY IS LOST. It is hard to do, but if you can do it it is quicker than killing them. Also, the direction you attack from makes a difference, units being attacked from the flanks or rear run much quicker than units being attacked from the front.

All this means that the position of your troops can make a big difference to the outcome of the battle. Compare this with your conventional RTS, where, in all but a few cases, the main factors are number of units and (if it is one of the better RTS''s) type of units.

Is it just me or are there a lot of newly registered people here now?

There have been lots of original ideas posted by many people here in this forum on how to revolutionize RTS games. From command and control issues, to resource gathering/manufacturing, to artificially intelligent commanders to supply and logistics to name but a few. Even issues like game balancing and mission success (and the purpose thereof) issues have been covered in this forum. If you do a search on the forum, you''ll discover quite a few intriguing ideas.

As for your own game, what is the rationale behind the game? I''ve come to the point in my own game design philosophy that I''m actually more interested in the game world in some respects than the game mechanics. In other words, what is the purpose of the game in the first place? I think without a storyline, games are just kind of mindless sports. That''s my own personal opinion, since some people like to play games without any inherent purpose as long as its fun to play.

But as has been mentioned recently in the article about games as a form of speech....I honestly think other than a handful of exceptions, no one has created a game that is worthy of being called a story.