Steve Baker wrote: > Aaron Kane wrote: > > > Since college I have had a idea that if I could combine the best features of games like SimCity, > > Age of Empires, Civilization, etc and add to them some real flexibility and custom personality I > > would have a really cool game. > > Game ideas come cheap. I'm sure many people here have heard the story "I can't program games - but I have > a great idea for a game - and I think you should all write it for me." - I have probably had 20 or 30 > emails like that over the years. However, programmers are not devoid of ideas of their own for games > and generally, they'd prefer to work on THEIR vision of what's good - and not yours. > > However, you have some financial backing - and that makes something of a difference. Haha... I appreciate the vote of confidence.. (smiles) > > I would use his money to buy some project hardware and then use the rest as Christmas presents for > > active developers (nothing beats a bribe... :-] ). > > I don't think buying hardware is a good investment. Developers have PC's to develop on - and OpenSource > developers have all the software they need. We really don't need anything else. This need is described better in my other follow up. I need to have a server host to run the "Approved" great library. I agree that buying hardware is not a primary concern. > You should spend your money on artists. There are few if any competent OpenSource artists out there - > and any game of the kind you describe will need a MOUNTAIN of the stuff. Most programmers are not > kick-ass artists. Agreed. I have rounded up 4 resources but many more is needed. My other mail also describes my hopes of using the players as a source for this. In the end, I am reserving part of the money to actually try and buy that work if it can't be found other places. (would really hate to do that though) > You might maybe need to buy modelling software for your artists - Maya, Lightwave or some such. You > might get away with Blender however...depending on what your artwork needs are. > > To make a commercial quality game, you'll also need music, voice talent - and possibly actors and/or > body artists and mocap time for your cut-scenes and intro-video. > > All of those things are EXPENSIVE - so that's where your money should go. My current resources already have that software. If other people who wish to work on the project needed it, it wouldn't be a bad way of thanking them for their efforts.... > > To be brief the current design is for a “Epic” RTS game that takes a society from cave men to > > spacemen. A short list of notable requirements are > > I think it's premature to design down to this level. You need to brainstorm the design with your > programmers and artists. This comment is 180 degrees from the other posted response. I think that we are currently somewhere in the middle. The design has been discussed with the current team members, but I didn't want to fix the idea or design until I opened it up to you all for comment. I am really hoping to attract alot of interest in the requirements phase. Something that I don't think there is enough of in Open Source. Which is way I am enjoying these comments > For example: > > > 1)The map is isometric clon of SimCity except there is no pre-set size limit. > > ...with modern graphics cards - why restrict yourself to isometric? Render stuff properly > in perspective...at least as an option. This will help you to look different from Civilisation - which > you seem hardly any different from right now. I would really like to open this comment up to the list.... The decision for isometric was a result of the looks of fear and panic on my developers faces when we estimated the work load of doing other types of modeling... I personally would prefer to take your recommendation... For the very reason you suggested... However, I have found too many projects in my background research that attempted to build a OpenGL game and spent 100% of the effort lost in the modeling and never really got much of a game. I will open this to the list... What does everyone feel about the effort needed to do full modeling and the likelihood that I could gather the needed resources to make it happen? Also, if there is a move towards full modeling that would make it more difficult for average players to create new units. and objects. > > 2)The main engine is a balanced tree with “game time” as the key... > > It's *WAY* too early to specify implementation details like this. ok. What information would be more interesting for public discussion at this phase? > > I know this is a lot of information for one mail. However, if any/all of this project sounds interesting > > please let me know. > > Nope - it sounds like a Civ clone with a few minor tweaks...this genre has been very completely explored > in everything from Sim City to Railroad Tycoon. I think you'd need some really major discriminators to > go against these record-breaking titles. Well... I hope that my longer follow-up mail might have described a "major discriminator". My rebuttal is that these games have a large audience for a reason. This is a style of game that people like to play. I think the major discriminator is that in simple terms you will be playing alot of your favorite games at the same time and be able to customize you game play around the style you most prefer. Thanks again for your comments.. I have taken notes. ~Aaron
Attachment:
smime.p7s
Description: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature