SE V Video on 3dGamers [Archive]

MightyPenguin

August 7th, 2005, 05:17 PM

Renegade 13 said:
167 MB!?!?! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/shock.gif Good thing I don't have to take a look at the movie to get a preview!! Damn...

*has 2meg connection*

*is faster than host site*

*flexes e-penis*

Can someone who's managed to watch it tell me on the preponderance of stat screens? I've managed to get myself into an argument with a guy on another forum- he's taking the piss out of the gamespot screenies because one of them is a stat report on an organics extraction facility.

Slick

August 7th, 2005, 05:18 PM

Got it. Thanks, guys.

Wow! great clip.

Slick

August 7th, 2005, 05:42 PM

I'm going thru the video, pausing at every step to see details and it sure looks like there are LOTS of things that are either revealed outright or hinted at by looking at the screens. I'll post a list of my observations soon.

MightyPenguin

August 7th, 2005, 05:48 PM

Bah. Too many stats screens to be useful. Camera control isn't very smooth, I noticed. And tactical ground combat seems overly complicated, unless there's some kind of shortcut for the attack and goto commands.

Nice space combat too. Can it be paused again after you've set it off.

AAshbery76

August 7th, 2005, 06:25 PM

Why bother with groundcombat for a 4X game if it's made for simpletons.Complex is good.

Atrocities

August 7th, 2005, 06:37 PM

Hey guys, thats not really SE V! Its a copy cat game made to lure you into a trap where they steal your soul by sucking you into an ultra real universe of 4x gaming. Your lifes will forever be changed if you watch this, like a boats of old lured to there deaths on the rocks of some fabeled island.

MightyPenguin

August 7th, 2005, 06:43 PM

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

There's a difference between complexity and depth. For a start, depth is good, complexity is bad. For another, making goto and attack commands a two-click process instead of a one-click process is needlessly complicating the interface. Of course, it's odds-on that the maker of the video chose to use the most long-winded method, as all such promo videos do.

Possibly because they wanted to attract the market segment that had to use a command-driven interface with a text-parser written by a non-native dyslexic for so long that they convinced themselves that they liked pain. Or maybe not; it's a mystery.

Raapys

August 7th, 2005, 06:45 PM

Wondering, will there be beam weapons?

Ed Kolis

August 7th, 2005, 07:12 PM

Wow, Malfador's really got the media blitz on... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Ah, good, I was afraid that was going to be a WMV, one of those horrid proprietary video formats http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

Now, on to the roasting - errm, review! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Aw, crap, there's just too much to see that I don't know what to say!!! Except for maybe, why is the ground combat turn-based, not real-time like the space combat? (Oh well, Titans of Steel was fun http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif) And (no offense to the artists, really!) why does the music sound like something ripped from UT2k4? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif (Honest, I DO like UT2k4's music, but there's that nagging suspicion! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif)

Oh yeah, I do have other comments... for instance, I like how fleets have attack AND defense strategies like in SE3, and I like the return of the right-click menus (gives that RMB something to do, in addition to freeing up screen real estate http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) and love how the scan-range hexes update as your ships move (those silly people at Gamespot thought they were ZOC hexes http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif)

OMG... did I just see the bolts fired by a Jraenar ship hit a CueCappa base and cause its rotation to alter in a REALISTIC way as it blew up??? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Errm... did I just see projectile weapons CURVE? Tell me those were seekers... Maybe projectile weapons should just be removed entirely or limited to EXTREMELY short range?

Oh yes, and if this thing doesn't run on WINE, well then, I am DEFINITELY deleting Linux and switching back to windows!!!!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

(It just gets better every day! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif)

MightyPenguin

August 7th, 2005, 07:20 PM

Ed Kolis said:

Errm... did I just see projectile weapons CURVE? Tell me those were seekers... Maybe projectile weapons should just be removed entirely or limited to EXTREMELY short range?

You what? Get a lump of steel, a railgun and a target. Set them up in space- load the lump into the railgun and put the target at a relatively immobile position somewhere at the other end of the galaxy. Fire the lump at the target and you will find, a couple of billion years later, that it will impact the target with exactly the same force as it left the railgun with. Assuming that there's nothing else in the way, kinetic energy (projectile) weapons have an infinite range in space.

However, it is far harder to make a perfectly accurate KE weapon than a perfectly accurate beam weapon. Which implies you'd have a hell of a job hitting the target from that far away.

Nevermind.

Fyron

August 7th, 2005, 07:37 PM

MightyPenguin said:
Camera control isn't very smooth, I noticed.

Actually, it is. That video has a lot of frames deleted for file size considerations.

MightyPenguin said:
Can it be paused again after you've set it off.

It wouldn't be a 4X game if you couldn't. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Raapys said:
Wondering, will there be beam weapons?

Sure. You can see them in some screen shots here and there:

http://www.spaceempires.net/home/gallery-photo_sevscreenshots-se5screen_05.html

Raapys

August 7th, 2005, 07:50 PM

Sure. You can see them in some screen shots here and there

Oh, cool, hadn't noticed that ;D

Atrocities

August 7th, 2005, 08:05 PM

I dislike the compression they used. Makes the game look like a cheep Nintindo 8bit system game. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

MightyPenguin

August 7th, 2005, 08:06 PM

Imperator Fyron said:Actually, it is. That video has a lot of frames deleted for file size considerations.

Nice. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

AAshbery76

August 7th, 2005, 08:12 PM

Does this mean the game is nearly done.A media push suggests this.

douglas

August 7th, 2005, 08:24 PM

A ASHBERY said:
Does this mean the game is nearly done.A media push suggests this.

No, but the retail release of SEIV is coming up some time next month.

Ed Kolis

August 7th, 2005, 08:37 PM

Let's hope nobody gets the two confused LOL... I mean SE4 is a great game but if you're expecting a graphical treat along the lines of SE5, well it might be a bit of a disappointment http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Fyron

August 7th, 2005, 08:41 PM

For the "jerkiness," I was talking about rotating and panning and such. But some of it is a result of using the mouse wheel, which is not a smooth, continuous operation. Much of the jerkiness stems from having to move the finger on and off the wheel.

Ed Kolis said:
Let's hope nobody gets the two confused LOL... I mean SE4 is a great game but if you're expecting a graphical treat along the lines of SE5, well it might be a bit of a disappointment http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

The next few months on the forums are going to be very interesting...

Phoenix-D

August 7th, 2005, 08:45 PM

Ed Kolis said:

OMG... did I just see the bolts fired by a Jraenar ship hit a CueCappa base and cause its rotation to alter in a REALISTIC way as it blew up??? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

That looked like the standard Starfury-style death to me..

Will

August 7th, 2005, 09:57 PM

Atrocities said:
I dislike the compression they used. Makes the game look like a cheep Nintindo 8bit system game. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Hey! I happened to like the original 8bit NES!

But yeah, the compression left a bit to be desired... cutting down what I'm assuming was 1024x768 resolution to what looks like 640x420, and making everything look fuzzy in the process. Then the temporal compression left parts of the video and ghosts for a second or so after a "scene switch". It would have been a little better I think if they cut down a bit more of the color depth, had 800x600 rez, and let the file size get to around 200MB to kill the temporal effects.

But it's still cool.

TheDeadlyShoe

August 7th, 2005, 09:57 PM

It looked like there were a lot of explosions being caused by non-visible projectiles (at least non-visible int he video). Perhaps the visible projectiles were actually missiles?

Colonel

August 7th, 2005, 11:42 PM

ok, this has been buggin me for awhile since I saw that first screenie with the big sun, will there be sphereworlds and what will they look like, or ring worlds for that matter.

Randallw

August 8th, 2005, 07:14 AM

I thought the Australian mirror would be quicker, but it kept pausing and then a third of the way through it asked for a password (granted I was using my download program to restart it when it stopped). Just some information for other Australians.

The video is quite informative, however I have a question, when it shows the system maps there are sections on the outer fringes that are red. Later on you see shared systems with the areas around each races planets in a different colour, but does the red mean you can't scan that area?. Would be interesting to sneak a ship into an enemy system to spy.

Captain Kwok

August 8th, 2005, 07:35 AM

Red is the default colour for areas that have never been unexplored.

Randallw

August 8th, 2005, 07:43 AM

unexplored http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif

"Lets unexplore this sytem, that way we can forget where everything is" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

So you're saying you have to explore the whole system to find every planet. I thought when that was mentioned in the review they meant searching each warp point for new systems, not hexes in the system. Interesting. I just finished "The Shiva Option" Where they have to explore each system to find all the wormholes. Now if only there was closed wormholes you only find once someone comes out.

Edit: and another thing I just noticed. It has a vehicle design screen and it says

Select Vehicle type,
Base
Drone
Fighter
Planet

...Planet! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif

Captain Kwok

August 8th, 2005, 07:50 AM

It depends on the level of sight you choose in the game setup, but you can make so that you need to explore a system to find its planets. And no you don't have to explore each hex individually, your sensors have a range. But now I've probably said too much. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Starhawk

August 8th, 2005, 08:57 AM

What I thought was interesting is if you paid close attention to that unit design screen you saw:

Tank
Artillery
Troop

As well as a few other things I can't read, I would seriously be interested to see Tanks Artillery AND INFANTRY formations represented in planetary battles http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Especially since with my prefered play style with armies I like to sit back and bash you with artillery and then race in with my armored vehicles and or cavalry units flank and exterminate the enemy!

Suicide Junkie

August 8th, 2005, 02:00 PM

TheDeadlyShoe said:
It looked like there were a lot of explosions being caused by non-visible projectiles (at least non-visible int he video). Perhaps the visible projectiles were actually missiles?

That would be due to the massively lossy compression in the video.

You're basically looking at the game through the bottom of a beer bottle.

narf poit chez BOOM

August 8th, 2005, 02:58 PM

Have to wait untill the sun isn't shining through the blinds to give a proper review.

Raging Deadstar

August 8th, 2005, 04:41 PM

Starhawk said:
Especially since with my prefered play style with armies I like to sit back and bash you with artillery and then race in with my armored vehicles and or cavalry units flank and exterminate the enemy!

What sort of evil overlord are you? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif I hope for infantry too, just so I can create a pointblank strategy called "swamp their guns with your bodies!"

Or better yet, Make sure the infantry is designed with bright colours! "Why are the infantry in illuminous jackets?" "So we know where to aim the Artillery!" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Suicide Junkie

August 8th, 2005, 05:05 PM

Just for you, I think we should allow orbital bombardments while our troops are present on the ground http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Kana

August 9th, 2005, 02:46 AM

Like it, Love it...Can't wait...hurry up and finsh the darn thing...

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Kana

Loser

August 9th, 2005, 04:16 AM

Select Vehicle Type : Planet!?!
You can design Planets!!

If you didn't see it, go back and watch again, full screen.

Edit : aw, dangit. My Jobe avatar is gone. How do I get it back?

Another Edit: Avatar back. Thanks to David.

Xaren Hypr

August 9th, 2005, 04:56 AM

Cannot.. stop.. watching.. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/stupid.gif

Hehehe, the waiting is almost over. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Fyron

August 9th, 2005, 05:21 AM

Media blitzes sure do bring you guys back out of the woodwork. We need to have them more often!

Raging Deadstar

August 9th, 2005, 08:18 AM

Suicide Junkie said:
Just for you, I think we should allow orbital bombardments while our troops are present on the ground http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Indeed! It isn't Friendly Fire if you can put it down in your Reports later as "Close Air Support!" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

narf poit chez BOOM

August 9th, 2005, 08:29 PM

I like it. The picture could have been better, but I liked what I saw.

Renegade 13

August 10th, 2005, 11:58 PM

http://www.gamershell.com/infosheets/244235.html

Not at all related to the SE5 video, but here's a little infosheet put up about SE5 by gamershell.com Has system requirements for those of you who'd like to know...but I wouldn't count on those if I were you.

Randallw

August 11th, 2005, 12:08 AM

Interesting, I was sure but good to know I can handle the specs. Assuming they havn't got things wrong, what makes freighters different from normal ships?. I played Hearts of Iron and you had the option of using freighters either as troop transports, or putting them into a pool for moving resources eg the more resources from a location the more freighters yopu needed to devote to that route.

Edit: assuming anyone can tell me without breaking the NDA.

Suicide Junkie

August 11th, 2005, 12:32 AM

Take a look at the history of freighters in SE3 and SE4:

- Minimum requirement of lots of cargo bays of some type or another.
- More hull space than warships of similar tech level.
- Maximum speed -1 compared to warships.

Randallw

August 11th, 2005, 12:41 AM

oh so it's no different than now, it's just that they have their own category.

Kamog

August 11th, 2005, 02:56 AM

The fact sheet says 100 solar systems with 15 planets each. Will we be able to increase the number of solar systems to at least 255 like we can in SEIV???

14 different races? I guess some of the SEIV races are not in SEV...
The screenshots show these races: Amonkrie, Cuecappa, Drushocka, Eee, Jraenar, Norak, Phong, Sergetti, Terran, Ukratal, Xichung. Do you know if there's going to be Cryslonites???

Kana

August 11th, 2005, 05:40 AM

Renegade 13 said:
http://www.gamershell.com/infosheets/244235.html

Not at all related to the SE5 video, but here's a little infosheet put up about SE5 by gamershell.com Has system requirements for those of you who'd like to know...but I wouldn't count on those if I were you.

I don't know if anyone noticed the release date...Feb 2005...that's got be a typo...I mean it can't be Feb 2006...It must surely say November 2006...

Kana

PTF

August 11th, 2005, 06:51 AM

Does the video in the first post still work? I just see many advertising popups (like: you have won free gasoline for 100 years, bleh).

TheDeadlyShoe

August 11th, 2005, 07:17 AM

Choose "Continue to 3dgamers.com" in small letters in the top right.

AAshbery76

August 11th, 2005, 07:34 AM

How detailed is ground combat? are we talkiing simple Imperium-Galatica2 point click and destroy with tank units(like the video suggests) or like a Wargame with great depth and hundreds of different units.

Ed Kolis

August 11th, 2005, 10:33 AM

DirectX 7? Funny, Aaron told me in an email that SE5 is using DirectX 8... (I asked him about it because DirectX 7 doesn't seem to work properly with WINE... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif)
edit: oh, and not a bad price point too - I was expecting something higher! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Fyron

August 11th, 2005, 11:07 AM

A ASHBERY said:
How detailed is ground combat? are we talkiing simple Imperium-Galatica2 point click and destroy with tank units(like the video suggests) or like a Wargame with great depth and hundreds of different units.

You design the units just like you do in SEIV. Except this time, the weapon stats actually matter. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Ragnarok

August 11th, 2005, 03:29 PM

All I can say about this video is WOW! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif
I cannot wait for this game to come out.

If any of you beta testers can say, are you still on target for a late 2005 release?

Captain Kwok

August 11th, 2005, 04:08 PM

Info that has been posted on gaming sites is February 2006!

douglas

August 11th, 2005, 04:09 PM

Ragnarok said:
If any of you beta testers can say, are you still on target for a late 2005 release?

I'm really not too sure. There's definitely a lot of work left, but we've still got four and a half months before 2006, and a lot can happen in that amount of time. I think it depends quite a bit on how many good ideas we keep coming up with and how many of them get added to the game. Let's just say there's a reason the NDA specifically disavows any commitment whatsoever to any particular release date.

Edit:

Captain Kwok said:
Info that has been posted on gaming sites is February 2005.

That's funny, I don't remember it being released six months ago. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Fyron

August 11th, 2005, 04:12 PM

douglas said:
That's funny, I don't remember it being released six months ago. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

You've been missing out man!

Ragnarok

August 11th, 2005, 04:47 PM

Thanks for the comments Douglas. I kind of figured I'd get a response similar to that. Ahh well, football season is here. That will keep me occupied until this is released. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Kwok, I can't believe I missed the big release. Why didn't anyone tell me? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

There probably is no chance of getting a version of the video that has no frames taken out, is there? It was worth a shot of asking about anyways. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

AAshbery76

August 11th, 2005, 05:21 PM

It shows how the times change.Once with a game like SE, it was all about the details of what's in the game.Now we have all this eye candy and little details of what's under the hood.I remember SE4 had a huge list pre-release of what's in the game.Nothing about SE5 on the MM website at all..

douglas

August 11th, 2005, 05:35 PM

The SE5 feature list is still nowhere near final, so releasing a full list now would do little but lead to disappointment over the inevitable cuts. Whatever the beta testers and Aaron decide about what should and should not be in the game, there will always be some people who disagree. Every beta tester played and liked SE4 for the gameplay, not the sub-par graphics, so don't worry about gameplay taking second place to eye candy. Yes, there's plenty of eye candy in the game, but that's primarily because the team of artists is a lot bigger this time around while the programming team is still pretty much just Aaron.

Colonel

August 11th, 2005, 06:21 PM

Hmm, cant remember where I read this but it said SE5 will have 100 system maps, does that mean thats the max or is it just standard, at which point I ask does anyone know what the max setting for that will be in SE5, I think its like 250 something for SEIV

Renegade 13

August 11th, 2005, 09:27 PM

In SEIV, the standard setting was 100 systems, but the max was 255.

Baron Munchausen

August 11th, 2005, 10:29 PM

The publicly stated list of features includes 'unlimited number of systems'... in a computer context there obviously cannot be NO limit, but a unsigned integer is 65,536 and that sounds like enough to keep you busy for a while. Game files will easily grow to several megabytes with thousands of systems. And turn processing time even with a dual-core 3 Ghz processor will undoubtedly take a while.

Fyron

August 12th, 2005, 02:19 AM

AAshbery76 said:
I remember SE4 had a huge list pre-release of what's in the game.Nothing about SE5 on the MM website at all..

The SE4 feature list did not surface until only a few months before the game's release... Aaron is wary of posting a feature list early on, then having several or many features from that list not be in the game, disappointing gamers... But you can find fan-compiled feature lists on these sites:

http://www.captainkwok.net/se5info.php
http://www.spaceempires.net/home/gameinfo-SE5.html

(note that SEnet is currently down at the moment, so only Kwok's site will work right now)

douglas said:
Every beta tester played and liked SE4 for the gameplay...

That isn't entirely true. A good portion of the beta testers for SE4 strongly disliked the game and left forever or just kept playing SE3, only to slowly fade away. I hope SE5 does not cause the same sort of massive schism that SE4 did...

douglas

August 12th, 2005, 02:32 AM

Imperator Fyron said:
douglas said:
Every beta tester played and liked SE4 for the gameplay...

That isn't entirely true. A good portion of the beta testers for SE4 strongly disliked the game and left forever or just kept playing SE3, only to slowly fade away. I hope SE5 does not cause the same sort of massive schism that SE4 did...

I meant beta testers for SE5. I suppose it is conceivably possible for someone to have applied for the SE5 beta either without ever playing SE4 or without having liked SE4, but I doubt any of the former would have gotten in and I fail to see how any of the latter would have the motivation to apply. Taking it as a given that every SE5 beta tester liked SE4, and the fact the SE4's graphics really aren't very impressive, gameplay is by far the more likely reason for liking the game.

Ed Kolis

August 12th, 2005, 03:41 PM

One thing I noticed is that there were no sound effects in the tactical combat. Is this just something that hasn't been implemented yet, did the reviewer not know how to turn the sound on, or is it an intentional design choice - "in space no one can hear you scream"?

Captain Kwok

August 12th, 2005, 03:49 PM

There are sound effects througout the game, but most of them are barely audible in that video for various reasons.

Ed Kolis

August 12th, 2005, 04:26 PM

"Various reasons"... hehehe...
I suppose one reason is because the music is so loud, but still, that sounds rather suspicious, as if most of the sounds in the game are just pirated placeholder sounds or something from some other game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

ZeroAdunn

August 13th, 2005, 03:15 PM

Am I the only one who noticed facilities listed in the cargo window? Does this mean that facilities will be built just like anyhting else and can be moved around via ships? That is just cool.

Am I wrong? I am I seeing things?

Will

August 13th, 2005, 06:01 PM

I interpreted that as a kind of simplification that has been requested by some people. Rather than have a set number of facility slots and a set number of cargo spaces, just make it one "space" value, and certain facilities would take up X spaces, and certain units would take up Y spaces, etc. But I guess we'll see.

Kamog

August 14th, 2005, 12:05 AM

Moving facilities around on cargo ships? That would be so useful! Then you can prefabricate an entire huge planet's worth of facilities, go colonize a planet and drop the facilities there along with units and population, and instantly it's fully developed.

Suicide Junkie

August 14th, 2005, 02:00 AM

Did you just say that with a straight face, Kamog?

cshank2

August 14th, 2005, 02:28 AM

I personally don't like the idea of being able to move tons of facilities between planets like Kamog suggested. I also hate how badly the movie was compressed. It looked like utter shiza. Oh well. The game looks awesome, and did anyone notice the Grey looking aliens? (The ones that everyone sees when they gets abductz0red. You know, the Aurolain from SC2. Except they're yellow...)

Ed Kolis

August 14th, 2005, 11:32 AM

Hmm, those guys... according to the list-box thingy on the left side, they're the Phong...

cshank2

August 14th, 2005, 05:21 PM

Those are some oogly lookin' phongs. Oh well, all the more reason to terraform their worlds into glass!

Puke

August 14th, 2005, 07:06 PM

cshank2 said:
terraform their worlds into glass!

heh, thats a good line.

Renegade 13

August 14th, 2005, 11:22 PM

cshank2 said:
Those are some oogly lookin' phongs.

Aren't the other races supposed to be ugly to your race? After all, it'd be hard to hate an alien race that looked like koala bears or little fluffy kittens http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif On the other hand, if you look at the alien and say "Whoa, who vomitted that up?" (No offense intended Puke! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif ), then they'd be a lot easier to dislike (and, of course, conquer!) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Raging Deadstar

August 15th, 2005, 06:32 AM

Renegade 13 said:
On the other hand, if you look at the alien and say "Whoa, who vomitted that up?" (No offense intended Puke! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif ), then they'd be a lot easier to dislike (and, of course, conquer!) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Not Always my friend (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20031129.html) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

cshank2

August 15th, 2005, 01:37 PM

Well, they look nothing like the original Phong... Original Meaning circa-SE4 for me.

As I said though, nothing a few Planetary Napalm V's won't fix.

bearclaw

August 15th, 2005, 02:36 PM

I wanna see a screen shot of a RingWorld!!!!

Renegade 13

August 15th, 2005, 03:13 PM

Raging Deadstar said:

Renegade 13 said:
On the other hand, if you look at the alien and say "Whoa, who vomitted that up?" (No offense intended Puke! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif ), then they'd be a lot easier to dislike (and, of course, conquer!) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Not Always my friend (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20031129.html) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Aaaahhh! Talking poop! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

AAshbery76

August 15th, 2005, 04:45 PM

bearclaw said:
I wanna see a screen shot of a RingWorld!!!!

I request an informative Diplomacy screenshot.Not just eye candy. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Baron Munchausen

August 15th, 2005, 05:40 PM

Kamog said:
Moving facilities around on cargo ships? That would be so useful! Then you can prefabricate an entire huge planet's worth of facilities, go colonize a planet and drop the facilities there along with units and population, and instantly it's fully developed.

But because it's so wildly 'out there' in game terms it ought to be a special technology. Something you can't develop until very late in the game when you'll be thinking of using it to fill ringworlds and sphereworlds.

Ed Kolis

August 15th, 2005, 06:25 PM

Well, if you either have lots of really small facilities (so it can be explained as moving smaller industrial units around) or really huge facilities (so it can be restricted to late-game mega cargo transports) it could work...

ZeroAdunn

August 15th, 2005, 06:55 PM

Actually, facility movement could just represent the movement of equipment or prefarb components that can be assembled on site. Still should take up a lot of space though.....

Ed Kolis

August 15th, 2005, 09:40 PM

Will give a new meaning to the term Colony Ship... especially since space colonies are supposed to be in the game... I wonder if facilities in ship cargo can produce anything? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Kamog

August 16th, 2005, 02:42 AM

Well, I agree, moving facilities around should be a late-game technology and expensive to do. It should require a huge cargo ship to transport a facility. Considering that a medium planet can only hold 15 facilities when full, each facility must be huge, much larger than than a big city.

If a facility in ship cargo can still produce resources, research points, and intelligence, then we won't need planets. We can have races that entirely live in space. But it really doesn't make sense that something like a mineral miner facility could produce minerals when there's no planet to mine. Research and Intel could still be generated on a ship, though.

cshank2

August 16th, 2005, 02:45 PM

It'd be neat if you could choose how you start out, either on a homeplanet, a home station or a home ship. Make for some interesting Roleplay scenarios.

Ed Kolis

August 16th, 2005, 03:09 PM

Or a home nebula, or a home star...

ZeroAdunn

August 16th, 2005, 08:18 PM

Your assuming that a facility is just a big complex and that is the only thing on the planet. I picture a facility as a instilation specifacly designed to support the spacefaring side of the empire. The actuall planet is probably filled with privately owned facilities, cities, and what not, but the majority of it only goes towards supporting the planet.

Emperor's Child

August 17th, 2005, 09:15 AM

cshank2 said:
It'd be neat if you could choose how you start out, either on a homeplanet, a home station or a home ship. Make for some interesting Roleplay scenarios.

I've always thought an interesting startup scenario would be the classic escape from the sun going nova scenario (name it the Nova mod, perhaps?). You would put all players with a single colony ship starting at the same starting point in a system with an unstable star. They would all need to move out of the system before the sun goes nova, and then play the game as normal from there. Presumably they would go their different ways, settle colonies, and eventually get down to fighting.

douglas

August 17th, 2005, 11:17 AM

Emperor's Child said:
I've always thought an interesting startup scenario would be the classic escape from the sun going nova scenario (name it the Nova mod, perhaps?). You would put all players with a single colony ship starting at the same starting point in a system with an unstable star. They would all need to move out of the system before the sun goes nova, and then play the game as normal from there. Presumably they would go their different ways, settle colonies, and eventually get down to fighting.

I seem to remember some scenario made by geoschmo where he experimentally tried playing as if he were a neutral race (never using warp points) and eventually got hit by a supernova event. As I recall, the scenario starts on the turn with the 3 year warning log message, so you have 30 turns to evacuate your only system before it blows up, and all the AIs have had a fair while to expand already.

Fyron

August 17th, 2005, 11:46 AM

I believe that was SuicideJunkie and the Exodus scenario. It is for SE4 Classic, so you can't play it with Gold, however.

http://imagemodserver.mine.nu/other/MM/SE4/Scenarios/

Ed Kolis

August 17th, 2005, 02:41 PM

Say, once Deluxe is released, won't that mean that everyone will be able to play the scenario, though, since both Gold and Classic will upgrade to Deluxe?

Suicide Junkie

August 17th, 2005, 03:35 PM

No, that scenario uses a P&N classic mod, and if it were possible to upgrade it to gold or better with a reasonable amount of work, I would have.

Ed Kolis

August 17th, 2005, 03:54 PM

Oh, I thought it was just that the savegame couldn't be loaded by SE4 Gold...

Suicide Junkie

August 17th, 2005, 05:06 PM

Gold is mostly an extension, and dosen't remove anything you can't do a different way.
But trying to get a savegame-compatible mod from classic to gold would be a lot of work. I could spend a weekend on it, but I'm pretty busy.

przy

August 17th, 2005, 11:43 PM

Anyone else having problems downloading the file? It always stops at about 12mb for me. I have been trying for a few days now. It just stops.

Randallw

August 18th, 2005, 03:02 AM

I had some trouble with the Australian mirror, it kept pausing every few mintes and about a third of the way through I paused the downlaod and started again and it asked for a password. After that I went to the US download site and had no trouble.

AMF

August 18th, 2005, 04:53 AM

Hey, is PBW going to be compatible with Se5? Does anyone know? That would be the total 'bomb' if PBW was up and running when the game came out.

Ok, I admit it, I am salivating....

Ta,

Alarik

Ragnarok

August 18th, 2005, 11:34 AM

alarikf said:
Hey, is PBW going to be compatible with Se5? Does anyone know? That would be the total 'bomb' if PBW was up and running when the game came out.

Ok, I admit it, I am salivating....

Ta,

Alarik

PBW:SEV probably won't be up and running when the game comes out. We will need to find out how it all works as far as multiplayer to see how to code the new PBW. But there will be a new PBW for SEV.
Here is the development forum. (http://www.tescosamoa.com/pbwdev/index.php)

There has not been any activity there for awhile as again, we are waiting for SEV to come out to begin the process.

Ruatha

August 18th, 2005, 05:21 PM

Ahh, this will be nice!!

Is it correct that there has been no new post since my post november 28 2004 in the dev forum???

douglas

August 18th, 2005, 07:19 PM

Ragnarok said:
PBW:SEV probably won't be up and running when the game comes out. We will need to find out how it all works as far as multiplayer to see how to code the new PBW. But there will be a new PBW for SEV.
Here is the development forum. (http://www.tescosamoa.com/pbwdev/index.php)

There has not been any activity there for awhile as again, we are waiting for SEV to come out to begin the process.

Wouldn't you only need to know the specifications for certain parts of the directory structure, organization of savegame/player order files, and command line options required to just process a particular game's turn with a particular mod? I'm sure we can get Aaron to mostly finalize and publish those details at least a month or two in advance of release, hopefully more, and geoschmo can test it for you since he's in the beta. Heck, you could probably get most of the entire beta team to test it for you once it's in a usable condition.