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Stardock Developing MMORTS Game
John Callaham writes "Computer Games Magazine has learned that Stardock, developer of Galactic Civilizations and The Political Machine, is now working on an unnamed massively multiplayer real time strategy title that will be free to play." From the article: "...the development team is trying to solve the problems that have kept other similar games from being as popular as other MMO titles. When asked to describe the gameplay Wardell said, 'I like to call it The Sims meets Total Annihilation.'"
For many players, the sims has already met total annihilation.
Basically any DnD Computer RPG acts like "The Sims meets Total Anniliation". Creating your character, tweaking stats, strategic placement in battles, it basically seems like a neat way to say something that has been done 30 million times before.
'I like to call it The Sims meets Total Annihilation.'
:)
Heh.
So half the players can spend all their time building and decorating nice houses, accessorizing their Sims' outfits, and ensuring they have healthy relationships.
While the other half runs over the occupied house with a Missile Tank.
I can see this being a fun way to end a relationship.
Stardock, developer of Galactic Civilizations and The Political Machine, is now working on an unnamed massively multiplayer real time strategy title that will be free to play.
Free? Wait a minute, I'm confused here. Why would they make this game free? Not that I'm complaining or anything, I just haven't ever heard of a for-profit company working to develop a game more complex than Frogger and giving it out for free. What's the catch here?
Hero of Allacrost, a FOSS RPG for *NIX/*BSD/OS X/Win
They are developing a game for free? Why? That doesnt make sense to me...
So... we'll take our +4 Holy Sword of Pepsi into Chryslertown and go on a killing spree inside the IPod store?
Hey, Brad! Long time no hear!
Going to develop this for OS/2, also?
You DID say that as long as OS/2 was around, Stardock would produce their products for it...
*nudge nudge wink wink*
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
They made a sequel to this game that got rid of the open ended technology advancement and replaced it with an overly complicated tech tree.
They tried a download style system (Dragoon net or something) and that did not work well at all. THeir Windows Blinds program seemed nifty but slowed your machine down to a crawl.
Still, good luck in getting into the MMORPG realm. My experience is the free ones are teh sux. (There, Second Life, A Tale in the Desert).
...as in www.Planetarion.com free, fist year or so is free (admittly PA was free for quite sometime) with lots of Ad banners, then when you're all hooked start charging.
"I may be full of crap about this game, and I may be wrong, and that's fine." -Jack Thompson
...being the best RTS game ever, of course. Never understood this fascination people have with Starcraft and C&C. To me, those games were like junior high. Dumbed down interfaces, limited units and command options, etc. TA was grad school. Insane unites, complex commands and unit construction...
Why not World Accessable Real Time Strategy?
See my art -> http://herbevore.deviantart.com
Doom 3's flashlight turned the scaryness factor up threefold with the darkness yet people bitched (No run and gun?! Flame on!.) Warcraft 3 has on average three or four new spells to manage per tier (sentinal, defend, canniblize, pillage are all abilities for tier 1 units so yes there is a system in place to encourage their use late in the game), not counting heroes which results in a stagnation of mixed units in multiplayer (no hero has more than 2 passive abilities). Total Annihilation? Too many units, insanely huge battles makes it hard to see whats going on/whos winning and advanced systems such as waypoints and artillery which can shoot across the map made things VERY confusing from the traditional "mass tanks up, throw at enemy base" system.
Vaporware Online.
I think the real hornets' nest here is how to combine a RTS with an MMO. Whether you're playing TA or WC3 or C&C, the overall gameplay is similar: 1) collect resources
2) produce units/tech
3) battle
Each game takes a finite amount of time, there are limited resources, and once the game is "won", it doesn't matter how many units/resources you have left.
Other games like CIVIII may make players weigh greater the costs of battle, but there is still an attainable goal or "end" to the game.
In most MMORPGs (or the good ones, anyway like WoW, CoH, EQ, etc), the gameworld is persistent. How will resource gathering/teching strategy matter in a persistent gameworld? I imagine you must fight to gain control of limited resources, but without the ability to accumulate resources "offline", the game will heavily favor plaers logged in for the most amount of time.
I remember an old BBS game called "Trade Wars" back in the day. It was turn-based, and resource accumulation was handled "offline". If you managed to own any planets, the resources were gathered for you while you were logged out, and ready for your use when you log back in. Granted this could be possible in a new MMO, where players control vast galactic and intergalactic territories.
Anyways, it seems like the RTS world and the MMO world are at cross-purposes.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, simulate.
Highlander mode. One big freaking free for all, where people are located around a globe with all sorts of resources to be had. Everyone builds up, but when people get eliminated they need to wait for a new game to start up. Being eliminated and respawning would be hard to do in something like this.
God spoke to me.
Am I the only guy here who remembers C&C: Sole Survivor?
T'was a fun game, if you could get a lan of 15+ people playing. Nowadays all those retards play is CS: Source.
Free as in beer is an overused expression.
Who is going to PAY or EXCEPT payment in beer after developing a game.
So no not free as in beer. Free as in free.
great! Now I get to watch my soldiers sleep in and miss the APC, then wet themselves in the living room then proceed to light on fire when they try to cook a meal in the food processor. . . Thats just how I want my RTS games!!!
disclaimer: I've been known to store numbers in my ass for which to dig out when quantities are required.
Why make it free?
Go and look at the Alexa.com ranking of WorldOfWarcraft.com (646).
The cost in these kinds of games is due to the massive network, IT, bandwidth and database resources. But we already have massive resources in those areas that are barely tapped for our non-games software.
BTW, by free we mean freeware. That means not adware or something.
Secondly, as someone pointed out, games like The Political Machine helped increase our overall revenue by a significant percentage because of all the new people that came in.
Since we can afford to make the game and we have the infrastructure to support it, then the game helps pave the way for exposing millions of people to TotalGaming.net and our non-game software.
As for an OS/2 version, who knows. It wouldn't be made by us though. We do plan Linux, MacOS, handheld, net-connected consoles and other platforms. However, what versions are supported will largely be based on who makes the client (so if a team of OS/2 developers volunteer to make an OS/2 client then sure).
There will be more info around E3.
but it did lose some focus with all the downloadable 'official' units released post core contingency, IMHO a few of them were not as balanced as the original game and created more problems than they solved.
For example in a tournament game years ago (can't believe I still remember this!) on one of the islands map I was Core and had total control of the seas and air and was building up for a final strike against the Arm player: however he invested all the little he had left in building the downloadable Arm amphibious units (can't quite remember the name right now) and he totally cleared me up with them: even the biggest Core ships, laser batteries and dragon teeth were no match for them.
Now, it's not that I'm saying it was unbalanced b/c I lost, heck, I lost many other games to excellent players, it's just that that particular match showed that there was just no point anymore in using the Navy on water maps, since those amph units were way more powerful (and cheap to build).
I really don't think that if Chris Taylor had still been at Cavedog such a unit would've been made available (and for ARM only!) since the 'original' game (and to a certain extent CC) was so extremely well balanced.
I still think that if licensing issues were solved and he had complete control TA2 would be great! Despite it being quite old it's still IMHO the best RTS around... if you don't agree, which recent games are in your book better than TA?
-- the cake is a lie
Total Annihilation had the best multiplayer system of any RTS game. The Boneyards. You had a galactic map with the Arm and Core controlling half of the systems. Player registered as either Arm and Core and they fought it out on the contested worlds. At the end of the day, whichever side had the most wins would get control of the planet. This would go on until one side controlled the entire map and then there would be a new map. This system really gave me a feeling of accomplishment when I contributed in winning the war for my side. I wonder how this new game will be different from the Boneyards. I would be happy if another RTS used this system for multiplayer.
My kids and I are gamers. We've seen games come and go with a few that remain fun for a decent amount of time. But TA? I bought the game in 1997 by recommendation from a friend, and it is still played to this day.
The original with the Core Contingency and Battle Tactics was great. Loved it. I don't know about you TA games out there, but I think my favorite unit was the Brawler (or bee as I liked to call it). The AI was terrific, the units looked great, the multiplayer gameplay was a lot of fun. In 2001 or so, I introduced it to my kids (6 and 7 at the time) who immediately were hooked. No killing people or anything. Units. My kids would play head to head with me all of the time. Now they can kick my ass in it (which really sucks!).
Later - some mods were independently released. New units, some cheats & stuff, etc. etc.. Then more - huge units bigger than the Krogoths.. some for the Arm (man am I a TA geek or what). It just kept getting better. Mods and TA sites are still in action today:
http://www.planetannihilation.com
http://www.tauniverse.com
http://www.tafansite.com
http://www.tadesigners.com
http://www.fileuniverse.com (for some files)
Examples of great mods (my son asked me to list these!!):
UTASP
Absolute Annihilation
Uberhack
a Starwars mod
etc. etc...
There's even a program called TA: Mutation which allows you to switch between the many mods, change AI's, change units, etc. etc..
If you have TA still - you must check out the mods. They completely renew the game, which you may be able to still buy in bargain bins for $5 - $10.
So - my point is - which has nothing really to do with Stardock with a Sims + TA game - is that TA was probably one of the best games that came along in a LONG time. A computer game that people still play after 8 years?!?!? Name me another one that is that good.
And now - my kids have both taken to modifying the units themselves - messing with the build times, unit speed, etc. etc...
Check it out again!!!