GC2 dev jouinal 7/9/05

Published on July 9, 2005 By CariElf In GalCiv Journals

This was a short week because of the holiday weekend, but I only had one main feature to get done for the week: starbases. I'm using temporary graphics for the starbases until the art team has the models ready on Monday, but I have the interface all hooked up. I don't know if starbases will be in the next build of beta 2, though, since the starbase bonuses affect a lot of calculations and most of them are not using the starbase bonuses at the moment. Terror stars are not in and will not be available until we have the graphics done, and they are not the high priority. I'm waiting until we have the real starbase graphics in until I post screenshots.

This is the way that starbases are going to work now. When you have a constructor selected and you hit the construct button on the ship context area, the starbase window will come up and ask you what kind of starbase you want to build: military, culture, or economy. If the constructor is intersecting a resource, it will only list the mining starbase. Once you've made your selection and confirmed that you want to build the starbase there, if there are any other constructors in that tile, it will change to the starbase upgrade mode. You can build defense modules on any starbase, but you can only build military modules on a military starbase, etc..

I think that you'll like the new interface. At all times, the starbase build/upgrade menu lists the number of constructors in that tile. It also lists the max number of modules that can be built on that starbase, and lists how many are currently available. There is also a text field that will explicitly list all of the bonuses that the starbase is providing. You will also be able to bring up this window for informational purposes by double clicking on a starbase. We discussed the idea of having a queue or some type of governor on a starbase, but we are holding off on that until we have the rallypoints in the game, because the rallypoints may end up being the best solution to macromanage starbases.

Well, that's all for this week. Have a great weekend everyone!

--Cari .

Comments

jcondor

on Jul 10, 2005

I just purchase Galciv 2 and the beta. Awesome graphics. I can see you have done alot of work on this project and I appreciate it. I did notice there was no sound which I am guessing is forthcoming.

One suggestion to an already great game engine in the original Galciv and Alterian prophecy. One aspect that I think made Masters of Orion (original) so successful is that you could actually win with an inferior tech level if you had a good economy and built vast quantities of ships. Certain technology was so expensive to research and took awhile to develop it would behoove one to build the cheaper inferior tech stuff and win with quantity over quality. This is sort of analgous to the Sherman tanks versus the Tiger tanks of WW2. This would be nice to see if you could model this into Galciv 2. The failings of MOO 2 was that this aspect of the game was lost. The game degenerated down to a race in technology to build the most powerful ships and deadliest weapons. Not that this is unrealistic for vastly superior tech level differntials (ex. when the Zulus with spears fought the Brits with musket and cannon) but when the levels are closer together this shouldn't be the case. One thing you could do is when the GCC council meets they would outlaw certain technological weapons (like the SALT I and II in the 21st Century which placed a moratorium on all atmospheric nuclear testing). I see this is done already on certain things in Galciv. One nice aspect of Galciv was that you could sell technology and arms (i.e. ships) to weaker civilizations covertly but still pretend to be friends of both warring nations. Please file this suggestion into for what it's worth. Thanks.

CariElf

on Jul 11, 2005

You may have missed the mulimedia module in SDC, which should include all the sound.

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