It's called "Sins of a Solar Empire". In beta now.



You could be right...

Saying that you want it done by next week either constitutes an unsettling disconnect with reality or a very strong feel of "let´s see how many flames I can get, teehee".

Just to put it in perspective, I am all for multiplayer, too. I just think it´ll be included at the soonest with the next expansion.

Where is it or what is it called? I would like to state my opinions & ideas there, and support for it.

it is in the stickies, but probably no one reads it anymore? so i guess this thread is justified.



I don't think that is a valid reason, i mean who would make an RTS game with no multiplayer?? no one!

it is because this is a turn based game that makes multiplayer less attractive.

I think that multiplayer should work like this (if it were ever to be used).

It starts as more of a forum topic/chat room thing. Where everyone tries to agree on what settings to use. (i.e. size of galaxy, number of players) And they definetly have to find a certain hour of the day where they will all have time to particaipate, because if you don't show up, you're planets, ships, everything (no techs, or trade goods) will be auctioned off to the other players/races.

There is a set time that everyone (playing in this game) has to log on and be ready to play. You basicaly roll a dice to see who chooses their race when.

After all that's sorted out the game begins.

To keep the game from dragging on, each person's turn is limited to five minutes (or whatever time limit seems best), each person will be able to think about what they do while the others are taking there turns. (since the more people you have the more time you have to think, so the more people you have the more time you have for each turn... i.e. more people=less turn time)

And the trade screen should be done so you can either literally talk to them, or you can type you're words in.

I think everyone should also have high-speed internet too.
I don't know what to think about minor races, maybe ban them in everygame.
No cheat codes, or mods. Duh.

I agree. I world love to have a multiplayer both to play friends who love the game and to play multiple empires when I'm soloing. Just add the multiplayer element but do not change anything to make it "faster' As some game companies do. Some companies seem to think that in order to make a multiplayer game you have to strip down the good elements of the game and make it similar to the RTS click fest games. But that is simply not true. And that is not what those of us that play GC2 and would like MP want.

Actually all they would need to do is put a Simultaneous turn option in (similar to Age of Wonders Shadow Magic) and an option for a timer. If you had the simultaneous turn option then you can work on your empire and go into the ship design and create ships while others are doing the same. That way you don't have to wait. Also with a turn timer you can set the length that every player has to take a turn if you want.

From Brad himself:

Read the rest here.

I just like multiplayer because (sp?) the AI is always DUMB! Yes, stardock did good job with the AI in this game but they still don't have the qualities that make playing against an actual human fun. They can't decieve, lie, cheat, steal. They are predictable, thats the whole problem.

Hi!

Please speak for yourself. Me and obviously quite some posters here do not belong into your "we".

And from my POV and experience with TBS MP games, just adding MP to the GalCiv, without significantly changing the pace of the game, will not add much quality to the game:

1) Currently game progresses way to slowly to be playable by more than a few players. An usual Stars! game (where most my experience comes from) usually takes 60-100 turns to complete, but in that time each player colonizes several dozens of planets, researches up to 156 technologies, builds several hundreds of capital ships, several (tens of) thousands of support ships, and fights hundreds of battles. Now look at Galciv and tell me where the game with 100 available planets and 4 players is at the second year of the game?

2) the "timer" system where each player has only a few minutes avalable to do his turn would help a bit to speed-up the game, but would IMO completely negate the "sit and think" essence of the TBS strategy game, and would reduce it to RTS style click-fest. I don't play TBS games to have a click-fest. I play games when I have free time, and simply dislike to be dependant of the free time of the others to have fun. For me it was almost too much of a burden to coordinate our actions over IRC in one large Stars! game. The only limit I want to see it a TB strategy game is the date to which my turn has to be done. Yes, PBEM game.

3) each MP game needs to deal with the upleasant part of it: player drops, old grudges, flame wars, cheats. For that a developer needs LOTS of additional code. With lots I mean the amount that can be compared with the code of the game. And the development here NEVER ends, because if it would end, there will always be players that will exploit known bugs to win. And that simply kills the MP part of game for any larger community, because nobody will be ready to invest dozens of free hours into the game just to have his fun ruined by a dirty cheater. Stardock has some experience in that field, but I'm affraid we'll just need to wait for GalCiv-3 to see MP introduced into the game. If you don't have the needed patience for that, I'd say you're in te wrong game genre.

BR, Iztok

My friends and I have no problem playing Turnbased Multiplayer. First off it is more challanging than single play because lets face it the AI in all games to date suck. And personally I really only play with stangers online very rarly unless it is an MMO or FPS. Most of my multiplay will be with friends or Solo play with multipile empires which I love to do a lot in most of the TBS games I have.
And yes I do agree that they should not take out ANY single player aspects to fit MP. The only thing I ask of the gaming company is to put in a Simultaneous play option so that I can still work on my empire while everyone else is still working on there turn (similar to what Age of Wonders Shadow Magic had. If I wanted a fast stratagy game then I would play RTS.
Now I do not play nor will I ever play a Play by mail game (I don't see the point) but they should have that option for those who like it (AGE of Wonders had this option too.)
Now to make myself clear, what I DO NOT WANT is for a game to be stripped down to make room for Multiplayer. When this happens then for me the game is no longer the game I like to play. I think the reason that the gaming company has this flawed logic is because of the fast paced RTS people who I think ruin the who stratagy genra for the rest of us.