Get the Civ 3 code

[Gray Wolf]

... the existing code which we all know has tons of bugs in it.

Not really bugs... I think the application is pretty stable and always does what it was programmed to do. It doesn't really have bugs per se. So, more accurately, I think it was programmed "poorly" in many areas.

 

[Gray Wolf]

While we are talking about this subject, I wish that everyone who makes utilities would make them open source.

 

[Gray Wolf]

Sorry for all of the posts in a row ... but I found this article on software bugs on wikipedia that explains the etymology behind the word "bug" in programming. It's pretty funny. Someone actually found a moth inside the hardware and started calling program errors "bugs".

Software Bugs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_bug#Etymology

So funny.

 

[Quintillus]

Also, we'll never get the code (Hell, I tried to buy it) because I suspect that it's fairly obvious that - with an obviously difficult to coordinate effort - we could, collectively, build a game that would be a direct threat to the Civ franchise - And (shudder, horrors!) probably release it as freeware.

Just my 2 cents (or, if you prefer, the $100,000 I was willing to offer for the code.)


So It Goes,

z

Eh, that certainly makes it look a lot less likely. $100,000 is quite a bit considering that as I understand it, the terms would have been pretty favorable for Firaxis. And there's a good chance that would have covered any inherent costs to them in the process (though not necessarily all obligations with third parties). So yeah... in light of that, the chance of them doing it gratis seems quite unlikely.

Oz, whenever you bring up AI I always wonder if we could coax anything definitive out of Soren Johnson - or if he would even be able to talk now that he's left Firaxis.

Soren is the one who wrote the Civ3 AI, right? I remember from the manual - I think it was the Civ3 one, but it could have been in the history-of-the-series section of the Civ4 one - that just one person wrote the Civ3 AI, but I'm not sure if it was Soren. He might indeed have some interesting information. I have wondered whether one person was really adequate - while there's obvious deficiencies, it doesn't seem too bad in light of it being a one person effort. I'm also curious how many people have worked on the Civ4 and Civ5 AIs.

You know...even if we got the code ... who has the time to work on it? I'm a retired .net programmer ... and when I worked ... I had a few projects where we inherited some old code and a client wanted it enhanced with better features. It would take several programmers months working full time every day to finish all the changes.

Also, we don't know what language civ3 was programmed in? I'd be willing to work on it if it was .net but something tells me it isn't.

What I was going to say... one time the client wanted so many enhancements and features that we decided to just re-write the whole application from scratch. It's easier to re-write an application than to spend weeks trying to decipher and reverse engineer someone else's code.

That's a very good point... I'm not sure who would be able to work on it enough to make significant changes, and the likelihood of that happening is probably lower now than, say, in 2009. I think we would see certain long-known annoyances and limitations lifted for good, and more cleanly than has been done currently, such as the city limit, the sub bug, and maybe the 32-civ limit. However, larger changes such as a significant improvement to the AI or new layers of the game would require a much larger effort, and I'm not sure how realistic that would be. I know that for me, realistically, it's not very likely, just because there are other things I also like to do in my free time, and I have a day job. I do recall Steph mentioning recently that he'd be back right away if the Civ3 code became available, though, and it may attract others, too. So I don't think it's impossible to see big changes, but it would indeed require a significant effort.

Civ3 was written in C++. This is known mostly via some screenshots of the Firaxis development that Firaxis shared, but also by the general structure of the code. Civ3 actually predates the .NET framework by a few months.

I think there's a decent chance it would be worth starting with Firaxis's code if it were available. It really depends on how well it's written and documented, though. If it's a mess, it might be easier to start from scratch, but considering that hasn't happened (or at least, hasn't gotten very far when it has), my guess is Firaxis's base would be quite useful.

While we are talking about this subject, I wish that everyone who makes utilities would make it open source. I'd love to see the .net code behind Steph's editor.
Steph is obviously a terrific programmer but sometimes 2 eyes are better than 1 at discovering something that can be done. And I've always wanted to see
the code behind the editor to see how it works.

I've considered this intermittently with my editor, which is written in Java (since that was my most proficient language at the time, and actually still is, though I've both become more familiar with some, including C#, since then, and become less familiar with others I haven't used in several years). But there are several factors that have made this not a priority, including:

• Natural hesitancy, since I'm not an open-source purist and would want a reason more than making it open source for the sake of making it open source.
• Not having any outstanding offers of help from CFC members for improving the code. If I'm still going to be the only one working on it, I already have the code...
• Wanting to keep options open in terms of being able to use the code for my own, non-related projects. This has become less of a concern since then, but does mean that if I ever release the code, it will not be under a GNU-type license. The editor itself does use some code from one of my other, much-less-extensive side projects, so it's not entirely baseless that I might want to use parts of it elsewhere in the future.
• Wanting to do some code quality improvements before releasing it. The code isn't always the best quality, in part because I was less experienced when beginning, and in part due to waffling back and forth between code styles for a bit early on. Although I may be being overly demanding of myself in this regard.
• The fact that I'm still working on it occasionally. If I were not working on it at all, and didn't plan to anymore, I do think it would make sense to make it open source so that someone could pick it up at a later time if they wished to do so. However, at the present time, I'm still updating it occasionally, and it doesn't look like anyone else would be doing so anyway.

If I do release code, it's likely to start with the core components for reading the BIQ, and only afterwards expand to the entire editor. I have shared the core components with one other CFC member thus far, but his project was in a different language so it was really mostly for his reference in areas where the existing BIQ documentation isn't always accurate.

But this could change, or be accelerated, with sufficient interest, particularly if it were demonstrated that someone really did want to seriously look at/review the code, create a new utility using it as a base, or add a new module to the editor. Right now, when I work on the editor, it seems like the best use of my limited time is actually working on it (or related Civ3 projects).

Looking back, I think it probably would have made sense to inquire more about collaborating with Steph rather than recreating the wheel. There are some benefits to having re-created the wheel, like the cross-platform support. But two of the biggest factors I did re-create the wheel were that I didn't know C# at the time (which seems kind of silly looking back, now that I've worked with C# and realize it basically is Microsoft's equivalent of Java), and that in part I wanted to see if I could actually do a project of that scale, which at the time was a lot more ambitious than anything I'd embarked on by myself, and wound up being a much larger project as well.

But it wouldn't surprise me if more could have been made available with less effort had the collaboration route been chosen, even with the initial disadvantage that I wouldn't have known C# at the start. Whether Steph would have been willing to go along with it, I'm not sure, and I could certainly understand being skeptical - both the language barrier and my relative inexperience (and lack of anything significant to demonstrate) at the time contributing. Of course it's also a question of whether it would have gotten off the ground (beyond what Steph had already done) - even as it was, my editor may have fizzled out before its release had it not been for a timely utility request by Lee Dailey about a month after I'd started (and before I'd posted anything on CFC about it) that corresponded very well with what I'd already done and was a much more reachable milestone than having a mostly-complete editor ready.

For the re-creating route, some of the biggest barriers include technical skills (different people knowing different languages), and a project getting far enough off the runway to attract interest from additional people in the first place. And it's hard (and thus far, impossible) to organize a concerted effort without that demonstrated progress to start with. It's be great if someone said, "Hey, let's start a Civ-type game project in C#!", but people will naturally be skeptical about joining until they can show something that proves why their project might work. And I think the threshold really is something that is at least somewhat playable - either a rudimentary AI, or some degree of multiplayer. I think the people who got the farthest are JimmyH, whose project looked promising but stalled due to lack of time, and Steph, whose Civ-like game I'm less familiar with, but from the sounds of it could have wound up being good. And as far as I know, neither of these reached the plateau of playability which might allow really being able to grow from their own momentum, rather than solely due to additional efforts by their founders.

 

[Jimmyh]

For the re-creating route, some of the biggest barriers include technical skills (different people knowing different languages), and a project getting far enough off the runway to attract interest from additional people in the first place. And it's hard (and thus far, impossible) to organize a concerted effort without that demonstrated progress to start with. It's be great if someone said, "Hey, let's start a Civ-type game project in C#!", but people will naturally be skeptical about joining until they can show something that proves why their project might work. And I think the threshold really is something that is at least somewhat playable - either a rudimentary AI, or some degree of multiplayer. I think the people who got the farthest are JimmyH, whose project looked promising but stalled due to lack of time, and Steph, whose Civ-like game I'm less familiar with, but from the sounds of it could have wound up being good. And as far as I know, neither of these reached the plateau of playability which might allow really being able to grow from their own momentum, rather than solely due to additional efforts by their founders.

IndieCiv never stalled due to lack of time, as stated in this post, it was due to the fact that pretty much every one wanted some thing close to playable before they would start using it.

And it doesn't help that every one wanted some thing new in civ3, so adding all those new features on top of what is already civ 3 is a massive task, and without people showing interest it can be a huge hit on motivation to continue. I think a few people said they were going to put a few documents together, Takhisis being one of them ( I think ), but those never happened.

Unfortunately other the past year or so it looks like the civ3 community as completely died down, I could be wrong tho. The civ 3 community being so small now doesn't help the project either.

Although reading some of the comments on here over the past week or so has been enough motivation for me to think about the project again.

 

[ZergMazter]

O.O I never knew about this project. You know i think if someone was to pick up the project again they should aim at making an exact copy of conquests first, and forget about what everyone wants lol.

I want a few things done too, but the realistic thing is to let the work be done to clone civ 3 conquests. In fact i'd be happy to get a clone in which only limitations have been lifted from the game, and i mod the rest.

1- Limitations:

build city limit
32 civ limit

2- Bug fixes:

The submarine bug for the love of god, or any invisible units that trigger war when stepped on by accident.

3- What i want:

An option in the editor that allows you to set a cap on the production of an unit. Think about armies. I would like to have a flag option that i could lets say make a "Modern Armor" require the support of X cities to be built. Lets say X=2 and i got 20 cities, then you can have 10 tanks at a time, and wont be able to build more till u expand or they die. This would force the AI to build more infantry units and not a swarm of tanks only which feels odd to me. The result is a mixed military for both humans and AI. Oh yea let this cap also apply to auto-produced units.

I think we all can agree the limitations, and the bugs need to go. There are many things that can be added from newer civ tittles, but seriously lets be realistic and ask for the easy stuff first. Once we get a bug free, limitation free clone, then we can work on simpler stuff like the unit cap option i suggested. Who wouldnt want religion yes, but this is free work right here and we shouldnt expect all these things to happen unless we are willing to pay a full time coder lol. We should stick to minor editor changes for now. I think we would all benefit of the options. If you dont like an option u dont use it. That way its not changing the game, but giving you extra options.

Let me repeat myself in case people missed it since i wrote a lot of stuff... First the game needs to be CLONED. No requests, no nothing. Let it be cloned and after we get a playable conquest copy. The guy can then focus on adding OPTIONS that you can turn on and off. That way we are not stuck with a game change we didnt want or liked since not everyone will agree on the same thing ever. Last but not least be realistic. Ask for apples, not for gold. An apple would be somethign that already exists within the game that we normally wouldnt have control of, and we ask for control to be available for that in the editor. Asking for gold would be asking for religion to be created which doesnt even exist in the game

 

[WildWeazel]

You know i think if someone was to pick up the project again they should aim at making an exact copy of conquests first, and forget about what everyone wants lol.

I've argued against this approach in the past, but I'm starting to think it's the only way to go. I've been involved in indie/amateur game development here and elsewhere and Jimmyh nailed the problem: nobody wants to put in the time to try incomplete features, and the devs don't know how to go forward until people try them.

@Oz, Quintillus: Yes, Soren was the sole AI programmer for Civ3 (and Civ4 lead developer, FWIW). He was once one of us, and currently keeps a blog at www.designer-notes.com

 

[Jimmyh]

O.O I never knew about this project. You know i think if someone was to pick up the project again they should aim at making an exact copy of conquests first, and forget about what everyone wants lol.

I want a few things done too, but the realistic thing is to let the work be done to clone civ 3 conquests. In fact i'd be happy to get a clone in which only limitations have been lifted from the game, and i mod the rest.

Let me repeat myself in case people missed it since i wrote a lot of stuff... First the game needs to be CLONED. No requests, no nothing. Let it be cloned and after we get a playable conquest copy. The guy can then focus on adding OPTIONS that you can turn on and off. That way we are not stuck with a game change we didnt want or liked since not everyone will agree on the same thing ever. Last but not least be realistic. Ask for apples, not for gold. An apple would be somethign that already exists within the game that we normally wouldnt have control of, and we ask for control to be available for that in the editor. Asking for gold would be asking for religion to be created which doesnt even exist in the game

I started work on a civ type game over 10 years ago with Sn00py, god that makes me feel old Unfortunately it never worked out. Almost 3 years ago I came here with this post, this then gave birth to IndieCiv.

You have got to be the first person to come up with the most sensible request, and I've been pretty much saying this from the start, but every one else is like, no don't make the same mistakes as civ3.

I've argued against this approach in the past, but I'm starting to think it's the only way to go. I've been involved in indie/amateur game development here and elsewhere and Jimmyh nailed the problem: nobody wants to put in the time to try incomplete features, and the devs don't know how to go forward until people try them.

Couldn't of said it better my self Wild Weazel. This was always my concern, and unfortunately I was right.
Going forward I think the only way of achieving this now is to produce some thing that can resemble a clone of civ, and without the input from the community. After that's done, we could then start looking at fixing/adding features that people request/need.

 

[ZergMazter]

Couldn't of said it better my self Wild Weazel. This was always my concern, and unfortunately I was right.
Going forward I think the only way of achieving this now is to produce some thing that can resemble a clone of civ, and without the input from the community. After that's done, we could then start looking at fixing/adding features that people request/need.

Yes yes yes. A clone i also think is the way to go. I saw the poll in your post and most people want a new game. Thats what we got firaxis for. They make a new tittle every couple of years lol. This project should be about cloning the game we all love to get rid of limitations and bugs, and maybe, just maybe get some extras in the long run.

Like i said before, this game we love as it is, and shouldnt be changed, but given OPTIONS to do more with whats in the system already. People always want too much lol. People want a game completely built for them with everything balanced, and for free!

As long as i am given the ability to create and manipulate to my will i'd be happy. I would create my own very awesome game (Mod) thanks to the people who took the time to lift the limitations the game came with. Thats all im asking for and im sure many modders would agree with me on this one

By the way the pictures on your post were stunning! I love them!!! Oh those mountains

 

[Gojira54]

Going forward I think the only way of achieving this now is to produce some thing that can resemble a clone of civ, and without the input from the community. After that's done, we could then start looking at fixing/adding features that people request/need.

Fourthed.

 

[Quintillus]

IndieCiv never stalled due to lack of time, as stated in this post, it was due to the fact that pretty much every one wanted some thing close to playable before they would start using it.

And it doesn't help that every one wanted some thing new in civ3, so adding all those new features on top of what is already civ 3 is a massive task, and without people showing interest it can be a huge hit on motivation to continue. I think a few people said they were going to put a few documents together, Takhisis being one of them ( I think ), but those never happened.

Unfortunately other the past year or so it looks like the civ3 community as completely died down, I could be wrong tho. The civ 3 community being so small now doesn't help the project either.

Although reading some of the comments on here over the past week or so has been enough motivation for me to think about the project again.

My mistake; I misremembered. I recalled something about it being remarkable that you were able to get so much done with a kid in the picture and everything else as well, and thus it made sense that time was a limiting factor. But I see that was not the case. I definitely understand the lack of people being involved being de-motivating; but I also see why they would want something at least somewhat playable before investing a lot. It's a bit of a catch-22 situation - no one's going to create a good alternative unless people take an interest in the project, but no one's going to take an interest in the project unless it's already a halfway decent alternative. Of course the hope is that cycle can be broken, but unfortunately it hasn't been so far.

Anecdotally, it does seem like the amount of activity in the forums has decreased over the past year. But completely is a bit strong. And with the right input, I think forums can be somewhat reinvigorated. The Civ1 forum has (again, anecdotally) had a nice boost thanks to some breakthroughs in Civ1 modding in 2013.

I see that back in that poll, I voted for "New gameplay function, but keep existing graphics". And while eventually, new gameplay functions would be good, I do agree that initially, a clone or something fairly close to it would be necessary. Having the gameplay itself be different would increase the barrier to people trying it beyond what it already inherently is. But if it were basically-Civ3, with a few fixes, and (initially) a few, but not game-breaking, deficiencies (such as AI, which I would fully expect to not be as good as Civ3's at the starting gate), I think interest could be garnered.

And of course, there's also the issue that everyone's idea of what a good addition to the game is differs. Take it one way, and a few people will be thrilled, but a lot will decide they'll just stick with Civ3. Sticking relatively close to Civ3 to start with is probably the best way to get the widest possible audience interested to start with (assuming you do want the game to be similar to Civ3, and not, say, Civ4).

From what I understand, FreeCiv more or less did that, being pretty close to Civ2 gameplay-wise initially (and as I understand it, still today). I could be wrong, however, as I haven't looked into this in detail.

I've argued against this approach in the past, but I'm starting to think it's the only way to go. I've been involved in indie/amateur game development here and elsewhere and Jimmyh nailed the problem: nobody wants to put in the time to try incomplete features, and the devs don't know how to go forward until people try them.

@Oz, Quintillus: Yes, Soren was the sole AI programmer for Civ3 (and Civ4 lead developer, FWIW). He was once one of us, and currently keeps a blog at www.designer-notes.com

Thanks for the confirmation on Soren, as well as linking to his blog. I'd bookmarked that a long time ago, but that was when I was bookmarking way too much, so it got lost in the flood, and I'd since forgotten about it.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Hmm, b4 I set out to reading it through, is there a short version to all the stuff fin this thread?

 

[Midnight-Blue766]

People we have to get together and make a petition. Why dont we do something like a tweeter account and fill it with followers with the petition to get the civ 3 code for modders?

Civ 3 is an amazing game that could be something more than civ 4 and 5. Heck i'd be willing to pay to have access to the code so that we can finish a game they never finished.

I'd be happy if the AI could at least be taken off dumbo mode. They are only good cuz they cheat.

Things on my wish list that i'd like to see a reality:

1- Smart AI (Including better use of bombardment units)
2- Tradeable units
3- Religion
4- Dynamic use of resources (Think of Stronghold the game)
5- Civil wars like on civ 2
6- Resistance with partisans like on civ 2
7- Colonies (Not the crappy resource colony)
8- Fortresses functioning like on civ 4
9- Expanded diplomacy:
A-Trade embargoes like on civ 4 and also stops gold/turn trade.
B-United nations like on civ 4 and not just to win.
C-Able to broker peace treaties between nations like on civ 4

10- What i mean by Dynamic use of resources:

On civ 3 Gold isnt used for much but to rush, upgrade, or buy a tech. This results in massive amounts of unused gold late in the game since there are no sanctions to hurt it, or anything worth using it for besides rushing a project. What if we made resources more dynamic like for example oil. Every unit that requires oil will need to consume a barrel of oil per turn. An oil mining site connected by a road will produce 10 oil barrels per turn. The more mining sites you control the more barrels u get, the more military machines you can build, or the more you can sell to other nation's reserves so that they can afford their machines. A trade embargo would devastate nations who do not control the resource themselves after they run out of oil barrels.

This is just an example but you follow me? Its more dynamic and gold will be constantly moving to buy whatever resource you need or selling surplus. Its a trader's dream. It could be done for every resource and make it more valuable to control multiple sites of the same resource.

Lets make a petition and see what happens. Even if they sell the code im in. That doesnt mean we wont buy later products. It means they better start making better games and stop trying to sell us 'ok' products just cuz they want money.

Oh yeah, I remember the petition.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

TBH, I'd hate that much Civ4-like stuff to befoul Civ3. There are far better examples to be drawn into the equation, i.e. from games like Call to Power, Imperialism and Alpha Centauri

 

[ZergMazter]

That was my dream best possible scenario. In reality i'd be happy if something could be done to work with the already available rules in the conquest editor, so that mixing X flags dont end up in a bug or limited for example.

I want the game to stay exactly as it is, but with a more powerful editor with more combinations possible to make things similar to the things i mentioned or close.

A simple example: Why would a unit lose its attack value and defense value when the 'army' flag is tagged. This simple change wouldnt affect the actual game itself, but it would allow someone in the editor to make it possible to make some units cap by X amount for a mod.

Example: Modern Armor = Select the 'army' flag, 1 city required to support each army. By lifting the limitation this simple change would make the AI use "Modern Marines'' as their primary offensive force and have a limited supply at a time of very powerful tanks. As a result you would see an AI military force composed of 70 marines and 30 tanks for example, and not just a massive stack of 100 tanks to try and end a war in a single unrealistic turn.

Its not the same fighting 100 tanks vs 70marines+30tanks. Games wont end in a single turn, and also it gives the AI a fair chance of fighting a human since even the human wont be able to be a lamer building an army of 200 tanks and wipe out everything in the world within a single turn. Heck the AI would even use helicopters. Ever wondered why they barely use helis? They barely got any infantry in the modern era when all they do is build tanks :/

Thats my take on it.