Ideas for a Civ-Like Game

[Fullerene]

I'm not sure if this might be the right place to post this and I don't mean to hijack FenixUnlimited's thread (good luck with your project!) but I'd like to share my civ-like game idea too and maybe get suggestions and new ideas.

This isn't just random idea but something I have had in mind for about year and most importantly I have already started to develop it for some months.

What it is?

• Strategy/empire building game heavily inspired by classic Sid Meier's Civ series
• 2D-graphics (at the moment I use Freeciv's graphics)
• Most likely freeware game
• Hobbyist project (there is no deadlines, it is done if/when it is done)

Feature that makes this game different from other civ games is something I call Symmetric simultaneous unit movement. What I meant is that unit moves aren't executed instantly, instead players tell units where to move and moves are executed when all players have finished the turn.
This has at least some positive effects on gameplay:
AI moves can be calculated while human player is playing his/her turn. This could potentially cut lot of waiting time on bigger maps.
Also, the possible multiplayer experience could be more fast than turn based movement mode and more fair than normal simultaneous mode (no who click fastest competitions).
This new movement system is also the reason why I'm trying to create a new game and not just mod civ4 or freeciv (besides I just want to make my own civgame).

Other features it has are:

• Hex grid
• No workers, improvements are build by spending gold or maybe some type of 'improvement points'
• Somewhat moddable, users can add for example new terrain types and units in XML-files.
• Possibly multiplayer over LAN/direct IP

The game I have in mind is somekind of hybrid of civ4 and civ2 (which is not civ3) that is fast to launch, easy to play (doesn't mean it can't be challenging) and has some moddability.

There are some game design challenges too. For example I'm not sure how the battles would be executed: should they be unit vs unit or stack vs stack?

Ideas are welcome and if someone with programming skills happens to read this and shares the vision we can at least discuss about joining up a team, although I like working on this alone.

Moderator Action: Moved your post to its own thread. Good Luck.

 

[FenixUnlimited]

I'm not sure if this might be the right place to post this

This is not the right place. Why you don't create a new thread?

I don't mean to hijack FenixUnlimited's thread (good luck with your project!) but I'd like to share my civ-like game idea too and maybe get suggestions and new ideas.

You are hijacking my thread indeed. Please remove your post from my thread.

This isn't just random idea but something I have had in mind for about year and most importantly I have already started to develop it for some months.

Mine is not a random idea. I have also had it in mind for many years. I started some development, but it isn't playable yet. It is in an early stage.

 

[Kid R]

Hi, I'm all in favour of this! Here are a couple of thoughts:

1.
The unit movement/combat system for handling simultaneous turns (e.g. how to deal with two players both moving to the same tile, or attacking the same target) is obviously a big part of this.

2.
Question: are you thinking of tweaking the idea of unit stacks? I ask because you mentioned "unit v unit or stack v stack" which suggests something offering more streamlined than how it was in civs <=4. Doesn't sound like you're seduced by 1UPT though

3:
Suggestion: There have been many threads here discussing alternate unit movement/combat mechanics, but new ideas are only ever speculation, or of course people try limited things out by modding civ, or just with pencil and paper, or comparing systems to other games. But a really useful thing would be a "new combat system" prototype - really low tech but functional and at least allowing discussion of new combat systems with some actual experimentation.

So my suggestion is, get that part of the game working first and play around with it. Change combat systems. Try stack combat vs unit combat. Try limited UPT vs unlimited. ZOC vs no-ZOC. Post simple executables here (or links to github or whatever) allowing you to plop down units anywhere and let them fight, ideally with some rudimentary AI to get a feel for how hard the system would be for AIs to handle.You will *not* be short of feedback on these boards!! Leave all the economics, artwork and so on till later. Something like this should end up with a really good and interesting combat system. IMO it would also be a real service to the strategy game community as a whole (not to mention maybe get some useful interest built up for your game in the long run )

Sorry if I've hijacked your thread and/or put too much weight on that part of your game idea! Anyway good luck! People developing games is always a good thing

BTW what have you used for the development so far? I could possibly help depending on the tech - e.g. C++ or Java, but would help with testing in any case.

 

[Fullerene]

@FenixUnlimited

Sorry again, I should had made new thread indeed.

@Kid R

1.
The unit movement/combat system for handling simultaneous turns (e.g. how to deal with two players both moving to the same tile, or attacking the same target) is obviously a big part of this.

My current solution (not yet implemented in the code) for the turn process is:

1. Players give movement orders to units, building cities or fortifying units isn't yet allowed.
2. Unit moves are processed
3. Conflicting orders. If you tell your unit to move 1 tile north and enemy which is located 1 tile north of your unit is ordered to move 1 tile south, what happens? They can't move across each other so these 'conflicting order' battles are fought resolved first.
4. Then all units move 1 tile to where they are ordered to move.
5. If there are enemy units on a same tile, a battle is being fought.
6. If there are units which have movement points and move orders left, iterate the process from 2.
7. Players manage the cities and settlers can build new cities (if they have movement point left).
8. Process to next turn.

Biggest challenge to this system is multiparty battles which happens if 3 or more civs all fighting each other moves to same tile at the same time. So there should be some rules how the battles are fought between more than 2 players.

2.
Question: are you thinking of tweaking the idea of unit stacks? I ask because you mentioned "unit v unit or stack v stack" which suggests something offering more streamlined than how it was in civs <=4. Doesn't sound like you're seduced by 1UPT though

Well as you can read above I'm planning units to move on same tile before battles are resolved. So,if we go stack vs stack system, on both side the unit combat values are summed up and then algorithm calculates which units will be destroyed and damaged in the combat. Example: 2 chariots and 1 archer moves to tile where 2 spearmen are defending. Attacker power would be something like 2 * 4 +3 = 11 and defender power 2*4 = 8... well of course spearmen would likely receive some sort of bonus against chariots... which might not be easy to calculate in stack vs stack combat.
Unit vs unit system again is different in the sense that it would put individual units fighting against individual units. Taking above example: Cause defender has advantage of choosing defending positions (so they will pick opponents that suits them best) there would be following fights: Chariot vs spearmen and Chariot vs Spearmen. But what about left over archer? Maybe it just have to wait till 1 of the chariots is dead... or it can join another of the battles to give support for other chariot... or something like that.
Hmmm, this really takes some careful thinking how to resolve the battles

I'm not familiar with 1UPT system, I only recently purchased Civ5. It doesn't sound really realistic system to me. But on the other hand it could solve the battle system dilemma above, make things less complicated. However I have read that AI in the Civ5 can't handle it too well, so what are chances that hobbyist project like this would be more successfull in it...

3:
Suggestion: There have been many threads here discussing alternate unit movement/combat mechanics, but new ideas are only ever speculation, or of course people try limited things out by modding civ, or just with pencil and paper, or comparing systems to other games. But a really useful thing would be a "new combat system" prototype - really low tech but functional and at least allowing discussion of new combat systems with some actual experimentation.

So my suggestion is, get that part of the game working first and play around with it. Change combat systems. Try stack combat vs unit combat. Try limited UPT vs unlimited. ZOC vs no-ZOC. Post simple executables here (or links to github or whatever) allowing you to plop down units anywhere and let them fight, ideally with some rudimentary AI to get a feel for how hard the system would be for AIs to handle.You will *not* be short of feedback on these boards!! Leave all the economics, artwork and so on till later. Something like this should end up with a really good and interesting combat system. IMO it would also be a real service to the strategy game community as a whole (not to mention maybe get some useful interest built up for your game in the long run )

Yes it seems that I certainly have to try few prototypes for combat system before developing game further. I just wanna note that one of my design principle for this project is to keep things quite simple and not trying anything too ambitiously complicated systems.
---

For the reference here is my thread in gamedev.net about unit movement system:http://www.gamedev.net/topic/660472-movement-in-simultaneously-executed-tbs/

Sorry if I've hijacked your thread and/or put too much weight on that part of your game idea! Anyway good luck! People developing games is always a good thing

You had very good points about combat system thanks for the input.

BTW what have you used for the development so far? I could possibly help depending on the tech - e.g. C++ or Java, but would help with testing in any case.

It's C++. I could maybe set up github project in the future, but I think not yet. At the moment I have put together executable that loads tech tree and map,terrain and unit data from the XML files and allows player to view map (zoom in/out, scroll, click) and give movement order to units, but orders aren't yet executed.
Other than giving ideas or doing programming and testing, it's possible to help me with creating XML files to fill the tech tree and unit stats/information.

Some screenshots:

 

[Fullerene]

I have made some good progress with this project lately.

What I have put together so far:

• Load the game rules from XML (Units,Terraintypes,Buildings,Tile improvements, etc)
• Simple main menu, that let's player select a nation and launch the game
• Map view and simple city view
• Fog of war
• Give units movement orders, manage cities
• Adjust tax rate
• Very simple beginnings of AI that makes quite random decisions
• But most importantly, I managed to create system that calculates the AI moves in threads at the same time when player plays the turn. Which means that AI can be brute forced to become more "smart" without extra loading times
• Process turn and advance to next turn. (Including updating cities, making unit moves and fight battles)

Oh well, I think I actually have put together almost semi playable game already.

---

I think that my next step is to release an alpha version so that I can get possible feedback and suggestions. And to stay motivated.

The alpha version will be sort of proof of concept for the movement system. I think I'll add barbarian civilization that spawns units in random locations on the map and attacks and harass the the player and AIs. Just to give the taste how the combat is like in this new movement system.

---

About game economy:

At the moment I have system like this:

• 1 population point gives 1 science point
• Food, Production(Hammers), Commerce... just like classic civ series
• Commerce is divided into Gold and Luxury defined by Tax rate
• 1 Luxury = 1 Happy
• 1 Population point = 1 Unhappy
• Gold is used to pay upkeep for units and buildings ( and in the future for governments/civics)
• Unhappiness will not stop citizens to work, but it will cause waste % of hammer production. (I might make it to cause corruption and riots too later)

I think it's fairly balanced system but if you see some fundamental weakness in this system, feel free to enlighten me!

---

And I have idea for culture inspired by Civ5. I'm going to implement system of "cultural tradions". Cultural traditions are much like social policies of civ5. They give you positive and negative effects depending on circumstances.

Cultural traditions are grouped into following pairs:

• Pacifism/Militarism
• Rationalism/Spritualism
• Equality/Caste system
• Civilized/Imperialism
• Liberty/Autocracy

Each cultural tradition has multiple levels, for examle Rationalism I, Rationalism II etc.

You spend global culture points to adopt for example Militarism II. You can also adopt tradition from counter type of traditions, for example you adopt both Rationalism I and Spritualism I. However, having opposite traditions will cause unhappiness in you cities. You can also abandon tradition by spending culture. Some traditions may be unlocked by tech.

---

Yeah if all goes well, I think I'll have alpha/demo version up quite soon.

1 screenshot:

 

[Fullerene]

Bit of daydreaming:
Let's assume I have created full game including new original graphics art, and all the programming library licenses I have used do allow commercial use of software. Now would there be any legal restrictions to go commercial with this project? As far as I know you can't protect game mechanisms with licences?

I just been wondering why there exists so few alternative commercial and indie Civ-like games? In the 90s there was Call to Power series. And then I can't think of anything else. There has been some RTS games yes, but I'm talking games that are turn based and focus on the history of mankind. Is market saturated with Sid Meier's official series or is the game too expensive/time consuming to create? Too risky project? Or what ever the reason is?

***

Well, I'm not seriously planning about going to sell my game, it will be freeware product by 99% probability.

I have made lot of progress lately, including random map generator and many bug fixes. It also seems likely that there will be multiplayer feature that allows players to connect via direct IP or LAN/VLAN.

Not all info in the first post is true anymore but the basic design philosophy for this game is still the same: Simultaneously executed movement, Quick to launch, smooth/easy to play and minimum waiting times. Those are the goals I'm aiming for.

I don't feel like sharing a demo yet but the first demo will have almost full set of game features minus the AI (there will be barbarians though). I think I have about 80% of the features done.

For the AI development I might ask for some help if there are people who likes the idea of this game.

 

[LDiCesare]

I can't see any reason why you couldn't go commercial.
There have been a few alternatives and civ-like projects. Mostly freeciv andClash of civilizations on apolyton. Notethat Call to Power 1 was called "Civlisation : CtP" but got sued and the 2nd game didn't have the "civ" prefixed to it.
There are a few other turn based games such as Endless Legend, but not many, usually they are just wargames.
As for recreating history, Europa Universalis and the other paradox games are probably what's nearest a history simulator that we have, but they are real time too.

 

[Kid R]

Bravo for making such great progress The map looks nice and clear (bison resource!) so IMO don't spend any more time on that in preference to gameplay.

No reason I can see to be afraid of releasing the game when it's done. I think one reason there aren't huge numbers of civ-like games is that deep down there's really little to distinguish them (it's all just tweaking the dials on a handful of equations), so for players to immerse their imaginations in one requires it to be really lavishly produced as well as basically a good balanced game design. That means lots of reaources on graphics, interface, AI, plus interesting lore backing it all up. And TBS probably isn't a huge market to begin with!

Lots of strategy games get started and never seem to be finished - many on kickstarter for example. Or they do get finished but on release players/reviewers will play once and instantly say "same as xxxxxx but not as good" and never play it again because...well xxxxxx is better! As with movies a lavish production, basically sound story, and a big name attached virtually ensures break even just because people will buy it out of curiosity and so they can join the conversation about whether it was any good. Also big-name games like Civ are guaranteed a lively modding community, so you can be fairly hopeful that even if the original sucks there will be some good mods! (Hmm on reflection I wouldn't be surprised if there were more interesting/distinctive Civ mods than all other TBS games put together )

Anyway for a small indie studio (ie game dev in your case,) a game really needs to offer something unique enough to actually be worth playing for itself. I guess if you can get a playable version out it will be possible to gauge whether the simultaneous turn combat combined with instant load time is interesting enough to people! Definitely sounds good to me so I'll give it a spin Post a link in the mod forums here too - I bet that'll generate hundreds of good ideas....

Keep up the good work

 

[Fullerene]

Yes I guess the modding capabilities of Civ IV and Civ V really offer more than most civ players ever need.

This project however, most likely isn't possible to mod into Civ IV for example. That's why I'm building new game.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well, all right, I guess I could share a alpha version demo. I hope anyone who tries it understands that this is unfinished , work in progress version, which is missing lot of features including the AI for other civilizations. It's only partially tested and may contain bugs and errors. Also I rushed the GUI a bit. So it may look a little bit unharmonious...

Remember to read readme.txt before trying. I welcome any feedback, be it harsh criticism or praise, or just minor suggestions.

Especially I'm interested to hear about the movement system. How could it be improved? Should I maybe try 1 unit per tile rule?
What is the most important thing I should implement next?

Implemented features:

• Give units movement orders
• Found cities and improve land
• Construct new units and buildings in cities
• Research techs
• Fight barbarian waves
• Explore map

NOTE: If you don't select civ or choose to play as Barbarians, the program may crash or may not work as intented.

NOTE2: I haven't yet implemented save game feature.

NOTE3: It's possible that the game hangs sometimes, at least in the multiplayer main menu. I assume that people know how to use alt+tab or ctrl+alt+delete and task manager to kill the process in that case.

Multiplayer info:

Spoiler :

Game can be played in multiplayer mode via direcp IP.Multiplayer feature is not really tested except for local host.
How to start mp game?
All clients must use same XML and INI + MapName.txt values except for screen resolution.Host must host new game and select a civ. After all clients have joined the game and have chosen their civs, the host must click 'launch' button.

If you have problems running the game try the download version with the _XP suffix.

 

[Kid R]

Hi - well it starts instantly and the menu screen looks veeeery nice But clicking "single player" crashes. Tried various ini file combinations but no luck.

I had to get the VC++ 2013 redistributable vcredist_x86.exe from microsoft to make it run at all. (I think you're allowed to just supply MSVCP120.dll in the app directory as a convenience but I'm a bit out of date with how they set up the CRT these days.)

Whether that CRT install is my problem who knows. The only diagnostics available are Windows event viewer which shows

Faulting application ParallelCiv.exe, version 0.0.0.0, time stamp 0x55acc7f7, faulting module ntdll.dll, version 6.0.6002.18881, time stamp 0x51da3e27, exception code 0xc0000374, fault offset 0x000b06fc, process id 0x7438, application start time 0x01d0c32a1ef083d0.

0xc0000374 is STATUS_HEAP_CORRUPTION which could be a CRT mismatch from what you compiled against but might just as likely be an app code problem. A more specific diagnostic from ParallelCiv itself might be good if it could catch something. As I said I'm a bit out of date - 10+ years professional VC but now retired - yay!

Sorry I can only give feedback on the boring system stuff, not the awesome game stuff, this time

PS this machine: Vista 32 bit, SP2, Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.4Ghz, 4G RAM. Runs Civ 4 acceptably at low settings (long turn times in late game). Can not run Civ 5.

 

[Fullerene]

Thanks for reporting error and reminding about VC++ redistributables.

I did test the game with 2 PCs and it worked for me just fine.

Error could be heap corruption maybe, it's possible. But I think it's something about the GUI code, maybe linking something wrong.

After clicking single player, there should appear civ selection screen, but it just crashes for you at this point? No map is generated yet, so it must be something about the GUI I think.

I updated the GUI library to most recent version now, and it stopped to respond mouse clicks for me, though not crashing.

I will upload the new version when I think I've fixed the problems.

 

[Fullerene]

All right new version is up, at least it shouldn't require VC++ redistibutable package now. I might have fixed your(Kid R) error too, but I'm not sure since I couldn't reproduce it.

 

[Kid R]

Hi, still same thing, sorry. "ParallelCiv has stopped working" when clicking Single Player. Same error as before. The same thing happens when clicking "Host Game" or "Join Game" in fact so maybe it's something to do with mouse input. Finally it also crashes when closing the window with Alt-F4 or the X button (different error - actually in ParallelCiv.exe with that one).

This is a really old laptop so I guess it's not a huge surprise it won't run something built with the new tools and/or using new versions of stuff like Direct X. Unfortunately I don't have access to a better machine any more

What IDE are you using? I could try installing VS Express 2015 in the hope that doing that will upgrade any other random stuff that needs it. Newest version I have installed at the moment is 2008 Express.

 

[Quintillus]

I tried it on my XP x64 machine, but it looks like it requires Vista - it said it wasn't a valid Win32 application. So I tried it on my Windows 10 virtual machine, and I was able to start a game, although there are some graphical issues. Since some of those may be due to running it in a virtual machine, I'll only go into more details if they show up on a physical Windows 7/8 machine as well, which I hope to try in a few days. But it runs!

 

[Fullerene]

Hi, still same thing, sorry. "ParallelCiv has stopped working" when clicking Single Player. Same error as before. The same thing happens when clicking "Host Game" or "Join Game" in fact so maybe it's something to do with mouse input. Finally it also crashes when closing the window with Alt-F4 or the X button (different error - actually in ParallelCiv.exe with that one).

This is a really old laptop so I guess it's not a huge surprise it won't run something built with the new tools and/or using new versions of stuff like Direct X. Unfortunately I don't have access to a better machine any more

What IDE are you using? I could try installing VS Express 2015 in the hope that doing that will upgrade any other random stuff that needs it. Newest version I have installed at the moment is 2008 Express.

That's indeed a weird error. Yeah I think it's possible that there's simply missing some random file(s) from your computer. But you could try the new upload targeted for XP machines, maybe it helps. If it doesn't help I can give you more technical info about what tech I have used to build this, if you up to problem solving a bit.
Of course I'd like to see the program running on as many machines it can. Maybe I later try to port it to linux as well, when it's closer to complete game.

I use VS 2013 Express for development.

 

[Fullerene]

I tried it on my XP x64 machine, but it looks like it requires Vista - it said it wasn't a valid Win32 application. So I tried it on my Windows 10 virtual machine, and I was able to start a game, although there are some graphical issues. Since some of those may be due to running it in a virtual machine, I'll only go into more details if they show up on a physical Windows 7/8 machine as well, which I hope to try in a few days. But it runs!

Thanks for trying it. You could try the new upload for XP machines. I haven't got a chance to test it on XP though.

If you want to report graphics issues, you should be able to take screenshot with ctrl+s too.

 

[Quintillus]

Thanks for trying it. You could try the new upload for XP machines. I haven't got a chance to test it on XP though.

If you want to report graphics issues, you should be able to take screenshot with ctrl+s too.

I'm on a Windows 8.1 machine now, and all but one of the graphics issues went away. Probably a virtual machine issue. The one that remains is that some of the Civilopedia entry names, such as "Ocean" overlap with the next column to the right. I tried to get a screenshot with Ctrl+S and PrtScn, but for some reason I couldn't get one of the Civilopedia. I could take one with a camera if need be.

I'll try the XP one once the forum is faster again - it probably doesn't need me downloading a 9 MB file as slow as it's going right now.

I was able to successfully build a city and move my Warrior around. But I ran into an issue when my Warrior got too far from my city - the city disappeared. When I moved back, I got a crash . Unfortunately I didn't think to look into the details then.

But I tried again, and didn't get a crash. Things worked fairly well. I was able to build a city, scout, research, train some bowmen, see barbarians moving around nearby. Overall, I'd say it's about as far along, maybe a bit more, than the Civ3-inspired prototypes I've seen (I know you're going for more 2/4, but I've followed the 3-inspired prototypes most). I think it's a plus that you've borrowed Freeciv's graphics for now; as a result it has a little more gameplay implemented than most prototypes.

The simultaneous turns idea is interesting; it reminds me of the board game Diplomacy. It would be a nice alternative to fastest-clicker-attacks as in Civ4 simultaneous turns, or sequential-turns-and-slowness. And letting the AI figure out its moves at the same time is nice, too. I suspect the challenge from a UI perspective would be having a good interface that shows what all happened; in Diplomacy there are sufficiently few units that everyone can understand it all, but there can be a lot more units on a Civ map.

 

[Quintillus]

Thanks for trying it. You could try the new upload for XP machines. I haven't got a chance to test it on XP though.

If you want to report graphics issues, you should be able to take screenshot with ctrl+s too.

I'm on a Windows 8.1 machine now, and all but one of the graphics issues went away. Probably a virtual machine issue. The one that remains is that some of the Civilopedia entry names, such as "Ocean" overlap with the next column to the right. I tried to get a screenshot with Ctrl+S and PrtScn, but for some reason I couldn't get one of the Civilopedia. I could take one with a camera if need be.

I'll try the XP one once the forum is faster again - it probably doesn't need me downloading a 9 MB file as slow as it's going right now.

I was able to successfully build a city and move my Warrior around. But I ran into an issue when my Warrior got too far from my city - the city disappeared. When I moved back, I got a crash . Unfortunately I didn't think to look into the details then.

But I tried again, and didn't get a crash. Things worked fairly well. I was able to build a city, scout, research, train some bowmen, see barbarians moving around nearby. Overall, I'd say it's about as far along, maybe a bit more, than the Civ3-inspired prototypes I've seen (I know you're going for more 2/4, but I've followed the 3-inspired prototypes most). I think it's a plus that you've borrowed Freeciv's graphics for now; as a result it has a little more gameplay implemented than most prototypes.

The simultaneous turns idea is interesting; it reminds me of the board game Diplomacy. It would be a nice alternative to fastest-clicker-attacks as in Civ4 simultaneous turns, or sequential-turns-and-slowness. And letting the AI figure out its moves at the same time is nice, too. I suspect the challenge from a UI perspective would be having a good interface that shows what all happened; in Diplomacy there are sufficiently few units that everyone can understand it all, but there can be a lot more units on a Civ map.

 

[Fullerene]

I'm on a Windows 8.1 machine now, and all but one of the graphics issues went away. Probably a virtual machine issue. The one that remains is that some of the Civilopedia entry names, such as "Ocean" overlap with the next column to the right. I tried to get a screenshot with Ctrl+S and PrtScn, but for some reason I couldn't get one of the Civilopedia. I could take one with a camera if need be.

Well, the GUI just doesn't scale very well to different screen resolutions at the moment. I'll have to redesign the implementation of the GUI. Screenshot of that error isn't necessary, cause I'm familiar with the nature of problem already.
I just noticed that screenshots doesn't work in the civilopedia. Btw, the game doesn't support PrtSc button in fullscreen mode, that's why I implemented ctrl+s.

I was able to successfully build a city and move my Warrior around. But I ran into an issue when my Warrior got too far from my city - the city disappeared. When I moved back, I got a crash . Unfortunately I didn't think to look into the details then.

The disappearing city might have been razed by the barbarians that you didn't just notice. But, of course, the app shouldn't crash.

But I tried again, and didn't get a crash. Things worked fairly well. I was able to build a city, scout, research, train some bowmen, see barbarians moving around nearby. Overall, I'd say it's about as far along, maybe a bit more, than the Civ3-inspired prototypes I've seen (I know you're going for more 2/4, but I've followed the 3-inspired prototypes most). I think it's a plus that you've borrowed Freeciv's graphics for now; as a result it has a little more gameplay implemented than most prototypes.

Although that I wrote in the first post, that I'm designing game that is something between Civ2 and Civ4, in reality I loan ideas from all iterations. In my mind Civs 1-3 represents the classic Civ design and then Civ4 and Civ5 are "modernisations", both being different animals also.

The simultaneous turns idea is interesting; it reminds me of the board game Diplomacy. It would be a nice alternative to fastest-clicker-attacks as in Civ4 simultaneous turns, or sequential-turns-and-slowness. And letting the AI figure out its moves at the same time is nice, too. I suspect the challenge from a UI perspective would be having a good interface that shows what all happened; in Diplomacy there are sufficiently few units that everyone can understand it all, but there can be a lot more units on a Civ map.

Yes, UI needs to be very informative. I think that at least I should implement battle log. Battles fought last turn could also be displayed on the map (show battles option). One possibility is also to create battle viewing system that let's you view all battles at end of turn, battle by battle. Maybe something like the battle viewer of the original Colonization game had.

Thank you for testing and commenting.