Online petition for an updated Civ III editor

[CartesianFart]

My wishlist:

1.Make the game in someway accessible to mod creations(such as Warhammer and others) being able be played at multi-player format so we can duke it out with each other in the internet.

2.The ability to add or subtract any different categories(terrain,city flavors and etc.) and also to incorporate more or subtract new set of catagories.

 

[Plotinus]

But mods can be multiplayer. They just have to have no more than eight players (including AI players).

 

[I_batman]

I especially like that part, published in a public forum...

My idea would have been slightly different. I think Steel Panthers would be better.
I.e. they release the source to a small team, they will then take the responsability.
The team guarantees that the game still need the original CivIII CD rom to work, but beside that if there are bugs or anything else, Take2 could not be held responsible.
The "expansion" could be either free, or use a small fee, a part would be "indirectly" given to Take2 to generate more revenu, but without the need to manage the proejct (ie no cost).
As it would be distributed only via internet, there is no production cost (no CD, no packaging, no shipment)

The reason I spilled the beans was I figure this proposal is toast now, therefore nothing lost by making it public now.

I wanted to show the complete lack of interest TakeTwo has for the Civ III community.
If someone showed up with the hacked Civ III source code now, I for one would not be upset. I am not talking about pirated code, where TakeTwo gets no revenue. I am talking about someone running the code through a delinker and decompiler to miraculously get the source code.

But not only that virtually impossible to do technically, it would break a ton of copyright laws if someone distributed that code.

 

[I_batman]

BTW, ironically 622 Broadway is literally just a handful of blocks from where I live.

So it goes,

Oz

Perfect. So you can meet the powers that be for lunch to pitch your proposal. I am sure they will take the time out from cleaning out their desks what with the shareholder revolt and ensuing dumping of the board and CEO.


Seriously, I am hoping that a new management team is put in place at TakeTwo. Maybe they will be more open to generating a new revenue stream with Civ III. But it will be many months before they will have time to think about Civ III, I am betting.
So outside of my TCW work with El Justo and my PBEM game, I am pretty much calling it quits with Civ III for now, and am going to the dark side, Civ IV. I want to spuce up my old coding skills by playing around with some stuff there.
Maybe, if I feel I have regained a share of my old coding ability, I might ask Steph if he needs some help with his game.

 

[T.A JONES]

Perfect. So you can meet the powers that be for lunch to pitch your proposal. I am sure they will take the time out from cleaning out their desks what with the shareholder revolt and ensuing dumping of the board and CEO.


Seriously, I am hoping that a new management team is put in place at TakeTwo. Maybe they will be more open to generating a new revenue stream with Civ III. But it will be many months before they will have time to think about Civ III, I am betting.
So outside of my TCW work with El Justo and my PBEM game, I am pretty much calling it quits with Civ III for now, and am going to the dark side, Civ IV. I want to spuce up my old coding skills by playing around with some stuff there.
Maybe, if I feel I have regained a share of my old coding ability, I might ask Steph if he needs some help with his game.

Hey I Batman I read your letter and just wanna shout out a big thanks for all your efforts trying to improve CIv3 for the lively community thats still here. Your devotion will be missed but should serve the Civ4 community well.

Goodluck n all the best

 

[Rocoteh]

Perfect. So you can meet the powers that be for lunch to pitch your proposal. I am sure they will take the time out from cleaning out their desks what with the shareholder revolt and ensuing dumping of the board and CEO.


Seriously, I am hoping that a new management team is put in place at TakeTwo. Maybe they will be more open to generating a new revenue stream with Civ III. But it will be many months before they will have time to think about Civ III, I am betting.
So outside of my TCW work with El Justo and my PBEM game, I am pretty much calling it quits with Civ III for now, and am going to the dark side, Civ IV. I want to spuce up my old coding skills by playing around with some stuff there.
Maybe, if I feel I have regained a share of my old coding ability, I might ask Steph if he needs some help with his game.

I Batman,

I am very sorry to hear that you are quitting Civ 3.
However I understand your decision.

Its hard to see a future for Civ 3 now.
There have been a sharp decline in interest the last 3 months
and its now 99% it will remain unsupported.

My own position is that I will continue with scenario-creation for some
time, but no doubt the above mentioned facts do have impact
on motivation.

Rocoteh

 

[I_batman]

I Batman,

I am very sorry to hear that you are quitting Civ 3.
However I understand your decision.

Its hard to see a future for Civ 3 now.
There have been a sharp decline in interest the last 3 months
and its now 99% it will remain unsupported.

My own position is that I will continue with scenario-creation for some
time, but no doubt the above mentioned facts do have impact
on motivation.

Rocoteh

Well Rocoteh, like I have stated in conversations with you before, it is simply a matter of the game engine not giving us the flexibility we want, and the AI acting stupidly. I know the enormous effort you put into WWII-Global getting it historically accurate and trying to balance game-play, but then I see how stupidly the AI handles things, and for me, it ruins your scenario (and the vast majority of the other great stuff out there). TCW has the same inherent problems, but there are a bundle of guys trying to figure out auto-production and such to try to balance SP play.
I will continue doing my part with that TCW project, but I think the only lasting hope for Civ III is the human only PBEM world. And that only appeals to a small, very patient hardcore group.

When I look at Civ IV, even with its myriad imperfections, I at least see some hope.

Imagine things like this:

Carriers can only carry specific historically accurate planes (no carrier based jets on a WWII era carrier, unless historically accurate).

Ships that had a primary ASW role only attacking subs with their primary ASW weapon.

Subs having a percentage chance of NOT being detected.

Civ's able to transfer weapons to allies.

Requiring specific quantities of key resources (eg. Bauxite, oil, coal, iron, uranium) to build AND maintain your armed forces.

Food as a commodity to be traded.

These are just a few things that I can see as possible with the CIV IV game. Some have already been implemented by talented coders in the Civ IV world. Some are things I would like to try.

And the side benefit of me trying code some of these concepts is that if by some miracle the cource code of Civ III became available, I would have my coding skills ready to jump into it, or as I said earlier, maybe offer my services to Steph with his game (not now, my coding is anemic).

In a perfect world, I would win the lottery, buy the Civ III code from TakeTwo, then change all the things that drive us nuts right now.
But I don't see myself winning the lottery, and I am betting that TakeTwo wants a wad of cash for the code, regardless of the fact that they will do nothing with that code.

 

[Ozymandias]

Let's not give up the ghost quite yet. I'll literally have to give him a month or two to settle in (courtesy and all that) but, not only is 2K literally blocks away, I just learned that an old classsmate has been named to the Board (hey, there are some seriously fine advantages to living in NYC ). He wasn't someone I was very close to, but there's a good intermediary I can use at Microsoft.

I think it yet remains a slim chance, but those prematurely abandoning ship will be shot.

As Ever,

Oz

 

[T.A JONES]

Ozz your very valuable here sh*t, I never realized how so til now. Thats great man connections you might have man.
Also, props for making a go in the by NYC. I can't imagine surviving there a month without gettin thrown out or robbing to make rent. I don't even want to even know what you pay for decent single bedroom pad.

 

[Ozymandias]

Ozz your very valuable here sh*t, I never realized how so til now. Thats great man connections you might have man.
Also, props for making a go in the by NYC. I can't imagine surviving there a month without gettin thrown out or robbing to make rent. I don't even want to even know what you pay for decent single bedroom pad.

Let's not count the proverbial chickens before they're hatched.

And to rent a "nice" one bedroom (i.e., decent bldg., some sunlight) in my 'hood would set you back about $3,500.00 US/month. But I wouldn't fret. NYC's economy runs on the engines of Wall Street and "media", so robbery is built into the cost-of-living equation here.

Best,

Oz

 

[T.A JONES]

Most would say this is the closest we've got to placing a solid contact in the series of chronicles trying for the civ3 code! (just means none came close )
With rent like that. NY must be really hard to shake off the starving artist stereotype, unless cockroaches are a staple to the NY apartment dwellers diet, I hear they grow to a tasty down there. But hey no worries man! If your needing cash for decent dinners and massages or night at the rippers for a proper proper propasal atmosphere, we can chip in for that extra incentive.
It should be the communitys job to pay out the enticers for this guy to pull some strings. Im sure After horrendous rent you will be to broke to entertain the NYC style he expects!

Sure its nice to be where the action is, but I bet being your a writer you can submit deadlines from any ware in the world! If you lived In my city of over 100000 (filled with many hot women with nothing to do) you would be driving to a wilderness spot of inspiration in Bently coupe from your 4 bedroom spread. My rent is 570 for a 1 bed highceilings and all included +freeparking! PLus all the trimmins like no kiddies, dogs or cat pee smells, just some fishys (most mine died cuz of lack Air conditioning in the summer, that was stinky but also only drawback being on third floor

Anyway goodluck man your the one who orchestrated this all. I wonder if you know how many people around the world are counting on you ...proabably to fail miserably
I know you'll Take it all in stride though. We never had much chance to begin with so I appreciate all you efforts trying you best for us all!

Chow very truly
T.A

 

[Bluemofia]

Take II Board of Directors Replaced!!

New shot at a better editor?

 

[Ozymandias]

Take II Board of Directors Replaced!!

New shot at a better editor?

So you didn't read my post #208?

,

Oz

 

[19Delta]

I don't know if anyone has brought this up, and I'm not going to go back through the entire thread to look, so here goes. If any changes are made in CivIII, I would like to see units with the unload option being able to be carried on transports. I would like to see some special abilities like repair and heal. I would like to see the AI a little smarter. I would like to see the concept of ammunition be added in CivIII. I think these things alone would breath new life into CivIII.

 

[Steph]

I think the easiest thing to do, and with a lot of potential impact, would be to change the "ignore terrain cost" option, which is often useless as many units have 1 HP anyway, to "favored terrain"
It would
a) Make ignore cost
a) give a +50% attack or defense

This would make terrain specialization effective

 

[Ozymandias]

I think the easiest thing to do, and with a lot of potential impact, would be to change the "ignore terrain cost" option, which is often useless as many units have 1 HP anyway, to "favored terrain"
It would
a) Make ignore cost
a) give a +50% attack or defense

This would make terrain specialization effective

That's a great idea - personally, I'd use such a "rule" immediately, as I wish camel-mounted units to move faster in desert than, say, grasslands.

I also really miss the Civ2 "x2 vs. mounted" flag which also allowed the creation of effective anti-tank units.

-Oz

 

[Steph]

That's a great idea - personally, I'd use such a "rule" immediately, as I wish camel-mounted units to move faster in desert than, say, grasslands.

I also really miss the Civ2 "x2 vs. mounted" flag which also allowed the creation of effective anti-tank units.

-Oz

So do I, so do I...

In SSS, such customization will be much more interesting.

You can create as many type of unit, you can create "Move type" (foot, mounted, chariot, tanks, sail ships, propeller engine, etc), you can create "protection type" (chain mail, plate armor, shields, battleship armor), and weapon type...

And everything can then get bonus.

Like the Phalanx have a pike which as a bonus against the cavalry type, a large shield than give a bonus against arrow weapons, and are foot with a default move of X in grassland...

And then you can have specific bonuses, like the Greek have a +50% defense, or whatever...

Well, that's the design, we still have some coding to do to make it all work smoothly

 

[vingrjoe]

Steph, please tell me you are considering making AI for your game, to facilitate a single person play mode.

 

[Steph]

I'll cross each bridge when I arrive to them.

First, it will be multi players only (including hot seat), to check that the engine and concepts are working properly.

Then, we'll see to the AI.

 

[Ozymandias]

So do I, so do I...

In SSS, such customization will be much more interesting.

You can create as many type of unit, you can create "Move type" (foot, mounted, chariot, tanks, sail ships, propeller engine, etc), you can create "protection type" (chain mail, plate armor, shields, battleship armor), and weapon type...

And everything can then get bonus.

Like the Phalanx have a pike which as a bonus against the cavalry type, a large shield than give a bonus against arrow weapons, and are foot with a default move of X in grassland...

And then you can have specific bonuses, like the Greek have a +50% defense, or whatever...

Well, that's the design, we still have some coding to do to make it all work smoothly

If you need help brainstorming, I did spend over 20 years in I.T. and would love to help devise the AI algorithms.

Best Regards,

Oz