Planet Earth - Flat cube or flat sphere ?

elslipro

Chieftain
Joined
Oct 7, 2001
Messages
25
Have they managed to make the 2d-world simulate a sphere or is it still a cube ?
 
Forstår ikke, keine v(f)erstensig.
Sorry i dont know the difference between a sphere and a cube.
 
Jeg spør om jorda er rund som en ball eller om den er rund som en colaboks ...
 
I have no idea.:rocket2:
 
I believe I understand the question. In Civ I and II, the map was a square, much like a Mercator map. There was no longitudal boundary. However, in order for a unit to move from, say, just north of Russia to just north of Canada, the unit would have to move all the way around the map, whereas in the real world (sphere) it would only have to go a little ways across the Arctic region. I think the preceding is what is meant by "cube".
I think what he means by "sphere" is for a unit to move from , say, one northern (or southern) polar coordiante square to any other northern (or southern) polar coordinate square, regardless of the intervening squares, since these squares are, in the real world, part of one continuous mass (like Antarctica).
As far as the question of whether this is incorporated into Civ III, I do not know. It'd be pretty cool, though.
 
i think he's trying to ask if the surface will be rounded like a sphere right?? i think it will still look flat.
 
In truth, the worlds are either square/rectangular (no movement from any of the edges to the others) or cylindrical (moving from one opposite edge to the other (almost always left & right (or east & west))) or toroidal (donut shaped - movement between upper and lower edges as well as left and right edges).

No one's managed to do a sphere yet, that I know of.

- Stravaig
 
There have been strategy and other games that have used a truly spherical world, but it can only be with a three dimensional virtual reality. As far as i know, Civ 3 is two dimensional with multiple layers. Therefore, it can only have the shapes that Stravaig described.

If they really did try to have a realistic spherical map in a 2-D format, trying to navigate it would likely be somewhat confusing and the map itself would appear very choppy. Taking that into consideration, I dont think it would really be worth having a 'realistic' shaped world.
 
Call to power was completely 2-D. It was very identical to civ 2 in many respects, but just wasnt as addictive or fun. The game was missing a soul...
 
Ilspana
you are so right CTP had no lust for life!!

But back on topic they did have a donut world that allowed all over map travel.
 
Probably the only way to simulate this, would be a diamond shape with the points at the sides representing the equator. Moving off either side would bring you on the other side.

Difficult to say whether it would improve the play, look, or feel.
 
hey, that might actually work... Only not in a distinct 'diamond' shape, but more like a rounded oval.. Like at either pole it would be shorter and then as you went down it would grow wider and wider, and then reach it's widest point at the equator, then as you went further down, it begins getting smaller until you reach the south pole.
 
Think Tiger Woods, think golf, think of a golfball.

Now each little "hole" in the golfball is a grid. Take a camera and zoom in on the golfball. Take a picture. What would the picture show?

A squared 2d map, but the grids at the edges are smaller (and perhaps deformed) where as the inner grids are fine. This could easily be compensated for using mathematics and programming, right ?
 
Lol. Make the map rotatable and dont provide a compass / stellar guidance before you invent it. This coudl actually make people explore something they dont need to ... like the poles ... in the beginning of the game.
 
Jesus, what are you talking about!!!
do you really not understand the ease of this!!!!

the only thing needed to make the civ2-map spherical is this:
when i reach the upper border of the map, i can just go on, but i 'appear' again on the south-border. Meaning that i crossed the northpole.
It´s exactly the same with longitude. In civ2 you can allready go around the world horizontally.

When in civ3 it´s also possible to go around the world vertically, it means that the map is a 2D-map of a 3D-spherical world.

The next point: cubital world:
when you make a 2D-map of a 3D-spherical world, the land kind of seems to transform because you´re flattening something. There are two solution:
1: you say it´s cubital. So you can still go around the world, but you don´t show the transforming part on the map.
2: you *say* the map is spherical and what you see is what is the transformed map. This way the squares should not exactly be 'square' but they should be diamond-shaped or circular.

Anyway, there is no real problem since we only see the map! as long as we can move around the world horizontally and vertically, i say it´s spherical.

And they better have this possibility in civ3 because I WOULD HATE SAILING TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD FOR MANY MANY YEARS ON A HUGE MAP.
:grad:
 
Originally posted by WUM
the only thing needed to make the civ2-map spherical is this:
when i reach the upper border of the map, i can just go on, but i 'appear' again on the south-border. Meaning that i crossed the northpole.
It´s exactly the same with longitude. In civ2 you can allready go around the world horizontally.

No! When you cross the north pole, you don't end up at the south pole as you suggest here. It is very difficult to implement a realistic system whereby you leave the map at a position at the north and return at an appropriate position further along on the north boundary. On the globe, both poles are points at which any movement will send you southwards or northwards (greatly simplifying different kinds of pole). It is not really possible to use this in civ without utilising another tile shape than the square. There is a thread somewhere else in the Civ 3 section in which some more learned programmers than I consider the implications of using hexagonal or triangular tiles but I can't remember where it is. Sorry :(.
 
This was exactly what i was saying. However it shouldn´t be to hard to have 'one' tile between the north and south pole (as broad as the entire map!), so you can choose all directions when crossing the pole!
this way it would be spherical enough but still in a map-form.

But apart from this, even a donut-world would reduce my 'around the world sailing'-problem enough.



Originally posted by duke o' york
It is not really possible to use this in civ without utilising another tile shape than the square.
 
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