Screenshots!

[Ajidica]

Collection of old screenshots.

In all my years of playing Medieval 2, I've never seen this before. Plenty of Cardinals failing their 95% chance to denounce the witch, but never getting cursed!
The curse was so strong my Orthodox priest decided to turn into a Muslim, according to the game text.....


Hey Portugal, you know that time you backstabbed me and ambushed my faction heir's son who just came of age, killing him with javelins?
You do remember it?
IT. IS. ON.


Obligatory Morrowind beauty shot.


Divinity 2 has some great writing.



Civ6 does love the historical jokes. Saw Francis Drake as a Spanish admiral and recently got Nelson as an admiral while playing as the Spanish!
(Yes shut up I know I'm playing bad. This is an old screenshot back when I first got the game. Only 60 culture a turn as Greece? That hurts to look at.)

 

[Thorgalaeg]

Morrowind landscapes!

I am now playing Kingdom Come: Deliverance, probably the game with best graphics and most minoucious and realist landscapes ever, but i wonder why outdated Morrowind graphics continue being the most evocative.

 

[Arakhor]

I'd hazard a guess that that's because they're both exotic and nostalgic.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

Yep. And the music too.

 

[Arakhor]

Oh yes. The music is a win any day of the week.

 

[warpus]

I have been working on a Cities: Skylines city that I posted screenshots of at some point last year. Here is an update post!

The city of 30,000

Spoiler :

has grown to 130,000




The public transit system has evolved as well:

Spoiler :

is now



LRT routes are turned off here, but you can see them outlined in purple. The routes you see are subway lines. There is a regional rail line too, also turned off, but you can see some of the stations in orange. The ports are yellow.

There is also a new large international airport and spaceport in the north, and connects to the regional rail line, the red subway line, and LRT. You can't quite see the airport in the provide photos though, nor can you see most of the new ring road that I just finished building (but you can see some of the on/off ramps)

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Did someone say spaceport? How is this game compared to say, SimCity 2000? Does it have jazz music? Is it taxing for computers?

 

[warpus]

Did someone say spaceport?

Yep I have a spaceport right by the international airport! You're probably referring to it directly, but yeah it's in the top-right of the first screenshot right by the international airport (that's just out of view). I've since added another launch tower for space shuttles to the space port, as well as a space elevator

How is this game compared to say, SimCity 2000?

The main difference is that in SimCity 2000 everything is in rectangular modules, but here you can build whatever you want in whatever direction you want, as long as the slope is not impossible

That part might be a bit obvious. The main other difference is that it matters where you put city services and how you design city infrastructure. The game uses a maximum of 65,000 (IIRC) agents, meaning that up to 65,000 little dudes are going to be running around your city actually trying to get from home to work and back, to parks, leisure areas, to hospitals when they get sick, etc. So if your public transit design sucks and the road design sucks, then that will have a big impact on your city as everyone will take longer to get to places, leading to more gridlock, more unhappy people, goods not arriving at stores on time, dead bodies piling up because they're not being picked up, garbage piling up, etc.

So I don't quite remember SimCity 2000 but I think you could just plop down 20 elementary schools in one place and that would satisfy the needs of your city. That wouldn't work in Cities: Skylines, you need to spread everything out, like in a real city

If you're wondering what happens if your city grows to more than 65,000 people, the game simulates the same stuff that happens but doesn't use more agents to do it. I'm not sure what impact that has in-game, as I don't really notice a difference tbh. As far as I can tell the roads are getting busier when more people move in past the 65,000 marker

The one thing in the game that's not realistic is that every single agent uses the same algorithms to decide how to get to work. They will always pick the shortest route to get to where they're going, depending on their mode of transport. This means that if you design your city in a certain way, people driving from one district to another will all tend to use the exact same lanes, even if other lanes are free. They pick the most optimal route to get from A to B, but everybody else uses the exact same algorithm to determine that, so people going from district A to district B tend to travel along the same lane. So even if you widen your roads, that will not help in this case, as it would in real life. You can prevent this by basically giving your people really good public transit options. Less people will drive, and you will still see heavy traffic in a city 130k+ line mine, but it is very manageable and there are no real traffic jams.

I suppose that's the main difference really, the game is designed around the agent. You can follow agents around and see how they're getting from home to work. That makes it kind of cool, to see how different kinds of people use the infrastructure you've built. So say you click on somebody uneducated, he works in the industrial district and lives in the cheaper part of town, you can see how he gets to work as a way to see what could be improved in your city

Another difference worth pointing out is that you can designate districts in your city and assign different bylaws and tax laws to them. So for example my "Airport Park" contains the international airport, the space port, some shops, parks, and an industrial/office area. I've got unique tax breaks and bylaws set up for this district targetting tourists and high-tech businesses. I also have a Central Business district, a "Snobsville" hipster part of town, and a park area w/ football stadium where recreational marijuana usage is allowed (this is a stock in-game option) and more money is spent on park upkeep. Public transit is also free there IIRC

There are also a LOT of mods for this game, a lot of custom assets, game dynamics, etc. I mainly just have some extra assets installed

Does it have jazz music?

Is it taxing for computers?

I have a gaming rig I built.. 5 years ago I think. I haven't upgraded any of it in that time, and initially when I got it it wasn't top of the line, but it was def. above average. So.. I have no idea if that helps at all but the game runs fine on this machine

 

[hobbsyoyo]

How frequent are rocket launches? Do you control that directly?

OMG someone needs to make a spaceport simulator.

Is the spaceport in the stock game? It is just one piece or can you build it out?

 

[W|M]

So even if you widen your roads, that will not help in this case, as it would in real life.

Widening roads doesn't help with traffic in real life either, because of induced demand and the inherently low capacity of roads in general

 

[warpus]

How frequent are rocket launches? Do you control that directly?

OMG someone needs to make a spaceport simulator.

Is the spaceport in the stock game? It is just one piece or can you build it out?

Yeah I am pretty sure the spaceport is stock, but don't quote me on that. It probably is but I can't remember 100%.

It seems to slowly "build" a rocket, maybe depending on the industrial capability of the city (but don't quote me on that either). Eventually the rocket is built and you can launch it. When you do a launch everyone is really happy for a while as the rocket blasts off into the sky

I actually just performed a launch but somehow failed in the taking of screenshots. I'll be sure to be more careful and take some next time a rocket is ready

 

[warpus]

How frequent are rocket launches? Do you control that directly?

OMG someone needs to make a spaceport simulator.

Is the spaceport in the stock game? It is just one piece or can you build it out?

I am revisiting this post to share my spaceport

It's right beside the international airport and also contains a shuttle launch pad (which doesn't work but draws tourists) and a space elevator (which draws tourists). The buildings just to the right of the space centre are a high tech office space area (Airport Park), there's a science centre there (bottom right) and some shops. See if you can also spot the Enterprise, and the nearby Baseball stadium, which is where the Brighton Spacemen play.

Tourists arriving in my city at the international airport have a subway connection (to the red line) right by the terminal, the next stop to the east being the space elevator, the one after that a large commercial area with plazas and parks. Going in both directions the red line connects you to an extensive subway system that runs throughout the city (6 total lines). The airport also has an LRT connection, and is right beside an express rail station (you can see it right beside the terminal) which connects this airport to the smaller local airport, the port, the CBD, and other key parts of town





Here you can see the launch of Bluebird Heavy 3



Not the safest spot for a launch site, but my city is extensive and there really wouldn't be one. So I might as well put it in a convenient spot, right by the international airport, a transit hub, and the highway that runs to the industrial part of town and also acts as a ring road

Here's a similar vantage point as the above but showing public transit options



The Red subway line is visible here, the green things are stops. You can see how the space elevator stop is connected right to the international airport stop, and the line loops around and snakes through the city, connecting to all the other subway lines. The light blue and green subway lines can also be seen here (but the light green one is in the back and hard to spot). you can also see one dark blue line stop here but it isn't easy to spot either

The larger orange rectangles is the express rail line, which has 7 stops, but you can only see 2 of them here. It has a stop at the other airport, at the port, a couple residential districts, and it has stops on 2 islands

The roads that are coloured in purple is the LRT system. It's meant for more local distribution of people than the subway or the express rail line and has a lot more stops.

The underground circle you see is this city's preferred design for highway on/off ramps. Every on/off ramp has both an underground and above ground highway roundabout. I try to give my citizens options to use either one, no matter where they're going, but it's not always possible, so some of the roundabouts are only accessible from certain directions, etc. It seems to work but makes underground work for subways, etc. more difficult

 

[warpus]

The city of Brighton expands to 215,000. Here's a screenshot of a new neighbourhood that's recently been constructed and lies on the expanded red and purple subway lines

 

[Ajidica]

I got back into Dominion 4 and playing a campaign as Tir na Nog - the Sidhe and Tuatha of Irish mythology- and I'm off to a good start. Tir na Nog has excellent commanders and mages -although they are very expensive. They also have a sturdy sacred unit -Tuatha Warriors- which can take blessings. (In this case, I chose to give my god a heavy water bless to boost the defense of my sacred units.)



I'm fighting a rather large early game battle with my Tuatha Warriors backed up by various Sidhe commanders (offscreen). I didn't have the battle scripting quite right so the Cu Sidhe (green dogs lower part of screen) reached the Fomorian lines before my Tuatha arrived to support them so I took some casualties. The Tuatha look a bit strange because they all have the ability Glamour ability which makes them hard to hit on the battlefield and stealth on the campaign map. I used a Tuatha Sorceress with Air 4 to cast Storm which enabled my dirt cheap Fir Bolg Druids to cast Summon Stormpower -which boosts their Air 1 to Air 2- and allows me to spam Lightning Bolt which does well against the Fomorian giants.



I also got quite lucky with a hero that spawned. This guy is quite good. Tir na Nog already has excellent commanders once magical items are crafted for them and Lugh the Long Handed is good even by the standards of Tir na Nog. Plus Lugh has Holy 3 which allows him to cast Divine Blessing, a battlefield wide bless spell that otherwise could only be cast by my prophet since Tir na Nog doesn't have the greatest of priests. This means I don't need to use my Sidhe to cast small blesses on my Tuatha when Lugh is in the army. They can go straight in to casting Summon Stormpower and blasting Lightning Bolt or Thunderstrike at my enemies.

 

[Synobun]

Such an odd-looking game.

 

[Ajidica]

Such an odd-looking game.

Yeah, the graphics are pretty crude unfortunately. However, the game engine was made by two people working part time and is about a decade old at this point. Thankfully the newest release has a bunch of improvements to the interface.

That said, the game has a very deep magic system and more factions then you can shake a stick at. There are three time periods and some factions are present in all time periods but change from period to period. Others emerge out of other factions.
For example, Tir na Nog is an early age faction that in the middle age splits into Eiru ( with a more magical focus) and Man, which is composed of the Logrian invaders who took much of the Sidhes magical traditions. Marignon starts off in the middle age as a splinter faction that emerged after Ermor collapsed as a result of necromantic magic. Marignon survives into the late age but under pressure from Ermors undead legions made diabolical pacts - abandoning much of their crusader heritage and adopting the Inquisition and blood sacrifice.

 

[ls612]

Well, I accidentally found myself in a very familiar situation when playing around with Apollo-like missions in RSS.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd....860/A671DD182E428950A09D6489F524D362959CAF28/

 

[warpus]

Been playing Transport Fever in order to help destress

This is my biggest city, Wickwar. Its train station currently services 5 lines that spread out throughout the map: The Red Line, Blue, Purple, Yellow, and Green. The lines reach about 50% of all cities on the map so far.

You can also see all the LRT/tram stops, the harbour, and the airport. On the south shore of the river is the only bus route



^^ The LRT network

All cities connected by rail have an LRT loop that connects the train station to the rest of the city. This is a money losing venture, but the trains make a lot more money and essentially subsidise public transit in the cities. The airline and boats make up maybe 10% of my profits, the industrial truck business maybe 20%. Trains rule here

 

[Arakhor]

Where do you get these names from? Wickwar is the name of a village in the same county as me, but I can't imagine that you've pulled up a map of the Cotswolds and randomly picked one of the names from it.

 

[Synobun]

If @warpus is anything like me, I pick a random local name. Us Canadians aren't very creative and tend to rob others of their names.