When will they come out with ACII?

[beetle]

I've always hated the living planet, and wished there was a way to devote one's faction to surviving the awakening by engaging in a systematic extermination of fungus and worms.

I always felt that the planet rating was about understanding the ecology. “Going Green” helps with exploitation, and does not necessarily require embracing Planet or adopting a particular faction philosophy. The setting is such that fighting Planet makes as little sense as hating magma or trying to stop the weather.

It would certainly be more in-character for some of the factions at work in SMAC.

I agree with you there! You have some options to that end, for example waging a military campaign and probe efforts to ensure that Voice of Planet is never built. There are other ways to win, and the alien factions have considered — and rejected — transcendence. But a more direct means to sabotage Planet’s awakening would be cool. How might a lobotomy for Planet work? Would it just be a special project?

For game play purposes, one can simply have research and advancement result in opening new bonuses and facilities, and equipment which fills the same fundamental roles as previous gear, just with higher stats.

I understand the feasibility for game mechanics. What is difficult for me is how realistic is this? It does not make sense to me that we Terrans could ramp up to FTL technology, exactly catching and then matching, the rate of progress of races thousands of years older than us. Most space opera (e.g., Star Trek, Babylon 5) deals with this conundrum by assuming technology progress pretty much stops at a certain point. Those shows always were weakest when the plot revolved around a piece of technology advancement.

Why don't you hunt down a copy of "Master of Orion" 1 or 2? They provide some solid sci-fi TBS fun.

I appreciate that you specify MoO 1 or 2. I started with 3. After being so disappointed with Civ3. I am sure you can guess how that turned out for me.

 

[Yuri2356]

I always felt that the planet rating was about understanding the ecology. “Going Green” helps with exploitation, and does not necessarily require embracing Planet or adopting a particular faction philosophy. The setting is such that fighting Planet makes as little sense as hating magma or trying to stop the weather.

But what of displaching their ecology to substitute our own? Sure, you can plant forrests and kelp in the game as-is, but even if you hunt down every fungal tile and make it green, the worms always find a way to squirm back in.

I agree with you there! You have some options to that end, for example waging a military campaign and probe efforts to ensure that Voice of Planet is never built. There are other ways to win, and the alien factions have considered — and rejected — transcendence. But a more direct means to sabotage Planet’s awakening would be cool. How might a lobotomy for Planet work? Would it just be a special project?

Probably. Needing to control/destroy the Manifold Nexus would also make some sense there.

I understand the feasibility for game mechanics. What is difficult for me is how realistic is this? It does not make sense to me that we Terrans could ramp up to FTL technology, exactly catching and then matching, the rate of progress of races thousands of years older than us. Most space opera (e.g., Star Trek, Babylon 5) deals with this conundrum by assuming technology progress pretty much stops at a certain point. Those shows always were weakest when the plot revolved around a piece of technology advancement.

There are ways to explain it away when needed. The easiest one would obviously be paralell advancement - Everyone involved just happened to start spacefaring arround the same time and with roughly equal techbases. It wreaks of Authorial Fiat, but if it creates a good setting it can be overlooked.

The next would be uplifting. Through the intervention of some outside power, the progress of a species is sped along to help them catch up to their neighbors. (Could be local powers looking for vassal states, acting out of compassion. Could be some high-level civilization or individual taking personal interest in a situation, plenty of ways to balance the field.)

The one I think would work best is if it found, in that universe, that there are numerous natural 'tiers' of sorts which require a great deal of technological investment in order to break, but provide a great deal new capabilities to those who master them. Everything until breaking that barrier would just be the gradual refinement and expansion of one's established technology.

I appreciate that you specify MoO 1 or 2. I started with 3. After being so disappointed with Civ3. I am sure you can guess how that turned out for me.

I've heard the tales of Master of Excel.

1 and 2 are great TBS fun though, right up there with the Civ series. Their tactical fleet battles really help to varry up the gameplay.

 

[IlyaZ]

It's strange that no "Alpha Centauri 2" is scheduled, as AC recieved 98% (along with HL2) in well known magazines like PC Gamer (the highest score yet).

Alpha Centauri includes loads of features Civ 4 doesn't have even. Terraform and real 3D heightmapped terrain for instance. Maybe civ 5 could continue on "alpha centauri" when that star is reached?

 

[sir_schwick]

The Unity colony ship, while very advanced by Terran standards, was hardly that advanced by normal space opera means. The mission took 40 years to reach the Alpha Centauri system, which is approximately 4-5 LY in distance from Sol. By classical or relativistic definitions that means they traveled at STL. Additionally nuclear pulse propulsion drives might be able to send vessels of that size at those speeds even today.

The cryogenic freezing pods everyone was in for the trip were a bit advanced, but not of Q proportions. From what I can tell from recovered pods, weaponry for the Unity mission was not a high priority.

Also, as Colonel Santiago says during the advances for Orbital Spaceflight, much of the research went into how to adapt former knowledge to surviving on the new planet. It also went into how management, and implementation of often resource intensive and technology intensive projects could be completed. The soil and air are much different, as are the tectonic plates. It is actually impressive that the humans utilize the planet's surface and even depths so greatly in only a few hundred years when it took human civilization 8000+ years to do the same.

 

[Yuri2356]

Also, as Colonel Santiago says during the advances for Orbital Spaceflight, much of the research went into how to adapt former knowledge to surviving on the new planet. It also went into how management, and implementation of often resource intensive and technology intensive projects could be completed. The soil and air are much different, as are the tectonic plates. It is actually impressive that the humans utilize the planet's surface and even depths so greatly in only a few hundred years when it took human civilization 8000+ years to do the same.

Human civs also started with nothing in terms of scientific knowledge, engineering skill, and tools/infrastructure. The SMAC were walking into something completely new, but they were doing so with the sum of human expertise from the not-to-distant future. They had a fair leg up from when Tribesman Thag started bashing different rocks togeather to see which ones made sparks.

 

[SideshowBob]

"One producer for Firaxis turned around and said, “We could make ‘Sid Meier’s Space-something,’ we have a great group to do that, but it just wouldn’t be the same.” No, it really wouldn’t."

Don't flame me! I think SMAC is a great game. Other than some bugs and the AI, there isn't much I would see fixed.

I'd rather see Sid Meier's Space-something" Letting my mind ramble, instead of colonizing a paltry planet like Earth or Alpha Centauri, how about the Milky Way.

Imagine different spectral types of stars are better for certain types of planets. Some produce planets with heavy metals; others are more life bearing. And certain stars produce more energy.

Factions: how about aliens. Not just some progenitors and humans that can live on the same planet, but alien races that prefer different types of planets.

Once again, I love SMAC. I just think it is too close to perfection to be really improved. A Sid Meier's Space-something," where the galaxy is colonized by alien races that prefer different environment is different enough from SMAC that EA's copyright of SMAC would not come into the picture.

Imagine the new game mechanics, the new aliens, the new strategy, the new technologies. In addition to nutrients, minerals and energy, we could have air, water and temperature.

I'll be nice and skip the torch... These ideas have already been done. Master of Orion II had most of it. I never learned to play MoO2 properly, it never appealed to me the way SMAC did. SMAC is the best game I've ever played. It was thoroughlly advanced in so many ways and to top it all off it had those magnificent voice overs.

As many other have said, I would also be happy with a fully patched SMAC that runs on XP and Vista. And I'd pay more for it than I would have paid for Civ Chronicles (which I mostly bought because my C3C CD exploded in the CD-drive becasue it had a little crack in the middle - but now I have doubles of everything except C3C).

I rarely have time to play anymore, but I have not thrown out my SMAC-box. I could never do that. I even just look at the poster every now and then, not to mention the fact that I still several years later have dreams where I play SMAC. But time being the issue it is, I never have the time to find out what measures to take in order to get SMAC running on my Windows XP (32) With and AMD Athlon 64. It just says it's incompatible, I swear and let it be.

I don't think the headmen at at big gaming companies realise what a treasure the source code and rights of a good game are. Personally I'd see a new rerelease of all the games I played as a kid very ten years. No additions, just guaranteed compatibility. I'd pay for it. Any day. I miss Loom and Monkey Island and Eue of the beholder and the crappy-graphics-Prince of Persias. I haven't time or will to learn something new, but god knows I'd pay for the ability to be properly nostalgic and entertained the few times I have the free time for playing.

And despite my user handle I'm a woman - if you by now are wondering how a bloke could produce that much mushy text about the good old times.

Cheers

 

[Borealis]

Just a note, I had to hunt around in order to get SMAC(X) working on my XP machine, but if you're trying other programs, especially the old DOS ones - try DOSBox http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/ It helped me get the old Apogee games running, plus some more, when XP didn't like them. You'll need to make sure you figure out the proper settings for sound on each game you play, as SoundBlaster drivers are usually the problem, but once you do it helps most things run beautifully.

For SMAC(X) itself, here are a few suggestions:

1) Install the compatibility patch.
2) If you get a 'cpu not supported' like I did (your computer goes too fast for SMAC) follow the instructions here to add a line to your ini file: http://www.civ.org.pl/articles.php?action=ViewArticle&lang=Eng&type=SMAC&ArticleID=183
This worked for me - I still get the error box, but if I click OK my game runs well.
3) If SMACX doesn't like you and you get a TERRANX.ICD error (I did, my classic would run fine but not my xpac) follow the instructions here http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?threadid=143725 which basically tells you to put it running in a special compatibility mode.

After following these three steps I can run both the original and the expansion fine... and often do! I really like Civ4 but it lacks the lore and ambiance of SMAC that made it unique, even apart from the gameplay innovations SMAC immersed me into my game like no Civ game has.