Rant: Things that sucked about...
 

I feel like spewing, so without further ado...Has 'ado' ever been used in another context? Is this further ado? And why is ado always further? What about the initial ado? Anyway...

Things That Suck About
MOO3:
1. It takes way too long to realize a player's move (reward frequency)
2. Player decisions are counter-manded by the player's own peices (detachement)
4. Moves planned out for players (Programmers playing instead of players); simulation rather than game.

Galactic Civilizations:
1. Graphics are lame.
2. Scenario-based, no strategic game.

GC2:
1. Turning up difficulty becomes a SuperCheeze competition.

SEV:
1. Lousy GUI

StarCraft:
1. Linear plot
2. In-between-mission missions added for filler.

Massive Assault:
1. Scenario-level only

UFO:Aftermath:
1. Boringly repetetive scenarios. (scenario design requires too much labor)
2. Lame strategic play (waste of time)

Starfleet Command III:
1. Removed tactical controls and player feedback.
2. Demoted strategy game to shooter.

SpellForce 2
1. Lack of monster differentiation (model shortage = level 12 mosquitos)

4x Economics
 

One of the main probs with 4x is their economic explosion. There's some initial struggle to survive, a critical mass, and then an exponential growth that trivializes all money.

I think it is mostly because the currency is magically centralized.

If all resources were restricted to their locale, the game wouldn't explode. Freighters would have to be used to ship minerals to a factory. Shipyards could only produce with what's on hand. And the result would be a lot less explosion.

Re: 4x Economics
 

Here's a thought: Why not reduce the number of ships as technology develops? Now, unless I'm miss-remembering, ship battles in the mediteranian in the greek and roman eras often involved up to three hundred ships. Now, the entire US navy, the most powerfull nation in the world, significantly larger than the roman empire, has 280 ships total.

So, my suggestion for tech levels is, less numbers. Less ships, less units, but significantly more powerfull ships and units. First firepower goes up, then speed, then area control.

Re: 4x Economics
 

AngleWyrm said:
...If all resources were restricted to their locale...

Stars! did that, and it wasn't much fun at all.

Re: 4x Economics
 

Well then this would mean that the more powerful ships will cost more to build, and therfore cost more to maintain as well...

Re: 4x Economics
 

Just tried looking for a demo for Stars!, but no luck. Google seems to ignore the exclamation point, and moves on to thousands of irrelevant pages.

Many cheap units vs a few expensive ones. Quantity vs Quality. Production vs Research. Some core philosophies there.

In MOO3, the research tree was priced to match typical research point income during the course of an empire's growth. So it had an exponential cost to closely mimic the player's development.

That was the plan, anyway. But just sleight variance in starting conditions effected the exponential trajectory in a major way. The butterfly effect made starting conditions almost a deciding factor.

Re: 4x Economics
 

Tribes Vengenance
1. Unreal with spinfuser
2. Rampant on line MP cheating
3. Developers didn't listen to the fans - took a great game franchise and turned it into FUBAR.

MOO3
1. Bad horrible UI
2. Fuzzy Fonts
3. Released an early alpha as the full game.

Dominions II
1. Small tiny graphics
2. Lack of intuative player controls for economic, unit, and expansion control
3. Needed TANKS!

Sim City 4 - pre rush hour
1. Half a game
2. Horribly executed game
3. Just out right nasty game

Civ 3
1. It gave me nightmares
2. Still get sick to my stomic when thinking of it.
3. Caused absolute dispair and generated feelings of depression

Space Empires V
1. NDA - Cannot talk about the one or two little things that upset until NDA lifted.

Re: 4x Economics
 

AngleWyrm:
GGmod promises some nice horde vs hero options...

Ship construction costs are roughly proportional to the hull size squared. Maintenance cost grows slower than size.

Thus, you can quickly have a horde of small ships (which are somewhat high maintenance, so throw them at the enemy quick), or you can take your time to build big, beautiful Dreadnoughts http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Rant: Things that sucked about...
 

Moo3:

1. Many features were cut from the game late in development, but the design was never revamped to account for the cuts, leaving a gaping void in the gameplay where those features used to be.
2. The game is fundementally broken. For example, ECM/ECCM has no effect whatsoever on combat. Many of these problems are due to sheer laziness on the part of the developers. For example, the famously broken diplomay was in fact down a to a misnamed text file.
3. The AIs obsession with troop transports and point defence frigates.
4. That the game had so much potentual, so many good ideas, a few parts that worked well (see: the economic model) and yet is such a shuddering, wretched abortion of a game.

GalCiv & GalCiv 2:

1. The strategic map is one of the worst ever conceived.

Space Empires V:

1. AI based on the martians from Stranger In a Strange Land.
2. Why is the system view isometric 3D, again? Put the full 3D in tactical combat where it'll be appreciated.

Re: Rant: Things that sucked about...
 

Have you tried the moo3 patcher? At the risk of being flamed, I'll just mention that after I applied the moo3 patcher and a few mods moo3 was insanely fun... http://bhruic.dyndns.org/patcher/

One might argue, "why should I need mods to fix the game?"

To which I'd counter, "why the hell are you playing se5? get off the forums you troll."