RE: "Upgrade" options between Dominion series.

[Archonsod]

Gooles said:
[1] I think you'll find that BF2124 sold but a fraction of games that BF2 did, and BF2 still has many filled servers, assuming that was what you were referring to. (I'll never understand why people buy new versions of a sports game annually)

No, I was refering to the fact that around 60% of their output are generic template games with different graphics. Although if you want to put comparisons on series up, spot the difference between Battle for Middlearth 1 & it's successor. How about the grandaddy of them all, Id's Doom & Doom II.

Games that graphically intense require nearly everything to be modified to fit the game's "mood" anyways. As well, companies big enough to have an Unreal engine usually don't use the same engine again

1. 90% of the code used by most games companies is generated by third party applications. There's actually very little new coding done these days, simply tweaking pre-made scripts to get the right values.
2. Depending on the licence, some companies will actually look specifically to code on an existing engine, simply to ensure they make back the money they spent.
3. GTA III - GTA:SA all use the exact same engine. The only alterations made to the code that couldn't have been done by a mod (given enough time) is the code optimisation. The rest was modular by design.
4. Graphics are hardly a big deal, and as far as coding goes they're usually one of the least time consuming areas. You'd piss more people off by releasing Doms 2 with a new 3D, pixel shaded interface and claiming it was a new game.

Yeah..... That's kinda my point. New versions usually don't require as much work as new games and the price tag should reflect that.

Not really. It can take longer to make a minor change to an existing program than it can to start from scratch. With new code, you don't need to worry about breaking the stuff that works, or indeed making sure what you are writing is compatible with something from several years ago.