First of all I'm sorry I couldn't find the "New Poll" or whatever button so you'll have to reply saying "Option 1" or whatever. Neway, my friend and I are making this strategy game - like a fantasy one. Only, we've come to a little disagreement on the engine. His idea The entire world in a massive huge scale RTS. Like AOE or Empire Earth (it's going to be 3D), but scaled up massively. And with a higher population limit. You will controll the King only (like RPG) and give orders by letters that you will send to people. You have scouts painting pictures of whatever's going on on the borders, and they take time to reach your palace and give you your news. During battles you go into RPG mode, and give orders by writing letters to units, and fight yourself. My idea Basically, this combines the RTW and the Civ3 systems - in that you have cities, and build stuff in them per turn, but the provinces are determined by the economic radii of the cities. When a city grows, its radius grows. These also determine the borders. However, there is also the option to build new cities, like Settlers in Civ series. And you also get nomadic civilisations, who can't build cities, but can build nomad camps, which are like mobile cities (but with a smaller radius and population). You have a certain degree of design in what you want cities to look like: i.e: You can choose where buildings go, what they look like etc. Battles are done pretty much exactly like in RTW but with a few differences (more options for formations, command whether to use melee or ranged etc) So what are your thoughts?

Quote:Original post by kourosh
His idea
The entire world in a massive huge scale RTS. Like AOE or Empire Earth (it's going to be 3D), but scaled up massively. And with a higher population limit. You will controll the King only (like RPG) and give orders by letters that you will send to people. You have scouts painting pictures of whatever's going on on the borders, and they take time to reach your palace and give you your news. During battles you go into RPG mode, and give orders by writing letters to units, and fight yourself.

Well, to my knowledge, nothing quite like this has never actually been implemented before. However, I suspect this is less a mark of originality and more a sign that implementing it and/or making it enjoyable to actually play will be difficult.

I think the number of players who would actually enjoy writing letters to every piddling little unit in the game would be infinitesimally small.

Quote:
My idea
Basically, this combines the RTW and the Civ3 systems - in that you have cities, and build stuff in them per turn, but the provinces are determined by the economic radii of the cities. When a city grows, its radius grows. These also determine the borders. However, there is also the option to build new cities, like Settlers in Civ series. And you also get nomadic civilisations, who can't build cities, but can build nomad camps, which are like mobile cities (but with a smaller radius and population). You have a certain degree of design in what you want cities to look like: i.e: You can choose where buildings go, what they look like etc. Battles are done pretty much exactly like in RTW but with a few differences (more options for formations, command whether to use melee or ranged etc)

This sounds much like RTW, so I suppose it's less 'original' than his idea, but sounds more fun and infinitely more achievable. You could probably implement most of it just by modding RTW.

[Edited by - Sandman on May 30, 2006 3:04:51 PM]

Please don't take this as an insult, as it's not meant to be one, just my brutally honest view:

His idea is unrealistic
Your idea is unoriginal

Why not sit down together and start from scratch, and design something from the ground up that is new and different, but possible for your team to make? Starting from two opposite and huge concepts and trying to merge them will only lead to failure. Building up from scratch a concept with input from both sides can lead to a new and fun game.

Of course, if you get together and brainstorm and can't agree on anything, you're probably working with the wrong person.

Good luck!

His idea: Just like Age of Empires, but totaly different? ok,...

But I do like the idea of the player being a general/king, and distance has an effect on the time it takes for orders to be issued, (and feedback). The farther out from the general, the more grayed out his units become (armies/cities), and AI generals picked by the player controls things to some extent. Someone else attacks lands far away, You may only know you've lost a city because you stop getting messengers from there, and your messengers don't return. But then it could be the city there has rebelled, or simply bandits in the hills. The player would then have to decide how large of a force to order there, or if he wants to oversee it himself and bring his own army, delaying updates from far away places even more as messengers travel first to your last known position, and then play catch up.

Would give options for much greater cloak and dagger gameplay. Find an outlaying province of your oppenents empire, use a spy to bribe the general there, general keeps sending reports back to their old nation making the other player think they still control that, even send reports of great victories and that they've expanded their control into new lands. If a player isn't careful with managing his genearls/governors, he could find that he actually doesn't control anything beyond the walls of his home city. Of course, pulling such tricks should be hard.

Quote:As if World of Warcraft or Madden NFL '07 is original? You definitely don't need an original concept to have a successful game.

Very true, I'm just giving my two cents :)

The way I look at it, World of Warcraft and Madden are successful not because of originality, but because they have the budget and backing to create a massive game in the genre of their choice. From the sound of this project, it doesn't have the same backing, and these smaller projects can easily get lost in the indie pool and not stand out.

A large game with no originality is appealing. A small game with an original and fun concept is appealing. A small game with no originality is generic.

Every once in a while you can make a small generic game and still be successful (especially in the casual games market), but this is the exception rather than the rule.

That was a few more than two cents, but probably still worth less than $1.