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Greetings my fellow gamers and developers,
Ascendance is a turn base geopolitical strategy game for iOS. You will be able to set up and manage your country in practically every way possible. To start, try cutting welfare programs, legalizing prostitution, and taxing religious institutions and see what happens. Ascendance can be played single or multiplayer with all your friends. Your goal is to gain ascendance, or a fifty percent score majority, over your opponent. That score is the sum of six main stats: economy, culture, military, tech, international opinion, and popular support. Your path to victory, then, can involve any approach you choose. If your opponent chooses to try for military domination, you can outproduce her with a strong economy and get your victory majority by funneling some of those vast funds into arts and culture programs within your borders. If your opponent tries for a tech victory, get the court of international opinion on your side by pointing out the horrors of technological advance while destabilizing his popular support through black ops within his borders.
Who are we?
We are a two nomadic game developers traveling from Turkey to the UK over a six month period. Our goals are to create awesome games that make you think. Head over to our website www.yetiden.com to find out more.
What have we done so far?
My friend came to me about a month and a half ago with the idea of Ascendance. I immediately loved the idea and couldn't wait to get started. After many countless hours of brainstorming and 10lbs of coffee, we have finally boiled down our general course of action. Other than general gameplay, we have most of the planning done for the economics system and are currently working on the military system. We want to create an accurate representation of how each system works in the real world so that people will learn the effects of their actions. I.e. enacting a law requiring schools to teach creationism. Laws like this one wouldn't show full effect for roughly a decade, or until the next generation made it through school and become adults.
Challenges
The biggest challenge so far has been the interface. We are trying to make the most advanced political system not only work, but fit onto the iPhone screen and still be fun to play. We don't want people to get lost in a hierarchical system that requires lots of scrolling and clicking to get down to the lesser aspects of the game. So, our current idea uses the map as the central point, and icons that you can tap to make basic changes, or view the full page to make more detailed changes. For example, from the map view, an icon for welfare might be shown with the ability to increase/decrease funding. If you tap for further details you would be able to target low income single moms, or what the heck, why not everyone?
Keep checking back to see updated information and pictures. You should also follow us on Facebook or Twitter if you support the idea. I'll even make it easy for you. Here, just click the link:
https://www.facebook.com/yetiden
https://twitter.com/yetiden
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This image shows the military map. The military advisor is at the bottom left and can be pulled out to select one of the other five advisors (economic, information, culture, interior, and government). The background changes color according to which advisor you have selected. Each screen will also have a unique layout. We only have the economic interface completed right now.
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This is the economics system. When you click on an icon, it will expand its subcategories. Also, connecting lines are drawn to other industries that are directly effecting it.
What do you think about the layout and design? It might be hard to understand the game with the information so far, so stay tuned. I will post our progress as we go along.
