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Matrixgames should go mideaval - 1/7/2001 9:21:00 AM

marcusjm

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No and I don't mean go berserk with axes but try a neglected period. Namelly the period between the Ancients and Modern times. As a tester and player of Europa Universalis I can testify that there is a market for this period if done right. Even if EU is a good game I think there's room for much more depht and accuracy than this game has. 30 years war is still a very good topic for a wargame but still noone has tried it. Except Avalon Hill of course (behind some of the most unique and best game designs ever done). How about a Conquistador game? Same as the boardgame perhaps? The Crusades. Saladin meets the Franks. The Arab conquests. Like the old boardgame Jihad. Agincourt(or the whole 100 years war for that matter) US revolution in grand strategy terms (ok maybe not mideaval anymore but still) I don't really care about the specifics but I think there's alot of good topics for something unusual, something we haven't seen before. Matrixgames is the right group for this kind of bold and innovative project. Marcus

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- 1/7/2001 1:35:00 PM

David Heath

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Hi I am not against it but at this time the subject really does not interest anyone on the team. If someone else comes along and has something I would be interested to see it.

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- 1/7/2001 11:23:00 PM

marcusjm

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Couldn't you recruit some of those Avalon Hill designers?

Marcus

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- 1/8/2001 6:08:00 AM

David Heath

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It all costs money... but if a right deal could be made we would be open to it. David

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- 1/9/2001 1:44:00 AM

marcusjm

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I realise of course that in the short term my ideas would seem rather unrealistic but I'm thinking 10 years ahead. What I really wanted to say was that the ideal for me would be if Matrixgames became the "Avalon Hill" of computer wargaming. They failed miserably but Matrixgames could take off where they left so to speak. Now that you have SSI:s founder in the vicinity one could hope that this is not entirely unrealistic. They made some great games in the 80:s but when the graphics became good enough to do some really good strategy/war games they lost it almost totally IMO. As for genres the team might be less interested in. I hope if things go well you could have various departments working on different time periods. I'm sure there must be at least one designer interested in pre 20th century

. Marcus

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- 1/9/2001 4:58:00 AM

Grumble

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One of the reasons AH went down was catering to tastes outside the mainstream (if there is such a thing) in wargaming. Along with failing to take the initiative in the computer gaming arena (I've got a story about talking with Don Greenwood about that subject I'll relate sometime). An example of the former is ASL: Obivously only those who enjoyed ASL would purchase the Gamettes, and those whose enjoyed the gamettes will buy others with previous gamettes as prereq's. Economically, your market share diminishes as you cater to a smaller and smaller consumer base. Additionally, you incur added costs as developers are taken away from more profitable products and one loses economies of scale in production. Sorry, didn't mean to turn this into a micro-econ lecture. Matrix needs to turn a profit; if the market says medieval/age of reason games aren't going to sell, it's not profitable to invest development time on them. Otherwise, Matrix may well become an "AH": subsumed by a larger software manufacturer.

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- 1/9/2001 7:30:00 AM

marcusjm

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Grumble. I know more of the hard economic realities than I really want thanx to the nature of my work (self employed).

Avalon Hill actually made good profits from their boardgames afaik. They lost it when they went digital. As for Mideaval I see a huge interest not only modest. Look at the successes of games like AoE/AoK and numerous games based on this period (Kingmaker was a big seller boardgamewise). SSI made a game called Mideaval Lords which was very good except for it's mediocre gfx. The current Europa Universalis at least brought in the dev costs. Lords of the Realm was also fairly popular. I think it's a huge misconception that "odd" periods doesn't sell. People want good game designs with long term appeal first and forthmost. Since Matrixgames isn't interested in the periods it's not possible to hope for these games right now but I was thinking in a 5-10 year period if MG expands. Marcus

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- 1/9/2001 8:03:00 PM

Ed Cogburn

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Grumble,marcusjm: I thought it was the parent company of AH (whose name escapes me right now - Monarch Avalon?) that really doomed it in the end, sucking its profits away to dump into another enterprise that never turned the corner. The parent company would not invest in AH the funds it needed to go digital with its games. Its early attempts at computerizing games failed basically, but some of its attempts at computerizing games in the end did succeed fairly well, Advanced Civilization (not the big one you're probably thinking of), 1830 (*very* good), Kingmaker, to name most of the good ones. It was the attempts at computerizing wargames that never worked very well. 3rd Reich was a dissapointment both in terms of the game itself plus the fact that AH released a much improved "Advanced 3rd Reich" boardgame at roughly the same time. They never could get a computer design company to take a shot at a literal conversion of ASL, the companies always came up with something that basically wasn't ASL, but looked like tactical combat, just not as deep as ASL. What's the name of that tactical realtime 'light' wargame produced by MS? That was one of the games that started life as an ASL wanna-be. I also got the impression at the end that AH just lost focus, pumping out a lot of beer-n-pretzel games and fewer hard-core wargames than they normally did, but that's not a fact, just an impression. I certainly don't have a problem with Medieval games, an operational level game with a bunch of good scenarios including Agincourt may work. Another interesting one could be a strategy type game where all the nation-states and smaller players of this era in Europe are represented but the game would be a detailed simulation (the economics of warfare in this time could be an interesting change from the WWII, industrialized, massive scale, total war we play now) with real tactical/operational combat, not some real-time, 'light' combat engine crap that we're already neck deep in.

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- 1/10/2001 12:11:00 AM

marcusjm

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You summarized it very well Ed, thanx. Basically I was hoping for MG to do what AH failed with digitally, namelly stunning wargames with great AI

. The rest is just ideas. Marcus

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- 1/10/2001 12:47:00 AM

Paul Vebber

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Breakthrough AI will take awhile, our initial crop of games will have decent AI, hopefully better than decent! But there wil lnot be a good replacement for human vs human play for a while yet. Our emphasis will be on games people can play against each other to get the most out of them. This is not to say we will dumb down AI, but as to development priorities and time investment, game play is #1 (no one plays a game that isn't fun), visuals and sound is #2 (more people will play a fun game that is immersive) and AI 3rd (everybody loves to dis the AI, no matter how hard you try :-). Once we have become established, long term investment into cutting edge AI will be possible. But one has to make a choice to focus on making several good AIs in several games, of pulling out the stops to make 1 super duper one. To reach our long term goals, we need to get a base of solid games out. In order to do that we have to be carful about balancing providing gamers with their dollars worth, and guiding the lilly to the point of fiscal self-destruction. AI is one of those things that can rapidly reach dimishing returns on investment. Some of teh most popular games have had rudamentary AI (Sp a prime example) but was so much fun folks mostly accepted that. We want to raise the SP bar substantially, but have to be careful how we balance game play feature investment, graphics and sound, and AI. Too much in one at the expense of the others leads to problems! We have long range plans for our game lines. Nobody in hard corp wargaming produces a game and leaves it hanging, the realities of the market mean there will always be a Mark II, III etc. Development time in many years and the need to have income during the development cycle require it. The key IMPO is to get enough meat in the initial product so it stands on its own with a minimun of bugs, captures the players imaginatioan and starts them going "Man, this is great! ... but it would be even better if..." Then back it up on our end with commitment to the evolution of the product lines.

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- 1/10/2001 5:20:00 AM

Ed Cogburn

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quote:

Originally posted by Paul Vebber: Breakthrough AI will take awhile, our initial crop of games will have decent AI, hopefully better than decent! .... AI is one of those things that can rapidly reach dimishing returns on investment. Some of teh most popular games have had rudamentary AI (Sp a prime example) but was so much fun folks mostly accepted that. .... Then back it up on our end with commitment to the evolution of the product lines.

I do like to hear about a commitment to the evolution of your product line, as long as that commitment is deep enough to matter. Every company tries to profit off of its best games by coming out with "BestGame-II", or "Advanced BestGame", but do they ever come back to a game and bugfix it more than 2 years after its release? A basic update to make it playable on newer equipment for example (not improvements, just fix-it-enough-so-it-works-on-new-gizmo)? No, ... they'll support it for about 1.5 years, and after that it becomes abandonware. There are a few exceptions, like Gary Grigsby coming back to PAC to make an unofficial update. Of course, it was unofficial because SSI had lost interest in the game, so that partially makes my point too. This is the main reason I like Open-Source so much, although it has not made a significant impact on the computer gaming industry yet. With open-source you are basically guarantteed not to end up with abandonware, if the game has a decent popularity, there will always be someone working on it or at least maintaining it. The FreeCiv project has a lot of the Big Mo (momentum) behind it. It may turn out to be the first open-source project that proves itself to be viable in the gaming community. As for AIs, don't kid yourself. I and I'm sure *many* others recognized the stupidity of the AI in SP, but with enough cheating the AI could at least *appear* reasonable, and thats all we needed since the game was so fun we played it anyway, stupid AI or not. I dream of the day when a game company has the guts to produce a popular game where it opens up the AI to the user. By this I mean designing the game so the AI can be, in effect, a plug-in module. Modules using some kind of embedded scripting language like Python or equivalent, with the source script for the default AI provided, allowing the users (the fraction of the user base that are also programmers, professional or otherwise) the chance to experiment and improve it over time. If the game is popular enough, this would work, I'm sure of it, but I also figure I'll have to wait until Hell freezes over first though ....

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- 1/10/2001 5:49:00 AM

Paul Vebber

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To me there is a difference between "commmitment to development" and "repackaging" (with patches). There are economic realities for why it sometimes becomes necessary and I don't think gamers always realize that you have to be successful as a business to make better games. Its not philanthropy

There is a value in communication though,and in general folks understand that there are rough spots as long as you don't appear to be exploitative. As to open source wargame development, the biggest problem is going to be in the details. I can tell you from work done on SP:WaW that trying to agree on how to change something can be a real bear. Somebody has to be in charge, and they need incredible people skills to keep the project focused. Otherwise you get conceptual dissonance and the project fails because it loses self-consistency. The general result is everybody want so to do their own thing, and you end up with 99 different incompatible versions and nobody can play anybody else. There is a reason every Tom Dick and Harry aren't out making their own games. Its tough and often unforgiving. Wargamers can be a tough crowd and you can go from Heroes to Zeroes in about an instant. On AI I guess I miss where I am kidding myself...we seem to be in agreement that lack of AI sophistication (to a point) can be forgiven if "good enough" not to spoil the fun... Just like a book or a movie, if the storyline (gameplay) generally does not offend one's sensibilities, then minor lapses are shrugged off in willing suspension of disbelief. Same thing for wargames and AI. As to AI scripting have you looked at the doctrine files in Fleet Command that govern unit behavior? It amazes me how that went right over the heads of nearly the entire wargame community...check it out! [This message has been edited by Paul Vebber (edited January 09, 2001).]

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- 1/10/2001 7:24:00 AM

Les_the_Sarge_9_1

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I am not even remotely interested is seeing anything but World War 2 or more modern efforts being pursued. Any idiot and his uncle can make a non modern warfare game. And the market is already knee deep in them now. It would be a waste of good manpower to do something that is already done to death. Who cares if the Matrix way hasnt been done yet. I want Steel Panthers because I like tanks, artillery fire, machines guns chattering. I am not one bit interested in a mob of casualties waiting to happen in a mideval setting. When I want to swing a sword around I go over and roleplay with the gang. Steel Panthers is good because it delivers what no one else is delivering (in my opinion at least). ------------------ Winning all the time is as boring as losing all the time

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- 1/10/2001 4:37:00 PM

Ed Cogburn

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quote:

Originally posted by Paul Vebber: As to open source wargame development, the biggest problem is going to be in the details. I can tell you from work done on SP:WaW that trying to agree on how to change something can be a real bear. Somebody has to be in charge, and they need incredible people skills to keep the project focused. Otherwise you get conceptual dissonance and the project fails because it loses self-consistency. The general result is everybody want so to do their own thing, and you end up with 99 different incompatible versions and nobody can play anybody else.

As a general rule, open-source doesn't lead to 99 different versions of the same thing. That is a common, and understandable, question that is often posed. Open source projects are never egalitarian, there is a leader of the project that as long as a majority respects that leader, he is allowed to make the major decisions. They become leaders by example, but they also understand if they go against the majority on some fundamental issue, they peasents may revolt.

Its really interesting to watch and see how this works out. Its kind of like "chaotic creativity", but most projects manage to find a way of self-regulation to keep from falling apart.

quote:

There is a reason every Tom Dick and Harry aren't out making their own games. Its tough and often unforgiving. Wargamers can be a tough crowd and you can go from Heroes to Zeroes in about an instant.

Please don't misconstrue what I meant when I brought up open-source, Paul. I'm not at all suggesting open-source can accomplish the same things a commercial wargaming company can do. That was not intended. You're right ; 99% of the Tom, Dick, and Harrys out there can't make something like WitP. I don't expect that to happen. I brought up open-source because it has a characteristic which leads to good programs remaining viable because they remain supported by the community, while the commercial side abandons games and moves on to others because they need to make a buck. I understand that, I don't like it

, but I understand it.

quote:

As to AI scripting have you looked at the doctrine files in Fleet Command that govern unit behavior? It amazes me how that went right over the heads of nearly the entire wargame community...check it out!

Fleet Command? I don't remember hearing of it. I'm not much of a naval guy, even though I was in the USN for awhile. Is this available as abandonware, or is it a recent game? Anyone?

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- 1/10/2001 5:14:00 PM

Ed Cogburn

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quote:

Originally posted by Les the Sarge 9-1: I am not even remotely interested is seeing anything but World War 2 or more modern efforts being pursued.

Everyone's entitled to an opinion.

quote:

Any idiot and his uncle can make a non modern warfare game. And the market is already knee deep in them now. It would be a waste of good manpower to do something that is already done to death. Who cares if the Matrix way hasnt been done yet.

Excuse me, but what planet are you living on? The only category from a non-modern era thats been done to death is the American Civil War era and maybe the Napoleonic era to a lesser degree. All the other categories are still wide open for support, most especially the pre-Napoleonic eras. As for being "done to death", I would think that describes the WWII-to-modern tactical wargame category quite nicely, don't you?

quote:

I want Steel Panthers because I like tanks, artillery fire, machines guns chattering.

At what point did we say we were going to take SP away from you? Go to the SP forum and hang out with like-minded individuals then, instead of taking pot-shots at other people's ideas for new games.

quote:

I am not one bit interested in a mob of casualties waiting to happen in a mideval setting. When I want to swing a sword around I go over and roleplay with the gang.

Right, you're only interested in casualties occuring in a modern setting. We've got that figured out already, but please point out to us where we've been discussing roleplaying games. You're a little over the top here.

quote:

Steel Panthers is good because it delivers what no one else is delivering (in my opinion at least).

Uhm, excuse me, but where in the hell were we talking about SP here???? Please show us where SP was even mentioned in this discussion. There was no attack on your favorite game that I see. If you want tactical combat in a modern setting then SP is your answer. Fine, but SP is not the end-all and be-all of wargaming. If this thread were happening in the SP forum, I might understand your ... uhm ... "response" here, but seeing as this is a general discussion board where discussion about any kind of game is allowable, your rude response, defending SP from some perceived attack that never happened, and attacking what I see as a reasonable idea for other games, is totally off-base and pointless.

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- 1/10/2001 8:03:00 PM

Paul Vebber

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Darn Ed - the board just ate my response ... in a nutshell you make some very good points and the relationaship between wargame companies and the community hard -core needs to be looked at hard if we are going to thrive. Open Source ideas deserve a close look, but there are lots of pitfalls. FOr Fleet COmmand it is relegated mostly to the Bargain Bin but check out: http://www.naval-warfare.co.uk/ For examples of the miacles you can do with doctrine files...

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- 1/10/2001 8:17:00 PM

marcusjm

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It's possible he was thinking of Age of Empires and those light games, then I agree. I was however thinking serious wargames with hard core wargaming/strategy gaming as focus. Machiavelli(boardgame) for instance had simple rules but was a really deep strategy game. Would that be hard to do btw? Open Source is nice but I think where most gain could be made from is the tools to create wargames. As I suggested elsewhere, why doesn't all wargame companies join forces for a short while and create a real OS CASE tool for wargame creation? Instead of recreating the wheel for thousand times (AI for instance) you could start with design of the actual game instead. That would ultimatelly lead to cheaper wargames and better ones too. Basically an Aide De Camp where you can compile and hook on AI modules etc. Marcus

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- 1/10/2001 8:20:00 PM

laurent Favre

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just my 2 euros

it's obvious pre-1939 subjects will never have in the next year the appeal of WW2 and modern wargames ( moreover domination of tactics over strategy is another trend limiting profitability of certain titles). In the boardgame field, most of the exotic subjects are addressed by the very small DTP companies even if bigger companies devotes some ressources to them. The computer field lacks an equivalent to DTP games: a toolbox for those who know how to program but will never have the time to make a game from scratch. All the graphic routines by example take a long time to program. As the graphical quality would remain inferior to companies games, I don't think it would be a real competition. By the contrary, more subjects would be covered, more developpers would appear and in the long run, the computer wargame would be strenghtened. Marcusmj we have had the same idea at about the same time...I really consider such a project would be a blast [This message has been edited by laurent Favre (edited January 10, 2001).]

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- 1/11/2001 2:25:00 PM

Ed Cogburn

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quote:

Originally posted by marcusjm: Open Source is nice but I think where most gain could be made from is the tools to create wargames. As I suggested elsewhere, why doesn't all wargame companies join forces for a short while and create a real OS CASE tool for wargame creation? Instead of recreating the wheel for thousand times (AI for instance) you could start with design of the actual game instead. That would ultimatelly lead to cheaper wargames and better ones too. Basically an Aide De Camp where you can compile and hook on AI modules etc.

The commercial companies are not going to do anything that leads to *cheaper* wargames. Cheaper games is the last thing they want. I do like the idea though, except we're really talking about at least two different versions as strategy games are usually very different from tactical games, and would need their own creator kits. There are some examples of such a thing happening in the Open Source community. One is a project I heard of trying to build a "Warcraft-type" game engine. Don't know how well or not the project is doing, and it obviously isn't a strategy wargame, but there appears to be enough people interested in that type of game to reach critical mass and allow such a project to become viable. Hard-core wargames is another matter sadly, there just isn't enough of us out there.

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- 1/11/2001 4:29:00 PM

marcusjm

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Sorry I meant cheaper to produce. That I think would interest most companies

. Marcus

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- 1/12/2001 11:00:00 AM

Ed Cogburn

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quote:

Originally posted by marcusjm: Sorry I meant cheaper to produce.

Oops, sorry, I should have understood that.

quote:

That I think would interest most companies .

I don't know... Would they want to make games that resemble the competition? I wonder what Paul would think of the idea of sharing their software tools with their rivals. My bet is he'd say they want to separate themselves from their competitors by designing games that are unique in as many ways as possible. Heck, I bet some game companies, or game designers, protect their software tools as if they were a company asset, the way MS protects its source code to Windows. [This message has been edited by Ed Cogburn (edited January 11, 2001).]

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