Home » Stars! Clones, Extensions, Modding » FreeStars » Don't Let the Stars Fade Away
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Re: Don't Let the Stars Fade Away |
Sun, 21 October 2007 21:52 |
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ken-reed wrote on Sun, 21 October 2007 12:09 | Nova was trucking along nicely. The race designer is finished. Job done. Lots of other stuff to do, though.
But, due to health problems I have to call it "a day". I'm moving all the stuff to SourceForge. I should get that sorted out in time. The code is there ... I just have to sort out the web.
That is my job for tomorrow. Sorry folks. I've made (I think) a good start with Nova. But, if any one cares, it is up to them to pick up the project now.
Hey! I've actuallly got a refrence in Wikapedia (sorry about the spelling but vallium does strange things to your mind). great while you are taking it ... hell when you stop.
Bye folks! I've met some nice people. But ...
Cheers guys, sorry I didn't manage to finish Nova.
Ken
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Ken, I'm sure that lots of people reading this are really concerned!
I don't know what the problem is but I hope like hell that you can recover.
Thanks for everything!!!
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Re: Don't Let the Stars Fade Away |
Sat, 05 January 2008 08:12 |
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ken-reed | | Senior Chief Petty Officer | Messages: 92
Registered: December 2006 Location: Oxfordshire, UK | |
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Well, sad person that I am, I've adopted the Microsoft approach. E-mail and other resources are cheap, generating one file is cheaper in code than generating and distributing - oh, let's say say 5 separate files. Besides, the turn files are small - currently 26KB in the test game I'm running. It only includes updates to data stored locally on player's PCs.
The world has changed. Internet connectivity is cheap. People's time is expensive - not only in money (which does not apply to my Nova hobby) but in terms of time - I've lots of other things to do. I grab time to play with Nova when I can.
I'm implementing missile accuracy at the moment.
As I keep saying, this is just a learning project for me. The fact that we now have a very playable (open source) Stars! v1 is a very unexpected bonus
One other point. I've now switched to the 2008 version of the (free) VS Express tools. They are nice but not compatible with earlier versions (but you just need to make a few tweaks to a few files so that they can be). Nova will also need version 3 of the .Net framework (also a free download).
I have one problem, I have VS 2005 which I was using for binary releases. This no longer works with the new 2008 VS Express versions.
I've added to my "list of things to do" a new binary release mechanism. I don't think that will happen before february. (I've a divorce to sort out,find a new place to live and set up a new ISP, etc.)
The test game is going well. Everything pretty much works. Lots of stuff still to do (minefields for example). But, I've learned a lot (which was my intention) and I'm still learning (which is great).
All the latest stable stuff is in SourceForge. Including the Nova homepage, source code and latest binaries.
[Updated on: Sat, 05 January 2008 08:20]
Don't let the Stars! fade away.
http://stars-nova.sourceforge.net
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Nova is not Stars! |
Thu, 10 January 2008 17:49 |
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ken-reed | | Senior Chief Petty Officer | Messages: 92
Registered: December 2006 Location: Oxfordshire, UK | |
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How close should Nova be to Stars!? I'm inviting a discussion here.
Nova was meant to be a personal excuse to learn a few new things. Wow! that has been a total sucesss! But, we have a new game here now. it works! Friends and I are playing it (yes, we are finding bugs but they are fixed within a day).
I've been speaking to some of my combat opponents of various Stars! games and they just simply do not use some options (for example, cheap engines ... nobody (in the crowd I'm in) has ever selected this option... that's just one of many examples.
Should I bother implemeneting it?
On the plus side, Some friends and I have being playing Nova and it seems to work just fine. The only gripe is "Ken, you must implement minefields soon". Right, Mine layers are now in the component database. In this month's release they will be in the ship designer, Next month they will actually lay mines.
The month after that the mines will be active. Sorry if things are a bit slow but I'm dealing with a divorce, change of job, finding a new home, sorting out a new ISP (my wife has grabbed my current one) and my liver is packing up (four pills four times a day).
For those "in the know" as Marvin said "Life? Dont't talk to me about life!.
Ken
PS Never give up, never surrender! If you have not seen starQuest you should
PS Best regards to all, especialy the people who sent me e-mails wishing me well. They did wonders for my morale! Which is why Nova is still moving forward. Thank's guys!
Don't let the Stars! fade away.
http://stars-nova.sourceforge.net
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Re: Nova is not Stars! |
Thu, 10 January 2008 18:15 |
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ken-reed wrote on Fri, 11 January 2008 09:49 | How close should Nova be to Stars!? I'm inviting a discussion here.
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I'm a supporter of making a perfect clone, removing clear 'flaws'.... And only then making (optional) mods.
Quote: | it works! Friends and I are playing it (yes, we are finding bugs but they are fixed within a day).
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w00t! Well done ken-reed, nice stuff!
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I've been speaking to some of my combat opponents of various Stars! games and they just simply do not use some options (for example, cheap engines ... nobody (in the crowd I'm in) has ever selected this option... that's just one of many examples.
Should I bother implemeneting it?
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Well, I'm a CE addict... I've played it in something like 50% of my games. It's not suited to every race/universe I've played, but in the ones I've used it it has proven itself to be a worthy choice. So yeah, I'd want to see it in. I would tentatively suggest that you implement all the LRTs exactly as they are, but with a view to possibly tweaking some of them *later*, once the template of 'vanilla stars' is complete (example: later on, make MA with the MA LRT efficient enough to actually have value.)
Quote: | PS Best regards to all, especialy the people who sent me e-mails wishing me well. They did wonders for my morale! Which is why Nova is still moving forward. Thank's guys!
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I'm one of the ones that's been sitting quietly, but attentively watching your progress (Nova) and silently wishing you well (the rest.)
[Updated on: Thu, 10 January 2008 18:16] Report message to a moderator
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Re: Nova is not Stars! |
Fri, 11 January 2008 13:59 |
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m.a@stars | | Commander | Messages: 2765
Registered: October 2004 Location: Third star to the left | |
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ken-reed wrote on Thu, 10 January 2008 23:49 | How close should Nova be to Stars!? I'm inviting a discussion here.
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I'd say, as close as you can possibly make it, within reasonable effort. Time for [lots of] tweaking/improving later.
Quote: | I've been speaking to some of my combat opponents of various Stars! games and they just simply do not use some options (for example, cheap engines ... nobody (in the crowd I'm in) has ever selected this option... that's just one of many examples.
Should I bother implemeneting it?
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Why not, unless it was staggeringly difficult to cram in?
Think of the "Primitive Stars" games, or the OWW races, or...
But perhaps you should get minefields working 1st, mainly to counter those pesky "hit-and-runners"
So many Stars, so few Missiles!
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Re: Nova is not Stars! |
Mon, 14 January 2008 07:02 |
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ken-reed | | Senior Chief Petty Officer | Messages: 92
Registered: December 2006 Location: Oxfordshire, UK | |
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Quote: | A .rar is fine too.
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Yep, but it means people have to sort out where to put things, sort out the start menu, blah, blah.
The more I'm reading about the "One Click" install the more I like it. I don't know if SourceForge will support it, though.
Still, new stuff to learn. And that's what I want. Got a bit more reading to do before I settle on how I release binaries.
There will be a January release of Nova (nothing visible has changed but the battle engine has been improved ... missile accuracy, damage done by a hit or a near miss, etc.)
Then it's minefields ... Bugger, that's going to be hard. Still, it will make me think and that is the whole point of the project
Ken
PS I lost the test game. I was JOAT, my friend was Hyper-Expansion. He won
Don't let the Stars! fade away.
http://stars-nova.sourceforge.net
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