| Star Ruler Modding? |
Thu, 18 November 2010 13:28  |
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 Singularity |
 | Civilian |
Messages: 3
Registered: November 2010 | |
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Hey guys, new here.
I just joined, and I'm patiently waiting for ron to send a serial to me. (I admit, I ended up sending a donation after trying to pursue... alternative routes.  ) But that's because I'm, well, not so interested in it these days. My attention span isn't so long. I remember this game about 10 years back, on a random shareware CD, most likely. It was decently interesting, but as a kid I didn't get far (and of course it was shareware, so you couldn't get far anyways).
Anyways, as to why I'm here... I'm studying some of Stars!'s mechanics. I bought Star Ruler recently, which has a ton of promise, but so far, hasn't utilized it yet. It's still under heavy development. It is, however, extremely moddable. Despite it being real-time, I think a lot of Stars! mechanics would fit well into the basic premise. Apparently I wasn't the first to have this idea, either. http://forums.blind-mind.com/index.php?topic=847.0
As an aspiring game programmer (that's what I'm in college to learn to do!) I want to take a stab at the project. So, anyone well-versed in the game mechanics willing to help me out with the details?
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| Re: Star Ruler Modding? |
Mon, 22 November 2010 12:22  |
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| Singularity |
| Civilian |
Messages: 3
Registered: November 2010 | |
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Sorry for the late reply. I've been pretty busy lately, and will be for at least the next couple weeks. That's college life for ya...
That being said, the first thing I'd like info on is terraforming and habitability ranges, because I know that will have broader appeal than the core Stars! group. As it stands, any planet you can find is instantly colonizable, and the only distinction between them is the number of "slots" each one has. I've already hacked temperature and density (gravity) values in for each planet. Temperature is based on the temperature of the star it orbits, and the distance that planet orbits said star. Density is based entirely on the planet's size, for now. I'm probably going to add in radiation as the randomly-generated wildcard.
Basically, what do you guys think are good ranges to set these? How do you think terraforming and habitability ranges should work? And perhaps most important, what would be a good conversion between Stars! years and time spent in Star Ruler? I still want it reasonably fast-paced, so I was thinking 30 seconds to one minute per "year". Keep in mind, in singleplayer at least, the speed is adjustable to anything from 0.25x, to say 10x speed. I just want a comfortable base to use for multiplayer games.
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| Re: Star Ruler Modding? |
Fri, 26 November 2010 17:01 |
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| CrazyBS |
 | Petty Officer 1st Class |
Messages: 68
Registered: November 2010
Location: Portland, OR | |
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Well, I've picked up Stars Ruler as well hoping it would make a great modern day alternative to Stars!. However, it is really really bad at the moment. It certainly has potential. But Stars! has such a huge amount of details in it, that its simple GUI design lends itself perfectly to present all those details to you. Personally, a rehaul of the orginal game with more intuitive GUI is what really needs to happen...but it's highly unlikely. If Stars Ruler really want to make progress, there MUST be more time in its presentation. Adding Stars! details to the Star Ruler planets and Modding it be more like Stars! would not be succesful at all. This is mainly because Stars Ruler can't present its own, limited, amount of information to you in an intuitive way. There is no way around that.
-Brenton
--------------------------
Brenton Pyl
Technical Lead
Catalyst IT Services, Inc.Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Star Ruler Modding? |
Sat, 27 November 2010 10:34 |
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| Singularity |
| Civilian |
Messages: 3
Registered: November 2010 | |
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Well, Star Ruler's UI is moddable just like the rest of the game. I haven't played around with it too much, but I did manage to add "Density" and "Temperature" bars in the quick view, under "Mood". So the potential is definitely there. A full overhaul would be pretty tough, but not impossible. Anyway, I'd still like to know answers to the questions I posed before.
Like all good game projects I've seen before, the emphasis is on gameplay first, and then presentation. Doing it the other way around rarely gets anywhere good. I'm sure the Star Ruler team has UI on its plate, and they do make changes to it with every update. Patience is the key.
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