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We need to save Stars! Thu, 05 September 2019 17:48 Go to next message
magic9mushroom is currently offline magic9mushroom

 
Commander

Messages: 1361
Registered: May 2008
You know it, I know it. The Stars! community is dying. The PRT forums and the Academy have barely been touched except by me in a year. There's a grand total of two games left active on SAH.

We need to do something about this. I really should have made this post a while ago, and it might even be too late now, but we have to try. There are two basic things we need to do.

1) Advertise. Each of us left needs to promote Stars! anywhere we can. I can hit the various forums of the Spacebattles-sphere, but we really need someone to advertise on the various gaming subReddits. Advertisement also isn't going to do much unless we...

2) Reduce barriers to entry. Each advertisement post needs to link Starsbox, Starswine... and a free means of getting keys. Yes, Ron, I know you've historically been worried about people cheating with multiple keys. But any price on a game this old is a serious barrier to entry, not to mention the hassle. You need to release the keygen, or SAH is extinct and no-one will ever cheat again anyway. Please, I'm begging you.

Another Fledgling Admirals game or two wouldn't go astray either, if Altruist is willing.

-m9m

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Re: We need to save Stars! Thu, 05 September 2019 19:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
raptor is currently offline raptor

 
Chief Warrant Officer 1
Creator of StarsWine
Created StarsWine

Messages: 138
Registered: June 2014
As far as reducing barriers to entry in a technological manner, I see the following as important:

  1. Easy-to-set-up server that uses a different authentication system than in-game passwords (like SAH+https+password)
  2. Client with this authentication system built in. A web-browser port where ending turn is automatically detected and fetches/uploads the turn files from server would be ideal. I've attempted this with stars-browser, but I rarely have the time to do the JS hacking.
  3. (biggest wish) The Stars! source code. I know I've talked about trying harder to get this with a few of you over the years, but not much has come from it.



[Updated on: Thu, 05 September 2019 19:38]

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Re: We need to save Stars! Sat, 07 September 2019 18:42 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Altruist is currently offline Altruist

 
Commander

Messages: 1068
Registered: August 2005
Location: Berlin
magic9mushroom wrote on Thu, 05 September 2019 23:48
[...] and a free means of getting keys. Yes, Ron, I know you've historically been worried about people cheating with multiple keys. But any price on a game this old is a serious barrier to entry, not to mention the hassle. You need to release the keygen, or SAH is extinct and no-one will ever cheat again anyway. Please, I'm begging you.


That's not really necessary.

1) It's not like Ron is only sitting on the keys and hording them. He is freely giving them out, any donation optional and voluntary.

2) As a backup I have lots of keys, too, which enables me to make very sure that especially the newbies don't play with keys they might have "found" with the usual risk of ending in a universe of trouble in a multi-player-game because coincidally someone else might use the same serial key.

3) As a matter of fact it is VERY good to have the keys centralized or at least in the hands of people who know what they are doing. With the funny copy protection of Stars it is just necessary to ensure that keys aren't just completly freely available but that the ones giving them out make sure that each serial code is given out only once. That's not really difficult but it needs keeping a log. I am doing that and I am sure Ron does as well.

Fazit: Just publishing serial keys for the picking isn't solving anything but is surely resulting in troubles. I like the system we have now and it works.

magic9mushroom wrote on Thu, 05 September 2019 23:48
Another Fledgling Admirals game or two wouldn't go astray either, if Altruist is willing.


Is it time again?
Well, I need some more time to free myself from playing Stellaris than I am surely willing.

[off topic]
I have to admit I have strange feelings about being hooked on Stellaris at the moment. It fascinates and discusts me at the same time. Stars and Stellaris obviously have the same roots but Stars, of course, is some decades older. Contentwise Stellaris is overhwelming, strat & tactwise it is a bit underwhelming but that's probably to be expected playing against the "AI", Stars is not much better in this regard. Multi-player wise, I guess, it is a question of taste, I absolutely prefer the pbem-style of Stars to the real time way of Stellaris.
What really discusts me is that paradox introduced slavery as a very playable option in the game. Who on Earth except rascists would do something like this? Besides being discusting, it was also very much proved that you can squeeze a lot more out of "free" workers instead o slaves.

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Re: We need to save Stars! Sat, 07 September 2019 18:52 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Altruist is currently offline Altruist

 
Commander

Messages: 1068
Registered: August 2005
Location: Berlin
About the advertising thing... I've thought a bit more about it.

Probably it would be quite good if one could "buy" Stars at STEAM and GOG (good old games), the latter would probably accept it only without copy protection, though... on the other hand I have (so far) simply refused to buy anything at steam, so I'd very much prefer it to see Stars at GOG.

Might be even possible to earn a (very few) bucks for the Jeffs (as late as it may be). Such platforms just weren't available back then and they are really great for distribution which was and is the biggest problem for independant or small companies/programers. Old games like Stars are sold for a very small sum, often enough around $2-5, so lack of money shouldn't stop anybody.

Anyone still in contact with the Jeffs to ask them?


[Updated on: Sat, 07 September 2019 18:54]

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Re: We need to save Stars! Mon, 09 September 2019 16:43 Go to previous messageGo to next message
mrvan is currently offline mrvan

 
Officer Cadet 1st Year

Messages: 220
Registered: May 2014
I fear that if we really wish to save stars!, what needs to be done is a rewrite, with a browser-based client (so no software is needed to play) and a means of scripting (to manage the MM on larger games).

This has been tried a number of times, I suppose - but how difficult can it really be to rewrite a 90's game? It's not as if the Jeffs had a team of 20 programmers slaving away at it for years...

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Re: We need to save Stars! Wed, 30 October 2019 23:23 Go to previous messageGo to next message
ricks03 is currently offline ricks03

 
Officer Cadet 1st Year
Creator of TotalHost and Stars! utilities
Created TotalHost and Stars! utilities

Messages: 222
Registered: January 2012
Location: NC
My one thing to make it more usable (for me at least) was creating a web hosting program with a different feature set than Autohost, because AutoHost is from the same era as Stars, (i.e. not open source) so it didn't work how we played. Still even under active, if intermittent development (although I admit I don't regularly update it on Github because, if nothing else, the only person using it is me Smile )

Also in part because the thing that was killing Stars for me was people dropping out, and no way to replace them if they'd password protected--a problem I solved. My hosting program does need better checking of turn validity, it does the basics, but can't tell if a .x file is truly hacked. That detection code has already been written, it's just secretively squirreled away.

It shouldn't be hard to set up my hosting program in a Windows VM (were people to try, I think we could hammer out the problems in instructions fairly quickly). I haven't been interested in creating a public Hosting Windows VM due to Windows Licensing issues. I've thought about separating the host and client so that the front end is a linux VM, and the back end is a windows box hosting to make the web server side more secure, but at the moment that's hardly a big deal. A amazon web instance, running virtual box, running XP would work. Or running Wine and converting the DB to mysql/maria.


However, there's a perfectly fine hosting program in AutoHost, so creating hosting shouldn't be an issue, the problem is on the client side.

An easy-to-use VM is critical to adoption. The efforts for StarsWine are core here, and should be sticky on top of everything. I created a virtualbox Stars! VM that I can hand people to get them up and almost instantly running, but windows licensing an issue, even for XP.

Stars! being available on Steam or Gog is also brilliant. I know there used to be a cracked version of stars out there that would open any file that didn't have a password (someone flipped the order of the check).

I'm in the same school of thought that I think keygen should be open. Keeping that process secret is a component of why the Stars! is shutting down - the community is secretive. That encourages closed frustrating systems, not open inviting ones. The risk from keys is sharing/reuse, not from generating them. The odds of two people having identical keys when they were all generated fresh and being in the same ~8 player game are effectively zero (even if there were only 1000 keys, that'd ~ 1 in a million). And if they are duplicates, you just back up a turn and fix it with a newly generated key.

If keys are open, the host could easily just create keys for everyone in the game, or validate everyone's keys, because THEY WOULDN'T BE SECRET. There is no real reason for key gen to be secret. People could publish their key, send it to a host, or keep it in their user profile when a game is hosted.

I still advertise and get new players among friends of mine and folks I meet at board game conventions. An interesting story that I was talking to someone at a Con and, as they sounded interested in old school strategy games, mentioned Stars! and they said, "Oh you're THAT Rick Steeves". I get that a lot because of the guy on PBS, but it was the first time that Stars! did it!




https://www.irelandbybicycle.com
http://totalhost.sinister.net:999
https://github.com/ricks03/TotalHost

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Re: We need to save Stars! Wed, 30 October 2019 23:25 Go to previous messageGo to next message
ricks03 is currently offline ricks03

 
Officer Cadet 1st Year
Creator of TotalHost and Stars! utilities
Created TotalHost and Stars! utilities

Messages: 222
Registered: January 2012
Location: NC
Oh, and some way for the Stars! Autohost forum to notify me when new messages were posted (say, via email). For any forum, not just topics I've posted to. That would also be inordinately helpful.


https://www.irelandbybicycle.com
http://totalhost.sinister.net:999
https://github.com/ricks03/TotalHost

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Re: We need to save Stars! Wed, 30 October 2019 23:33 Go to previous messageGo to next message
ricks03 is currently offline ricks03

 
Officer Cadet 1st Year
Creator of TotalHost and Stars! utilities
Created TotalHost and Stars! utilities

Messages: 222
Registered: January 2012
Location: NC
mrvan wrote on Mon, 09 September 2019 16:43
I fear that if we really wish to save stars!, what needs to be done is a rewrite, with a browser-based client (so no software is needed to play) and a means of scripting (to manage the MM on larger games).

This has been tried a number of times, I suppose - but how difficult can it really be to rewrite a 90's game? It's not as if the Jeffs had a team of 20 programmers slaving away at it for years...
I think you sum it it - given the number of attempts, fairly difficult. In many respects, each attempt to rewrite it has only made the game weaker. People burn out on the project, and I'll bet leave.

From a MM perspective, I give you a contrast. I play a board game called RoboRally. It's a race game, so you can, in many respects, make the game as long or short as you want. Yet one common complaint I hear is, "It's too long; it takes HOURS". Because people pick multiple boards, too many players for the board layout, and make the game take a long time. People have a tendency to pick more complicated than they actually want.

I had plenty of time as a college student. I don't as a working adult. Most stars players are at least my age because, well, that's the era of stars! Entering a packed huge game is a travesty if playing amongst people you don't know. Too many will have real life take them out of the game. But it's not so bad it you limit the universe size and star density.

And stars! has some automation for load balancing minerals. I'll admit, if I could mineral balance in the same manner as how fuel balancing was (mostly) removed I'd take it. But I'd like that at the game creation level. And it's there with Max minerals.


Oh, and a good/current page of all the Stars! utilites. Many of the old links are dead. I have the ones I like just because I downloaded them ages ago.


[Updated on: Wed, 30 October 2019 23:37]




https://www.irelandbybicycle.com
http://totalhost.sinister.net:999
https://github.com/ricks03/TotalHost

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Re: We need to save Stars! Fri, 08 November 2019 23:10 Go to previous message
Hank is currently offline Hank

 
Crewman 2nd Class

Messages: 16
Registered: November 2002
Hi All,

It's very sad that the Stars! community is shrinking. Most of us have kids and a full time job with little time to play Stars!. I suppose one way to 'save' the community is to have a database of players and their e-mail addresses. Send invitations for games once a year or something like that to keep players in touch. I started playing Stars in the 90s, when range 10 weapons still existed. I recall the original Home World Forum was a nice shade of cyan, 100 games were running, the waiting list to host a game was long, and play by e-mail (PBEM) games were common. People who haven't played in more than a decade still come and visit this forum because it's such a good game. It would be good if there's a way to keep in touch with players from long ago so that if a game were to start, they could be invited to join. When we retire in 20 years or so, we still need to be able to find one another for a 1v1.

Hank

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