[Freeciv-Dev] Re: freeciv feedback (was: Nice article about Freeciv in O'Reilly Network)

[Daniel Sjölie <deepone@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Den 2001-11-23 14:27:16 freeciv, %Y skrev Jules Bean följande:

> On Fri, Nov 23, 2001 at 06:16:21AM -0800, Raahul Kumar wrote:
> > 
> > --- Raimar Falke <hawk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >  
> > > > Yes.  The author doesn't mean quite what he says.
> > > > 
> > > > By 'slicker user interfaces', he means 'better graphics'.
> > 
> > 'Better graphics". I'm playing with the civ 2 tileset. How does Civ 2
> > have better graphics than Freeciv?
> 
> It doesn't.  I play with the trident tileset, and personally I think
> that's much nicer than Civ 2.  But the author is comparing with SMAC
> and Civ:CTP, which are jazzier.

Even so, the graphics are more than the tileset... I think graphics for
advances, improvements and stuff like that in the civiliopedia is one
example of something that just makes the game a little nicer...

> > > > By 'better gameplay overall', he means 'better graphics and sound'.
> > > >
> > 
> > We have sound? 
> 
> Exactly. (So SMAC and Civ:CTP have better sound, unless you think that
> their sound is worse than no sound... which is a valid point of view)

You can always disable the sound - I don't think the _option_ of sound
could be a bad thing...

> If this wasn't obvious, I was being slightly sarcastic about the
> original article author's comments.  But I do believe he was mistaking
> graphics for UI, and also mistaking graphics for gameplay.

I think a distinction between two ways of playing a civilization style
game might be in order... You can play it either as a _strategy_ _game_
or as a _simulation_... Freeciv is in many ways better than the
competition on the first but frankly kind of terrible on the latter...
E.g. in a simulation a nation would be willing to make great sacrifices
to just survive even if it means it can't win - in a strategy game
winning is pretty much all that matters...
Of course you could play it as a simulation if everyone in a multiplayer
game agrees to do so but that's not the same thing really... The
civilization simulation concept in pure forms mean you're not primarily
playing a game but running a simulated world and the fun is in see how
the world reacts to what you do, how you can manipulate and control it,
rather than in beating the opposition...

Related to this is that when you play the game just to enjoy it as it is
rather than to win it as fast as possible eyecandy and stuff like that
becomes more important and optimizing the efficiency of the interface
becomes less important...

> > > Ack. We should add some tool tips to the clients.
> > 
> > We need an interactive tutorial kind of like what civ 2 had. It showed the
> > basic stuff like founding a city, how to build the first unit and how
> > to set stuff to research.
> 
> Yup.  One of those would be nice.

Indeed...

/Daniel

-- 
Now take a deep breath, smile and don't take life so seriously... :)