[Freeciv-Dev] Re: graphics...

[Per I Mathisen <per@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 31 May 2002, Jules Bean wrote:
> Letters represent unit types (w: warrior, c: catapult, s: settler).
>
> Colours represent the side the unit is on.  The 'action' of a unit
> (fortify, irrigate, etc) could be represented by the background colour
> of the square.
>
> Terrain types are indicated by symbols('.' for sea, ':' for grassland,
> '/' for mountains), using colour just to make things a little more
> recognisable (blue for sea, green for grassland, grey for mountains
> etc)
>
> Cities would be numbers.  With some convention like 1-9 means 1-9, but
> yellow 0-9 means 10-19, and red 0-9 means 20-29.
>
> Some other information would have to be represented textually in a
> side panel (like angband has a side panel)
>
> It's an interesting project, actually.. would be a lot of work,
> though.

You mean like this (drawn by Brunus three years ago):

+----------------------+------------------------------------------+
| 6,680,000 People     |~~~~~~~~~~~~§~§~~~§~§~~~~~~~~~//9:::######|
| Year: 1140 BC        |~~~~~~~~~~~~~§~~~~~§~~~~~~~~~~===:::######|
| Gold: 965            |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~//8~~~~~~~~~~~~;;;:::######|
| Tax:40 Lux:0 Sci:60  |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~---~~~~~~~~~~~~;;;:::######|
+----------------------+~~~~~~~~~~§~:::|||:::~~~~~~~~~~~~::::::;;;|
| Destroyer (veteran)  |~~~~~~~~~§~§:::|||:::~~~~~~~~~~~~::::::;;;|
| Moves: 8             |~~~~~~;;;//6^^^:::::::::~~~~~~~~~:::::::::|
| Ocean                |~~~~~~;;;===^^^^^^::::::~~~~~~~~~:::::::::|
| Tingis               |######:::###:::^^^::::::~~~~~~:::::::::~~~|
+----------------------+######:::###:::^*^::::::~~~~~~:::::::::~~~|
| _/\ ====             |//4;;;######::::::::::::::://6:::~~~~~~~~~|
| \_/                  |===;;;######:::::::::::::::---^^^~~~~~~~~~|
|                      |::::::::::::###~~~~~~::::::::::::§~§~~~~~~|
|                      |:::::::::^^^###~~~~~~::::::::::::~§~~~~~~~|
|                      |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|
|                      |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|
+----------------------+------------------------------------------+
| Game: Pollution near Massilia                                   |
| Game: Learned Mobile Warfare. Our scientists focus on Robotics, |
|  goal is Robotics.                                              |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+

Actually that's a pretty stupid idea. Unless we added lots of
ASCII-compatibility stuff to rulesets, such a client would have to
hardcode everything, and would not be able to use modpacks and you would
have to redesign a lot everytime something big changes in the client. It
would be essentially unmaintainable, and/or it would add a lot of cruft
and limitations to freeciv for no real gain.

Yours,
Per

"It is difficult to catch a black cat in a dark room.
Especially if there is no cat there." - Confucius