Which source code should we petition them to release?

VetLegion · January 12, 2003, 22:02

There has been some talk about this. I would for example like to see civ2 code released, for my curiosity and education purposes plus I also think a nice community would gather around it to improve the most glaring bugs.

It is simply a classic and needs some maintenance work, but no revolutionary stuff

Obviousely, after ToT they dont plan to make any more money off it, so they could as well release it. What do you think are the chances of that?

I created this as a poll, so you can vote for the game(s) whose source you would most like to see released to the community. I made it multichoice, but dont vote for all of them though, you ll mess up the poll

ravagon · January 13, 2003, 00:07

Civ2/ToT by a long shot.
The ability to add new triggers/flags, remove the unit/city numerical limits and tie these in to map locations would make a huge difference.
Add in new resources/specials created throughout the game and remove the events filesize limitations and you're set for life...

Maquiladora · January 13, 2003, 01:54

Of all of these games that would benefit most from the source code being released, it would be CtP2 by a country mile. Alot of bugs that need to be fixed and theres plenty of people around here whod want to mess with it. I would personally like to see the "rush-buy bug" in MP fixed too.

But i cant see any Firaxis fan-boys signing a petition for that. Fat lot of good it would do anyway.

H Tower · January 13, 2003, 02:40

colonization. i'd love to be able to tweak the little things in that game. city radius for one.

Rasbelin · January 13, 2003, 05:09

Voted SMAC and MoO2 as those could have some interesting code that could give ideas to StP, but I assume CtP2 could be interesting too.

Lemmy · January 13, 2003, 05:27

CtP2, even if it is just to read the comments

When voting, ironically i got this quote

Quote:

ARBITRARY_TERRAIN_VALUE = 650; //I don't know; just sounded good
-- St Swithin (Activision), tut2_main.slc

DrSpike · January 13, 2003, 05:32

Colonisation if it would help bring along Colonisation2.

Dauphin · January 13, 2003, 09:58

CtP2 would probably be the most useful. Given the game has been abandoned I don't see the problem.

Panag · January 13, 2003, 11:46

hi ,

CIV II , but it should be limited , otherwise some people shall ruin the game and the fun

have a nice day

H Tower · January 13, 2003, 13:24

how would they ruin it? i'm betting that all those cheats Xin Yu found could be eliminated. there's a list as long the role of the civ3 democracy game.

Gatekeeper · January 13, 2003, 14:40

I voted for Civ I and Civ II ...

When I upgrade my computer to the newest model/software, I plan to make sure it can still play a "classic" game like Civ II (I have a Macintosh). The game is simply TIMELESS.

Gatekeeper

CapTVK · January 13, 2003, 16:04

I voted for Civ II. After 7 years it's stall hard to beat thanks to it's scenario support. Some old loopholes and cheats closed would also be welcomed. The chances of it actually happening are slim to absolutely nill. Only smaller companies seem to release the source for their games (like 3D realms Rise of the Triad).

As for Freeciv, well that's a bit obvious ain't it?

spartak · January 13, 2003, 17:37

Civ, Civ2 and SMAC/X of course...

Mark_Everson · January 13, 2003, 19:08

I voted for Civ II MGE as the most important. It is still modern enough to be of relevance, yet old enough to be even vaguely possible. Plus I was obsessed with it for quite a while! If the AI could be brought up to snuff I could see myself easily playing Civ2 today.

CTP II might be another good choice because of its good modding capabilities, but I never played it, so civ2 won. Same for SMAC. I played the demo and it just seemed to be Civ2 in space, with the same atrocious AI

.

I hope you can succeed, but it doesn't seem likely. Going to have an e-petition with signitures?

How about this for an idea with a little more punch. . . Ask the relevant company How Much Money they would want to do it. It might be a rather modest amount that would make the bean-counters smile since the games are essentially written off already. Then set up a paypal account for donations. Spread over a large fan base it might be doable. I think it'd at least have a better chance than appealing to their altruism!

yaroslav · January 13, 2003, 19:57

Civilization II by far. Adding to Civ2 more than 7 civs and border-lines support will be nice. But Infogrames (it has the rigth after Microprose problem, hasn't it?) is maybe still gettting money from it...

DarkCloud · January 13, 2003, 22:58

Since they aren't likely to release any of the others, i voted for the oldest:

Civ I
MOO I
Colonization [Possibly the best of the 3

]

Since we have the greatest chance of getting them
But In a fantasy world- Civ II would be great

for the reasons that yaroslav stated... and they are still selling it... in bundles

(I'd say in another 4 years it might be viable... although it wouldn't run on that year's current systems, likely

)

Panag · January 14, 2003, 06:22

Quote:

Originally posted by H Tower
how would they ruin it? i'm betting that all those cheats Xin Yu found could be eliminated. there's a list as long the role of the civ3 democracy game.

hi ,

some people went a bit to far with civ II , in fact everytime you played a scenario you had to reinstall your original again if you wanted to play lets say MP , anyway we have enough options in the editor and more to come in the future , so why bother , .....

Mike from Firaxis gave ones a long explanation in a chat as to why they would not release the codes , its somewhere on this site , ...

have a nice day

VetLegion · January 14, 2003, 16:58

panag

Quote:

some people went a bit to far with civ II , in fact everytime you played a scenario you had to reinstall your original again if you wanted to play lets say MP

you werent supposed to keep scenario files in the main game directory you know. I played lots of scenarios and didnt reinstall once.

Quote:

Mike from Firaxis gave ones a long explanation in a chat as to why they would not release the codes , its somewhere on this site

can you give us a summary?

CapTVK · January 14, 2003, 17:03

Quote:

Originally posted by panag

hi ,

some people went a bit to far with civ II , in fact everytime you played a scenario you had to reinstall your original again if you wanted to play lets say MP , anyway we have enough options in the editor and more to come in the future , so why bother , .....

Those guys reinstalled the entire game for a replaced terrain and units.gif!?Did they actually say that!? LOL

DrSpike · January 14, 2003, 17:03

Quote:

Originally posted by VetLegion

Quote:

Mike from Firaxis gave ones a long explanation in a chat as to why they would not release the codes , its somewhere on this site

can you give us a summary?

You might be better off searching for posts by Mike.

DrSpike · January 14, 2003, 17:04

Quote:

Originally posted by CapTVK

Those guys reinstalled the entire game for a replaced terrain and units.gif!?Did they actually say that!? LOL

I'm not sure......it doesn't sound that likely.....but that's what was said.

VetLegion · January 14, 2003, 17:08

Quote:

Originally posted by Mark_Everson
I voted for Civ II MGE as the most important. It is still modern enough to be of relevance, yet old enough to be even vaguely possible. Plus I was obsessed with it for quite a while! If the AI could be brought up to snuff I could see myself easily playing Civ2 today.

Yes, me too.

Quote:

I hope you can succeed, but it doesn't seem likely. Going to have an e-petition with signitures?

I m just checking what the pulse of the fans is. But that would be the best way to eventually do it.

Quote:

How about this for an idea with a little more punch. . . Ask the relevant company How Much Money they would want to do it. It might be a rather modest amount that would make the bean-counters smile since the games are essentially written off already. Then set up a paypal account for donations. Spread over a large fan base it might be doable. I think it'd at least have a better chance than appealing to their altruism!

Hmm, you know how InternetPeople are, we want it now and we want it free!

The smartest approach would not to let them know we care

'Dear Mr.Infogree, ups! ...I mean Infogrames, you can release civ2 code to us if you really really want to... I mean we got better stuff to do but if you badly want to disclose it... ahh well ok here is my mail'

Would it work?

Someone mentioned that they still sell civ2 in bundled packs or compilations. My question is, do they still print civ2 or are they just getting rid of old stocks?

And it is pretty surprising to me that they would still have stocks of civ2, I mean how many millions of copies did they make?

Locutus · January 14, 2003, 19:29

Although I'd like to see Civ1, Col and CtP1 too, the code for CtP2 would be the most useful: it's a very new game (compared to Civ1 anyway), it's been abandoned by the developer/publisher, fairly minor changes to the code would mean huge improvements for the game, there's a fairly sizeable group of very enthousiastic people still slaving away on making the game as good as it can get and they would absolutely *love* to get their hands on the source and perfect it (even if it would take years)...

And I'd like to see the comments too

Quote:

//more workarounds than you could shake a lemur poo at
-- St Swithin (Activision), tut2_main.slc

If the public code has so many, I wonder what the closed code looks like...

DarkCloud · January 14, 2003, 23:50

Perhaps we could persuade them to sell the source code as a bundled program!

then everyone would get what they want!

Panag · January 15, 2003, 00:36

Quote:

Originally posted by CapTVK

Those guys reinstalled the entire game for a replaced terrain and units.gif!?Did they actually say that!? LOL

hi ,

well back then there where several people who a great deal of problems with mods and scenarios , and indeed most of the files where completely changed by the mods and scen's , some creators even put eastereggs the size of nebraska in them

have a nice day

Panag · January 15, 2003, 00:37

Quote:

Originally posted by DrSpike

You might be better off searching for posts by Mike.

hi ,

it was in a chat , we talked about it for a very long time

have a nice day

Straybow · January 16, 2003, 01:52

You forgot Civ2 2.42 in there…

CtP2 has SLIC. Source code much less necessary than for other games.

Locutus · January 16, 2003, 09:07

Although SLIC probably gives CtP2 more modding potential than all other Civ games combined (well, except for FreeCiv

), there is still a LOT that needs to be fixed/we would like to improve but which falls outside the scope of SLIC...

DrSpike · January 16, 2003, 10:06

Go on, I'll bite.......what the hell is SLIC?

Immortal Wombat · January 17, 2003, 07:55

A scripting language. Think Civ2's macro language crossed with Java.
http://apolyton.net/ctp2/modificatio...ion/slic.shtml