Empire: Rebuild a Nation!

Dale · February 16, 2003, 01:54

Introducing a new turn-based strategy game:

Empire: Rebuild a Nation!

Build date: 16th Feb 2003

Version: v0.1 Alpha

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The first public Alpha of the new turn-based strategy game Empire is available from the below website:

http://members.dodo.net.au/~thesdale

Please take a couple of minutes to download the game and manual, and take it for a test drive. If you have any comments/suggestions/bugs please let me know in this thread.

Thanks
Dale.

Pedrunn · February 16, 2003, 06:55

I get the error message "Font surface could not be created" and when i press ok the game crashs

I just extracted the zip inside a folder and run the .exe
I use win98

How can i play the game?

mapfi · February 16, 2003, 08:15

For me the game starts up fine, I also get into the map editor, but when I click PLAY in the game setup screen the game crashes without any messages. (I use Win XP)

Mark_Everson · February 16, 2003, 08:48

Hi Dale, just a quickie report. I'm on WinXP also. I only can dedicate a few minutes to check it out, and. . .

The game seems to fire up fine. I ended up in the middle of a big patch of water, but the manual said that's an expected bug. However to read the manual I minimized everything. When I went back to Empire I had the usual sword cursor and a completely black screen. I had to kill it using windows.

I restarted and found the default player's homeland. Then I started pushing buttons (buttons could use tooltips), got back to the main screen and it wouldn't go back so I quit. Next time I'll RTFM

.

The graphical look is good! A way to kill the animations (flags flapping in the wind) would be nice since at least for me they are just distracting and annoying.

Good work guys!

Dale · February 16, 2003, 17:36

Mark:

Thanks for trying.

I saw what you're talking about. I'll make sure that's fixed for the next demo. Eventually there will be options to stop animations and stuff. Just a while to get there yet.

Mapfi:

When you were at the game setup, did you use the Empire map or the user map? Also, coming out of the map editor did you save the map? I know there's still a problem or two (quite simply there's not too much logic checking when coming out of the map editor yet) when using map editor maps and scripts. Try using the default Empire map.

Pedrunn:

Not having access to win98 (Empire was built on winXP and I have a win2K PC also to test on) I'm a bit in the dark what it could be. But firstly, have a look in the SYSTEM folder of Empire, and make sure there is a file "Font.bmp". Secondly, make sure you're using DirectX7. I know XP and 2000 have that by default.

mapfi · February 16, 2003, 21:24

I tried the default map without even using the map editor first - later I just checked the editor out but didn't play around with it that much, didn't save the map
I know, I gave up rather quickly...

hexagonian · February 16, 2003, 21:41

Just to remind everyone, this is an alpha build, but this will also give an idea what direction we are heading.

Dale will be gone for the next few days on a well- deserved vacation, but continue posting here. I will not be able to help too much on the coding aspects, as he did the entire coding for the game. (I was in charge of graphics)

Pedrunn · February 16, 2003, 23:01

Quote:

Originally posted by hexagonian
I was in charge of graphics

How did you make the tileimps and the terrains?

BTW, The font.bmp is in the sistem folder.

hexagonian · February 17, 2003, 00:31

Photoshop...

Pedrunn · February 17, 2003, 06:43

Actually, the font.bmp is in the pics folder.

Quote:

Originally posted by hexagonian
Photoshop...

You did all that from scratch

Nebula · February 17, 2003, 10:06

I downloaded and liked what I saw.

It runs fine on my system btw.

Some suggestions :
- Scrolling is funny. Scrolling would be better imo if it goes N/E/S/W
- Tooltips would be usefull.
- Zones around the mouse when in building mode would be usefull.
- How about a way of telling when a unit is active?
- Panic button to quit program - Escape to end or main menu for instance
Editor :
- Right mouse button to erase.

Bug :
- When scrolling down/right it stops at a certain point this when Scrolling down/left is possible.
- Manual does not load graphics in wordpad. It only shows the text after having to press buttons on a requester a number of times.
Edit ****
- In the editor mode when pressing on the left icon the map is edited.
- When pressing on the map a unit apears to be selected when no unit is visible. (Happened several times)

Looking forward to new versions. Mini map would be real usefull.

XarXo · February 17, 2003, 10:46

(deleted) The gfx are AMAIZING man!!

MATT:-) C · February 20, 2003, 07:03

I gave it a go and here's my couple of pennies.

With regards to the font surface error, I had that problem on one PC (with an ancient voodoo card), but not on the other (Geforce 4). I think the problem might be the texture dimensions as they are not powers of 2. I guess that just enlarging the bitmaps to an appropriate size would be okay; it looks to me like the program reads from the bmps in pixel offsets.

I'll echo Nebula's comments, the scrolling is not quite intuitive. Am I right in thinking the map is diamond shape not square? (Hence Nebula's first 'bug' is a misunderstanding).

I had the same problem as Mark (minimize, then maximize to a blank screen + cursor).

Also I couldn't select a city until a barracks was built, is this intended (or am I stupid, more likely!)?

It seemed that a large numer of my mouse clicks were not being registered. I don't know if this is my mouse/win98 or the program's input routines or whatever (my stupidity again!).

Having said all of that however, it's looking very nice indeed. I will most definitely be playing this one.

Good luck!
MATT:-)

Dale · February 20, 2003, 17:48

Well I'm back from holidays, and pretty tanned.

Ahhh....... the Aussie sun.

Thanks to everyone who tried Empire. It's great to get some feedback.

Now to those answers.......

Pedrunn:

It looks like it might be related to graphic hardware on the PC (see below). What graphics card have you got?

Nebula:

- I chose scrolling on the diagonals, because of the simple reason that my maps x and y axis run on the diagonals. The x-axis is on the top-right/bottom-left directions, and the y-axis is on the top-left/bottom-right directions. It's logical once you get used to it.

- Tooltips will be coming. They're additions for a later build. I feel it's more necessary to get the basic game running first.

- Building zones will also be coming soon. When you build a building, a red (can't build) or green (can build) shadow of the building will appear.

- A selection border around the active unit will also be coming soon too.
- Actually, I used to have CNTRL-SHIFT as my "boss key".

Maybe I should put it back in.
- To erase in map editor, you could use ocean.

Nah, an erasor will be coming.

Bugs:
- When scrolling down-right and the map stops, you've hit the bottom of the world. Because the y-axis is on that diagonal, there are limitations to the top-left/bottom-right scroll distances.
- Manual graphics. I whipped up the manual in about 30 minutes, and I know I forgot to embed the graphics in the word document. I'll have something better done for the next version.

Quote:

- In the editor mode when pressing on the left icon the map is edited.
- When pressing on the map a unit apears to be selected when no unit is visible. (Happened several times)

I don't get what you mean by these two. A bit more info please.

Matt:
- Thanks for the help on the font surface error. I must admit I was a bit stumped. I'm running a Geforce4 so I couldn't replicate it in any way at all. However I'll change the dimensions for the surfaces and see if it has an effect (I know someone IRL who has the problem so I'll get them to test it first).
- See my comments for Nebula. It's quite logical when you get used to it.

- Minimise/maximise is a bug I need to fix.
- Selecting cities. Yes, it is intentional that a city only selects when it has a barracks. At this time. It will change in the future when more of the city features are in the game.

- Mouse clicks. No not your stupidity, the game input routines.

Because the game runs at 10 frames a second I had to put in a "SlowMeDown" function. What was happening was if you clicked once, it registered about 5 or 6 times.

Not good, so I put in the SlowMeDown. I will shrink the impact of this though.

General comments:
Thanks everyone for taking some time to test this. It's extremely useful and appreciated.

I know I've said "this is coming" to a lot of things, but remember what an alpha build is: an initial build. As part of the development process, alpha builds are perfect for getting parts of an application tested. Of course this means a lot of stuff is either not functioning correctly, not complete or not even in yet. For instance, the combat model in that alpha build is definitely NOT what's going in the release version.

I have a fantastic idea for combat, based around a tactical 5x5 chess board, with ranged combat, bombarding from catapults and even flanking manouveres. However, it'll be a few alpha versions later by the time it gets in.

As always, keep your ears to the ground as I take this game seriously, and will upload regular public alphas.

J Bytheway · February 20, 2003, 18:18

I found the time to look at this today, and have a few comments of my own:

1. It would really be nice to have an option for 1024x768 (even if only drawn smaller in the middle of the screen), since at present the graphics look horrible on my laptop due to the way it stretches things, and I want to see the way it looks nice like everyone else keeps saying

.
2. The cursor flickers constantly (dissapearing and reappearing).
3. When moving the cursor over things on the build menu, the box into which the cursor must be moved to make the costs appear doesn't line up with the picture very well.
4. There should be some way to close the build menu without selecting a building (preferably one way using the mouse (like clicking the sword pommel again) and another with the keyboard (Like Esc)).
5. I'm also having trouble with the mouse - it fails to register when I click too briefly, so I it does indeed sound like SlowMeDown is the problem.
6. An option to remap the keyboard would be good (possibly in a config file, rather than in-game), so that I can bind keys to the scrolling commands which are pointing in the right directions, rather than the arrow keys.

Keep up the good work

LDiCesare · February 20, 2003, 19:02

Hi Dale, hex. Nice alpha game. I have a few comments.
The most important one:
Don't use a .doc for the manual. It is huge, I mean really huge, because of the screenshots I guess, and it takes forever loading in StarOffice (I don't own and won't get legally or otherwise MSWord). I am afraid downloading the full manual when it is done will take more time than the game unless you can reduce the size of it (what format do you used for images in the .doc?) Whatever else (html, pdf, txt) would be better from my point of view.
On the game itself:
I ran the game without a problem on XP.
The game is nice looking. The graphics are really good, although units might look better sharpened a bit.
The combat display screen is something I like. Seeing the numbers change is a good interface for me. Reminds me of MOO ground combat.

Your last post shows you know what you need to do next (highlighting selected unit for instance). Here are a few critics:
You should not sport ai labels in the opening screen if you have no ai. That's cosmetic but puzzling if you read the manual too fast.
You shouldn't put the End button near a corner since I may scroll instead of ending my turn or vice versa. Put it somewhere there is no risk of confusion, like in the middel bottom of the screen.
Iron and stone icons look like too much one another. I tried building units with stone thinking it asked for stone.
Moving units is a lot of guess-clicking for now. It looks like units remember move orders from one turn to another but you have to click on the boot icon to make them move, which means you have to select each of them every turn for them to move. No point remember move orders in that case. I once managed to get a unit moving in the exact opposite direction of what I wanted through some clickfest.
Combat needs a model in which 500 + 250 + 50 units don't lose 104 units to 50 pikemen. Building archers should result in archers instead of pikemen, too. I guess all that is to be developped.

Dale · February 21, 2003, 20:29

J Bytheway:

1. 1024 x 768: Never even considered it actually. Hmmm..... I'll see what I can do okay?
2. Someone else mentioned that too. I haven't seen it at all yet.
3. I took a look and saw what you mean. That's now on "the list".

4. Right-click closes the build menu. I think I'll put a close jewel on there instead to stop the confusion.
5. Another one for SlowMeDown.
6. Good idea.

LDiCesare:

- The manual is a bit of a problem.

I know it's a crap way to do it. Next time I'll organise a nice little .pdf instead.

- Unit graphics aren't finalised yet. They'll definitely change.

- I've got a list telling me what has to be done next. I'm slowely working my way down it.

- The End Turn button thing shouldn't be a problem from now. I've decided to make the sides scroll. So left-right screen edges will be the x-axis, and top-bottom will be y-axis. That should stop the end turn thing you mentioned.
- Iron and stone similar. I'll let Hex know.
- Moving units will be a lot easier to work out once I get some pathfinding in, and I'll have a selection box around units to go with it. I'd like to keep the boot thing because what I want to happen is your units will auto-select when giving unit orders.
- Combat model as mentioned above will definitely be changing. I just threw that in so there was something there to simulate combat.

- Archers instead of pikemen. Next you'll want horsemen instead of catapults.

Dale · February 22, 2003, 23:30

Just an update on "The List":

IMPORTANT:

1/2 Fixed - font surface error thing. Seems to be related to older graphic cards.
Done - Scrolling: make edges instead of corners.
Added - "Boss key"
Fixed - Minimise/maximise black screen.
Fixed - SlowMeDown problems with input.
Temporary (made system arrow) - Cursor flickering. Related to only being 10fps?
Fixed - Gamestate number system.
Fixed - Make sure what unit you select to build is what you get!!!!
Fixed - Fix army joining so it actually works.
1/2 DONE - Map gen.
- Minimap.
- Selection box.
- Unit pathfinding.
- Unit auto-select.
- Build menu change to similar to unit build.
- "Cancel" jewel for build boxes.

LATER:

Fixed - first turn/first player auto-centre.
- button tooltips.
- Animation killer. (stop flags flapping)
- Green/red build shadows.
- Editor: erasor.
- 1024 x 768????
- Keyboard remapping
- Unit graphics update

Dale · February 23, 2003, 08:43

Just a quicky to say that the font surface error thingy is now fixed. If anyone who had the problem on the earlier build can confirm this for me, it'd be appreciated.

Just download the development build from the downloads section of the above website.

MATT:-) C · February 25, 2003, 06:00

I tested the dev build on my voodoo 3 and it there's no longer any font surface error thing, but the cursor is flickering. Looks like it could be a SlowMeDown-type update thing.

I'll mess around some more this evening (GMT).

mapfi · February 25, 2003, 06:38

Got it to work now after all, still without the devel build. It seems that the game doesn't appreciate to be installed on the desktop but rather wants to be in some simpler folder path?
Somehow I couldn't build watchtowers and castles even though I had the resources and I don't like the diagonal scrolling either. Everything else lloks fine for now.

Pedrunn · February 25, 2003, 08:16

The font surface problem is fixed.

I played the game and seems like you have done a lot of stuff already. The game looks really cool. Very much evolved. As expected visually the game looks great. I liked the way units are handled. All the critics i can think about looks like something to do. Not actually a bad concept. The diagonal scrolling sure is confusing. I like the way units are handled (warriors, horses, etc in one unit. The stocking resources in national to build thing part is one of the best ideas ever since it does reduce micromanaging. Keep this idea.

Great work Dale

Dale · February 25, 2003, 21:14

Matt-C:

Good to hear it worked now.

As for the cursor blinking, I did some research and found it's related to a problem within some graphics card drivers and DirectX's DirectInput (trust Microsuck). Anyways, there's a couple of solutions, but not all guarenteed to work. It's related to the fact that the game runs at a low frame-rate and DirectX. But I'm working on it.

mapfi:

There's a different scrolling method implemented in the Devel build. The edges are for scrolling now not the corners. Try that one out and let me know how you feel about it.

I haven't finished the watchtowers and castles yet. Eventually you'll be able to build them in your borders to expand them, garrison them with an army, and in luck goes your way a city form at the foot of the castle.

Pedrunn:

Thanks for the compliments.

I like the national resource pile too. I want the game to be more a national level than city-level. Therefore, everything that I can will be national, but unit building will still be city-level. This is for garrison reasons for castles in cities.

Velociryx · March 8, 2003, 09:48

Took me a bit longer than I thought to get enough time to do a test justice, but I got there!

Just finished giving it a test drive, and I'm impressed!

Game started without a hitch....I was aware, from the reading here that the game opened over open water, so rather than hunting, I simply ended my turn, and from then on, the game cycled correctly to each player's capitol.

The graphics are....awesome!

My first recommendation in looking at the structure of the game would be to either increase the amount of starting player resources slightly, or introduce something similar to "goody huts" to later builds of the game. Since things move somewhat more slowly in the TBS realm, having more starting resources, or at least some means of potentially getting a small boon (the huts), would give players more options in those early turns (of course, make it optional, since huts tend to unbalance things if you want to balance for MP environment)--or, maybe there are goody huts, but just none on my starting island...

I noted the same problem that Mark reported....when I minimized the game to check something in the manual, then came back to the game, I had the sword icon, and a black screen that never would redraw. Had to quit the game via the task manager and restart, but other than that, everything you've completed thus far is working properly....I built myself a Merchant "thingy" and a Watch Tower, then moved my grand army out to go meet the green gringo I was sharing the island with....several turns later, we met and engaged in brutal combat, which I lost narrowly....

Couple of things regarding combat...as it stands, it's fairly much a static thing....I saw no option to withdraw from the battle, nor any means of directing my troops to do any particular thing....for armies of the default starting size, the combat was okay (took about 40 seconds), but I can imagine that as the game goes on, and people begin building armies of increasing size, you might want to have a way to automate the combat process, lest folks spend an undue amount of time watching the numbers wind down in an attack or defense. One possible thought too, might be to scale back the starting force to something along the lines of 50 or so pike (an honor guard?) and give the player some resource equivalencies for the troops....in this way, right off the bat, the player has some tough choices to make....expand that military, or hope for long enough peace so that investments to infrastrucutre pay dividends?

GREAT stuff so far! I'm digging it!

-=Vel=-

Dale · March 13, 2003, 01:39

Sorry guys for being so long without an update, but I've been in the house-moving process for the last two weeks.

Anyways, I'm back in action.

Random maps will be in the next alpha, that's for sure. I've almost finished them, just a couple of things to touch up.

Vel:

Try with the updated .exe contained in the development build (below the alpha on the download page). This contains a few fixes for things you mentioned.

XarXo · March 13, 2003, 10:03

Great... But... What I have to do in the game?

Dale · March 30, 2003, 08:37

Just letting everyone know before hand that Alpha V0.2 will be released soon.

I haven't added/fixed everything I've wanted to, but there's enough in there. The MapGen routines just took too long to get right. Here's how the Alpha V0.2 Change List looks:

The List!

Fixed - font surface error thing. Seems to be related to older graphic cards.
Done - Scrolling: make edges instead of corners.
Added - "Boss key"
Fixed - Minimise/maximise black screen.
Fixed - SlowMeDown problems with input.
Temporary (made system arrow) - Cursor flickering. Related to only being 10fps?
Fixed - Gamestate number system.
Fixed - Make sure what unit you select to build is what you get!!!!
Fixed - Fix army joining so it actually works.
Added - Map gen.
Added - Editor Map gen.
Added - Minimap.
- Minimap screen locator (due to diamond shape, will use a pointer not a box)
Added (all but roads) - Minimap overlays (Owner, units, buildings, roads).
Added - Selection box.
- Unit pathfinding.
- Unit auto-select.
Added - Build menu change to similar to new format.
- Editor terrain menu.
Added - "Cancel" jewel for build boxes.
Fixed - No border flags, coloured post instead.
- Watch tower extending borders by 5 squares.
- Stone/gold/iron on map.
Fixed - first turn/first player auto-centre.
- button tooltips.
Fixed (Made colour-tipped border posts) - Animation killer. (stop flags flapping)
Added - Green/red build shadows.
- Editor: erasor.
Not planned - 1024 x 768????

Dale · April 4, 2003, 22:39

Some screenshots of the current build.........

Screen 1. Setup screen.
Screen 2. Starting out in a new random game.
Screen 3. A couple of turns on, building.
Screen 4. The enemy approaches!

Dale · April 4, 2003, 22:40

Dale · April 4, 2003, 22:48