What about source code? Firaxis?

[Sava]

Will Civ 3's or any Civ game's source code ever be released?

Dan from FIRAXIS, can you shed some light on this subject? At least give me some hope!

[Frugal_Gourmet]

Re: What about source code? Firaxis?

Originally posted by SoulAssassin
Will Civ 3's or any Civ game's source code ever be released?

I can answer that one myself.

No.

If you want the source code to a Civ game, check out FreeCiv. Otherwise, you're going to be out-of-luck. No commercial game company of Firxas's ilk would be that insane.

[shade]

the only way to get info about the sourcecode is by looking very hard at the game when playing,you might recognise some techniques.The only other source there is is the great library of the Civ2 forum,there you can find some of the math used to calculate caravan-profits,combat-models,...

but real source-code,no way you will find any of it.

Shade
(btw why would you want that source code?)

[Frugal_Gourmet]

Originally posted by shade
(btw why would you want that source code?)

That's what I was wondering.

Design your own game, man. If you really love Civ, you can base it on Civ. You know all the rules and interfaces.

[shade]

Design your own game, man. If you really love Civ, you can base it on Civ. You know all the rules and interfaces.

=>and you can believe me it isn't that hard(I'm working on a clone myself ),just use your imagination and play a hole lot of civ(1,2,Ctp,SMAC,...)

Shade

[Sava]

I'd like the source code so I could look at certain things...

A lot of the modifications I want to do are:

Change to hex based map

Enlarge the scale (possible maps around 1480x2360, but with graphic tiles 1/4 of what they are now)

Adding terrain types

Increasing the amount of simultaneous civ's as well as the amount of total Civ's

Add the commodity system from Colonization, and change the food/trade/prodcuction system.

Change unit production similar to Colonization (equipping people with guns makes military units)

Add a bridge unit (Basically, a city improvement out of a city)

Get rid of current method of building TI's (My idea is a combo of PW and Workers... You have a labor pool, a resource pool, and you select the area(s) where you require major improvements. Silly little things like farms, irrigation, and mines will be micromanaged, Only Major improvements will require this method.)

Change the combat system and unit movement (to make it more realistic without harming the gameplay, I have created a model that takes away the traditional way of movement, and replaces it with an order system where you dispatch units, and then they carry out their orders, then return)

Change the unit properties (units will be taken directly out of the population pool, an army of 10,000 men deducts 10,000 men from the population pool of a city, an explorer group of 50 men, deducts 50 men, etc)

Change the population/city size to reflect actual population. No more 1=10,000, 2=30,000, 3=60,000.

Change population growth model and effectively eliminate ICS. I know this will make a lot of people happy. ICS will be somewhat eliminated with the population/city size thing, but with this new model, things like percentage urban population, population density, health, food, religion, and technology will all effect the equation.

Change the overall view of the map and gameplay environment. (Before writing/mapmaking, you simply see a raw sketch of the area. Then the more educated your people get, the maps will reflect that. The way I envision it now is -- raw sketch, Pharaoh[tm] type map, detail artist's rendition, exact topographical map, and finally satelite photos). Actual villages/towns/cities will have a more detailed, AOE/simcity type view with little moving guys and all. The hierarchy of the view will be like this -- town/small region(cities,roads, detailed terrain)/ large region(cities as seen from a higher altitude, roads, general terrain)/ world view (political, or satelite type view, with multiple zoom levels)

Production will be partly micromanaged, but major improvements will be player controlled. Also, simultaneous production will be possible in a labor screen that will have labor pool, resources, money, etc.

An evolving culture/language model.(this is too complex to list here, basically it solves the whole *yourcivhere*'s culture stays the same for 4500 years?)

On the highest difficulty level, I'm adding a ruler, revolution feature. This means that once your family's rule is overthrown, or assassinated, the game ends. This might seem stupid but it is actually fun. It does allow for changing government types where the player relinqueshes some control of the game to the AI. In effect, your people have their own AI. If you are too oppressive of a ruler, then you will be overthrown.

Politics model. As your civilization grows, you will require governors, mayors, and military leaders to manage the people. They each have their own little wants, needs, and strengths and weaknesses. You can also put leaders to death who defy you.

And finally, a morale, loyalty system for the military.

I have many other changes that I'm working on, but these are the only ones I actually have workable code for.

I'm hoping to put this together for a version of Civ 3, I have a playable version of Civ 2 with some of my changes, but it needs lots of work still.

If Firaxis releases the source code, I could easily put out a mod, similar to Counter-Strike for Half-Life. Basically, it not be a stand-alone game, you will need Civ 3 to run it.

I do have the FreeCiv, but there isn't much documentation. I've spent countless hours searching and searching through so many lines of code to find certain functions/algorithms and implement changes. And with my changes, the Freeciv version is going to be very large once I add graphics, sound, and animations.

Hopefully they will make a Civ 3 version of Freeciv. But I doubt many people will get exposed to my game because it will be so large without being directly compatible with Civ 3.

And getting a game pitched to a company is especially tough, I'm not even going to try unless I can get it polished, which with my team of 2 people, will take about 5 years, LOL.

It seems Firaxis doesn't even have the marbles to answer my question. If they aren't going to release the source code to any of the Civ games ever, the least they could do is tell me why. But I think it would be bad business to say, "Because we're greedy!"

[Inverse Icarus]

no, that exactly the point SA.

capitialism rules this world, via people's greed.

but hell, you never know, Microsoft recently "abandoned" a game (Allegiance), and almost completely forked over the developer tools to a group of people.

now i'm in a group of people trying to better the game for all!

so anyway, join the OSDN or the FreeCiv project. (i dont have to freeciv link on hand... Korn does .)

OPEN SOURCE FO LIFE FOO!

[shade]

SA:with all the changes you want to make you better start from scratch,there is nothing you keep the same so...

btw I don't think there will be any documentation in the code the Firaxis-ppl use.

Shade

[Frugal_Gourmet]

LOL! It'd be easier to design your own game.

In any case, that source code is the valuable intellectual property of Firxas. Isn't any way it's ever getting out. No chance. Zero. Zilcho.

And, BTW, if weren't for the game company's evil "greed" (UberKrux) Civ III would probably be no better than FreeCiv.

[Inverse Icarus]

dont rank on the freeciv!

and debian works well without greed, better any any os micro$hit can dish up.

[Sava]

I checked out that Open Source Org thingy, its too bad I'm two years away from my Undergrad degree... I also don't have any real world experience as of yet. I can read and am very fluent in quite a few languages, though. I am a greedy bastard though, I couldn't work non-profit. I bet iD Software[tm] has made tons of money by releasing the Quake source code, so I'm not sure if Firaxis is greedy, or selfish.

Anyways, I mainly want the source code, not to edit it, but to look at a few techniques. I've already got a hex grid terrain up and running, it's pretty cool. The terrain creator tool is pretty cool too, basically, you draw the land SMAC style, altitude/depth and all, and then choose a few options, climate, age of planet, abundance of resources, and the prog models the terrain for you. The prog even simulates ocean currents like the North Atlantic Drift. Another cool feature that I put in is that the climate can change over time. Pollution will slowly make the average temperature rise, and that makes some areas that were previously fertile, into desert. I haven't play tested it yet, but it is possible to melt polar ice and have sea levels rise, I don't have any animations for that yet, but with time it could be a cool concept that would add another dimension to Civ-like games.

I have a friend who has a PhD in Earth Sciences and he helped me create all sorts of fun little terrain types. I'm working with DirectX 8.0 SDK to create the models (WHICH IS TAKING FOREVER).