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Ah, I see. Well, thanks for clearing this up for me, Elmo.
About the system, I agree with you mostly. Many people propably find the year long games fun, although I think that some would, and that I am likely to be a part of the latter group.
So mostly people would propably play games like you described them - a few times longer than an ordinary Civ2 game.
But at the same time I think it would be cool if the games themselves lasted a long, long time, even though players would come and go. And I also think using clans (yes, they would only be an advanced version of password protecting your otherwise open Civ player slot) would be truly great.
So I believe a system much like the one we have thought of so far - realtime with a pause mode - would be the best for the game. Furthermore it could, with time, make it possible to speed up the pace and have the player only do general decisions, and so make really fast games (maybe just 4 hours or so to go from ancient to present day) possible.
So here is what I think the system should be like:
I believe it is much like what you have agreed upon, but just to make sure...
Basically it would be a "slow" realtime, where 1 year might take 5 or 10 minutes or so (yes, this should be modifiable, and then each year (or more or less often, or not at all) the game would pause for x minutes, and allow players to think through strategies, give complex unit orders, manage economics, politics and other more time consuming things that is easier to do when you don't have to look at your units move around. This way, if we keep everything completely modifiable, the game can be made just as the players want.
The only problems now are the extended games, where 1 year could be 1 day, and when the players are not online at the same time. This simply does not work with realtime. But all we need is a mode where the realtime mode is set on "instantaneous", there is a pause every year (or whatever), and people just do everything they do in the pause mode. Then it just has to be playable by email, and we actually have simple, preplanned turns.
So with this system, which again is not at all my invention, but yours, we could have everything from pure realtime to pure preplanned turns, plus everything in between. And if anything is optimal then it has to be that.
Now the only problem is to make it work. Can we do that? Are there any design issues that we should think about? Any weak spots or potential bugs in the system? Otherwise the turns will just be up to the programmers now, which, I guess, should start working on them when we have a UI, and perhabs a map.
Anyway, I am home for easter from today untill monday. So if you guys would like to have a meeting with me then this is great time to do it. Can we arrange a time?
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"I have an idea for a movie. It's about a killer robot driving instructor, that travels back in time for some reason."
- Homer J. Simpson
GGS Website
About the system, I agree with you mostly. Many people propably find the year long games fun, although I think that some would, and that I am likely to be a part of the latter group.
So mostly people would propably play games like you described them - a few times longer than an ordinary Civ2 game.
But at the same time I think it would be cool if the games themselves lasted a long, long time, even though players would come and go. And I also think using clans (yes, they would only be an advanced version of password protecting your otherwise open Civ player slot) would be truly great.
So I believe a system much like the one we have thought of so far - realtime with a pause mode - would be the best for the game. Furthermore it could, with time, make it possible to speed up the pace and have the player only do general decisions, and so make really fast games (maybe just 4 hours or so to go from ancient to present day) possible.
So here is what I think the system should be like:
I believe it is much like what you have agreed upon, but just to make sure...
Basically it would be a "slow" realtime, where 1 year might take 5 or 10 minutes or so (yes, this should be modifiable, and then each year (or more or less often, or not at all) the game would pause for x minutes, and allow players to think through strategies, give complex unit orders, manage economics, politics and other more time consuming things that is easier to do when you don't have to look at your units move around. This way, if we keep everything completely modifiable, the game can be made just as the players want.
The only problems now are the extended games, where 1 year could be 1 day, and when the players are not online at the same time. This simply does not work with realtime. But all we need is a mode where the realtime mode is set on "instantaneous", there is a pause every year (or whatever), and people just do everything they do in the pause mode. Then it just has to be playable by email, and we actually have simple, preplanned turns.
So with this system, which again is not at all my invention, but yours, we could have everything from pure realtime to pure preplanned turns, plus everything in between. And if anything is optimal then it has to be that.
Now the only problem is to make it work. Can we do that? Are there any design issues that we should think about? Any weak spots or potential bugs in the system? Otherwise the turns will just be up to the programmers now, which, I guess, should start working on them when we have a UI, and perhabs a map.
Anyway, I am home for easter from today untill monday. So if you guys would like to have a meeting with me then this is great time to do it. Can we arrange a time?
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"I have an idea for a movie. It's about a killer robot driving instructor, that travels back in time for some reason."
- Homer J. Simpson
GGS Website
), and after that I will have a pretty long summer break before uni starts in September, in which I will have time to do some serious GGS work. And I guess you guys will have summer breaks as well, so... 
Yeah, I know everybody are buissy. But it's easter! Surely you can't be working or going to school now?
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