In-House Preview Online: Part 5

[Jack Frost]

I don't really care if dan liked moo or not.

If you are going to write a 30+ page description of a game, you should have played it.

I can't figure out why he would want to write a massive preview like that, just post a bunch of screen shots, scan a few pages of the manual and call it a day.

its really arrogant, and unfair to your readers.

[canimoo2]

it's almost as if the whole thing is some massive inside joke, and we are the unwitting butts thereof.

there was considerable improvement in #4, then this.

I just don't understand. Hey Dan, when the game finally ships, will you let us in on why you did the preview the way you did?

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Mr.Moustache
Hopefully this wasn't a boring read for you , and hopefully I made everything easy to understand. Expect part 2 by next Thursday...lol I'm just kidding.

Great post Mr. M; definitely not boring. That's more of the nuts and bolts I like to see in a preview of a game... not just some prosey rambling culled from the author's imagination. I want to know how the game plays, what choices need to be made. Sure, the AARs and such give me a feel for how immersive the game will be, but they do nothing to indicate how the player is actually interacting with the game.

Thanks again. Actually, if you have more to share, I would like to see part 2 by next Thursday....

[To_Serve_Man]

Wow, Thanks for all the info! (Both Mr. M and Alexfrog)


Magnate races sound very simular to Minor races in Birth of the Federation (if anyone has ever played that). Which isn't a bad thing. I really like that kind of feature.

Also, maybe its just because its 'concept art' but some of the concept art does not apear in the screenshots you pointed me to (Mr. M).. I guess they were just concepts...
Also, the screenshots only show 6 of the 7 races. There are no shots of the 'Harvesters'

I asked this awhile ago when the 'In House Review Part 4' (i beleive)
had just been put out. But if a player is in the Senate, they will be able to propose bills and have the AI (or other players in MP) vote on them? And can they propose bills other just the basic 'appreciate race' or however its refered to bills. mm.. like could a player propose to ban Nuclear weapons? or is it just AI that does this?


(PS: This is kinda of off topic, and i'm sorry in advance. But can anyone see my Avatar? I've been here at Apolyton for 4 years, and have changed computers, and thus, hard drives, and I had a custom avatar. But the file is not on my hard drive. I was just wonder if anyone can see it. Not the Greenland flag. its a litle square that says "To Serve Man" sideways. Its actually a still from the Twilight Zone episode (my favorite one if you couldnt tell )...thanks again)

[Alexfrog]

Yes I can see the Avatar.


There is a huge wealth of info about the game that has been posted on IGMOO....and lots of it is spread out all over, though some attempts have been made to collect it.

Most of us regulars over there have read it all....
so things we assume "everybody knows" are things that most people, even most moo fans, dont know about moo3.

[kalbear]

The player can propose bills exactly the same way that the AI can. I believe that you can only propose so many in a given time and have to wait a bit before proposing the same one, but I may be mistaken.

Otherwise, you and the AI are indistinguishable in that respect.

[Darkrenown]

Originally posted by Mr.Moustache


Magnate Races

Besides the 16 playable races and the unplayable NO, there are Magnate races. Some of these races are actually from previous MoO's (MoO1 and MoO2), and of course there are races that we don't know about yet. Anway, these races inhabit certain planets. They don't build ships, they don't expand and you can't set up trade or non aggression pacts with them. Instead you can colonize the world that they inhabit, which they will become a part of your empire.

The other magnate races are:

Brye Ehts - non corpreal
Ajadar - protoplasmic
Audrieh - plants
Phaigour - fungal
Rhea - gargantua

[Darkrenown]

Originally posted by To_Serve_Man
But if a player is in the Senate, they will be able to propose bills and have the AI (or other players in MP) vote on them?

Yes.

And can they propose bills other just the basic 'appreciate race' or however its refered to bills. mm.. like could a player propose to ban Nuclear weapons? or is it just AI that does this?

Yes, players can propose a number of laws and bills. I don't know about the nuclear weapons ban but the name starts with a anti NBC weapons law in place. As well as the normal laws there are special laws which appear randomly but are still voted on normally.

[Purifyer]

Heh.

I cannot believe DanQ was 'selected' for writing this preview. No MOO experience, a writing style that borders on torture, and a lack of respect for MOO fans by not taking the time to actually understand or care about the game.

I agree with other posters that a better preview could have been written by a diehard moo1/moo2 fan without ever playing moo3.

If you were only allowed to play moo3 for half an hour or so (seems plausible, I cannot believe you could have played for more than that), I understand the shortcomings of your preview. If this is the case however, you should have had enough respect for yourself and your readers to tell QS to 'shove it'.

Thank you Dan for trying however. You must have put a lot of effort into writing those 36 pages and pasting screenshots. I must say with great regret that your preview has really dampened my enthusiasm for the game.

[niteshade6]

I sometimes wonder if this was all a big joke too, if maybe Dan was writing that badly on purpose as some kind of wierd psychological experiment. Or perhaps they were lying about having the game in the first place, and the reviews were just based a hacked copy that wasn't functional or something like that. At this point nothing would surprise me. But then I know you should never underestimate the potential depths of plain old human stupidity.

What does surprise me is that nobody is writing in to say how great this review is. What happened to all the people who were praising Dan's work no matter how bad it was? Could this possibly have been too awful even for them?

[rhofman]

I think those that don't mind the his previews have realized it simply is a waste of time to defend them. I read them for whatever bit of info I can gather. I'm hungry for the game end of story.

What is amazing to me is the amount of b****ing that goes on. If you don't like them it shouldn't have taken 5 previews to figure it out. I suggest NOT reading the sixth one and save your complaing for actual game play or balance issues.

[niteshade6]

Are you kidding? The sheer awfulness of the previews is what makes them fun to read. It's like watching the bad movies on MST3K. Also they aren't all horrible. #4 was actualy halfway decent.

Obviously there are people out there who are so hungry for game info they will be happy no matter how awful the writing is. But even then you can't be too happy about this last one. Not only does it have no new info in it, but it's dead wrong about some of the info it has. Not only that but it shows that the reviewer didn't actualy play the game he is reviewing.

[rhofman]

I don't think it shows he didn't play the game. It shows he is completely unfamilar with the MOO universe. Anyone who's played either MOO or MOO2 knows a Meklar (or possibly Cynoid) designation when they see one.

That said the fifth installment is the only one of the five that I really got nothing out of. So what if his writing style leaves a lot to be desired, the previews still provided game info.

[niteshade6]

It's not the he didn't know a Meklar, it's that despite supposedly having the game for 2 months, he has only played 80 turns and not engaged in any space combat aside from with one scout where he didn't bother to control it. Imagine if he had actualy done his job and played the game? Think of the info we could have gotten then. And realize that if he hadn't written this review, the MoO3 people would have chosen somebody else to do it, presumably somebody who would actualy do their job.

There's nothing wrong with saying the preview had good information but bad writing. That's what most of us said about past previews. But anyone can just list information. Writing a preview is about doing it in an entertaining (or at least readable) fashion. Otherwise you may as well just give a list of facts.

[rhofman]

From what I understood he was limited by QS on how much he could play. That combined with his infamiliarity with the MOO universe means less info gathered which leads to less info passed on.

If you are right and Dan has had it for 2 months then I COMPLETELY agree that it is pathetic what is being put out.

I am being both forgiving and appreciative to Dan in part because I sympathize with having an obviously complex piece of software to analyze, and a rabid group of followers picking at whatever scraps are thrown to them.