I was wrong about MOO3

[notyoueither]

I think what is statistically valid is that major fans of a game are very hostile to fundamental changes to the concepts of that game in a sequel. I can see that. I can appreciate that. However, that the lovers of 2 hate 3 is not an objective measure of the value of 3.

We've seen it all before, believe me. I mean, BELIEVE ME! The Civ2 die hards hated and hate 3. Big deal! There are a large number of people who like Civ3. There will be a large number of people who will love MoO3. I'll most likely end up liking it if they can fix some of the balance issues and the major bugs.

What I see in MoO3 is an attempt at an innovative new idea. I can see the value in what they are trying to do. What I hope is that they see it through and fix the problems in the initial release so that what was intended becomes a reality.

At the same time, I can see that many people will be put off by the differences from previous games, and the grade of the learning curve. Some good docs would help a lot with the later.

[Ianpolaris]

notyoueither,

Oh I agree that 'the lovers of Moo 2 hate Moo 3' is not in of itself a valid measure of it's worth. I will, however, take pains to point out that you did not pick a particularly good example. Civ 3 (while better and more polished than Moo 3) was a bad game that did not and has not done very well (at least in comparison with it's expectations). The Civ 3 PTW fiasco did not help matters.....but all that of that really belongs on the Civ 3 boards.

I guess my underlying point is this: If you were to do a marketing survey of the hard-core 4-X gamers, I rather suspect you would find that Moo 2 and Civ 2 (along with some other titles.....Civ and SMAC come to mind) form what I call the 'benchmarks of quality'. That is to say that any game (esp with Moo in the title!) will inevitably be held against Moo 2 as it's standard.

Given that fact, don't you think it was more than a little strange (I am tempted to use harsher language) for a developer to allow his person bias to alienate a huge chunk of the target audience? Don't you also think it was more than a bit odd that IG let him get away with it? [If I were an IG suit, and I read Emrich's first post bashing Moo 2 (on the Delphi boards then), I would have had him in my office pronto to explain the realities of market capitalism....such as don't piss off your customers! ]

That was really what I was trying to get at. Don't get me wrong, I am all for groundbreaking and innovative game ideas. However, if Emrich had a new and unique vision for his game, he should have convinced IG (or another publisher) to make a NEW game....and then let his ideas be judged on their merits....without any preconceived baggage.

I guess I am saying that IMHO Moo 3 was crippled almost from the start by a lead Dev who hated Moo 2 and on an emotional level, he allowed that to cripple the project by alienating large parts of his target audience.

-Polaris

[Arnelos]

See... the funny thing is that a lot of us view the original MoO as our benchmark

But I'll admit we do that because we've been around for a while and actually played the original MoO and benchmarked the upstart MoO2 against it

Just think... Emrich was a HUGE fan of the original MoO that hated MoO2 for ways in which it was different... you and a lot of other people who were huge fans of MoO2 now dislike or hate MoO3 for ways in which it is different....

Gee, what would happen if a MoO2 fan that hates MoO3 makes MoO4?

[vmxa1]

I don't know if Alan hate Moo2 or not, but I love Moo1 and Moo2. I am still not sure about Moo3.
In any event I can not see any resemblance to Moo1 in Moo3 at all.
No starlanes, no TF, very little micromanaging. Ok you could not upgrade ships, but no game had done that at that time AFAIK. Sliders were controlled by the player.
When I play Moo3, I do not at any time see anything that makes me think of Moo1.
I know Alan must have love Moo1 as he wrote the guide and it is the best one I have ever seen, ok he had help (Trotter?).

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ianpolaris
notyoueither,

Oh I agree that 'the lovers of Moo 2 hate Moo 3' is not in of itself a valid measure of it's worth. I will, however, take pains to point out that you did not pick a particularly good example. Civ 3 (while better and more polished than Moo 3) was a bad game that did not and has not done very well (at least in comparison with it's expectations). The Civ 3 PTW fiasco did not help matters.....but all that of that really belongs on the Civ 3 boards.

Actually, Civ3 sold over a million copies. It is considered a success by the developers. I suspect that PTW may not be the end of that road, either.

I guess what some people expected did not define the totality of the possibilities for the game's success.

I guess my underlying point is this: If you were to do a marketing survey of the hard-core 4-X gamers, I rather suspect you would find that Moo 2 and Civ 2 (along with some other titles.....Civ and SMAC come to mind) form what I call the 'benchmarks of quality'. That is to say that any game (esp with Moo in the title!) will inevitably be held against Moo 2 as it's standard.

I think that the Civ2, Moo2 bench marks are highly subjective. Subjective to the people who fell in love with those games. I played Civ for many hours more than Civ 2. Moo for more than Moo2. MoM and some others as well.

When it came time for Civ3, I was ready for something new. I was open to the possibility that it could be different. I was not disappointed.

MoO3 is very different. I have not yet decided whether it is a keeper or if I should shelve it. I do know enough about game development to know that I should either put that decision off, or I should revisit it after a patch or two.

Given that fact, don't you think it was more than a little strange (I am tempted to use harsher language) for a developer to allow his person bias to alienate a huge chunk of the target audience? Don't you also think it was more than a bit odd that IG let him get away with it? [If I were an IG suit, and I read Emrich's first post bashing Moo 2 (on the Delphi boards then), I would have had him in my office pronto to explain the realities of market capitalism....such as don't piss off your customers! ]

That was really what I was trying to get at. Don't get me wrong, I am all for groundbreaking and innovative game ideas. However, if Emrich had a new and unique vision for his game, he should have convinced IG (or another publisher) to make a NEW game....and then let his ideas be judged on their merits....without any preconceived baggage.

I guess I am saying that IMHO Moo 3 was crippled almost from the start by a lead Dev who hated Moo 2 and on an emotional level, he allowed that to cripple the project by alienating large parts of his target audience.

-Polaris

This I agree with. It does seem strange if a developer brought in a person who hated what went before. Kind of like bringing in Woody Allen to do the next Rocky.

Although, what I will judge in the end is the finished game, not some of the history of how it got there.

[Arnelos]

It is useful to note that Alan Emrich was brought in precisely because the original MoO was a Hall of Fame game that (for all intents and purposes) created the MoO franchise and was a far more ground-breaking game for its day than MoO2 was. MoO2, for as good as it is, simply didn't get the same acclaim and honors as the original MoO.

Alan Emrich was in the credits for the original MoO and he wrote the Strategy Guide to the original MoO, a strategy guide which any gamer you ask who has it will agree is the best strategy guide every produced for any game - period.

So it was, in part, Alan Emrich's celebrity status among people who loved the original MoO that created part of MoO3's hype when it it was learned that none other than Alan Emrich would be the lead designer of the game. I have no doubt that this was part of the designer's/publisher's decision to bring him on board... they even stated as much.

A lot of us who consider the original Master of Orion one of the best computer games ever made (if not the best) and found ourselves somewhat dissappointed by MoO2 were VERY encouraged by Alan Emrich being the project lead of MoO3.

The difference of opinion is somewhat obvious, however... Many of us grew (over time...) to actually like MoO2 for its own qualities. It's not as good as MoO, but it's a good game. Alan, on the other hand, seems to STILL hate MoO2. He never got past that initial dislike with the things that were "wrong" about it that made it "not MoO".

Oh well.

What is interesting to point out here is that while the core concepts of MoO3 can be attributed to Alan Emrich, it's final shape CANNOT. The reason is that Emrich was largely booted from the project for what were rumored to be creative differences. This was about the same time that the project then was wildly redesigned at least in part. That's when IFP's went out the window (though I honestly think good riddance with that) and all of the other changes were made. Those were NOT Alan's changes, many of them were changes Alan was apparently against and a lot of people have speculated as to why he left.

The result is what I've seen a number of people say it is.... you can see Alan's original concept in this game, but it's obviously a half-hearted attempt at that concept. It's like they had this wonderful concept that they were working toward and then they decided it was too much for them and ripped out part of it here and tacked on some other stuff there to try to make the game "playable".

The result of such a process would not surprisingly be an absolute mess. That the game has as much cohesion as it even does is surprising, actually.

I don't know what the game Alan Emrich designed would be like, but this is not the game he designed but something altogether different.

What's very interesting to point out here is that the fans of the original MoO such as myself who really hated MoO2 when it first came out but found that the game grew on them and they eventually liked it are inclined to be nice to MoO3 not because it's like MoO (I assure you that it is not...) but because we've been through this before.

Those of you who came to MoO2 in much the same way that we came to the original MoO are having similar reactions to MoO3 that we had to MoO2...

The interesting thing then will be to see whether more of you have an experience like Alan Emrich did with MoO2 or like some of the rest of us did with MoO2. We eventually grew to really like it after we got the idea out of our minds that it was supposed to be like the original MoO.

A similar trend can be seen with Civ to Civ2 to Civ3 and for similar reasons. People who loved and played the original Civ like Civ2, but we certainly had some gripes with it. So we were more forgiving of Civ3 being a different game... we'd been through that before.

Sequels do that and I'm honestly happy that sequels are vastly DIFFERENT games than MoO 1.5 or MoO 2.5 now that I look back on it. I like the fact that the designers are trying to innovate and do some really different things with the genre that might just be really neat.

The main problem with MoO3 is that it's true beauty reveals itself subtlely. So subtlely that most people don't seem to have the patience for it. But for those who have the patience for it, this game truly has amazing promise.

What it needs are documentation, a tutorial, and a patch.

[Hydro]

I find it highly amusing that SMAC is now considered to be a ‘benchmark’ by many of what a TB game could and should be. I love SMAC and, after many years, still play it. But, I seem to remember a firestorm of posters on the official forum (which died, thankfully) who ranted about how bug were killing the game, obtuse gameplay, stupid AIs, and what they considered to be serious design flaws. The designers were pilloried for not paying enough attention to the irate, and often vitriolic, posters; the game was deemed unplayable and not worthy of the CIV tradition. The posters at Apolyton were much more considered and (in my opinion) rational and polite – hence my migration here.

My point is that is far too early to pronounce doom for Moo3. SMAC made it through its tumultuous birth to be a ‘classic’ and a ‘benchmark of quality’, or at least a minor classic. Lest we forget, it was plagued by bugs and there were and are playability issues. The key is that it was, and is, fun. That will be the test for Moo3.

In a few years we will all forget all the petty firestorms, demands for patches, and pronouncements of doom. What we will remember is whether the bugs and playability issues were fixed in a reasonable fashion, and whether the game is ‘fun’ for most of its players. I wish IG and QS well. In my opinion there is a lot of potential here, and I hope they pay attention and make calm, considered decisions. They still have a chance to make it ‘right’.

[N4M8-]

What's very interesting to point out here is that the fans of the original MoO such as myself who really hated MoO2 when it first came out but found that the game grew on them and they eventually liked it are inclined to be nice to MoO3 not because it's like MoO (I assure you that it is not...) but because we've been through this before.

Bingo! I wasn't rabid about it, but I was quite suprised and a bit disappointed in MoO 2 when it came out. It was buggy, lost the sliders, had a simplified tech tree, had annoying command points, required you to build every structure on a planet, etc.

Eventually many of the bugs were removed, machines became powerful enough that you didn't suffer through a laggy UI, and I came to love the game for what it was and not hate it for what it wasn't.

Hopefully the same thing will happen for MoO 3.