Experimental Post

From the G.E. file
I'm going to try this and see what happens. Just in case though, so this isn't a total loss, here are two shots of the U.E.P. Imperial Power card. Front and back. The front lists the in-game effect of the card, the back is story. There are one of these for each player empire, and a total of eight playable empires. I'm not sure the rules can handle eight players, but there are eight options at least.

(ok, it didn't work. I need to figure out a way to not host files on my local machine...)

G.E. Update coming soon...

From the Galactic Empire zone:
I've been all over GE the last two days. I've banged out the templates for each of the empires and did a total proof of the rules. Now I just need to figure out if I can post word documents up here.

Patchy. Patchy. Patchy.

Rant on.
What is the deal with companies who put out patches that ignore the *major* show stopper issues with their products. What are you on about, eh?
I have become a huge fan of the Star Wars themed Battlefront Series. Ok, not the best game ever made but really a hoot. And what I want now is to do some online action with Battlefront II, a product that addresses most of the design issues of the first product quite nicely. I have played both extensively (in single player mode), at least enough to know I prefer II over I, even if I do like the look of Phase one clones more.
To bad I can't play online. To bad the reason I can't play online is because the game locks hard every time a map ends and I end up shelling to the task bar and killing the task and logging in all over again. To bad it looks like every second owner of the product appears to see the same level of functionality.
Too bad.
See in the life cycle I figure you go through several distinct phases of support. Phase one of support is identification of and repair of major technological errors. Now there is a patch, and that patch does seem to have smoothed out the online play experience -when it's connected. But still no joy on the network dropping and having to kill the task and re-connect.

On the other hand, maybe I'm working to hard to get online in a game where I'm just going to get owned by kids less than half my age anyways...
Rant off.

Something like...

that. Take that board design monkey. Ok so here's the deal. Each "square" represents about 1 month of movement for a body-oid (planetary system, or space base). Each planet or planet system is represented by a breakout area at the edge of the board, which also shows you how much resource value the spot is worth. Some are subdivided, and values range from 1 to 3 resource points per "location".

Oh and skip the cyborgs for now. I can't figure a good way to put them on the map yet. Say it like this: ecks-span-shun. Tee hee.

By the way Corel 12 way rocks over Corel 9. Best 200 buckazoids I ever spent on productivity software. This here same map would have taken me days instead of hours previously.

Post-O-Matic Ray

And what I realy want now is to work on something with a classic SciFi look and feel. You know classic rockets with big fins. Ray Guns. Buck Rogers esque. I just don't know what it should be. War game, strategy game, RPG?
Rockets vs. Saucers, Earth vs. Mars. Mars executes a colonial break in the late 22nd. Earth has the cooler technology base (saucers, kill-o-zap fields) while Mars has the larger industrial base and more utilitarian look and feel (rockets, missiles). And then for fun (because it's what Blizzard would do) the cyborg aliens come from deep space! And not the modern slick cyborgs either, the classic big fishbowl with a brain types with metal pincers.
That could be cool...

Sick as a Dog

And a poor dog at that. I wonder where that saying comes from? I've had a few dogs as friends (canine dogs mind) and I don't remember them getting all that sick. Actually my lost dog broke his tail, and that was just a pathetic few weeks, but no so much the sick.
None of which is helping me get anything done on Galactic Empire, which is really killing me.

Post 0

Why is it 0(zero)? And if I post again, does it then become 0.1 or 1.0? Well, it is a test post.

Post 0.1 - The Kung-Fu of MMO design

Ok, that didn't take long. Anybody who wants a better understanding of the kung-fu of MMO design should read this
The Laws of Online World Design. This is actually the second time in as many weeks that I've ended up surfing to Mr. Koster's page. He's in serious jeopardy of getting into my pantheon of design gods.

I have to say this article realy speaks to one of my core phylosophies. I think I shall ponder it's implications on my personal design work.

Or not (arrogance is its own shield).