Planetarion game design problems

[Structural Integrity]

Reason for this thread is to speculate about the future form of PA and what changes would make the game itself interresting again.

I've been thinking about why planetarion has been such a successfull game in the past, and why it has dropped to the state it is in now.
Most people conclude that the P2P thing has been the main cause for the downfall of PA. Personally I think it's the lack of inovation and evolution of the game itself. Therefore I'd like to bring in a few suggestions that could make the game evolve or atleast give me ideas of what people want in a game like this.

The success of Planetarion as a game in it's younger years has always been it's simplicity. You get roids, you get more resources, build more ships, attack more targets, getmore roids.... repeat till the round is over.
That's it...
The master in the game could use the games fomulae to optimise his roiding.

However... the downfall of PA began after it had run a few rounds. The community began to establish itself and friends started forming alliances to work together.
This is IMO the first and biggest problem of a game. The moment politics have a bigger influence on the games outcome than the players skill in it, the game is ruined. New people don't have a chance, and never will because they cannot join the clique.

Now, I don't want to discuss the history of PA, and what all ruined it, but I want to make a few things clear first.

Second problem: races
==========================================
The moment races were introduced the strength of the game was partially taken out: simplicity. The introduction of four races gave sooo much overhead for new players (and also experienced players) that it required people to learn more to master the game.

Third problem: lack of evolution of the game
==========================================
This is not really a problem, but the success of a game lies in the ability to keep players busy with new options, and at the same time simple enough to make joining the game relatively easy.
Another thing PA lacks IMO is the graphical representation of an universe.
Races did have that effect, but it made the game more difficult for the newest players.

Fourth problem: P2P
==========================================
Not the biggest of all problems for a gamedesign, but it does have one significant effect: The player cannot die before the round ends.
Instead, dying in PA leaves the player with a lot of disappointment and loss of time. And even worse: he will be left with that feeling till the round is over, because there is NO way of him getting back into the race.







============================================






OK, enough chit-chat about what's wrong.... how do we fix this?

We know Spinner & CO are working on a new design for the game. I haven't heard what it's gonna be, but I'm very curious. I hope they fix the alliance problem in a "natural" way, meaning that they don't implement artificial formulae like attack-limitations to block this. I bet they can come up with better ideas than me, but I'll give it a shot anyway.

Fix 1: Seperate rounds
==========================================
This implementation will fix quite a few problems.
It actually means that at the same time you have different games running.
For example, you have three universes at the same time, each with 1500 players.

Each universe will have a fixed number of players (1500 for example). People can sign up for an universe. And as soon as 1500 people have signed up it will start.
A player has the ability to reset into another universe. He will leave this universe and play another, but his planet/ships will remain here, leaving food for other players.
If the universe has a certain number of people left (300 or so) or if the top player reaches a certain score, the galaxy will halt. The scores will be noted and all the remaining players will be put in another universe.

What will this fix? It will limit an alliances influence on the game. An alliance can control one universe. But it cannot control 3 universes at the same time. Also, if someone resets, he will be seperated from the current players, meaning that he doesn't have to bear another round with this Fury or Legion alliance that bashed him to death.



Fix 2: Change P2P
==========================================

Well, the seperate universe fix is all fine and dandy, but no one want to throw 10 bucks away just because he cannot win.
That's why P2P should be changed from "pay for one round" to "pay for three months of PA".
During these 3 months a player can change universe as often as he wants. If he has a crappy round, he can just reset and play on. Non-stop fun...
Also, waiting till 1500 people have signed up for a universe before it begins is a penalty for resetting: it will be a loss of playing time.


Fix 3: Evolution
==========================================

Well Spinner... let that brain work! I gave you a few ideas of how you can rid yourself of a few limitations the current design and structure of PA forces upon the evolution.
I really think you should pay more attention to the options you are going to offer players, than adjusting stats or formulae. Don't be too affraid to redesign PA or design whole new games. Each design will give you more ideas that could be implemented in PA.

Personally I'd like to see a real-time starmap in Planetarion. But that'd be a whole different design. That's why I'm not going to put that forward as a suggestion. PA with a starmap wouldn't be PA anymore.

Perhaps you can introduce alliances on game level... rid yourself of galaxies and allow 4 or 5 people to ally with eachother in-game with a travel-time bonus or something.

If you really want to make seperate universes you can give people medals for becoming top 50 in a universe or so. These would be visible to other players and would help them to make new friends or would be an acknowledgement of their skill.

Or you can introduce research levels, giving very small fleet/resource bonusses...




What I can't fix
==========================================

Alliances: IMO it's not possible to limit alliances in the game. Atleast not with the current design. The static shape of the universe doesn't give any "natural" limitations to the movement of players and alliances.

Races/simplicity: Well... even though races made the game more difficult for new players and gave an overwhelming amount of stats, it was a step forward for the game. Going back to one set of ships would be a step backwards.
Perhaps you can give all races a static set of ships and two or three specialised ships.




Why did I write this?
==========================================

I just pumped out lots of text which will probably be lost in some dusty corner of this forum. But for me personally this will be a reference for my own implementations and designs.
If anyone has suggestions to the designs and ideas, or if you find weaknesses in it, then please feel free to tell me.
I hope this whole load will be read by the crew, and I hope it will help a bit.
If the ideas are being thrown out because of obvious flaws then I've accomplished more than enough, as I've made you think about the options I see in the game.






- Struct

[Embroglio]

I agree with you mostly, especially on simplicity making PA what it is (or was), however, I do think races were a great improvement in the game as even though they did complicate the game they have added variety and enhanced the stratigical side of the game with is more then enough to make up for the (slight) complication.

[Bashar]

I kinda skim-read this, and tbh, it is a pointless post. I am not saying you are stupid as it is well thought out and has good ideas - there is just 1 major flaw.

It is based on the theory of PA being similar to previous rounds for round 10 onwards. This is not the case. The differences are (supposedly) so vast that it can barely be compared. My advice for people with suggestions is to forget them. The differences are so great (supposedly) that you will hardly recognise it as PA. I fear you only wasted your time with this post, as I am quite sure that a lot of what you have said doesn't apply to round 10. For round 10, you must assume everything from resource aquisition to combat is completely different. I don't think with the present amount of "public" knowledge there is on round 10 that any suggestions are of any use. I think the best thing you can do is wait for the beta.

[Structural Integrity]

That can very well be Bashar. I haven't played PA for... what is it... two rounds now, and I haven't read a single CH or newspost giving away information on rnd10 and it's structure. I have NO idea of what's going to happen.

As I said, I haven't wasted my time completely, as every idea posted here went right into my database for personal future reference.

I really wonder what PA will bring us for rnd 10. I hope it's something with a 2D starmap and conquering planets instead of roids, and giving the ability of killing people off instead of leaving them with a planet in rubble and ashes.

[isildurx]

killing people would be a bit harsh :\

imagine beig new to the game, paying, and then the game is over for you after 2 days... to harsh imo.

But in theory there should be a way to make your 'enemies' suffer more, when you attack em.

And i also would prefer rnd 10, to have no galaxies, and each planet on its own

[Structural Integrity]

Originally posted by isildurx
killing people would be a bit harsh :\

imagine beig new to the game, paying, and then the game is over for you after 2 days... to harsh imo.

But in theory there should be a way to make your 'enemies' suffer more, when you attack em.

And i also would prefer rnd 10, to have no galaxies, and each planet on its own

Harsh?
I can already see a invincible n00b playing Command and Conquer 3 because it'd be too harsh to let him die.

No seriously, when you run multiple universes at the same time, you can place someone in the next universe if he dies.

[hAl]

Originally posted by Structural Integrity
Fix 1: Seperate rounds
==========================================
This implementation will fix quite a few problems.
It actually means that at the same time you have different games running.
For example, you have three universes at the same time, each with 1500 players.
...
What will this fix? It will limit an alliances influence on the game. An alliance can control one universe. But it cannot control 3 universes at the same time.

Why not ??? I fear that could be exactly what happens.
Still not a bad idea although i'm not sure a PA universe with 1500 people is viable.

Fix 2: Change P2P
==========================================

Well, the seperate universe fix is all fine and dandy, but no one want to throw 10 bucks away just because he cannot win.
That's why P2P should be changed from "pay for one round" to "pay for three months of PA".
During these 3 months a player can change universe as often as he wants. If he has a crappy round, he can just reset and play on. Non-stop fun...
Also, waiting till 1500 people have signed up for a universe before it begins is a penalty for resetting: it will be a loss of playing time.

This is better suggestion, payment for a period and being able to restart quickly into another ongoing game seems a good way to go.

What I can't fix
==========================================

Alliances: IMO it's not possible to limit alliances in the game. Atleast not with the current design. The static shape of the universe doesn't give any "natural" limitations to the movement of players and alliances.

There are plenty of ways to limit the strength of alliances and battlegroups. Problem is that most players are currently in an alliance so every suggestion that is made will affect them negativly and most people react poorly on those suggestions. Most heard excuse quote "But I want to play with my friends". It is not that you cannot take measures against alliance play but it is that many of the current community seem scared to...

hAl

[Razorback]

well done mate quiet a few good ideas. Only problem, spinner is not listening and busy making pa an [other game] ripoff.

We have already stolen their specialops system moved 1:1 into pa just renamed the activitylevel into stealthmodus etc.
And they already have stolen their "science" system and made it "engineers" where you get a certain % on a special area if you "research" or "engineer" in it. im pretty sure we will see some more "new" features when spinner progresses more in other online games

p.s. once PA was something other games copied from, now it seems pa became a small copycat of other games.

p.p.s IC is free so i wonder why someone would want to play paR10-IC-ripoff in p2p

[AlbinoSquirrel]

Originally posted by Razorback
well done mate quiet a few good ideas. Only problem, spinner is not listening and busy making pa an [other game] ripoff.

We have already stolen their specialops system moved 1:1 into pa just renamed the activitylevel into stealthmodus etc.
And they already have stolen their "science" system and made it "engineers" where you get a certain % on a special area if you "research" or "engineer" in it. im pretty sure we will see some more "new" features when spinner progresses more in other online games

p.s. once PA was something other games copied from, now it seems pa became a small copycat of other games.

p.p.s IC is free so i wonder why someone would want to play paR10-IC-ripoff in p2p

Not to piss on your parade, but there aren't very many new ideas coming about in games these days. Spinner and co. may very well have taken hints from other games. Why not? They are logical extensions to the current game, and will add some needed complexity.

I don't condone wanton ganking of other games, but honestly, there's not much PA could do that couldn't be construed as stealing from another game. Give the man the benefit of the doubt, we've all been busting his balls for ****ty design for years now. Give him a break :P

[Cochese]

Just a small nitpick:

The Engineers idea was apparently something he had in mind for r1...I'm guessing IC wasn't around then

[Hicks]

Originally posted by Structural Integrity
Harsh?
I can already see a invincible n00b playing Command and Conquer 3 because it'd be too harsh to let him die.

No seriously, when you run multiple universes at the same time, you can place someone in the next universe if he dies.

Like in "Space" ? if anyone knows what that is (Search MPODG for it, as it's a far better game than Planetarion). The only problem with it is that while it will strengthern the game itself it will weakern the community which was one of Planetarion's assets, although saying that you get quite a strong community in Space as well it's just in a different form.

[Razorback]

Originally posted by Cochese
Just a small nitpick:

The Engineers idea was apparently something he had in mind for r1...I'm guessing IC wasn't around then

Actually IC started round about the same time as pa. As i joined both games simultaneously in r2.

Not to nitpick here but IC is and never claimed not to be anything but an modified Utopia -space version.

At alby, not to spoil your paradepissing but i call it hardly creative to copycat from other games, i mean basically thats what he is getting his money for and i have seen much better ideas throughout all these rounds then just to say "i cant invent something so im *stealing* something". All onlinegames are someway similar depending on their nature and the general objective but now balantly after 9.5 rounds of pa to force a IC face on it and sell it as a new game seems not right for me.

[Tactitus]

Originally posted by Cochese
Just a small nitpick:

The Engineers idea was apparently something he had in mind for r1...I'm guessing IC wasn't around then

Good Lord--R1!?!? And it's only now just making it into the game? :eek:

I think I'm going to be mildly annoyed at having spent 9 rounds suffering through all those dumb ideas of his if it turns out that he was sitting on a good idea the whole time. :/

Spinner needs to accelerate his time-to-market; or he's going to end up trying to sell 'Pong' to a 'StarCraft' audience.

[AlbinoSquirrel]

Originally posted by Razorback

At alby, not to spoil your paradepissing but i call it hardly creative to copycat from other games, i mean basically thats what he is getting his money for and i have seen much better ideas throughout all these rounds then just to say "i cant invent something so im *stealing* something". All onlinegames are someway similar depending on their nature and the general objective but now balantly after 9.5 rounds of pa to force a IC face on it and sell it as a new game seems not right for me.

You completely missed my point, Focht.

There are very few "new" and "creative" ideas in the gaming world at the moment, and that includes the web-based-wargame genre. Anything that they put into PA, will probably have been used in another game or planned for another game of the same type. Therefore, it's not fair to pick on them for the ideas they come up with - it all depends on how they actually implement those ideas.

You want to pick on people blatantly grabbing other ideas, go pick on all the PA cloners. You're taking one fairly small upgrade to the game and laughing at it because it's similar to something in another game. Give it a rest, it's petty and small.

[Al_zz]

Originally posted by Slacker
[Link removed. hAl likes to whine. -Leshy]

Thats the future

nope, that game is useless for a lot of players. It takes to much effort and game time to play it. PA does hardly take any game time to play the game. Also the excellent graphics of eve (and they are really good indeed) were things I wanted to shut down after only a few hours of playing it.

Also I cannot really play eve anywhere else but @home which is also poor for me. I rather see the access to PA widened by adding it to mobile phone services like i-mode or vodaphone live. That could also bring in cash for the owners so would be excellent.

I need a low maintenance strategy game, no software to install, playable anywhere and simple gameplay. PA has that and it has also thing that I like around that like the (IRC) community.

Eve is something for people with way to much time on their hands. It probably takes 5 to 10 times as much actual game time than a game like PA. I rather spend that time chatting on IRC or even drinking a beer with m8s in a pub.

hAl

[Razorback]

Originally posted by AlbinoSquirrel
Give it a rest, it's petty and small.

The only person petty is you, as far as i know everyone is entitled to have his own opinion or ? and "small" upgrade i wouldnt call it if you rip atleast 10-20% of another game and put it into pa, selling it as a new idea
And clearly i picked on all pa clones, they are only ripoffs and not as good as the original game, but they are free.
YOU missed my point completely.
If someone wants to get money with something he shouldnt rip ideas from freegames and sell them because thats pathetic. Atleast we could await some creativity, seeing they think of upgrades for uhm 8 rounds ? and seeing alot of good ideas were submitted by the community itself during this time, none ever been considered or actually moved into the game.

[JonnyBGood]

I'd like to see a totally random universe, 15 man gals, wider variations in travel times across the universe, scaled benefit for individual fleets (ie up to xxxk ships there is a 10% performance bonus, for xxk ships there is a 15% bonus and so on), the ability to personalise (to a small extent) your fleets, eg trade off armour for shorter travel times, but only to a limited extent, a chaos element in larger battles, 1.7 mil on 200k results in friendly fire casualties for the 1.7 mil fleet, diversify roiding so that the more you risk the more you gain (small fleets, emphasis fleets not planet score, gain far more off bigger defending fleets than large attacking fleets gain off small targets, however running with your fleet loses you maximum cap of roids). That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

[zenopus]

Originally posted by Structural Integrity
What will this fix? It will limit an alliances influence on the game. An alliance can control one universe. But it cannot control 3 universes at the same time. Also, if someone resets, he will be seperated from the current players, meaning that he doesn't have to bear another round with this Fury or Legion alliance that bashed him to death.

Originally posted by hAl
Why not ??? I fear that could be exactly what happens.

I agree.

There are plenty of ways to limit the strength of alliances and battlegroups. Problem is that most players are currently in an alliance so every suggestion that is made will affect them negativly and most people react poorly on those suggestions.

Well, at least that is what they perceive.
But as it will effect everyone equally, I think they are wrong... The alliance vs. alliance fights won't change - but yes, alliance-less players have a marginally better chance at succeeding - or rather alliance players are as much at risk as alliance-less players (well, not quite, but you get the idea).

Most heard excuse quote "But I want to play with my friends". It is not that you cannot take measures against alliance play but it is that many of the current community seem scared to...

If I understand this correctly you are saying that those who oppose limiting the power of alliances (or even a random universe) are basically stating that they have no confidence whatsoever in their own personal PA skills.

[Structural Integrity]

Originally posted by Hicks
Like in "Space" ? if anyone knows what that is (Search MPODG for it, as it's a far better game than Planetarion). The only problem with it is that while it will strengthern the game itself it will weakern the community which was one of Planetarion's assets, although saying that you get quite a strong community in Space as well it's just in a different form.

Yes, like in Space.

Space is beautifull for a browser based game, but has it's problems too:
- it requires more activity that PA
- The learning curve is MUCH steeper
- The graphical representation causes the game to be bug-laden
- The community makes the rules, not the game...



About the ripoff thing, Razorback, just look at the current gamingindustry. We recently got Unreal2, UT2003, Blackhawk down, racing games, more shooters, more racing games... and another few shooters... oh, and a new version of Mahjong!
Aren't those ripoffs?
You take a random game, pretty it up, double the amount of polygons, throw in a few nice colors, add a few maps, rename a few things, and you have a whole new game that can be sold again for 50 quid.
Where's the inovation?
We haven't seen anything new since this Russian dude invented Tetris. The man who came up with that gameconcept for the first time was a friggin' genius!
Any commercial gamecompany is going to borrow ideas from other games. Not because they can't think of their own, but because those ideas have been tested, tweaked, fully developed and proven to be a successfull asset to a game.
If you want to make money, don't implement something people might not like.



But, to get back to the original point, hAl is partially right when saying that an alliance can control multiple universes. But not when people keep swapping and resetting. At some point people will be in a universe that they can dominate without being kicked in the bollox by some superalliance.
About the 1500 players thing not being viable... well... the team is now designing a whole new game. Perhaps the new game is very playable with only 1000 people in the galaxy.
Also, I think that with a smaller targetbase available people will start picking on eachother (including alliance mates) earlier.

JonnyBGood mentioned that he'd like to see galaxies of 15 players. If I had to redesign the game, I'd remove galaxies and clusters and give each planet in the universe a 2D position on a map and make traveltimes relative to your position. This would also reduce alliances effectiveness and it would give more of a deathmatch effect. Alliances formed outside the game would lose effectiveness because they cannot guarantee that they can defend eachother with the variable traveltimes every round.
The problem in this is how would you display this while still keeping the simplicity of PA.

[rUl3r]

i think there were quite some discussions about traveltimes and 2d/3dc maps earlier (Spinner started one himself) - the conclusion was that a map and varying traveltimes are kinda unfair, as some ppl at the very edge will not have the same chance (positive or negative) as those in the middle. as well as you´ll find it hard to get a good target after some time if you killed all ppl in a certain range.
i think if you make a map and lonmger traveltimes for longer distances it might lead to certain "blobs" of strong planets and a wide no-mans land of totally roided and killed planets around. certainly NOT what i see as fun.

[Tactitus]

Originally posted by rUl3r
i think there were quite some discussions about traveltimes and 2d/3dc maps earlier (Spinner started one himself) - the conclusion was that a map and varying traveltimes are kinda unfair, as some ppl at the very edge will not have the same chance (positive or negative) as those in the middle. as well as you´ll find it hard to get a good target after some time if you killed all ppl in a certain range.

As a number of us have pointing out repeatedly, it's rather straightforward to make the universe "wrap around." This would largely eliminate any positional advantage or disadvantage from being on the "edge" or the "middle" of the universe.

i think if you make a map and lonmger traveltimes for longer distances it might lead to certain "blobs" of strong planets and a wide no-mans land of totally roided and killed planets around. certainly NOT what i see as fun.

Doesn't sound much worse than being in a hostile cluster/parallel tbh. Of course, it doesn't sound much better either.

[zenopus]

Originally posted by rUl3r
i think there were quite some discussions about traveltimes and 2d/3dc maps earlier

There have been threads about this kind of thing at least since R5...

the conclusion was that a map and varying traveltimes are kinda unfair, as some ppl at the very edge will not have the same chance (positive or negative) as those in the middle.

That might be the case in a poorly designed open-neded universe (a opposed to a wrap-around universe). IIRC there were a number of fairly simple solutions - even for an open-ended universe. It's likely at least one of them would work...

as well as you´ll find it hard to get a good target after some time if you killed all ppl in a certain range.

So - don't kill your neighbours then... It's a strategic consideration.

i think if you make a map and longer traveltimes for longer distances it might lead to certain "blobs" of strong planets and a wide no-mans land of totally roided and killed planets around.

Only in a poorly designed universe.

[Al_zz]

Originally posted by zenopus
I agree.Well, at least that is what they perceive.
But as it will effect everyone equally, I think they are wrong... The alliance vs. alliance fights won't change - but yes, alliance-less players have a marginally better chance at succeeding - or rather alliance players are as much at risk as alliance-less players (well, not quite, but you get the idea).

A fight of alliance versus alliance is no problem as alliances are a part of this game. Problem is that the current alliances control the game rather than the game/creators being in control. Preround the result is already settled by groups of alliances. Several alliances do never recruit new players and therefore alliances make the game less open for new players to enter it. These kind of thing just need to change. That means the current alliance structure needs to change. No more large concentrations of top experienced players all joining the same alliances. No more extremly closed communities. No more preround politics that decide on the game beofre it starts.

If I understand this correctly you are saying that those who oppose limiting the power of alliances (or even a random universe) are basically stating that they have no confidence whatsoever in their own personal PA skills.

That is overstating it. It would rather be that they fear being unable to win without their powerfull alliance/battlegroup even though they are excellent players.

hAl

[Gerbie]

I agree that something has to change, however, making it harder for bigger alliances will only mean that they will have less interest in growing by allowing new members to join. That is not the way to go.

[Browolf]

I've been thinking about why planetarion has been such a successfull game in the past, and why it has dropped to the state it is in now.
Most people conclude that the P2P thing has been the main cause for the downfall of PA. Personally I think it's the lack of inovation and evolution of the game itself. Therefore I'd like to bring in a few suggestions that could make the game evolve or atleast give me ideas of what people want in a game like this.

I played pa from r1 to r7 b4 dropping out. Tbh I always liked the earlier rounds better. before they introduced races and unrandom galaxies and tried to make it ultra-fair.

I didnt really like P2P either. it wasnt that i couldnt afford it but more the idea of paying for something that wasnt as good as it used to be. I say pa was a victim of its own success.

dunno how they should fix it tho.
maybe they can give up on this pa and make a new game set within the pa genre.
or maybe they can loose the whole webbased interface and say do a deal with trillian and build it all into trillian. now that i think about that would be pretty neat.
or howabout forgetting the galaxy entity as it is and making you work more at finding who is close to you.

whatever, i'd say they'd have to do something pretty radical to revive things.


~browolf