Spring RTS Engine

[supercolossal "updates" image was here]

Looks familiar, I guess I've played Knights and Merchants too much...

Woah, neat update!

thx 4 tha updates

by the time this is released the devs will have finished that new engine

Hazzah! (sp? v.v)

Long weekend coming up! I'll try to post something worthwhile then. I've got so MANY ideas, they're all really good. Stuff you haven't seen before, but stuff you won't be able to live without. Not a lot in the way of eye candy.

Stuff to look for:

-The return of an old hero
-The introduction of a well-known hero from another universe... in a form... oh the wit...
-Worthwhile and painless reasons to build L1, L2, and L3... hopefully...
-Dramatic changes in line with both sides' "personality", affecting many buildings. Units/Buildings won't get worse, just one side will get better ones. But both sides will have many advantages
-No more "Well arm has this, so core needs to have it too" nonsense, I'm tired of listening to that. The sides will not be mirrors of each other, even main combat units
-Special abilities for certain categories of units
-More reasons to build rarely-seen or poor-performing units
-Major economy changes, the only "identical" economy structures for the two sides will be wind generators, solars, and basic metal makers
-At least one other completely new unit/structure
-The largest explosion ever in a Spring mod, AFAIK, implemented in a fun, playable manner
-Many units/structures removed, eh, in a good way if that's believable
-Vastly improved starting game, so much more enjoyable
-Completely original implementation of plasma repulsors (AFAIK)
-Old units which were not practical have been remade in light of new engine improvements
-Lots of previously unused engine features are now taken full advantage of
-Seismic detectors unborked
-Improved spies
-Better groundscars
-Some units have had their roles completely changed so as to better reflect the sides' personalties, promote strategic diversity, all that good stuff...
-Commanders aren't just a one-off nuke in comm continues games anymore
-Completely renewed wreckage values
-Late game units are actually worth having
-Unit icons (still in planning stages, but I am committed to getting this finished before the next AA release)
-A lot of other stuff I forgot to record, and a lot more that I haven't done yet

I'm sorry this sounds really vague. I had to do that purposefully, I want the stuff to remain original at least until the next AA version's been out for a few hours! The actual changelog is a lot more specific.

so aa is gonna be another complete reshuffle?

hmmmmmm

Caydr wrote:Will be done in June.

Luls.

I want the stuff to remain original at least until the next AA version's been out for a few hours!

I promise I'll wait a few hours to steal your ideas

I really look forward to the next version of AA. Don't make your fans wait plz !

The largest explosion ever in a Spring mod, AFAIK, implemented in a fun, playable manner

Grr, why did I promise? Now I have to wait

Sounds like this version is pretty ambitious


but (If you ignore the 'disaster versions') caydr has a pretty good track record imo.

~i have faith~

Ok, its august now....

Gimme gimme gimme :D

Most of those changes are already done. I've got a handful of relatively minor things left, plus balancing around the last round of changes I made. Still, no promises on the release date or anything like that, I've given up on setting dates for stuff I do. I'll have time this weekend to work on it, but some things aren't even dependent on me. For instance, I'm waiting for a real reply here:

http://spring.clan-sy.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=11226

And I'm not sure if there might be another quick bugfix version of Spring soon. If so it'd be logical to wait for that.

I'm also planning some advertising around the tubes, with both the original AA trailer and a couple of new ones that are still in storyboarding mostly.

Snipawolf wrote:Looks familiar, I guess I've played Knights and Merchants too much...

Yea, the music to that game was really nice. :D

A few people have asked why I should continue development of AA. Some think I should join CA or BA, others think AA isn't needed/wanted anymore, etc.

First, it's my project. AA has always been one of my favourite hobbies, and that doesn't change even if nobody plays it. I don't think that'll happen though. I develop AA for me and a few friends to play, that's always been the main reason. I release it to the public just in case anyone else wants to play it.

Second, from what I can see of CA/BA's development, they aren't taking the mod anywhere. CA has its primary focus on graphics and taking advantage of LUA, with a lot of disagreement and a lack of leadership about balance-related things. This is what I've seen, though I'm sure the mod has done significant things elsewhere, I just haven't played it a lot. BA seems to be mostly balance changes. The combination of the two would be a great improvement on AA 2.3 (but what wouldn't?), but they're not taking the project anywhere new. Better graphics doesn't make a better game, and balance can only be tweaked for so long until it gets boring.

Third, there doesn't seem to be the degree of community support for these mods that AA enjoyed. Every AA mod thread grew in a matter of days or weeks to be dozens of pages long. These offshoots don't get that. The community involvement is nothing like AA. With AA, anyone could make a suggestion and if it wasn't game breaking, it was at least tried to see what effect it would have and implemented to some degree if the change wasn't negative. This caused a lot of problems towards the end, sure, but the benefits from this blew away any negative effect. This is probably the biggest reason AA was so overwhelmingly popular, people weren't powerless to voice their opinion and make changes that would affect everyone and give anyone the ability to be a "developer". From what I've seen, BA/CA don't follow this doctrine. The game is a lot more consistent between versions, but changelogs are short and uninteresting.

Fourth, why I shouldn't join BA/CA: Too many strong personalities clash. These mods have their own development team, adding me would just cause problems. I get lots of crazy ideas and I like to try them out, so I'd probably be thought of as an idiot when I talked about them. Fortunately I can tell a good idea from a bad one... eventually...

Well, IMHO BA isn't about going anywhere, it's about staying where it is, proud and strong.

I agree that CA seems to be more of a tech demo than anything else - but it's still in beta and the guys doing it are basically trailblazers.

If you want to do something new but don't want to Lua yourself inside out, now is the perfect time to do this.

imbaczek wrote:Well, IMHO BA isn't about going anywhere, it's about staying where it is, proud and strong.

That our goal yes, to change as little as possible.

NOiZE wrote:

imbaczek wrote:Well, IMHO BA isn't about going anywhere, it's about staying where it is, proud and strong.

That our goal yes, to change as little as possible.

Which is a laudable goal, except that you picked an arbitrary (and, imho, inferior) version of AA to start from. If you'd picked an AA that had LRPC-ships and weak vehicles, would they be in BA?

Pxtl wrote:

NOiZE wrote:

imbaczek wrote:Well, IMHO BA isn't about going anywhere, it's about staying where it is, proud and strong.

That our goal yes, to change as little as possible.

Which is a laudable goal, except that you picked an arbitrary (and, imho, inferior) version of AA to start from. If you'd picked an AA that had LRPC-ships and weak vehicles, would they be in BA?

we'll never know

Caydr wrote: Fourth, why I shouldn't join CA: Too many strong personalities clash. These mods have their own development team, adding me would just cause problems. I get lots of crazy ideas and I like to try them out, so I'd probably be thought of as an idiot when I talked about them. Fortunately I can tell a good idea from a bad one... eventually...

If anything, CA is THE crazy ideas team.

Seriously, I tried to be the "Voice of Reason" when it came to balance but the quantum brigade forced me to retire >:[.

Oh and CA doesn't focus on graphics but rather on new, fresh features and uniqueness in general.

But yes, it is sort of a tech demo right now .

I too disappeared from CA. I'd show up again if you did, however, we would need Tired as well.