A few notes from the Field Marshall...

[Marshall Ellis]

Hey all:

Thank you all for you continued patience. We're making great progress in developing EIA for the PC. We're still testing and this is a vital part of our development cycle since most of our testors are experienced EiA players and their input is key. This type of work involves many subtle (And some not so subtle) changes and retesting! It's hard to say how much time until release since this loop of test-change-verify needs to go on until Matrix feels comfortable with the feature set!

A few things to consider that should make life a little easier for you experienced EiA board gamers...

This game will...

Track all corps units and their supply statuses.
Trace supply to the best possible supply depot in a valid supply chain!
Give you immediate access to your foraging chances!
Tracks and informs you of any reinforcements available!
Tracks all shipbuilding and locations!
Obviously tracks and makes changes to the PSA!
No money matters! During an economic phase, just spend your money as opposed to hiring a CPA to calculate what you got this quarter!
Takes care of all combat paperwork! I never realized how much red tape was involved in EiA combat until I played! Now you just click and fight! Commit the guards, pursue the losers and do it all in less than minute!

Just a few notes on things that I'm finding are making a BIG difference for me alone!

Thank you

[mariovalleemtl]

Thinks going better by the minute I see. Good to read that [:)]

mario

[pasternakski]

Excellent.

Just please correct the spelling of "le Havre" on the map (it is currently "Le Harve").

[Hoche]

Will the game keep a log of battle? When I play ftf and pbem EiA games I keep a record of each battle and siege. That way I can track the potential strengths of armies and corps.

For example if my enemy fights a siege combat the previous turn. I would like to be able to look back at the record of the combat to determine what I need to improve my chances of winning the battle I want to fight in the current turn.

[crenfrow]

Very Very good question...intel is the key to success!

[peskpesk]

I would also like to see a quick moral calculator so if you can guess
the enemy strength then you can see what is avrage moral rating
going to be-

like

- Select Country
- Enter Grd
- Enter Inf
- Enter Cav
- Enter Mil

= 3,5

[YohanTM2]

ORIGINAL: peskpesk

I would also like to see a quick moral calculator so if you can guess
the enemy strength then you can see what is avrage moral rating
going to be-

like

- Select Country
- Enter Grd
- Enter Inf
- Enter Cav
- Enter Mil

= 3,5

Excellent point, that should be an easy addition. Worst case someone (perhaps me) could build a quick Excel spreadsheet that would make that happen

[Roads]

Let someone post something online. I mean you still have to worry about minors, and allies, so it's not as simple as it looks. And if you have the optional Portugal morale rules you have to worry about those as well.

I'd rather alt-tab out and use a free utility or even a spreadsheet.

[Soult]

We're making great progress in developing EIA for the PC.

no doubt about that

[hlj]

Great to hear from you Marshall, it is looking good ^_^
 
Now get back to work

[Soult]

ORIGINAL: hlj

Great to hear from you Marshall, it is looking good ^_^

Now get back to work

well, I am somewhat sorry now hlj... cause all I did was to quote a 2 years old posting... but if it makes you feel good I can quote a lot more optimistic stuff from Marshall

[hlj]

Dear Soult, don't quote Marshall or anyone else on my account. Chance is I have allready read whatever you might quote.
 
And if you choose to quote anyone, you do not need to choose optimistic writings. Just dont expect everyone to agree with your comments or reply to the quote.
 
It was not my intention to make you feel sorry. But you didnt just quote a two year old posting, you also asked David Heath two questions. I don't think you wanted only David Heath to answer the questions as you asked him in a puplic forum. If you wanted a personal reply, then you had surely sent him a private message. [;)] That is why i commented, and still comment on what you write. 
 
First question is moot, since we do not need to trust Matrix Games. If they develop the game we might buy it. If they don't develop it we won't buy it. We dont need reasurance from Matrix Games or David Heath that Mashall Ellis or anyone else is doing their job.
 
Seccond question implies that you feel it was a bad idea to give the job of making EIA for computer to Marshall Ellis. I can understand how you could loose your faith in Marshall after such a long wait. I just want to make it clear that I have not lost my faith in him yet.
 
Regards
hlj

[Soult]

ORIGINAL: hlj

Dear Soult, don't quote Marshall or anyone else on my account. Chance is I have allready read whatever you might quote.

it was just an offer because you reacted so positive upon this two year old postig ... "great to hear from you Marshall" [;)]

But you didnt just quote a two year old posting, you also asked David Heath two questions. I don't think you wanted only David Heath to answer the questions as you asked him in a puplic forum.

Well, now you mix up two different postings and thats seems not to be very helpfull.

[pasternakski]

Matrix only made two mistakes, and Marshall Ellis was not one of them.

First, they committed themselves to a half-baked idea for a Napoleonic wars game that was neither in an advanced stage of development nor ready for announcement as a pending project. You have to understand that Matrix in those days was trying to build quickly on the good feelings engendered by their release of free, re-developed versions of Gary Grigsby's old "Pacific War" and "War in Russia" titles. Matrix wanted to revitalize computer wargaming as a business and make a profit. Nothing wrong with that but impetuousness.

Unfortunately, the game went into the tank quickly, and they had to look for some other idea to fill the void they had unwittingly created by announcing that this game was pending. EiA was available for development as a computer game. They got together with the owners of the copyright and went for it.

Next, they had to put together a brand new project from the ruins of the old one.

Matrix tried to continue the optimism engendered by their early efforts, and those early messages you quote, Soult, are from that time. What do you want? Here is a fledgling company trying to make its way in a business that has already been written off by most as dead. The idea was that a new messiah would be found and the project would live happily ever after.

This is the turd pile Marshall Ellis (not a Matrix employee and not someone who makes his bread and cheese strictly from designing wargames) stepped into. Despite any previous pronouncements, how could he possibly know what shape the final product would be in, let alone the degree to which it would replicate the original EiA (which, by the way, was never a big seller, either for ADG or AH, and served here only as a foundation stone for work on a project that lacked not only a foundation, but an earth on which to build).

As hlj has so accurately pointed out, we will have to be Forrest Gump and wait to see what we get from the box of chocolates (please note I absolutely hated that film, but it's useful for pop philosophy quotes in discussions like this). Computer games are not cardboard games, and making one into the other may be more difficult than some have stated it to be on these forums (particularly where PBEM is involved, which has required design changes that I wish had not been made, but who am I?).

The second mistake (were you wondering if I would ever get to this?) was talking about this design at all. I would have removed it from public sight at the moment the original project went into the dumpster and not re-emerged until I had something closer to a finished project.

Matrix seems to have learned this lesson. Consider the remarks of those who have noted that the "pending" forums are rather short on entries these days. Why expose yourself to criticism from a few impatient folk who seem to have nothing better to do than grouse about companies not giving them their favored opportunity to waste a few bob on a game - A GAME, MIND YOU - and then criticize the living hell out of it after it is produced.

I used to be a rather vociferous chap. Then, in my first year of law school, a professor penned, in red ink triple underlined, on one of my assigned memoranda of law, "CUT THE CRAP!!!"

I think Matrix has decided to cut the crap. I believe it to be a good decision.

[Soult]

my dear pasternaki,
isn´t it a mistake to say in 2002 that matrix games is going to "publish the computer version of Empires In Arms", to repeat in 2004 that "We're making great progress in developing EIA for the PC" and now let us know in 2006 that there was "never an intention to port EiA" ? 
At some point the plan to develop EiA for PC was changed as it seems. Too sad nobody told  us about it. Or do you think Matrix just needed the titel of a game that was never a big seller as you say ?
I think some guys at Matrix did understand that EiA would be a perfect game for a computer cause it is that complex. The rules are quite simple, but there are so many of them, and indeed not always clear. EiA simply needs a computer(version) to be played comfortable.
And yes, you are right- they still tried to use some "ruins" for this project, the best possible description i.e. for the map that is used now...
I don´t know if the problem are these ruins, the fact that Marshall knows that less about EiA and its mechanism, perhapse it was too hard for him or would be to costly to programm an ai that would fit for EiA...
 
But in the end there will be a game that might be called EiA without being EiA and now even the developer himself says that there was never an intention for it. And that is a pitty.

[pasternakski]

So what do you want?

[David Heath]

Hi Guys
 
This was Marshall and my idea to stop what we were doing and make a computer Empires in Arms computer game.  I will even go on to say it was more my idea then his.  We both looked over the rules and I had already played the board game many times over and we truly got taken in.  I will give Marshall full credit that once he commited himself he has gone the full mile.  This has taken a lot longer then any of us figured it would be we plan on completing it.  I will also say you are hardly ever likely to see Matrix commit to another board game to computer design again. 
 
David
 
 

[pasternakski]

David, there is not a lot wrong with the idea of "porting" board games to the computer. Some have been done with at least a limited amount of success (AH's Third Reich comes to mind). I know that WiF has been a bugbear for you, and that you will be just as relieved as happy when it finally sees the light of day.

The problem as I see it is that you cannot see a game monolithically. Just because element "a" exists in a board game does not mean that it has to be precisely the same in the computer version. When designing a computer game, you are working in an environment totally foreign from that in which the board game was created. Yes, similarities can remain, but, unless the subject game is no more complicated than "monopoly" or "chess," an attempt to be totally faithful to the original is doomed to failure because of the technological differences between the two versions.

I think that the best idea would be, as I have suggested above, to start such projects without fanfare. That way, the entire matter can be explored without public "commentary" like you have seen here. Forum posters (including me) are not, in my estimation, the best source of substantive advice on upcoming projects. Trust yourself, make good decisions, then let 'er rip.

Now, can we talk about the great idea of a Matrix development of the old AH title "Titan" (which was published before them, but they picked it up because it was so GOOD)?

Ummmm.... David ... Hello ...

[Vyshka]

Oooh Titan on the PC. That could be fun, as long as they don't charge what it costs to get the boardgame on eBay.

Soult, perhaps what was meant to be said was that this game is not a direct port of EiA to the PC. There are similarities and
differences.

[hlj]

http://colossus.sourceforge.net/
 
 
Colossus is a Java clone of Avalon Hill's Titan(tm) boardgame.