Future of the series

[Simulation01]

I completely support moving to 3D in DW2.  I love DW as it stands and I do prefer depth over the eye candy of 3D, but I suspect that many of the depth requests will be handled in DW and it's patches/expansions and so the only thing left would be to kick it up a notch into 3D.

[Raap]

It's far from that simple. You'd have to remake entire layers of the game, re-implement features, etc. You could quickly end up with a game that had far less depth, but would actually be far more expensive to make and not even look great because it was poor quality 3D( which is what you get if you don't put crazy amount of cash and work into it). So no thanks, no 3D for me. Nicer 2D art? Sure, but that's the extent of the graphical changes I'd want. And you can never have too much depth, there will *always* be features you can add, AI you can improve, game mechanics that can be changed for the better, etc.

And again, history-wise I've never seen a single game series improve when deciding to go 3D to 'appeal to a wider audience'. The vast majority of them have gotten worse, while precious few have managed to stay at about the same level.

[Simulation01]

ORIGINAL: Raap

It's far from that simple. You'd have to remake entire layers of the game, re-implement features, etc. You could quickly end up with a game that had far less depth, but would actually be far more expensive to make and not even look great because it was poor quality 3D( which is what you get if you don't put crazy amount of cash and work into it). So no thanks, no 3D for me. Nicer 2D art? Sure, but that's the extent of the graphical changes I'd want. And you can never have too much depth, there will *always* be features you can add, AI you can improve, game mechanics that can be changed for the better, etc.

And again, history-wise I've never seen a single game series improve when deciding to go 3D to 'appeal to a wider audience'. The vast majority of them have gotten worse, while precious few have managed to stay at about the same level.

I'm not arguing that making the awesome depth of DW into an awesome 3D DW2 with depth would be easy or cheap.....I'm saying that it is what I support and want...eventually. My job is not making the 3D version....my job as a consumer is to tell the creators of DW that that is what I want. I would be negligent if I did otherwise.

[Abraxis]

ORIGINAL: Simulation01
I'm not arguing that making the awesome depth of DW into an awesome 3D DW2 with depth would be easy or cheap.....I'm saying that it is what I support and want...eventually. My job is not making the 3D version....my job as a consumer is to tell the creators of DW that that is what I want. I would be negligent if I did otherwise.

Well, you have to realize that resources are always finite, if the developers decide to switch to 3D, that means hiring a whole new team, buying graphics design software (not cheap), paying for more office space. Alternatively they can use those resources to focus on all the things that make DW stand out from the thousands of other strategy titles out there.

You could only excel at both if money were not an issue. Money is always an issue.

[caerr]

You don't necessarily need to move to 3D to have more depth, you can have stuff like dynamic lighting and shadows with 2D too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AwJb0lz5nk&feature=related

Of course this kind of technique requires the models to be in 3D for the purpose of generating normal mapping, but I think the ship models were originally 3D to begin with.

Edit: read too hastly, thought you meant visual depth. [:'(]

[Simulation01]

ORIGINAL: Abraxis

ORIGINAL: Simulation01
I'm not arguing that making the awesome depth of DW into an awesome 3D DW2 with depth would be easy or cheap.....I'm saying that it is what I support and want...eventually. My job is not making the 3D version....my job as a consumer is to tell the creators of DW that that is what I want. I would be negligent if I did otherwise.

Well, you have to realize that resources are always finite, if the developers decide to switch to 3D, that means hiring a whole new team, buying graphics design software (not cheap), paying for more office space. Alternatively they can use those resources to focus on all the things that make DW stand out from the thousands of other strategy titles out there.

You could only excel at both if money were not an issue. Money is always an issue.

I'm not talking about moving to 3D in the next patch or expansion....I'm talking about moving to 3D in the next imagining of this game.

[Abraxis]

Well, whether it's a new game or an expansion, I still think they should stick to their current design philosophy rather than shifting resources towards improved 3D graphics.  The industry is saturated with developers who prioritize graphics, Codeforge has craved out a great spot among the few developers who focus their resources on gameplay.

They should stick to what they're clearly best at I think.

[Raap]

Yah, that's what I'm thinking too. Personally I don't even get why people would want 3D in a game such as this. I mean, there's nothing to be gained from it. You'll still be playing top-down so that you can actually see what's going on, and the 3D graphics wouldn't be 'awesome' enough to make you zoom in and stare in amazement at them. And even if they spent all their time on making the graphics that awesome, such notions wear off after a few minutes and then you're back to just playing it like you would in 2D again. You'd also have a far smaller ship selection and much more work for mod creation, since creating models and textures is far more work than creating a sprite. So a lot of extra work for basically no real gain and quite possibly missing out on things they didn't have time to re-implement. Not to mention making the game more hardware-demanding.

So yeah, let's just have them focus on what they're good at and what makes the game as great as it is.

[Simulation01]

I didn't realize 3D had become passe.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: caerr

You don't necessarily need to move to 3D to have more depth, you can have stuff like dynamic lighting and shadows with 2D too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AwJb0lz5nk&feature=related

Of course this kind of technique requires the models to be in 3D for the purpose of generating normal mapping, but I think the ship models were originally 3D to begin with.

Edit: read too hastly, thought you meant visual depth. [:'(]

The shipset I made was in 3d, rendered in a 3Dengine with lighting, and if you look closely, you will note there are shadows in the .pngs though obviously they are not dynamic. I'm sure it could be done (even if using different .pngs with various angles of shadows) that it could be done.

[Raap]

ORIGINAL: Simulation01

I didn't realize 3D had become passe.

More like it has been overly hyped and anything that didn't have it was suddenly 'old'. 3D certainly has its uses, but this game isn't one of them. Not unless they also decide to make a 3D game; i.e. not just graphics, but up and down movement and such.

[Simulation01]

ORIGINAL: Raap

ORIGINAL: Simulation01

I didn't realize 3D had become passe.

More like it has been overly hyped and anything that didn't have it was suddenly 'old'. 3D certainly has its uses, but this game isn't one of them. Not unless they also decide to make a 3D game; i.e. not just graphics, but up and down movement and such.

Well, that is what I was wanting. Movement in 3D up, down, sideways....how else would you do 3D?![;)]

[unclean]

I'm guessing that Distant Worlds in 3D would end up looking more like EU3 or Supreme Ruler 2020 than Starcraft 2, so I'm going to have to side with Raap here.

Normally I'm all for games getting 3D engines, but indie strategy games are definitely an exception.

[Raap]

Ah, that's a bit different. Thought you just meant keeping the game as it was now, just with 3D models instead of 2D sprites as many other games have done before( Space Empires 5, MoO3, etc.)

Well, in that case I do agree it might actually add something to the gameplay, but it would probably also be a lot harder to make it proper. You'd suddenly need to think of all sorts of things, like collision detection and pathfinding. Could end up being pretty frustrating to program, and would likely just benefit the human player since it's hard to make the AI able to exploit such an open game world. Would also require immense CPU power to calculate stuff for that many ships, and it would end up pretty messy at space ports when they are under attack with tons of civilian ships in the mix.

I like the idea, but I don't think it's been done in such a big scale before. Star Ruler has it, but that game's far less complex and detailed, and also runs poorly a while into the game or with large galaxies. It's also a complete mess when it comes to overview of your ships and such.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: Raap

ORIGINAL: Simulation01

I didn't realize 3D had become passe.

More like it has been overly hyped and anything that didn't have it was suddenly 'old'. 3D certainly has its uses, but this game isn't one of them. Not unless they also decide to make a 3D game; i.e. not just graphics, but up and down movement and such.

Um, I'll pass. This game is best played just like it is, top down.

[HectorOfTroy]

Top down all the way. You have enough things to worry about, so 3D movement would just be one more extra thing.

[J HG T]

3D would add nothing meaningful to DW. Well maybe nice visuals of vast space, nebulaes and stuff.
Still, I side with 2D on this one. More practical, needs less resources from Com. and has certain charm in it. Easier to mod too.
If Erik and Codeforce are planning to move DW to 3D I won't object, but I won't be jumping from joy either.

[James009]

I just want to chime in on 3D. I think 3D is overused in modern computer games. Some of the best and most deep strategy and RPG games were only 2D and they were so great because of what 2D provides. Making a game in 2D reduces strain on the developer because instead of focusing on a 3-dimensional engine they can focus more on adding new features, more gameplay, and added content. With 2D games there is also a little less to break because it should be a little more simple.

I'd like Distant Worlds to stay mostly the same (as in 2D) but with more content and more gameplay. I still think it'd be nice to have more ship designs availible (ie. multiple Escort looks or gradual differences in design), better UI, more events, more customization, multiplayer, and a gamemode to play as the captain of one ship. I don't think ground combat or anything 3D will bring much to Distant Worlds and would probably hamper it.

Regarding ground combat I think it'd be, at the very most, nice to see a little running combat simulation when you click the planet showing the progress with little army men fighting (simular to Master of Orion II). That would be pretty cool and I don't think it'd be impossible to implement.

[Data]

+1
i think 2D will eventually end on it's own GOG.....but we all love good old games for the gameplay first of all
and i really like the MOO2 similar ground combat....but then again I like everything similar to MOO2 so you can safely ignore me[:)]

[Webbco]

It's important that people don't equate "3D" with "lack of depth". Having 3D ship design, if done correctly, would add heaps to immersion. We shouldn't reject the idea simply because there are so many game developers that really do think cutting edge graphics is the primary goal (and there DOES seem to be so many).

After thinking a bit about it, I can't realistically see DW becoming true 3D in the near future, simply because of the sheer scale of the game. Some features would probably have to be cut out in order to implement 3D design...an unworthy sacrifice for a game of this calibre in my opinion.