Distant Worlds: Shadows

Distant Worlds is a vast, pausable real-time, 4X space strategy game which models a "living galaxy" with incredible options for replayability and customizability. Experience the full depth and detail of large turn-based strategy games, but with the simplicity and ease of real-time, and on the scale of a massively-multiplayer online game. Now greatly enhanced with the new Universe release, which includes all four previous releases as well as the new Universe expansion!

Moderators: elliotg, Icemania

Post Reply
Bingeling
Posts: 5186
Joined: Thu Aug 12, 2010 11:42 am

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Bingeling »

I think you can turn off quite a lot of messages in the filters. I am not sure you can filter civilian attacks specifically, though.

What I miss sometimes is a ship type indicator in the message itself. I am only so-so to separate between explorers, cruisers, and freighters by ship name. In general I am more interested if a carrier of a fleet is under attack, than if an explorer was found by a space slug.

For message spam I would prefer if there could be some grouping of similar messages, but I guess it is hard for the game to predict that another 15 build complete messages are right around the corner.

As for message I want, I quite frequently wait for ship builds to complete, and being able to tag a specific one to display a popup on completion would not hurt. And also, actually, tag a ship/fleet order to flag loudly when it completes (for instance when sending multiple fleets to a crap star system near the objective to gather for attack).
User avatar
Ralzakark
Posts: 225
Joined: Tue Apr 24, 2012 2:22 pm

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Ralzakark »

A few questions:

1. Shadows is set before the original DW and its expansions. If you play long enough will the timeframes run together, so that you can continue from the age of Pirates into the age of Empires?

2. Given the background will there be new technology which is more basic than the current lowest level in Legends, for example weaker blasters and slower engines?

3. Will you still be able to play in the DW timeframe, so play against the current background but with the new technologies and enhancements to ground combat?
Ossipago, Barbatus, and Famulimus
User avatar
Anthropoid
Posts: 3107
Joined: Tue Feb 22, 2005 1:01 am
Location: Secret Underground Lair

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Anthropoid »

Just a quick comment here. I don't keep up with DW and haven't really read this thread closely so my apologies if my comment is somewhat off-base.

I think the inclusion of boarding actions and more detailed ground combat are FANTASTIC. With the implicit release date of end of 2012 maybe my suggestion is kinda useless, as maybe the design is all done. But . . .

There was a game years ago by Sid Meier's "Pirates!" was the name of it. Not sure if it still sells or maybe you can even find it for free. I think the game might have aged rather well, even by todays standards as it managed to blend together five or more different gameplay interfaces into one very compelling game.

1. A strategic map of the Caribbean in which the player could assembly a naval force, and visit locations on that map.
2. An isometric view land-map interaction system in which the player could disembark landing parties and approach settlments from inland, hunt for buried treasure, visit land-based quest locations, etc.
3. An alterante isometric/first person view naval battle map that matched up (for the most part) to the strategic map. Basically intercept or get intercepted by another fleet on the strategic map = naval map activates. The naval battles in this game were amazing.
4. A city espionage map. Basically you could try to sneak into a town even if you were a wanted criminal.
5. Various "in-town" interaction maps (courting the Governors daughter, dancing to impress the Governor'd daughter, etc.)
6. Sword fights, both on ships and in certain land-based contexts (e.g., fighting over a woman)

Now most of this is really not applicable to DW, obviously, except to point out that: a game that offers a player the opporunity to interface BETWEEN what are effectively multiple different games can be a real success. Another example of this are the Western Civilization games like Forge of Freedom which use both a strategic map and a tactical battles map.

But here comes the real value of maybe some folks going back and having a play at Pirates! if nothing else just for nostalgia, but perhaps as a way to generate new ideas:

7. A city attack map. If you attempted to attack a town, it would prompt a semi-randomized grid map to generate. Your soldiers would spawn on the far side of this 30x30 (or thereabouts) map. The battles were both amazingly simple, amazingly historically accurate, and fun. It certainly wasn't "The Operational Art of War" by any means, but for a game in which the player aspired to be the greatest Caribbean Pirate ever, this little "land-combat mini-game" was FANTASTIC.

In sum, it added a great deal to the game, despite the fact that it was really very simple. By virtue of being simple, the algorithms behind the AI must've been pretty straightforward and the AI could actually give you a run for your money sometimes.
The x-ray is her siren song. My ship cannot resist her long. Nearer to my deadly goal. Until the black hole. Gains control...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkIIlkyZ ... playnext=3
User avatar
Kayoz
Posts: 1516
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:55 pm
Location: Timbuktu
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kayoz »

ORIGINAL: Bingeling
I think you can turn off quite a lot of messages in the filters. I am not sure you can filter civilian attacks specifically, though.
No, you can only turn off scrolling messages for attacks. There's no granularity for ship type, much less civilian/military.

Me, I don't care if my mining ships or freighters are under attack - as there's nothing I can do and don't particularly care. Attacks on my constructors, ports and military ships, however, are more likely to be of interest.
ORIGINAL: Bingeling
For message spam I would prefer if there could be some grouping of similar messages
Don't think it can be done, given the current event hooks.
ORIGINAL: Bingeling
As for message I want, I quite frequently wait for ship builds to complete, and being able to tag a specific one to display a popup on completion would not hurt.
Excellent point. An explicit notification when a ship is built or mission completed - but not for ALL such events, would be welcome.

Why you can't queue orders for colony ships is frankly bizarre. I have to send it to refuel say at a midpoint to where I want it to colonize - then assuming I remember - click on it again and tell it to colonize. Why can I queue with a constructor - but this ability has been explicitly removed for colony ships?
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
User avatar
tjhkkr
Posts: 2430
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2010 11:15 pm
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by tjhkkr »

ORIGINAL: Anthropoid
There was a game years ago by Sid Meier's "Pirates!"

Man that guy was talented.[:)]

Elliot here is a real trooper, and fantastically skilled.
But Sid Meier... the kind of game you describe is not one of his usual kinds... I would be curious to know how many titles that guy has produced.
Remember that the evil which is now in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love -- Olga Romanov.
Bingeling
Posts: 5186
Joined: Thu Aug 12, 2010 11:42 am

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Bingeling »

ORIGINAL: Bingeling
For message spam I would prefer if there could be some grouping of similar messages
Don't think it can be done, given the current event hooks.
ORIGINAL: Bingeling
As for message I want, I quite frequently wait for ship builds to complete, and being able to tag a specific one to display a popup on completion would not hurt.
Excellent point. An explicit notification when a ship is built or mission completed - but not for ALL such events, would be welcome.

Why you can't queue orders for colony ships is frankly bizarre. I have to send it to refuel say at a midpoint to where I want it to colonize - then assuming I remember - click on it again and tell it to colonize. Why can I queue with a constructor - but this ability has been explicitly removed for colony ships?
It could be that queuing is specifically turned on for construction ships...

I find I miss "tagging missions to make noise on completion" when I have some special manual thing going on. Refueling colony ship. Running either a scanning or a brute force search for pirates/other. When doing random mops of mining bases in war sending small fleets to systems that could either be empty, or systems where you don't want to hang around for long. And once in a blue moon I have constructors of special interest.

Gather multiple messages in one line could be possible with some message buffering, but I am not sure if a small delay in messages would be something the user notices too much. I am quite good at ignoring attack messages, anyways. I do care about early game attacks in freighters, and in general attack on mining ships, though. Those are noise that will be repeated, and created by wildlife that should be killed. For explorers I only care about attacks involving Silvermist.
User avatar
Kayoz
Posts: 1516
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:55 pm
Location: Timbuktu
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kayoz »

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

It could be that queuing is specifically turned on for construction ships...

Nope. Just disabled for colony ships. You can queue orders for any other non-civilian ship. Constructor, destroyer, explorer, etc - just, for some inexplicable reason, not colony ships.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
User avatar
Kayoz
Posts: 1516
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:55 pm
Location: Timbuktu
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kayoz »

13. ship design cleanup

requested changes:
a) inclusion of required components should be done automatically. All ships, regardless of type require a few components - command center, one generator, one fuel storage, etc. Why force the player to peck through the list for these REQUIRED bits? If you have researched others, then you should be free to swap them out - but I'm guessing that most players will only research one line of engines and use them on all their designs. Another example, say I'm designing a colony ship - why is it that I have to peck through the list for the colony module??? It's required by it's role - so pecking through the list for it (and there's only ONE to choose from, realistically) is a complete waste of time. Other bits, like the first reactor, the command center and the first fuel cell are mandatory. Forcing the player to peck through the list of components that are REQUIRED is a waste of time. How does forcing a player to do this add to the depth or enjoyment of the game?
b) group component types visually by type - they're arranged by type in a list, but this should be made more explicit. Using the first few pixels of each component to form a colour ribbon is one potential method. That way, for example, all weapons would have the first few pixels of the component showing red - so the weapons section of the list shows up as a vertical red ribbon, followed by another colour based on what's next.
c) remove irrelevant component types from the list - mining stations and space port design should not even present the hyper drives to you. Selecting this as a component should not be possible.
d) redundant components - once you have a medical or recreation center in the design, further components of that type are utterly pointless (redundancy in the case of one being destroyed aside, but I suspect that's incredibly rare). Same applies for hyper drive, command center, etc. Once a component of this type has been added, further additions of the same type should be removed from the left hand side selection list. What is to be gained by confusing new players who might try to add a dozen recreation centers, and are confused when their design costs more, but does the same job as the one with only one recreation center. Remove this confusion by removing it from the list.
e) Please remove the automatic "obsolete" flag every time I cancel a manual upgrade. This bug has been in the design screen since the first release and has never been fixed.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
Bingeling
Posts: 5186
Joined: Thu Aug 12, 2010 11:42 am

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Bingeling »

Once in a while I have some fancy dreams about a future design setup.

Some functionality that may look like.

"Replace all matrox blasters with shatteforce blasters" (all designs).
In the ship designs. A list of all different kind of components. The chosen item, and the number of them. A fancy option to add a second one (for two kinds of weapons). Just tweak a number to go from 4 to 6 blasters. Just modify a combo box to switch from matrox to shatterforce.

And no more wondering if the design has both damage control, target tracking, and proximity sensors. I find myself scanning through the item lists a chore to make sure the design does not miss fancy gadgets.

The UI of the ship design screen is not the game's strongest point...
lart
Posts: 12
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2012 10:50 pm

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by lart »

ORIGINAL: Kayoz
Looking over the feature list of Shadows, I'm concerned over a few issues:

1. graphics
I hope not too much time has gone to improving graphics. DW could use some improvements to the efficiency of the graphics engine - but trying to make the game prettier is, in my opinion, a waste of time in a strategy game.
I'd be happier with the graphics improvement left till the next version. Doing so in an expansion seems to be a waste of time, considering other places Elliot can focus his efforts. Improving the AI, for example, would appeal to me far more than eye candy.


Graphic improvements were announced for the next expansion, especially scaling issues and hopefully font issues on higher resolutions. There are people out there who bought the game and the expansions and are unable to play it because of this.
User avatar
Kruos
Posts: 130
Joined: Wed May 05, 2010 8:43 pm
Location: France

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kruos »

Graphic improvements were announced for the next expansion

Please could you point a quote or a statement from Erik which confirm that?

I have to say that, even if I that dont care about graphic improvment (game depht is far more important as everyone here will agree I think), some work on the font scalling issue would be much appreciated.

In fact, from my point of vue the font scalling issue is the main default of DW. The small font is so painfull for the eyes that once the pleasure of the discovery is past, even if the new features are greats, you no longer want to restart a game. It was what happen to me each time I bought an expansion (RotS & Legend), it is a little bit lame I think.
lart
Posts: 12
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2012 10:50 pm

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by lart »

ORIGINAL: Kruos
Graphic improvements were announced for the next expansion

Please could you point a quote or a statement from Erik which confirm that?

I have to say that, even if I that dont care about graphic improvment (game depht is far more important as everyone here will agree I think), some work on the font scalling issue would be much appreciated.

In fact, from my point of vue the font scalling issue is the main default of DW. The small font is so painfull for the eyes that once the pleasure of the discovery is past, even if the new features are greats, you no longer want to restart a game. It was what happen to me each time I bought an expansion (RotS & Legend), it is a little bit lame I think.

This was posted in the "Please scale interface for higher resolutions - Feel I'm going blind threat"

Font size is also the main issue for me and I hope general scaling the interface will fix this as well.
Erik Rutins -> RE: Please scale interface for higher resolutions - Feel I'm going blind (8/29/2012 10:13:32 PM)

As a side note, Distant Worlds fully supports higher resolutions, but we do not currently have a solution for scaling the interface. It is unfortunately not a trivial task but this is one of the areas we have very high on our priority list to try to improve for the next expansion. I cannot promise, but we will try.

Regards,

- Erik
User avatar
Kruos
Posts: 130
Joined: Wed May 05, 2010 8:43 pm
Location: France

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kruos »

Thank you lart for the quote.
 
Good news indeed. I hope they will try, and succeed! :)
User avatar
Kayoz
Posts: 1516
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:55 pm
Location: Timbuktu
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kayoz »

ORIGINAL: lart

Graphic improvements were announced for the next expansion...

I still don't understand where you get this. Erik, as far as I can see, has never promised any graphics improvements.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
User avatar
tjhkkr
Posts: 2430
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2010 11:15 pm
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by tjhkkr »

Hey Erik,

Can you throw me a tidbit about Special Forces in the new game?
I am kind of excited about that feature. [:)][8D][:)]
Remember that the evil which is now in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love -- Olga Romanov.
User avatar
ASHBERY76
Posts: 2079
Joined: Wed Oct 10, 2001 8:00 am
Location: England

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by ASHBERY76 »

I am thinking they work somewhat like the underated Armada2526 expansion.They can be landed secretly on planets.
If you attack a planet where you have Special Forces, you can use them to sabotage the defenses. They will start the battle deployed on the planet, but invisible to the enemy until they attack. Their first attack will have a special bonus and high chance of destroying the target.
User avatar
tjhkkr
Posts: 2430
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2010 11:15 pm
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by tjhkkr »

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76
I am thinking they work somewhat like the underated Armada2526 expansion.They can be landed secretly on planets.
If you attack a planet where you have Special Forces, you can use them to sabotage the defenses. They will start the battle deployed on the planet, but invisible to the enemy until they attack. Their first attack will have a special bonus and high chance of destroying the target.
That would be pretty cool. I am also hoping they can work independently of invasion and capture prisoners and that sort of thing...
Remember that the evil which is now in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love -- Olga Romanov.
User avatar
nelsonlee_slith
Posts: 22
Joined: Thu Dec 29, 2011 3:32 am

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by nelsonlee_slith »

- New expanded Ground Combat with new troop types and an animated ground battle resolution screen

is it something like Total War?
User avatar
Kayoz
Posts: 1516
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:55 pm
Location: Timbuktu
Contact:

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by Kayoz »

ORIGINAL: nelsonlee

- New expanded Ground Combat with new troop types and an animated ground battle resolution screen

is it something like Total War?

I think you're being dementedly hopeful.

I'm rather expecting something akin to MOO2's invasion graphics.
Image
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
User avatar
eltharion
Posts: 43
Joined: Sat Feb 20, 2010 10:32 am
Location: 1701-A Deck 5-Room 0195

RE: Distant Worlds: Shadows

Post by eltharion »

I could cry ...

- Assault pods and ship to ship boarding actions or base, Including ship and base capture
- New Ground Combat expanded with new troop types and an animated battle ground resolution screen
- Infantry, Armor / Mech, Special Forces, Planetary Defense Units (multi-layered)
- Resolution of the multiple stages of a planetary assault
- Expanded troop experience
- New Ground Combat technology tree

I hope that the section Heroes (created with Legends) to be expanded.
If then there had the ability to create quests with RPG elements for heroes... I think I would need a bowl.
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. Is not life a hundred times too short for us to bore ourselves?

-Friedrich Nietzsche-
Post Reply

Return to “Distant Worlds 1 Series”