Interesting Game

[Baleur]

ORIGINAL: Tophat1812

ORIGINAL: Baleur

looks interesting indeed, and i agree about DW not being worth 50 bucks, but i disagree strongly about the main reason being that its 2d..
Some of my favorite games are 2d lol. I'd rather have nice well done 2d than shitty indie-developer 3d. But sure, i'd rather have nice 3d than nice 2d.
But DW works well in 2d and looks good (could look GREAT if the .png's were more well made, but that has nothing to do with being restricted to 2d, in 2d every pixel can be hand-crafted to perfection without any fps difference)

Example of 2d done right (even though the gameplay was lacking lol)
http://www.vertex4.com/sunage/media

For digital download it is $39.99 so $40.......if you want the physical shipment it is $49.99 so $50.

So other than it is 2d why do either of you think it is not worth the $.....???? Some reasons would be helpful? or is it just the graphics?

Never said it was because the graphics, but rather because imo the gameplay is still lacking. The sub-surface calculations may be complex, but in essence it's still a fancy version of Risk. Maybe i expect too much, but when it costs the same as a AAA title, shouldnt i?
I still enjoy it, to say that i find its priced too high doesnt mean i dont enjoy it or wish it to keep being upgraded

[Baleur]

ORIGINAL: rk0123msp@mindspring

I'd rather have a game run smoothly & faster on my system with gif quality images (for example) rather than slow & clunkily with png quality images (for example). Graphics are just way overrated these days.

Well frankly, Distant Worlds could use .jpg images saved at 80% compression, and nobody no matter how sharp their eyes were would be able to tell the difference between that and a lossless .png image that's 10 times larger and takes much longer to load / unload from your RAM. Why 2d games in general never do this is a mystery to me.
Heck, even .dds would load faster and run better than .png's, especially with the built-in mipmaps.

[Equendil]

GIF, PNG, JPG, it doesn't really matter, they're just for *disk* storage. Graphic cards only handle "raw" graphics or specific compression schemes for fast decompression and random access. Compression schemes that fully optimize storage space are not practical for anything other than storage.

Edit: If loading speed from disk was an issue, the very first thing to improve it would be to put all files in big "packs", accessing lots of small files is inefficient.

[WoodMan]

Never said it was because the graphics, but rather because imo the gameplay is still lacking. The sub-surface calculations may be complex, but in essence it's still a fancy version of Risk. Maybe i expect too much, but when it costs the same as a AAA title, shouldnt i?
I still enjoy it, to say that i find its priced too high doesnt mean i dont enjoy it or wish it to keep being upgraded

Hmm, I got DW for £30.00 in the UK, this is cheap for a new game these days.  Most new releases of AAA titles are now £32.99, or recently £39.99.  When I first bought DW I thought honestly it was overpriced, but after a couple of hours of playing the game I changed my mind.  Here is an example of what I mean: Empire Total War AAA title = less enjoyment than DW and less than 10 hours played before bored(okay it had game breaking bugs is the main reason), Spore AAA title = less enjoyment than DW and less than 10 hours played before bored, Starcraft II AAA title = okay I actually like this one, but not being able to play offline is dumb [:D].  So I think Spore and Empire Total War were not worth the money, but Distant Worlds was.  There is no difference between DW and AAA titles other than the budget/graphics etc

[Bartje]

I think that DW easily matches most premium games in gameplay terms. Heck I'd say it even surpasses many of them.
Sure it doesn't have 3d but the graphics really aren't that bad, they fit with the gameplay.

To be honest I think that paying 50.0 for DW is a lot more reasonable then paying 50.0 for many other supposed AAA titles. (AAA is somewhat of an inflated rating these days)
Ofcourse this does come down to taste. (I do consider games overpriced though that is another discussion)

As for StarRuler, It is a very promising game but I derive from various public statements that it won't be released with as much polish as the developers originally intended (DW had its issues too on release by the way). I have a lot of confidence that like Elliot & Erik they (SR devs) will continue to support the game however and that it will become a glorious addition to the genre as well. Just like DW is in my opinion.

[Gertjan]

I see it a bit differently. I think it is amazing what Elliot/Matrix have done considering their capacity/resources. From Activision/Blizzard you can expect that they deliver a superb game considering that they must get crazy revenues 1,5 m (probably already more now) times 50-60 dollars (what is the exact price) gives you really a lot money to make a good game with.