We want a successor to Caesar III!!

[Keith]

:D

There are large numbers of us still waiting for this to happen...from anyone.

Using the ideas introduced with Pharaoh and Cleopatra how about some monument building. Monuments like the the Circus Maximus, Flavian Ampitheater (Colosseum), Roman Forum with the Bascilica Julia and Bascilica Amelia on either side, Arch of Augustus, House of the Vestal Virgins, Temple of Vesta, Temples of Castor and Polux, or the baths complex built in 212AD by the Emperor Caracalla that covered 11 hectars and contained 80,000 cubic meters of water and served in continuous use for the next 300 years. Even road building or aquaduct construction would provide some interesting challenges.

I would personally like to see some return to the empire, province, and city maps of Caesar II. At the very least I would like a return of the "battle screen" from Caesar II with which to fight my legions' battles on.

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[EmperorJay]

:D I'm very much looking forward to CotN, since it indeed takes citybuilding not just one but many steps further. But I must agree, if I could create my own Rome and then be able to walk through it... *faints at the thought of that*

[Keith]

:D I'm very much looking forward to CotN, since it indeed takes citybuilding not just one but many steps further. But I must agree, if I could create my own Rome and then be able to walk through it... *faints at the thought of that*My mind boggles at the thought! :eek:

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[Nebhotep]

Egypt has always been the love of my life, this is my dream come true :)

[Keith]

Egypt has always been the love of my life, this is my dream come true :)I find ancient Egypt enthralling as well, but many of us have been waiting six years for the next emanation of Caesar III or a suitable successor.

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[klingon9]

While I would like to see a successor to Caesar III more, I think i will still love walking through my empire on the Nile while i wait.

[Keith]

While I would like to see a successor to Caesar III more, I think i will still love walking through my empire on the Nile while i wait.
I've got no problem there. I'm just putting in a word now for later consideration. I'll be happy with CotN until then.
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[EmperorJay]

I second that, I'm more than happy with CotN, don't get me wrong, but I just like Rome more than Egypt.

[mouse]

Ahhhhhhhhhh Keith C 3 was my first love in city building and I can see that the game engine used for CotN could work for a Roman game :D That would be a nice second game for Tilted Mill :cool:

[PCDania]

Ahhhhhhhhhh Keith C 3 was my first love in city building and I can see that the game engine used for CotN could work for a Roman game :D That would be a nice second game for Tilted Mill :cool:

Hear, hear!
Until then I like others would be happy walking the streets of CotN while waiting

[Jaguar]

C3 will always be my favourite CityBuilding game. Well, unless C4 comes out I suppose. Even with those pesky marketladies :p

[Celebithil Dae]

Only played the C3 demo (i came on the gaming scene a little late, then when i decided i wanted it, well... lets jsut say it aint around anymore, besides online) But i loved it. Wish i had the game. I know, buy it online, but im not a big online buyer. Perhaps sometime, but now isnt the time.Maybe i'll stumble across it somewhere sometime though...

[Elvenwarrior2001]

You ought to get it CD! :) Great game. And as much as I'd like to see a Caesar three...I'll like to see a fantasy/strategy battle game first since their first game is a city builder. But yes, I would very much love to see a Caesar 4. The "title" Caesar 4 might not be there, since that technically belongs to Vivendi Universal as far a I know.

Elven

[Afterburner]

Call me a philistine, but...

I would MUCH prefer Tilted Mill's post-CotN efforts to continue the exploration of non-Mediterranean cultures that was begun in Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom. I'd love to see a game based in Japan, or India, or South America, or Medieval Russia.

It's not that I don't want to see reinterpretations of Caesar and Zeus to go along with CotN's reinterpretation of Pharaoh. Because I'd love to see those games.

But I'd love more to see new, previously unexplored cultures done first.

[Celebithil Dae]

Very good thought there. Id love to see something done on east asian cultures/ Perhaps even pre-exploration age south, south central american cultures. East european would work too... But id like to see an east asian bit dont, featureing japan and/or china. How many games have you seen done on CHina? And boy did they have a civilization to work with.

I'd like to see that happen, a neat idea.

[Elvenwarrior2001]

I'm hopeless, because I keep reiterating this...but a fantasy game is tops on my list.

As for what you just mentioned: That's not a bad idea either. ;)

Elven

[Keith]

Very good thought there. Id love to see something done on east asian cultures/ Perhaps even pre-exploration age south, south central american cultures. East european would work too... But id like to see an east asian bit dont, featureing japan and/or china. How many games have you seen done on CHina? And boy did they have a civilization to work with.

I'd like to see that happen, a neat idea.
Well, I can think of one recent game on China at the very least. ;)
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[mouse]

Much as I loved the idea of a game based in China I don't think Emperor sold all that well ;) Seems most of the gaming public knows about Egypt, Rome and Greece but not much about the rest of the world's ancient kingdoms :D Personally I'm unbelievably happy to have a new city builder period :D

edited for spelling

[Keith]

Continuing on with my original thought at the top, I would like to see the monuments of Rome built piece by piece, much as the pyramids in Pharaoh. Buiding things like the Circus Maximus and the Flavian Ampitheater (Colosseum) would prove time consuming and challenging. Even constructing triumphal arches after victories block-by-block would be a vast improvement over the old Caesar III "plunk-it-down" style for that item. Having to construct housing instead of placing tents or huts and then having them evolve wouldbe preferred . They shouldn't just rise up out of nowhere or change appearance.

In short, since we are dealing with 3D and a new realm of realism, I would like to actually see "construction" in my new citybuilders.
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[Ineti]

Related to that, I think it would be fantastic to see the Great Wall of China get built block by block (albeit with a speed-up feature for use as needed). ;)

[Azeem]

Much as I loved the idea of a game based in China I don't think Emperor sold all that well ;) Seems most of the gaming public knows about Egypt, Rome and Greece but not much about the rest of the world's ancient kingdoms :D Personally I'm unbelievably happy to have a new city builder period :D

edited for spelling

I think it's more because "Emperor" wasn't really marketed that well and there were already A LOT (obviously too many ;) ) of games based on Chinese civilization, especially the famed "Three Kingdoms Period."

[Anguille]

:D

There are large numbers of us still waiting for this to happen...from anyone.

Using the ideas introduced with Pharaoh and Cleopatra how about some monument building. Monuments like the the Circus Maximus, Flavian Ampitheater (Colosseum), Roman Forum with the Bascilica Julia and Bascilica Amelia on either side, Arch of Augustus, House of the Vestal Virgins, Temple of Vesta, Temples of Castor and Polux, or the baths complex built in 212AD by the Emperor Caracalla that covered 11 hectars and contained 80,000 cubic meters of water and served in continuous use for the next 300 years. Even road building or aquaduct construction would provide some interesting challenges.

I would personally like to see some return to the empire, province, and city maps of Caesar II. At the very least I would like a return of the "battle screen" from Caesar II with which to fight my legions' battles on.

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I agree completly with Keith (hi Keith...good to see you're also here ;) ) That would be awesome

[Keith]

Related to that, I think it would be fantastic to see the Great Wall of China get built block by block (albeit with a speed-up feature for use as needed). ;)Then you should create a thread requesting a game based on China. This one is about Rome. :p
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[Jayhawk]

Related to that, I think it would be fantastic to see the Great Wall of China get built block by block (albeit with a speed-up feature for use as needed). ;)

Why aren't you playing Emperor yet? ;)

[Lannes]

I would personally like to see some return to the empire, province, and city maps of Caesar II.

Me too, though primarily to restore some realism to resource production and transport. IMHO in this respect, CIII was a huge leap backward from CII that I understand was only partly repaired in Emperor.

Lannes

[Eddy]

It sounds weird, but I would get a kick out of seeing a building game like this based on our modern society, especially if it were a parody.

[Keith]

It sounds weird, but I would get a kick out of seeing a building game like this based on our modern society, especially if it were a parody.
Does Sim City ring a bell? ;)

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[Rachelc258]

You know, I really wasn't all that wild about Caesar III. I fell in love with the games with Caesar II, though Pharoah was fantastic, and was estatic about Zeus (and poseidon). Wasn't too wild about Emperor though. Truth be told, I found it too hard. Not that I don't like a challange, but I like to play computer games to relax:). The things I really really really liked about Zeus/poseidon was how the gods would wander around, and I really loved the sense of humor. Probably my favorite thing. (Actually, I'd sometimes get the little people's sayings stuck in my head , and blurt them out and have everyone look at me like I was totally insane. A good example? "I am so smart, so very very smart..." or "The vendor is such a doric" (hey, I'm an ancient history major, what do you expect?) But anyway....). And I liked the continuous development of the city (coming back to it, etc). And being able to attack other cities. Anyway. Rome is going to be my specialty, so I would be just as happy with a roman one. But please, no british accents. The british were barbarians, please. <g>. I also loved the graphics in Zeus. So often in games the graphics are always so dark and gloomy.


So anyway, this is my first post and I am glad I found this website. I went to see if there was any new game in the works, and I couldn't find neither hide nor hair of impression games, nor hardly anything about what happened to it. I thought I was doomed to be forever playing Zeus and Pharoah (ok, not so bad, but still). I have tried other city building games, and I don't like them all that much. The only sim game I ever liked was sim tower (sim city bored my to tears and almost turned me off the genre entirely). And the age of empires (someone gave it to me) frustrated me because military strategy is NOT my strongpoint (I also find it somewhat dull). And I was sick to death of having to tell every single person what to do all the time.

[Keith]

You know, I really wasn't all that wild about Caesar III. I fell in love with the games with Caesar II, though Pharoah was fantastic, and was estatic about Zeus (and poseidon). Wasn't too wild about Emperor though. Truth be told, I found it too hard. Not that I don't like a challange, but I like to play computer games to relax:). The things I really really really liked about Zeus/poseidon was how the gods would wander around, and I really loved the sense of humor. Probably my favorite thing. (Actually, I'd sometimes get the little people's sayings stuck in my head , and blurt them out and have everyone look at me like I was totally insane. A good example? "I am so smart, so very very smart..." or "The vendor is such a doric" (hey, I'm an ancient history major, what do you expect?) But anyway....). And I liked the continuous development of the city (coming back to it, etc). And being able to attack other cities. Anyway. Rome is going to be my specialty, so I would be just as happy with a roman one. But please, no british accents. The british were barbarians, please. <g>. I also loved the graphics in Zeus. So often in games the graphics are always so dark and gloomy.


So anyway, this is my first post and I am glad I found this website. I went to see if there was any new game in the works, and I couldn't find neither hide nor hair of impression games, nor hardly anything about what happened to it. I thought I was doomed to be forever playing Zeus and Pharoah (ok, not so bad, but still). I have tried other city building games, and I don't like them all that much. The only sim game I ever liked was sim tower (sim city bored my to tears and almost turned me off the genre entirely). And the age of empires (someone gave it to me) frustrated me because military strategy is NOT my strongpoint (I also find it somewhat dull). And I was sick to death of having to tell every single person what to do all the time.
I too started with Caesar II and it took me a short time to warm up to Caesar III's concept, but now I couldn't imagine going back to that style of city building, save for the use of the Empire map to select assignments, the seperate province and city maps screens, and most of all the C2 battle screen.

Actually, Emperor and Zeus are very much alike, since Emperor is based on a modified Zeus game engine. The humor of the previous games was definitely lacking though.

Sim Tower was fascinating because there was always something to do. Elevator scheduling was a real brain buster.

I have no problem with the english accents used on Caesar III. Most of us have been raised on Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, and 50-60's sword and sandal movies featuring British actors so it's almost normal. Personally, I'll take them over the actors such as the likes of Brad Pit any day. The voice actors used for Caesar III gave it just the right flavor of hautiness and snobbiness that you expect from a Roman if he spoke english. We certainly can't have them speaking Latin. It might be a novelty for a short time but would become very annoying after a while. When I first played Caesar III or any of the games when they were new for the first time I would not "read" the briefing so much as listen to the "reading" of the briefing text by the narator. Latin would be useless to me.

What language would you suggest? It couldn't be American english because we didn't exist in the period of time.
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[EmperorJay]

Funny though, you're speaking about an English accent Keith, but it's you Americans who are speaking with an American accent, the British English is nothing more than the correct English ;)

Just kidding. The British accent indeed fit in perfectly, especially the "Actor" was brilliant. I wouldn't mind hearing it again, nor would I mind hearing "Hollywood" English, I've come to get used to it after seeing so much movies :p . An Arabic/Egyptian accent would add some flavour to the game, but the chance of messing that up and overdoing it is quite great so please be careful with that.

[Keith]

Funny though, you're speaking about an English accent Keith, but it's you Americans who are speaking with an American accent, the British English is nothing more than the correct English ;)

Just kidding. The British accent indeed fit in perfectly, especially the "Actor" was brilliant. I wouldn't mind hearing it again, nor would I mind hearing "Hollywood" English, I've come to get used to it after seeing so much movies :p . An Arabic/Egyptian accent would add some flavour to the game, but the chance of messing that up and overdoing it is quite great so please be careful with that....British English is nothing more than the correct English

Say that again after you listen to someone from Liverpool. http://community.vugames.com/Images/emoticons/rotfl.gif

An Arabic/Egyptian accent would add some flavour to the game

For a game about Rome? (see thread subject ;) )

Actually, it is a good question, what "accent" would you expect to hear from a narrator in a game based on Rome, given that the primary game language is most likely going to be english and then possibly translated (I don't know if TM's publisher has the resources for this or not.)

Of course there are some famous American actors have portrayed Romans in films. One that springs to mind is good old Chuck Heston who appeared in one filmed version of Julius Caesar.
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[Afterburner]

Yeah, I think the British accents suited Caesar III in a way that the alternative (Italian accents) wouldn't.

The Greeks in Zeus used American accents, which I also thought worked well for the humorous tone of the game. If the game had been more serious, and less played for laughs, the American accents wouldn't have worked so well.

[EmperorJay]

...British English is nothing more than the correct English

Say that again after you listen to someone from Liverpool. http://community.vugames.com/Images/emoticons/rotfl.gif

An Arabic/Egyptian accent would add some flavour to the game

For a game about Rome? (see thread subject ;) )

Actually, it is a good question, what "accent" would you expect to hear from a narrator in a game based on Rome, given that the primary game language is most likely going to be english and then possibly translated (I don't know if TM's publisher has the resources for this or not.)

Of course there are some famous American actors have portrayed Romans in films. One that springs to mind is good old Chuck Heston who appeared in one filmed version of Julius Caesar.
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Sorry for going OT, but I kinda continued the Accent subject. ;) I ment CotN with "the game", obviously there shouldn't be any Arabian/Egyptian accents in a Roman game :p I'll open a thread in the CotN forums, maybe we can get a response there.

[Rachelc258]

<<The voice actors used for Caesar III gave it just the right flavor of hautiness and snobbiness that you expect from a Roman if he spoke english. >>

Everyone has this image of the romans as.... well... very british. Or more accurately, very stereotypical wealthy british. High culture and all that. If anything, I'd say the greeks are more like that. They saw the romans as wannabes when it came to civilization. :) The romans were very audacious and definitely not humble, but I wouldn't characterize them as snooty. For example, being a citizen of rome definitely did not hold the same prestige of being a citizen of, say, athens. Lots of people became citizens in rome. manumitted slaves, barbarians, etc. It may have given prestige on the world stage (don't mess with me, I'm a roman citizen), but it wasn't something you could be snooty about.

Anyway. I am on the whole against portraying ancient cultures with accents of any sort. It always breaks me out of the story, out of the illusion. If you find a good actor who happens to be british, fine. Or an american. Or whatever. Maybe tone it down for more outlandish accents, but still.

[Merepatra]

Anyway. I am on the whole against portraying ancient cultures with accents of any sort. It always breaks me out of the story, out of the illusion. If you find a good actor who happens to be british, fine. Or an american. Or whatever. Maybe tone it down for more outlandish accents, but still.

The problem with this is that everyone has some kind of accent, generally when North Americans say "no accent" they mean somebody with a middle of the road American accent, but its still a distinguishable accent, particularly to those of us who have other accents. ..... now of course if they choose all Aussie actors I could pretend they don't have an accent at all ;)

Still I don't really mind what kind of accent they decide to go with as long as its clearly understandable and the characters have something interesting to say :)

[Lannes]

Actually, it is a good question, what "accent" would you expect to hear from a narrator in a game based on Rome, given that the primary game language is most likely going to be english

IMHO British English is the most suitable for transfer to roman society, because it has the most recognizable class related accents.

Lannes

[Rachelc258]

<<IMHO British English is the most suitable for transfer to roman society, because it has the most recognizable class related accents. >>

What do you mean by class? I can't see how you could show that sort of thing any more with british accents than american ones (at least, in a roman context)

[Jayhawk]

Because the UK has royalty that speaks like stuck-up hoipoloi, where as the US has a people's representative, that speaks like a farmer?

[Rachelc258]

<<Because the UK has royalty that speaks like stuck-up hoipoloi, where as the US has a people's representative, that speaks like a farmer?
>>

Yes, but that is the thing about rome. It had a very flexible class structure, for an ancient civilization. You could be a slave of a wealthy man, be manumitted to run some business for him (perhaps he has senatorial ambitions), and after a few generations, your family could be ennobled if one of your decendents managed to become Consul. I mean, sure, there were the patricians, supposedly decended from the first fifty families, but in rome, money talked. Although, like in today's society, money with old famiily connections was even better.

I had always thought that the closest modern comparison with rome would be england, the british empire. That is, until I actually started studying rome.

I don't know if they can properly be compared with anyone. They were the romans. They were fascinating. You know that the prided themselves on never having actually (read: technically) started any wars? As if they stumbled on empire by accident:)


I just hate the pseudo-british accent that is adopted when people portray the ancient cultures. I can accept straight-up british accents, but still. I would rather people spoke in their own voices, since we don't have latin accents or ancient greek accents.

I guess you could say I would rather people portray their characters using their voices to express emotion rather than nationality. I can't say that right. It is quite late for me, and I am tired. Think of it this way: if a man was to act a woman's role in a play, a serious play, wouldn't it be better in the long run if he spoke naturally, but changed his... mannerisms and style of speaking rather than trying to speak in a falsetto?

[Elvenwarrior2001]

The problem with this is that everyone has some kind of accent, generally when North Americans say "no accent" they mean somebody with a middle of the road American accent, but its still a distinguishable accent, particularly to those of us who have other accents. ..... now of course if they choose all Aussie actors I could pretend they don't have an accent at all ;)

Still I don't really mind what kind of accent they decide to go with as long as its clearly understandable and the characters have something interesting to say :)

Ooooh! :D Aussie accents...that'd be saaweeeet!!! Of course...it might sound a bit odd at first to an American like me, but it'd be wicked kewl! :)

Elven

[Elvenwarrior2001]

Hehe. Forgive me for posting again, but I just remembered something an Aussie once said to me when I commented on how he had a wonderful Australian accent. He said, "What? I don't have an accent. You do." He was talking all in good fun of course, but it was hilarious. Um...anyway...back on topic. :D

Elven

[Lannes]

I just hate the pseudo-british accent that is adopted when people portray the ancient cultures. I can accept straight-up british accents, but still. I would rather people spoke in their own voices, since we don't have latin accents or ancient greek accents.

I guess you could say I would rather people portray their characters using their voices to express emotion rather than nationality. I can't say that right. It is quite late for me, and I am tired. Think of it this way: if a man was to act a woman's role in a play, a serious play, wouldn't it be better in the long run if he spoke naturally, but changed his... mannerisms and style of speaking rather than trying to speak in a falsetto?

I suppose the idea of having the Monty Python crew do the voices wouldn't appeal to you then :)

Lannes

[Keith]

Ooooh! :D Aussie accents...that'd be saaweeeet!!! Of course...it might sound a bit odd at first to an American like me, but it'd be wicked kewl! :)

ElvenThey could have "The Crocodile Hunter" as one of the characters, since we'll probalby have crocodiles in the Nile.

"Too roight, mate. Look at that croc. He's a killa, he is....." :D

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[Afterburner]

They could have "The Crocodile Hunter" as one of the characters, since we'll probalby have crocodiles in the Nile.

Reminds me of one of the mission intros for Poseidon, which was done almost entirely in a Steve Irwin voice.

[Afterburner]

I assume that we have real, actual, honest-to-Bob Brits playing Caesar 3. Some of the posts here have me wondering:

What did the Brits think of the British accents on Caesar 3?

[Lannes]

Having to construct housing instead of placing tents or huts and then having them evolve wouldbe preferred . They shouldn't just rise up out of nowhere or change appearance.

In short, since we are dealing with 3D and a new realm of realism, I would like to actually see "construction" in my new citybuilders.

You mean you'd like more realism ;) Good idea. And as for housing, having different paths for evolution and deterioration, has that been tried yet?

Lannes

[Keith]

You mean you'd like more realism ;) Good idea. And as for housing, having different paths for evolution and deterioration, has that been tried yet?

Lannes
Given the scale of the views we are going to have of our city I think you'd almost have to have some representation of construction. It just wouldn't be right to have a house suddenly popup out of the ground where one wasn't moments before. It was okay for the overall scale of the old CBs.
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[Elvenwarrior2001]

Yes! A great Easter Egg sort of thing! They ought to have this harmless little guy dressed like Steve Irwin wandering around the nile fooling around with crocs. "Oooh...he's cranky! You're alright, you're a good girl." *chomp* "She's gotten ahold of my leg. You're a naughty girl!" lol. That would be SOOO GREAT!

Elven

[Keith]

Steve Irwin?


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[Afterburner]

Steve Irwin?

The Crocodile Hunter guy.

[Keith]

The Crocodile Hunter guy.
Ah, I fogot his real name. :)
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[Elvenwarrior2001]

You ought to watch his show sometime. ;) It's loads of fun! lol. They show it on Animal Planet all the time. lol. Hilarious.

Elven

[EmperorJay]

They replaced Animal Planet with one of those TelSell programs in my area, but I remember his shows.. they were wonderful!

[Keith]

You ought to watch his show sometime. ;) It's loads of fun! lol. They show it on Animal Planet all the time. lol. Hilarious.

Elven
I've seen it. I just forgot his name. His show isn't on in my area any longer. They were getting repeated so they must have cancelled it or the network/station didn't buy more.
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[Elvenwarrior2001]

No no. They repeat them a lot, but they're stilling making more. :D

Elven

[Caesar Philon]

Sometimes when I come back home from work I watch the introduction movie of Caesar3. I think the music is wonderfull. I especially like the part with the hippodrome race. From time to time I go back to my old cities and just watch them for a while. Certainly I still build new cities and work on new ideas. I dont know why I like this game so much. Maybe its because the feeling of being in a living city where all my citizents talk to me or maybe its because I have spend too many sleeples nights playing this game. I couldnt agree more with Keith on his wish.

[Elvenwarrior2001]

I agree too! (But after Lords of Magic 2...) Ahem...

Elven

[Keith]

I agree too! (But after Lords of Magic 2...) Ahem...

Elven
Never! Caesar must have priority! :D
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[Lannes]

Never! Caesar must have priority! :D

Too much fantasy stuff around anyway these days; books, movies, games..... Anyway I'm confident that with CotN TM are just warming up for Rome ;)

Lannes

[Elvenwarrior2001]

Hehe. Too much bad fantasy stuff around these days. LoM was a good one! I want more good stuff. Not some of the crap I've seen pumped out these days. :p

Elven

[Torgen]

How about we go *all* the way back after CotN? Sumeria. :)

Start at the dawn of civilization (in fact,a good name would be "Cradle of Civilization") for the first series of missions, then go to Babylonia, then maybe the Akkadians and finally Xerxes' Persia. :D

[Keith]

The problem with some cultures is that there may not be enough known about them to base a new game on. Otherwise you might just as well create a fantasy game where anything goes.
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[Elvenwarrior2001]

That's a great idea! Creat a fantasy world called "Urak" and then call it...Lords of Magic 2!

What? You act as though I've suggested that before? I mean...there is a pretty decent and very loyal fanbase for that game still. From the old forums (The Old Inn).

Elven

[Bradius]

I agree with Keith. On to ROME!!!!

[Czech Centurian]

Hi just found this site. All I can say is WOW! My favourite game is also CaesarIII it's the game that inspired me to learn Latin :) .

[Keith]

Hi just found this site. All I can say is WOW! My favourite game is also CaesarIII it's the game that inspired me to learn Latin :) .
Welcome! Great minds think alike. :D

We can only hope that the developers will relent someday and we will once again witness the rise of Rome.
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[EmperorJay]

Hi just found this site. All I can say is WOW! My favourite game is also CaesarIII it's the game that inspired me to learn Latin :) .
I had exactly the same thing! C3 really got me interested in the Roman Empire. Welcome.

[Gordon Farrell]

We can only hope that the developers will relent someday and we will once again witness the rise of Rome.


I'd expect that the "CAESAR" city-building franchise is now owned by Activision, since they gobbled up Sierra Studios. And I'd be surprised if any Activision folks are checking this website. Still, Tilted Mill could develop their own Roman City Builder even if they didn't call it Caesar 4. I'm sure, in fact, they must have discussed it.

And, meanwhile, I wouldn't give up hope that Activision will come to the decision to revive the Caesar series on its own. When they acquired Sierra, they also got ownership of Empire Earth, which many of us thought would lie dormant forever. Nope. Activision saw a good game in EE and promptly started developing EE2. Maybe the same thing will happen with C3 --- to date, the best Roman game ever!

[Josh]

I dont give a crap about the franchise title, what matters to me is a continuation by the people who made it, if activision made a Caeser it would just be a knockoff of what Impressions did, official licence or not.

[Keith]

I'd expect that the "CAESAR" city-building franchise is now owned by Activision, since they gobbled up Sierra Studios. And I'd be surprised if any Activision folks are checking this website. Still, Tilted Mill could develop their own Roman City Builder even if they didn't call it Caesar 4. I'm sure, in fact, they must have discussed it.

And, meanwhile, I wouldn't give up hope that Activision will come to the decision to revive the Caesar series on its own. When they acquired Sierra, they also got ownership of Empire Earth, which many of us thought would lie dormant forever. Nope. Activision saw a good game in EE and promptly started developing EE2. Maybe the same thing will happen with C3 --- to date, the best Roman game ever!
Sierra Studios was a development studio which was probably sold off from Sierra itself. Sierra Studios had nothing to do with the citybuilders. Impressions was the team that developed Caesar III for Sierra. Sierra is closed. The guys that made Caesar III are now Tilted Mill for the most part. Vivendi Uuniversal probably still holds all the rights to Sierra game titles, not Activision. It is not likely that VU will produce any more citybuilders, unless they get Breakaway Games to do another one. Breakaway worked on Cleopatra and Emperor. It doesn't look like that will happen, IMHO.

[Nero Would]

The guys that made Caesar III are now Tilted Mill for the most part. Vivendi Uuniversal probably still holds all the rights to Sierra game titles, not Activision. It is not likely that VU will produce any more citybuilders, unless they get Breakaway Games to do another one. Breakaway worked on Cleopatra and Emperor. It doesn't look like that will happen, IMHO.
I agree that it's unlikely that we'll see any more city-builders from VU. But I would be interested to see what Breakaway could do if they were given the opportunity to create their own city-builder. Still, there is no doubt in my mind that Tilted Mill is where we should look to for the successors to the Impressions city-builders.

[Keith]

I agree that it's unlikely that we'll see any more city-builders from VU. But I would be interested to see what Breakaway could do if they were given the opportunity to create their own city-builder. Still, there is no doubt in my mind that Tilted Mill is where we should look to for the successors to the Impressions city-builders.
True, BA seems to do more add-on work than original work as of late. They created Cleopatra, came up with Emperor most likely using the Zeus engine, and they produced the Civ3 Conquests add-on last year.

Help us, Obi Wan (re:TM), you're our only hope. :D

[EmperorJay]

I must admit that I've been thinking about how the setup of CotN could fit in Rome's history.

The age of kings can be used as tutorials where the player builds up Rome. The age of the republic can then be used to let the player fight wars, create colonies and rule provinces while during the age of the emperors the player is challenged to become emperor. One can dream...

[Wen Kha-Ne]

Indeed I love the prospect of another Rome, I have always desired another Citybuilder set in Asia. Emperor didn't really live up to it's potential for some reason, but here is an area that is severely neglected in Historical gaming.

India. It is so simple I am surprised no-one has whipped the concept up already. It has all the components of a CB; powerful religion, trade, war, the city states which can always allow for fun (Emperor and Zeus's campaign map for example?) , it has a rich cultural heritage of all the arts, (even martial arts and the vital component: dancing) it has the whole evolving city approach that is needed in CB games, and it's culture is continuous so you could set it in Egypt's hwyday, through the empire of Macedon, right up to the Mughals and the Persians.

Being the birthplace of so much, and being so vast, why isn't anyone coding it already? I can see a couple of reasons, but it was avoided in Emperor, so what is wrong with it here?

[Azeem]

Quite frankly, I've sort of lost interest in Rome. Though I'd be interested in playing a game that would allow me to tear it apart. :D Besides, there are already 3 Caesar games and only one Pharaoh, one Zeus, and one Emperor.

[EmperorJay]

Well, I think there are quite a few C3 players who didn't play C2. C3 never had an expansion while Zeus and Pharaoh did.

I would be very interested in an Indian citybuilder, since I know very little about India. I just wish that they will return to Rome sometime in the future. :)

[Wen Kha-Ne]

Oh yes, so do I. Just as long as they don't stay there for a long sip of wine. I needs me ancient cultures! Preferably India

[Gordon Farrell]

Yes! India is a terrific idea! I wonder why no one's done it?

[Keith]

Yes! India is a terrific idea! I wonder why no one's done it?
I would suspect that western culture (save for the British) probably know less about the culture and history of India than they do about Rome, Greece, Egypt, China, and just about all of the other major cultures of the past. And, as a result, I just don't think the amount of interest in it is there.

I have to admit I know even less about India than I do about the MesoAmerican cultures of the Inca, Toltecs, Aztecs, and Mayans, and I'm not really interested in a game about them either right now.

They'd probably have to do some major marketing to raise the awareness of India's history culture in the west. They might try that when they have "deeper pockets" than they have at the moment. Since the guys at Tilted Mill are just getting started, the time for something totally new is probably not right just yet.

I would think that for a game to be even marginally successful sales-wise there has to be a large enough core audience interested in purchasing it to start with. Of course, there are us hardcore players that will generally play whatever they put out, but that's a mighty small market.

To paraphrase "Field of Dreams", "Just because you build it, doesn't mean that they will always come." ;)
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[Wen Kha-Ne]

If they provide a eye-catching game box, then anyone interested in this genre will at least consider it. :p

But seriously, I think people should know more about non-Mediterranean (or non-European for that matter) cultures, especially ones with such a long and complex history. India has all the components for a city builder, it even has a completely blue city! What more could one want? :)

Although I see your point about starting off. I am just feeding off hope that India will be included one day. Although I may die of hunger.

[Jayhawk]

India is a terrific idea! I wonder why no one's done it?
I guess people are not familiar enough with that setting for it to appeal to developers enough to risk a lot of resoruces on.
Personally, I'd love to see a Mughal Indian one, if only so I could build my own Taj Mahal.

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[Keith]

How about you guys take your quest for India to a new thread and carry on. ;) This is one for the people that want a game based on Rome.

[Jayhawk]

Hmmm, how about we won't clutter up the topic list and continue in the Non-Mediterranean civ thread? ;)

As for Rome... I'd like a game focussing on the pre-Empire times. Feels different enough to be interesting. And you must admit, all those testudos get a bit boring :p

[Wen Kha-Ne]

India has it all!

This was the one last updated when I suggested India. I then just checked the non-mediterranean thread as it was more relevant.

As I am sure you know, Jayhawk, India has a lot more to offer than that one mausoleum we most associate with it. It's filled with countless tombs and palaces for the citybuilder's pleasure. Let us not forget patron deities (at least in Hinduism) and their temples. ;)

I would put this in the other thread but that is currently debating the location of Troy. It seems to have gone off the title topic. So it's nothing like this one. :p

[Keith]

So start a new thread. You're allowed. ;)

[Keith]

Hmmm, how about we won't clutter up the topic list and continue in the Non-Mediterranean civ thread? ;)

As for Rome... I'd like a game focussing on the pre-Empire times. Feels different enough to be interesting. And you must admit, all those testudos get a bit boring :p
I'm not so sure. The Republic just doesn't have the same allure as the Empire. Most of the construction accomplishments seemed to have come during the Roman Empire, Circus Maximus, the Forum, Colosseum, etc. With the expansion of the Empire came road building which I'd definitely like see included in some meaningful manner as well.
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[EmperorJay]

Actually, the Circus Maximus was built as early as 600 BC for the first time. It was undoubtly enhanced and expanded later on.

The Forum Romanum (I think that's the Forum you are referring too) is very old too and was also enhanced an expanded later on especially during the time of the Emperors but it was built during the Republic or perhaps even during the reign of the Kings.

About Road building. The first major road, the Via Appia was build 321 BC. Some 300 years before the first Emperor.

Size wise, we can speak of the Roman Empire after their conquest of territory outside of Italy (The Second Punic War) IMHO. Of course, using the strictest meaning of the word Empire, there was no Empire until 27 BC.

Like I said before, the time of the Republic really can provide a good challenge and fun missions. The Punic Wars, the conquest of Greece (imagine a mission in which Greek buildings are already present!) etc. During this stage of the game there are many colonies that can be built by the player and which are most likely historically correct. When we arrive at the age of the Emperors, the big cities become available: Lutetia, Londinium etc. Along with that the player should visit Rome throughout the game to be able to watch and perhaps influence it's growth and evolution.

[The Legionaire]

I had exactly the same thing! C3 really got me interested in the Roman Empire. Welcome.


Well, I must say the same thing.It was a preliminary sparkle there, but C3 was decisive.

[The Legionaire]

Actually, the Circus Maximus was built as early as 600 BC for the first time. It was undoubtly enhanced and expanded later on.

The Forum Romanum (I think that's the Forum you are referring too) is very old too and was also enhanced an expanded later on especially during the time of the Emperors but it was built during the Republic or perhaps even during the reign of the Kings.

About Road building. The first major road, the Via Appia was build 321 BC. Some 300 years before the first Emperor.

Size wise, we can speak of the Roman Empire after their conquest of territory outside of Italy (The Second Punic War) IMHO. Of course, using the strictest meaning of the word Empire, there was no Empire until 27 BC.

Like I said before, the time of the Republic really can provide a good challenge and fun missions. The Punic Wars, the conquest of Greece (imagine a mission in which Greek buildings are already present!) etc. During this stage of the game there are many colonies that can be built by the player and which are most likely historically correct. When we arrive at the age of the Emperors, the big cities become available: Lutetia, Londinium etc. Along with that the player should visit Rome throughout the game to be able to watch and perhaps influence it's growth and evolution.


Quite well said, Jay, but still :

- Circus Maximus was built not around 600 BC. It was indeed in the 6th century BC ( under the rule of the Tarquins) but not quite 600 BC.
- Via Appia was started ( If I recall correctly) by Appius Claudius in 312 BC , with a first stage to Capua.Then ( somewhere around mid 3rd century BC) reached Brundisium.
- not every nation that conquers outside its country builds an Empire.IMO, we can talk about the Roman Empire after the conquest of Greece.( 146 BC?)
- as for the Republic, I think this is the most fascinating era, especially its Fall.Only the names of Caesar, Cicero, Pompey and Augustus should add some weight to that.

Didn't want to be overcritical, just stated my opinions :) !

[Mick]

Caesar 4 evah, enuf said. I want a 3d succsesor to caesar aswell, I'm pretty sure those wicked roman buildings will look awesome. Even now when I play C3 I lovee it.

[Kenneth M. Hinds]

We can only hope that the developers will relent someday and we will once again witness the rise of Rome.
Keith,

Let's hope that the "New, Improved" Rome doesn't take as long as some of us have been waiting in the Naval Sim areas for Harpoon 4. Or, we might have a female U.S. President first. :)

If Tilted Mill is going to be our new source for City Builders I dearly hope that they will not announce products prior to getting them to the "guaranteed to be finished" stage. As an end user, I'd much rather have total silence from the developers to threads like this one and the one by Afterburner, and then have a surprise announcement of a well designed, well tested, game that ships reasonably close to on time. I've had my fill of products that are delayed repeatedly or never ship at all due things like: Key staff leaving, producing companies changing hands or product line directions, new hardware arrivals causing redesigns to make use of them, Total game redesigns due to some Marketing Wizard's latest theory of what's hot and what's not, etc.

Ken

[Son of Moose]

Kenneth:

If Tilted Mill is going to be our new source for City Builders I dearly hope that they will not announce products prior to getting them to the "guaranteed to be finished" stage.

While I certainly have a great degree of sympathy for your viewpoint --- as there is certainly nothing worse than devs being unable to deliver a promised (and highly promising) product, this strategy will effectively prevent ANY FORM OF community participation in the development of the game.

Maybe, in some respects, this is good as it allows for less dev distraction but, on the other hand, there are many highly experienced fans who could most certainly actively contribute to the ongoing development of a new title.

Just a thought from one who is really keen to assist in the ongoing development of this and future TM products ... :D :D

[Bugsy]

:D I'm very much looking forward to CotN, since it indeed takes citybuilding not just one but many steps further. But I must agree, if I could create my own Rome and then be able to walk through it... *faints at the thought of that*
This is how I am for Egypt. :D

I MUST have this game lol

[Tarquinius Superbus]

I didn't play too much Caesar II or III, but I loved every minute of what I did play (I was a huge fan of the old original, too), and as much as I am interested in Ancient Egypt, Rome is simply my life's obsession, which I guess requires no further explanation.

[tobing]

There are many points pro and contra for involving too many people into develoopment at an early stage. As there could be a lot of good ideas if you do, it could also be too many actually so in view of just too many things to work on you'll never finish the product. So having gathered a lot of features you have to decide which make the way into the product and which will not, then you start the design and implementation. In that stage you don't need any more input from outside, it will be rather disturbing then instead of being helpful.

So I think the devs at TM are highly experienced, not only in how to do it, but also what the fans expect and what they consider right for a game. Remember, the game should be fun in the very first place, and that also means that too many features you have to learn could kill it. It's a really difficult balance, and I would not dare to comment on that, even though I have been thinking a lot about this issue. My confidence in TM in this respect is very high, they'll deliver a great game!

P.S. But anyway, I would also like to walk through MY rome... some time... eventually...

P.P.S. For now my addiction is Egypt, and it will always be more addictive to me than every other culture, though I like romans and chinese also.

[Son of Moose]

Tobing:

As always, an extremely considered reply!! :)

So having gathered a lot of features you have to decide which make the way into the product and which will not, then you start the design and implementation. In that stage you don't need any more input from outside, it will be rather disturbing then instead of being helpful.

Perhaps, in general terms (and not specifically applying to CotN or other future TM products), it would indeed be best to encourage community-based participation in the middle of the development phase when all the basics are in place. Possibly a dev would then be able to share their broad vision along with most of the provisional additional gameplay options which could then be discussed and analysed at depth in a designated forum. This is where ideas can be refined and expanded ... :)

But obviously this approach would not work for all development teams. "Unto each his own ..." :) Therefore (I repeat), I was not necessarily referring to TM or any of their future products. :)

[tobing]

Thanks, you are always very kind. :)

Actually there is some discrepancy between the wish to incorporate features and changes at later stages of a software dev project, and the finishing of the product which does not allow for any more changes.

[Keith]

Keith,

Let's hope that the "New, Improved" Rome doesn't take as long as some of us have been waiting in the Naval Sim areas for Harpoon 4. Or, we might have a female U.S. President first. :)

If Tilted Mill is going to be our new source for City Builders I dearly hope that they will not announce products prior to getting them to the "guaranteed to be finished" stage. As an end user, I'd much rather have total silence from the developers to threads like this one and the one by Afterburner, and then have a surprise announcement of a well designed, well tested, game that ships reasonably close to on time. I've had my fill of products that are delayed repeatedly or never ship at all due things like: Key staff leaving, producing companies changing hands or product line directions, new hardware arrivals causing redesigns to make use of them, Total game redesigns due to some Marketing Wizard's latest theory of what's hot and what's not, etc.

Ken
Ken, I think TM will someday deliver us a shiney new Rome, it's just a matter of how long they want to keep us waiting.

Recently, I've seen two games in development I was interested in simply pull the plug after a year of keeping tabs on them.

The devs here have a good reputation of seeing it through to the end. So I'm not worried unless something truly cataclysmic happens to TM's facilities.

Hopefully, TM will give us our new Rome before the slaves decide to revolt! :D

[Son of Moose]

Perhaps they can call it ... "A funny thing happened on the way to the forum" :D

[Keith]

Perhaps they can call it ... "A funny thing happened on the way to the forum" :D
Or

"Up Pompei!" (a old BBC comedy based in the Roman Empire.) :D

[queenimperiale]

I think it would be cool to have a Caesar IV. Maybe have it all 3D. Or, make it similar to COTN.

FYI: If someone has already posted something similar, please forgive me. I did not even look through the thread. :D

[Keith]

Basically, that is the gist of this entire thread. If a new game based on Rome is developed by TM it will probably follow along the same lines as CotN in design.

A official title of Caesar IV, is probably not going to happen, since the guys that created Caeasar, Caesar II, and Caesar III working at TM now, Impressions Games and Sierra have ceased to exist. The only chance of something coming out in the old series would be if BreakAway Games was contracted to do somenting, as they were with the Cleopatra addon for Pharaoh and Emperor.

[lordcaesar]

Well I am Italian and my Bloodthirsty-Ancenstors are screaming in my veins for another Caesar game!!!!!


You got to admit, back then we kicked some butt

[Prætor Urbanus]

ROMA INVICTA!

[Rubicon]

I was a relative late-comer to the Impression series. As part of a rebate program two years ago, I received Caesar III for free and it sat on my shelf for almost another year. I decided to give a try last year and became fanatically hooked on it. I've tried most of the other Impressions games, but C3 will always remain my favorite.

I AM BEGGING TM to follow up COTN with a "Caesar IV"!! Not sure if it's been suggested on other threads, but I think it would be an interesting twist to create an online community where gamers could build cities online, trade with one another and (possibly) do battle. Instead of MMORG, we'd have a new genre; MMOCIBUG.

[NanaBanana]

Not sure if it's been suggested on other threads, but I think it would be an interesting twist to create an online community where gamers could build cities online, trade with one another and (possibly) do battle. Instead of MMORG, we'd have a new genre; MMOCIBUG.

Emperor was made to play online. A lot of complaints were that no one was ever online to play it. I think the biggest problem there was people connecting with each other to play because of the time differences. My play style and speed would make some people crazy. I'm a very slow player.

Having recently wasted $35 on Everquest Platinum (didn't realize it was an online only game) I don't think I would purchase another of that type. :mad:
I want to be able to play my games in solitude.

I wouldn't mind another ancient Rome game, as long as the bazaar ladies had brains! :D

[Rubicon]

I wouldn't mind another ancient Rome game, as long as the bazaar ladies had brains! :D

Totally agree - it's one of the reasons I enjoy playing Pharaoh/Cleo. The control over the market buyers, granaries and warehouses is a great improvement over C3.

[Keith]

Online play for citybuilders has long been requested, and we finally got it in Emperor, but as mentioned above, now only a very small group of people actually play online. It proved not to be as popular as those that were requesting MP thought it would be.

So I'd rather have them spend the time on adding new features into the single player game rather than devote time, energy and money on another MP attempt.

[dreamsoftwilight]

I didnt like the Emperor MP, I wished they had an option in the game to not install it. So no, dont do a MP game... it'll flop like Emperor's did.

[Innovan]

The main problem with MP is it's impossible to get 4 people to all stay on line at the same time for more than a 20 minute stretch.

I love http://www.ticket2ridegame.com/
Getting four people to stay in to the end even with this simple 30 minute game... is difficult.

[homegrown]

See, just because the Emperor MP implementation failed, let's not give up on the idea. :p I still think it's possible to do multiplayer in a way citybuilders would buy into. My current idea is a 24/7 virtual world (The Sims) made up completely of player-built cities. You would interact with other cities (players) by building Trade Centers, Docks, Consulates etc. People can visit your cities and look around, offer diplomatic or trade options at the various buildings for those things, but not make any changes to "your" city. There shouldn't be any chance that someone will declare war on you and destroy your city while you're on summer vacation. :eek:

[Meli]

You would interact with other cities (players) by building Trade Centers, Docks, Consulates etc. People can visit your cities and look around, offer diplomatic or trade options at the various buildings for those things, but not make any changes to "your" city.

This reminds me a bit of the classic 'board' game of Diplomacy. Perhaps some elements of that could be included, where there are mechanisms for negotiations, treaties, declarations of war, etc. built into a (perhaps) turn-based mode that could be layered on top of the regular day-to-day building/maintenance of the cities. Hmm.

[Innovan]

Can you have player interaction? Yeah, sure. But think of things that can be downloaded, emailed, not things that demand you all are on line at exactly the same time. And for city builders, don't think competitive.

Scenario design is a heavy MP activity.
Skinning and altering the appearance of buildings and characters is a widespread and popular MP activity.

Building a game that requires simulataneous on-line interaction isn't the way to go. The time people have free to devote to entertainment is much more scattered and disconnected.

In both Emperor and Black-and-White, six months after the MP release, there wasn't a large enough user community left on-line to support playing the game. That's pretty common.

Partially it's about people wandering off to new titles. Partially it's about people not willing to risk being burned by playing with unknown players who could hang-up mid game, be insulting in the chat window (Germans are infamous for this), or otherwise waste your time.

If I look at scenario design for Stronghold, it's very popular to copy landscape features from other people and add them to your own world. With Black and White creatures are popular to trade. Give people a creative outlet where they can individualize a game feature, and next thing they'll start doing is trading that game feature on-line.

That is more interesting than just "beat each other up in real time".

[Nighteyes]

Continuing on with my original thought at the top, I would like to see the monuments of Rome built piece by piece, much as the pyramids in Pharaoh. Buiding things like the Circus Maximus and the Flavian Ampitheater (Colosseum) would prove time consuming and challenging. Even constructing triumphal arches after victories block-by-block would be a vast improvement over the old Caesar III "plunk-it-down" style for that item. Having to construct housing instead of placing tents or huts and then having them evolve wouldbe preferred . They shouldn't just rise up out of nowhere or change appearance.

In short, since we are dealing with 3D and a new realm of realism, I would like to actually see "construction" in my new citybuilders.


As for seeing construction, I think that it would be cool if you had to wait for anything that needed proper building, anfd that you can see work crews dig and then lay stones in the ditch to make a paved road, and well used tracks changed into pathes. It would take alot of work to make such a game but I think that it would be worth it. (there be a way to switch of that feature but it would inprove some aspects of citybuilding games) :cool:

[Nighteyes]

I still think it's possible to do multiplayer in a way citybuilders would buy into. My current idea is a 24/7 virtual world (The Sims) made up completely of player-built cities. You would interact with other cities (players) by building Trade Centers, Docks, Consulates etc. People can visit your cities and look around, offer diplomatic or trade options at the various buildings for those things, but not make any changes to "your" city. There shouldn't be any chance that someone will declare war on you and destroy your city while you're on summer vacation. :eek:

The only problem I see with this is what if you have a slow connection? There should be an option to install that or just single player.

[Josh]

the great thing about the kind of game described is it wouldnt require a super connection; because lag time doesnt matter like a FPS; all it would need to send to a server are prices and quanities of goods; army size, defencive armys, diplomacy messages, etc.

You all have a spot on the world map where you started your city, Server options could range from wether player vs player is on; or how many minutes or hours of play each person is alocated a day, to keep people on the same page. You then get to negotiate prices and supplies with other players; undercut others, and strive to become the richest and most powerfull nation (I think this would work best with rome or greece especialy, what with the concept of city states) Battle couldnt be used to destroy other citys, but it could be sent to loot and cause some damage; hindering other players if pvp is allowed.

I think it would be great fun to have 10-20 people all playing side by side, and interacting on the world level. But still not required to all play at the same time. IE Im too busy to play today, so I get two hours instead of the daily one to play tommorow.

These kind of games are really suprisingly popular but currently, all text based.
That would be the best way to implement Mplayer city builders in my opinion.

[Wen Kha-Ne]

Let's just bump this old topic shall we?

Keith has a point when he mentioned that India is more of a mystery to people, but this can make the prospect enthralling to some. Also, if you don't know much about India, then you probably don't know much about their grand culture. India has all the elements a city builder needs (but Egypt has a very special place in me for some reason) and it's an original idea.

There is a slight problem . . . which is castes. TM could work a way around this and integrate it into the economic system, but I do prefer those who work their ways up in society, such as villagers>nobles through farmers and luxury shopkeepers. Castes could mean you need a careful balance in population, and if you don't control the castes then areas could stagnate.

But then, castes were only around for a short (relatively) period of time. India carries from the Indus Valley Culture to the Mughals and Safavids. Just think of the stunning views! :D

(Yes I have come back but that isn't important. What is important is the fact I have finally found a copy of the game - I say...found)

[Son of Moose]

Nighteyes:

As for seeing construction, I think that it would be cool if you had to wait for anything that needed proper building, anfd that you can see work crews dig and then lay stones in the ditch to make a paved road, and well used tracks changed into pathes. It would take alot of work to make such a game but I think that it would be worth it. (there be a way to switch of that feature but it would inprove some aspects of citybuilding games)

Yes .... this would seem to be the logical conclusion to creating a truly realistic CB game. :) It would actually be pretty interesting (and rewarding) to see these structures slowly but surely arising from the dirt. :)

[arcan]

i f my memory is good, the "well used tracks changing to paths" thing used to exist in the early settlers games...

[vic_4]

Only problem is if it is too slowly growing. Most important thing is a balance between realism and fun.

[Son of Moose]

Vic4:

Yes .... balance is important. In addition, game speed should cater to the whims of the average CB player. Remember that CB players are most definitely (on the whole) a far more patient breed than (say) the average FPS player. ;)

[Stelly]

untill tm does efforts to make the game bugfree they don't have to try anything else, their fund must be low right now and sega is just not the publisher you need

after brilliant games like cIII and pharaoh, CotN could have been the breakthrough

cIII and pharaoh are to city-building as aoc and ra2 is to war based, but CotN failed

weak support, poor in-depth gameplay and no mod possibilities
these are 3 elements real time strategy needs more than a stupid 3D view

btw who wants to build small cities of 1500people? :rolleyes:

I hope tm learns once more, I hope I can buy a title like pharaoh or cIII in the future from tm and let's hope it's not just a small mod but at least a full add-on to CotN

[Son of Moose]

Stelly:

The ability to create "add-on" mods (like in SimCity and Zoo Tycoon) might have been nice. :)

[Stelly]

Stelly:

The ability to create "add-on" mods (like in SimCity and Zoo Tycoon) might have been nice. :)

battle for middle earth has it too and they don't feel afraid people will already make red alert 3 mods :(

[vic_4]

Sure, COTN has its shortcomings, but as the first of a series I think it is great. What IMHO did the worst to the game were publishers. At least in Italy it is still very hard to find the game, there has not been any advertisment that I have seen and there have been quite a few sloppinesses. I expect next game to develop the sistem in order to get bigger cities and a better control on some aspects, but this kind of game seems to me, at least right now, werking better with small-medium cities, since there is direct involvement with single cityzens.

[Son of Moose]

Maybe in 3 to 5 years time .... when 8 to 10 GHz processors and 5 GB of memory constitute the minimum specs for a game (and this is eminently possible), it might be feasible to place multiple civilizations on a single map. :cool:

This was also something I mentioned a looong time back. :)

[tobing]

...This was also something I mentioned a looong time back. :)
Some of us here can actually remember that. Thing is, somebody has to start working on this, after all what has been said already: There's plenty of material to create a design document and get your hands dirty on such a project.

[Son of Moose]

Tobing:

Some of us here can actually remember that.

I am really glad to hear that some of my contributions are still fairly fresh in the memory. :D

Perhaps what really needs to be done (in this regard) is for a couple of talented programmers and graphic artists to link up and form an amateur design team .... like the guys creating the RTS game 0AD. THis imho is HIGHLY commendable. :D

However, my hope was that TM might eventually feel emboldened enough to try to do this with the Titan 4.0 (or whatever) game engine. :cool:

[tobing]

Waht is 0AD? Is there a link?

[Son of Moose]

It is a freeware RTS created by a group of volunteers belonging to Wildfire Games (you should be able to Yahoo it for their Homepage). :)

Wildfire Games are currently busy with 2 freeware products .... entirely created by skilled teams of volunteers. Their dedicated forums are actually fairly busy. :cool:

Maybe some people with the background skills could do something similar with the CB genre. However, it should be a product of a sufficiently high standard that people would actually like to download. :eek:

Otherwise .... maybe CB game production should be left to the professionals .... like our friends at TM. :D

[Keith]

Only problem is if it is too slowly growing. Most important thing is a balance between realism and fun.
That is always a consideration, but there should at least be some representation of the construction process even if it is abbreviated for the sake of game play. I'm not suggesting that a Roman road take forever to build. However, it should take a considerable time.

Frankly, I wouldn't mind if the pace was slow when contructing something. As long as the work continued to proceed once initiated by me I could spend my type doing other things like ruling the city, conquering other lands, etc. I don't want to have to keep jumping back to the road construction crew to find out why they have stopped working without good reason such as the lack of a supply of stone.

I was recently reading through some of my old bookmarked links about the Roman aquaduct system. These would make tremendous projects for a game based on Rome. They were meticulously planned and constructed and there were so many of them, not just in Rome alone, but in their colonies areas as well.

The Romans were such prodigious builders the game would be chocked full of monuments and public works to keep a player busy. So you would not be stuck just watching a single thing being built and getting bored with the pace. You might be overseering the construction of a dozen projects all at the same time. NOW THAT WOULD BE AN AMAZING CITYBUILDER!

[Stelly]

it is impossible to rebuild rome or even a piece of it

rome imported about EVERYTHING, it wouldn't be a complete city building but just a capital with administrators, monuments and aristocrats

and the roads like in settlers are still the most fun imo, you can also easily see where the people walk and how much

[Shadow-Imperator]

Having, long ago, posted a thread about 'What are the chances of Caesar 4?' I never returned here to seek the fate of the thread. However. I think a Caesar III successor is long overdue and maybe, tilted mill and can learn from their experiances with Cotn and with that gained knowledge, perhaps they can give to us, a Roman masterpeice, worthy of Rome's great history.

I am all for a Romanesque game before they seek to explore other domains (be it non mediterranian or fantasy). Also, maybe something can be taken away form the recent Rome Total War and even past Caesar games, to put together a mighty mix of Epic Battle and Epic City Construction.

[Keith]

I'm with you. I said pretty much the same things in all my preceeding posts.

The only problem I see right now is that the CotN engine seems to choke even the best computers when the cities start to get moderately large. Given the size of a city like Rome, it would be difficult to make a city using the current engine.

I'm always hopeful that Rome will rise again! ;)

[Gordon Farrell]

I am all for a Romanesque game

I'd like to see C4, too, but I just wanted to point out that "Romanesque" means medieval, not Roman! ;)

[wodinoneeye]

I'm with you. I said pretty much the same things in all my preceeding posts.

The only problem I see right now is that the CotN engine seems to choke even the best computers when the cities start to get moderately large. Given the size of a city like Rome, it would be difficult to make a city using the current engine.

I'm always hopeful that Rome will rise again! ;)


Actually the Romans built alot of cities from scratch all over the empire (nice grid aligned streets & well planned infrastructure) versus Rome itself which
was originally a bunch of small villages nestled among the 7 hills an with twisty narrow streets (more organized look happened after large sections burn down...)

Children of the Mediterranean ??? Cousins of Rome????

City size is just symbolic anyway. Most CotN cities arent much bigger than large villages anyway. As long as most of the Roman flavored civic/commercial/etc.. functions are represented, it will be big enough for a game.

[Run]

[first post]


Thought I'd drag up this old thread from weeks gone by to publicise my webpage (http://www.nanacide.com/caesarIV) on the topic of a new Caesar. It's purely an information site, designed to archive ideas for a new Caesar (though it is not quite as big as my Worms one, which is located here (http://www.nanacide.com/worms-unlimited))

Anyway, comments please. Good or bad. From reading through this thread, I imagine I will get shot down for my comments on monument-building, but sorry I just don't think they'd work. If anyone wants to write up a counter-argument to why they would work, feel free to post it and I'll stick it on the site, credit given.

In fact, all ideas and suggestions are welcome. This site is for archiving everything that the community can throw at it, not just my ideas. If you have alternatives, variations, etc, or just new stuff completely, please poke them my way. Credit given.

I've never been apart of the online community, and all the ideas currently up on the webpage are my own, developed in my mind completely separate to anything you might have come up over the past 7 years. There's probably a hell of a lot of ideas out there, and I wanna hear them. If there are any other threads, on this forum or others, that might contain ideas, point those out to me too.

Also, reading this thread.... what's all this about Caesar II's province map thingy? Never played the game, and a lot of people say Caesar III lost something when it was dropped. Explanations and screenshots welcome. It could well make it onto my webpage.

Oh, and please mention any errors on the site, particularly with the history of Rome or history of the game and wot-not.


*bookmarks this thread*


[/first post]

[Keith]

[first post]


Thought I'd drag up this old thread from weeks gone by to publicise my webpage (http://www.nanacide.com/caesarIV) on the topic of a new Caesar. It's purely an information site, designed to archive ideas for a new Caesar (though it is not quite as big as my Worms one, which is located here (http://www.nanacide.com/worms-unlimited))

Anyway, comments please. Good or bad. From reading through this thread, I imagine I will get shot down for my comments on monument-building, but sorry I just don't think they'd work. If anyone wants to write up a counter-argument to why they would work, feel free to post it and I'll stick it on the site, credit given.

In fact, all ideas and suggestions are welcome. This site is for archiving everything that the community can throw at it, not just my ideas. If you have alternatives, variations, etc, or just new stuff completely, please poke them my way. Credit given.

I've never been apart of the online community, and all the ideas currently up on the webpage are my own, developed in my mind completely separate to anything you might have come up over the past 7 years. There's probably a hell of a lot of ideas out there, and I wanna hear them. If there are any other threads, on this forum or others, that might contain ideas, point those out to me too.

Also, reading this thread.... what's all this about Caesar II's province map thingy? Never played the game, and a lot of people say Caesar III lost something when it was dropped. Explanations and screenshots welcome. It could well make it onto my webpage.

Oh, and please mention any errors on the site, particularly with the history of Rome or history of the game and wot-not.


*bookmarks this thread*


[/first post]

http://members.aol.com/dheitm8612/animated/sign_Welcome_wav.gif

I'll have to spend some time reading your page later. One suggestion, could you make the text brighter, the gray text on the dark background is a little eye-straining. I can brighten it up now by simply highlighting the paragraphs by dragging my mouse over it with a left click, but it would be less work if I didn't have to. :)

The "provincial map-thingy" you mentioned that was in Caesar II but removed from Caesar III, is a seperate screen where it shows the entire area of your province that you are in, with all the cities and native villages and any borders. You would place things like farms, trading posts, and harbors on this map. Also, any troop movements from one area of your province to another and any invasions would appear on this map. You could also place defensive walls around cities or along boards with a gate that would only let your cohorts pass through. This is also the map where you place your raw materials industries and connect everything on the map via roads back to your capital city in order to encourage trade. No road, no trade.

If a enemy invaded they would either land via ship or cross the border and start pillaging any nearby "Roman" structures or camp outside walls besieging them giving you time to move your cohorts out of their fort towards the enemy location. When the two opposing forces got close enough to each other the screen would then change to the "battle screen", which was also done away with after Caesar II (unfortunately). The reason being that it caused many problems and not all computers could easily load the battle screen, etc.

On the battle screen you would see your troops, your archers, cavarly, infantry, auxilia, slingers, whatever you may have on both sides of a small battle area map. You could move various sections of your troops around the map to setup a plan of attack or defense within a prescribed area behond which you could not place troops. You could give orders to defend and not move, form a testudo, fire slings or arrows when a enemy moved into a target grid that you could move about the map, or send your troops off on the attack in various line or column formations.

Combat was determined by the loss of morale. As your troops won or lost the overall morale level for each type of unit would rise or fall, against a corresponding fall or rise of the enemy morale. If your troops are winning the enemy morale may fall to zero and this will cause the men in that unit to flee off the map. The same holds true for you troops.

You raised troops by paying men and placing them in training. This of course was an expense so you had to be careful. You also had to pay other plebians to work in other services in your city, like maintaing roads, industry, farms, etc. You could also hire any mercenaries to bolster your army if they were available in that province. You also had some naval combat, in Caesar II, but nothing as detailed as the battle screen. You basically moved your warships close to the enemy and tried to sink their transports before they landed. This was all done on the province map.

If you did not want to be a general or your computer had problems with the battle screen you could let the game resolve combat automatically. I rather miss all that. It gave me more of a feeling of expanding the Roman Empire than the Caesar III combat model.

The other thing missing from Caesar III, or rather was simplified in Caesar III, was the Empire map, where you chose the provinces you wanted to rule. I forget how many there were offhand but there was at least a good two dozen or more provinces, like Dacia, Germania Superior, Germania Inferior, Gaul, Judea, etc. The computer gave you a AI opponent that was vying for the rank of Caesar against you. It would assign provinces to this other general, thus keeping them from you, so you have to pick wisely. The AI general would pretty much keep pace with your victories, if you won he would also. In the end I don't think anyone ever really lost to this AI opponent. It took quite some time conquering all the provinces of the Empire map.

I'd have to install Caesar II to get any screenshots. I haven't really tried installing it on my XP system. Someone else may have some images though.

[Run]

One suggestion, could you make the text brighter, the gray text on the dark background is a little eye-straining.

Should be better now. Must just be my monitor that doesn't have a problem with it, as many others complain about that too. I fixed up my other site as well. If it needs brightening further I can do that.

Thanks for that very in-depth explanation of the province thingy :) Though there's too much stuff to get my head around it, so I need to play it to know really. Is Caesar II shareware nowadays?

[Azeem]

I'd have to install Caesar II to get any screenshots. I haven't really tried installing it on my XP system. Someone else may have some images though.

Installing Caesar II on XP is kind of hit-and-miss. It might work sometimes on some computers. But often it's very unstable. I tried installing it once. The regular free-build game works, but the campaign game always crashes whenever I go to the provincial map screen. Oddly enough, I was able to get Betrayal at Krondor and Master of Magic (both DOS-based games much older than CII) to work perfectly...

Is Caesar II shareware nowadays?

I don't know if it's "shareware" nowadays, but Caesar I is available for free download. I think the Sierra site might still have it. I got Caesar II at Office Depot a few years ago. I don't know if there are places that may still have it. As I mentioned above, CII is likely not to work on XP, unfortunately. It's a shame that a lot of classics won't work on XP...

[Keith]

Should be better now. Must just be my monitor that doesn't have a problem with it, as many others complain about that too. I fixed up my other site as well. If it needs brightening further I can do that.

Thanks for that very in-depth explanation of the province thingy :) Though there's too much stuff to get my head around it, so I need to play it to know really. Is Caesar II shareware nowadays?

Alot of things happened on the province map.

The city map is, of course where you construct the city itself. You would have to arrang buildings in such a manner that they fell into each others zones of influence. If youd had enough of the right items in a area, that area's desirabiltiy goes up and the hosing in that area evolves. This is different than C3 where walkers were used to spread the influence and services of a structure.

As for C2 being shareware...no, it's not. The rights are still held by VuGames/Sierra as with most of their old classic games.

The webpage text color is better but its still rather dim and requires more concnetration to read than a plain white text. I don't like to have to work too much to read something.

[Run]

As for C2 being shareware...no, it's not. The rights are still held by VuGames/Sierra as with most of their old classic games.

Never mind. I found it on an abandonware website anyway. Though i'll have to wait til september to run it since I will then be getting a computer old enough to have DOS :) Should provide some insight into how the Caesar series evolved, too.

Also on the abandonware site is this: http://www.abandonia.com/games/141/download/images/games/Caesar%20II4.png

Is that the province map?

[Keith]

Never mind. I found it on an abandonware website anyway. Though i'll have to wait til september to run it since I will then be getting a computer old enough to have DOS :) Should provide some insight into how the Caesar series evolved, too.

Also on the abandonware site is this: http://www.abandonia.com/games/141/download/images/games/Caesar%20II4.png

Is that the province map?

The image you link to is a picture of a provincial map.

The image below is that of the "Empire map", note all those nice provinces you had to pick from to rule and vie over against the computer AI opponent.

http://www.abandonia.com/games/141/images/games/Caesar%20II2.jpg


The city level map view:

http://www.abandonia.com/games/141/images/games/Caesar%20II3.jpg http://www.abandonia.com/games/141/images/games/Caesar%20II5.jpg

[David Beebe]

OK (http://www.caesariv.com/) :eek: :eek: :eek:

[Anguille]

OK (http://www.caesariv.com/) :eek: :eek: :eek:


Tilted Mill and Sierra???? :eek:

Gee...it looks likes i'll need a new computer very soon :rolleyes:

[Keith]

Veni Vidi Vinci!

I have prevailed! ;)

[wodinoneeye]

OK (http://www.caesariv.com/) :eek: :eek: :eek:


"Tilted Mill has developed its own proprietary game engine to provide the perfect visual experience for the next generation of city-building and RTS games. The "Linden" engine has been built from the ground up utilizing the latest in shader technology"


Is this the same engine from http://lindenlab.com/ ???

If it isnt then might there be some kind of name conflict here ???