Strategy like the Settlers serie

I have two thoughts on this :

1. If you're not going to use your economy to fight a war, why bother to build it?

2. Many people disagree with me.

Consider the success of Sim City, the Sims, Civ, and other build-oriented games, and you'll see that war is not necessary to success. On the other hand, you're not going for the commercial market, right? Your target is the web-download people, and I think they'll tend to be more like me, aggressive wargamer types.

Finally, if you're going to build warfare into your game, do it right. I agree with you that it was always badly done in the Settlers series; clearly a tacked-on addition to the well-thought-out economic model. Either design it in from the start, or leave it out entirely.

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On the other hand, you're not going for the commercial market, right? Your target is the web-download people, and I think they'll tend to be more like me, aggressive wargamer types.

I'm targeting a commercial indy game (you will be able to buy it online for something like $10 or $15), even if a lite version will be free.

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Finally, if you're going to build warfare into your game, do it right. I agree with you that it was always badly done in the Settlers series; clearly a tacked-on addition to the well-thought-out economic model. Either design it in from the start, or leave it out entirely.

That's my current problem... I know that making a economic game will target less people than if I make a wargame game, but if I suppress the war part, less player will play the game... So what make games like Sim City or Settlers so addictive ?

Chman

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Original post by Chman_a11w I've just finished my 3D game engine and I'm now looking at making an indy game. I'm not aiming at a really big game with wonderful graphics and dolby surround sound, I just want to make a fun game.

Congrats! Glad to hear you're focusing on the fun factor. Let the game industry produce the next lense flare riddled big beautiful empty world. Being smaller will force you to be more innovate.

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I've alwais been a fan of The Settlers (the first and the second only) and these kind of games, and I would like to make my own. Do you think people would play a strategy game where you must develop your village but cannot start big wars ?

Yes. Check out Stardock Systems and games like the Corporate Machine. You can have good, deep strategy without firing a shot.

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Is war necessary to make this game interesting ?

I don't think it's necessary. It can make things interesting, but if you ditch war I'd recommend making some things time sensitive in order create a touch of an adrenaline rush. Maybe you've got real-time seasons, and have to get things planted for the winter. Or you could have random, roaming wild creatures that you have to keep the population away from.

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I've started a design document with some interesting ideas (map will be made of an heightmap mapped on a sphere, etc...) but I wonder what features you would like to see in this kind of game... Tell me if you've got specials wishes :)

One thing with these gardening games that I have a problem with is short term objectives. It would be nice to have small things to do, such as little missions, embedded right in the normal process of growing your society to its top level. It just changes up gameplay.

Also, consider putting alot of work into the actual peons themselves, similar to Tropico. It makes it so much more interesting if the strategy involves not only the buildings you build, but how the people interact.

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About the war part, it's not part of the gameplay for the moment, and I don't know if I must add it... If so, how would it be designed ? War in that kind of strategy games have alwais been poorly designed, just take a look at the settlers serie or 1602 & 1503 games...

My motto is to avoid like the plague anything you don't enjoy or play. It's as bad as relying on random sampling, and you'll add a major feature with no internal guidance as to whether or not the strategies, interface or sub-features belong.

Thanks for all Wavinator !
Your posts are alwais full of help !

Hi, I really loved the first and second Settlers games too (not 3+ so much though).

Anyways, as simple as the combat model was, when you think about it, almost the entire economy was geared around creating and improving your army. Even if you didn't plan to fight you still needed your guys to occupy guard huts to expand.

I've not thought about it before, but I suppose it's actually quite well designed, because any wars were truly decided by who had built the better economy (not that everyone had an even chance, your closeness to resources had a huge effect. E.g. !gold == !officers == lose). Tactics had little to do with it (except for catapult placement in 2, and distribution of your troops).

If nothing else it gave a reason to actually bother, and to be quick about it, but that said, my dad was a big fan of the game too, and his favourite thing was building huge forests and mining all the hills. He didn't care for the fighting much at all, he would take over the entire map, and then just continue playing untill he had completed the above.

So yes I do believe you could make a Settlers game without combat, but like Wavinator suggested, extra objectives now and then would really help give the player something to do.

Good luck, and I love the idea of the map actually being a sphere.

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Original post by King of Men 2. Many people disagree with me.

I do :)

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Original post by King of Men Your target is the web-download people, and I think they'll tend to be more like me, aggressive wargamer types.

I remember hearing somewhere that one of the largest game markets is older women who play various card games online. I would hardly consider them aggressive wargamer types :). Just look at games like Snood or Bejeweled - granted they are quick little puzzle games, but they seem to be pretty popular.

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Original post by King of Men Finally, if you're going to build warfare into your game, do it right. I agree with you that it was always badly done in the Settlers series; clearly a tacked-on addition to the well-thought-out economic model. Either design it in from the start, or leave it out entirely.

This I totally agree with.

You can have aggression in your game that doesn't resort to total warfare. Look at games like Europa 1400 - there is a lot of political intrigue and behind-the-scenes cloak & dagger stuff going on there. Fielding an army to knock down the other guy's walls may be an option, but it should be a reputation-destroying last resort.

- Mike

For the warrior types, you could have roving bands of Bandits&Barbarians that you need to protect your citizens from, using fortresses and guardhouses similar to those in the Settlers.
If the goal of your economy is *not* to field an army, it has to be something else. To control trade routes, or to get as much gold as possible. Something! Those who just want to build can ignore the goals. Pharaoh did this pretty well.
These are some ideas I thought should have been in the Settlers:

* Have the buildings less spread out. Let's say they must be within a certain distance of a town hall, which also works as a store house. This doesn't apply to all buildings, e.g. mines and scout towers are excepted.

* Trading.

* More boats.

* If you're gonna have some kind of war, make it possible to raid storehouses and simply steal whatever's in there.

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If the goal of your economy is *not* to field an army, it has to be something else. To control trade routes, or to get as much gold as possible. Something! Those who just want to build can ignore the goals.

You're absolutly right !

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* More boats.

Yes, boats are a very important part according to me. I'm currently thinking about new ways to handle them and making them more useful/interesting.

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* If you're gonna have some kind of war, make it possible to raid storehouses and simply steal whatever's in there.

After many hours of thoughts, I've decided that war will be one of the main goal of the game. I think I'm gonna design this part in a realistic way (for example, warriors will die fastly if they are hit, not like AOE where they can be hit by dozens of arrows without dying) so as it will be important to manage armies correctly and avoid mass production and massive attack.

On the whole less war thing,

I love wars in strategy games, so i may not be of much help. You should focus alot on a Politics side of the game were you can make, break alliances, marry out prinsess's, assinate enemy leaders (although if they find out it was you, ie the assasin got captured, then it makes the whole world shun you), have a tax system so you can tax and have revolts, and an extremely good trading system. Hmmmm I think it would help to have a military, but have it so it has a pop cap thats relativey small. And then make it were they die quikly, like in Cossacks: AOW. Good luck!

-CM

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I love wars in strategy games, so i may not be of much help. You should focus alot on a Politics side of the game were you can make, break alliances, marry out prinsess's, assinate enemy leaders (although if they find out it was you, ie the assasin got captured, then it makes the whole world shun you), have a tax system so you can tax and have revolts, and an extremely good trading system. Hmmmm I think it would help to have a military, but have it so it has a pop cap thats relativey small. And then make it were they die quikly, like in Cossacks: AOW. Good luck

Plenty of good and interesting ideas here :)
But for the moment I'm only making an indy game so I must not plan a too big game design, else I won't be able to build the game in less than 10 years :P

Thanks anyways !

Chman

lol yep