Advanced start

[Esoteric Rogue]

from http://www.capitalismlab.com/forum/view ... =14&t=1092

Prelude
Are any of us business men in real life? Or any kind of self-employment, really. When's the last time you started up a business without any significant competition?

I highly prefer scenario play. I like being thrust into a developed industrial market and being asked to start a business. In fact, the old Capitalism tutorials trained us to play that way.

What industry should I choose? Obviously, one that I can afford, dependent on availability of resources. But more so, the one that lacks major competition.

The way the game is now, that never happens. When you start a game, you have no major competition. You can't even buy a frozen chicken or lumber. It's silly. Sure, there's nothing wrong with a sandbox game affording the player every opportunity. But for me, a brand new game feels like an empty sandbox. Me, in a sandbox, all alone, waiting for friends to play with.

Sure if I wait a few months, things will start happening. Down right interesting things after a few years...

Presenting the Advanced Start
I would like something of a new game mode. I would like to start a new game, but have the game run itself for n years before my company is founded. The point here is to give the competitors a chance to become established. The successful CEO would have to investigate which is the best industry to crack into. I feel this will create a sort of scenario-like feel. [e.g., Your competitors are busy cranking out the cars and laptops, but nobody has wheat yet!] The already established businesses would make the challenge feel more real to me. It's a sad truth that in the real world, if you want to start a new corporate empire, everybody else already has a head start! [n.b., I'm not actually interested in advancing the start-year, but I do mean, for-instance, start the AI at 1980, let them run to 1990, and then I'll start playing.]

I have a hunch that is essentially how half of the Cap2 scenarios were created, and it facilitates us creating challenges for CapLab.

I might suggest anywhere from 1 to 100 years. Should have a progress indicator. Should start paused, because we would like to start it, go to the bathroom, grab a snack and coffee, and then comeback, because it will take a while even at speed 5. (N.B. Although, all computer run much fast when they're not updating the screen.) Should autosave itself as start#00001 or whatever (another suggestion I have to add? everygame should do that, so that retrying is an automatic option. every game has "challenge" potential. But sometimes we forget to manually save for that purpose.)

Have fun!

[WilliamMGary]

Should be an option in custom game.

+1

[David]

1) How would you suggest about the visual indicator to be displayed on the screen telling the user that the game is now in AI Advanced Start mode and the player is not allowed to perform any actions?

How would you suggest about the above display so that the user will not get confused?

2) Will the player be able to view reports in the information center in the Advanced Start period or the player should be completely banned from doing anything? And there is just a window showing the game time passing? The game will run faster if it doesn't have to respond to player action and display nothing else other than just a window showing the time. In other words, the actual time the player need to wait for AI Advanced Start period will be shorter if there is only a fixed window.

Another solution is to add a new game speed mode called "Ultra Fast" which is basically just displaying a window showing the time and the game screen will not update, as described above. And the players can choose the game speed they want during the AI Advanced Start period. If the player chooses Ultra Fast, it will run the fastest, but there is no way to observe the game world. The player may also choose Fast (hot key: 5) with the ability to view reports and observe the AI while waiting for the AI Advanced Start period to complete.

[Esoteric Rogue]

1) How would you suggest about the visual indicator to be displayed on the screen telling the user that the game is now in AI Advanced Start mode and the player is not allowed to perform any actions?

That seem pretty straight-forward. A standard message box intuitively indicates you can only cancel until progess is conplete at which point continuing is enabled. My first attempt would be just using a simple message box and countdown.

Details:

After the player sets the number of years to Advanced and clicks on 'start',
Black out the screen (or whatever... put CapLab logo and maybe some background for decoration.) Pop up any version of a progress indicator. No application input can be taken except clicking the little 'x' in the corner which can return you to the previous new game options screen. (add full "cancel" button if you'd like),

Typical and sufficient is 1-100% progress bar that would refresh it's progress each month. Personally I'd choose a "number of months" countdown.

Code: Select all

Advancing competition:
Months Remaining: 120
Months Remaining: 119
Months Remaining: 118
...
Months Remaining: 3
Months Remaining: 2
Months Remaining: 1
Saving game0003.sav...
Ready! Click start to begin!

[/size]
We autosave & pause to accommodate the player being away from keyboard. Pause can be any old comfirmation "Ready! Click start to begin!" or just set game speed to zero.

Then switch the screen to typical game map view and commence play in the players chosen start year (as normal: 1990 or 2000)!

[Esoteric Rogue]

2) Will the player be able to view reports in the information center in the Advanced Start period or the player should be completely banned from doing anything? And there is just a window showing the game time passing? The game will run faster if it doesn't have to respond to player action and display nothing else other than just a window showing the time. In other words, the actual time the player need to wait for AI Advanced Start period will be shorter if there is only a fixed window.

Another solution is to add a new game speed mode called "Ultra Fast" which is basically just displaying a window showing the time and the game screen will not update, as described above. And the players can choose the game speed they want during the AI Advanced Start period. If the player chooses Ultra Fast, it will run the fastest, but there is no way to observe the game world. The player may also choose Fast (hot key: 5) with the ability to view reports and observe the AI while waiting for the AI Advanced Start period to complete.

Yea, just do minimal progress display and no reports. The idea is only to advance time in order to start the game, rather than focus on reporting the simulation details. Best is to do it quickly by displaying simple progress.

I personally wouldn't bother with an ultra speed unless someone had specific request like their Android can't run it fast enough at speed 5. It does help for "testing" but not really for playing. (Reminds me of FAST mode on the zx81 .. no need to go that far )