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Mark_Everson
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Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
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The new economy and military models are not quite up to the standards of being a real game yet, but are sufficiently nuanced that people can play with the two models and say what they like and don't like. We will also have the government/social model code that F. Smith did last summer integrated into demo 5 thanks to Gary. I think that's about all we can reasonably shoot for in demo 5. The main limitation at present is GUI stuff. One was kind enough to take over the GUI coding from me, and is currently working on getting the task force box implemented. The TF box shows the composition of every task force in a square, and is basically a steal of the implementation I had in demo 4  . After that will come a crude movement manager that cycles through task forces, and enough of a mouse handler to allow the player to select the task force they want to be active. When this is ready the player will be able to create task forces from different units, and move the task forces to attack stationary enemy forces, and see the outcome of the battles.
I have enough simple GUI elements for the Econ model that I think I'm ready for demo 5. What is there allows allocation of economic resources to build military units and economic infrastructure. The player can see the effects of taxation on overall growth rate, and the effects of any investments they might make on productivity in certain economic sectors. The player can issue orders and see the results at any level of the economy from the whole civilization down to an individual map square.
Laurent is working out what the player will see when a battle gets fought. Right now he has the test method for combat putting a lot of information out to a file, and he's going to trim the information down so it doesn't overload people.
Technology is a bit of a wild-card for demo 5. If things work out fairly smoothly then I' m pretty sure I'll be able to use technology in the Econ model as I've been discussing in the technology thread. But all that will take time, and may not be ready before the rest of demo 5 is. Whenever the limited GUI stuff that's required for a minimal demo 5 is available, I will put out at least a preview version almost immediately. So I guess the status with technology is "we'll see". But if it doesn't make it into demo five, I will try to release a demo with at least limited technological functionality as soon as practical.
Sorry this has taken so long, everybody! Switching to the new architecture has set things back much more than I thought would be the case. But the switch will pay big benefits in the long run. At this point I'm not going to make any more predictions as to when demo 5 will be out... It will be out when it's out, but hopefully soon.
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19-04-2001 04:49
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