28-12-2004 17:06									#1
	SMAC Homepage discontinued? Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

SMAC Homepage

I used to check it from time to time because of faction profiles, but lately I noticed that it is unavailable, however Firaxis pages give link to it and do not mention anything about discontinuing maintance of the page in the news for the last few months. Have I missed something or this is just the level of their disregard for the SMAC community?

	28-12-2004 18:22									#2
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

It's just the level of disregard for the SMAC community. The game is five years old, and they'll aim for a different target public for Civ4, so why care about us?

	28-12-2004 18:43									#3
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Looks like it's gone. Google has a cache of the page dated 12/17/04. Also gone is the Firaxis page with SMAC/SMAX patches.

	28-12-2004 18:51									#4
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

booo !!! nows a good time to zip and email myself the patch then before i need it again.

cheap, lousy firaxis why do you taunt us so !

	28-12-2004 19:57									#5
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It would be nice if they could release smac/smacx source code, so that the community could correct bugs and improve the game.
Maybe if the community could organize itself to make some preassure to firaxis regarding that issue.

	29-12-2004 02:46									#6
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

People have been saying that for many years, unfortunately firaxis doesn't care.

	29-12-2004 02:59									#7
	Increase the size of your Attachments

the smac community needs to look to the future. civ4 will be very modable. we as a community should get started on a 'return to alpha centauri' project

	29-12-2004 17:14									#8
	Put an end to popups!

Even if it is very modable, I don't think it will feature a design workshop, special abilities or SE settings (except for gov).

	29-12-2004 20:53									#9
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quote: Originally posted by Lazerus People have been saying that for many years, unfortunately firaxis doesn't care.

Shakespeare was considered mediocrer at best during his life time. Give it time. If Firaxis decides they are too big to deal with a five year old game, some one will come around to buy it from them and do the right thing.

I have a feeling they are going to try to lure us to Civ4 with an advanced feature set. They can't just make a new copy of Civ3 and expect good sales. They are going to have to bring something new to the table.

	29-12-2004 23:40									#10
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Well, SMAC is still being repackaged with various sets so it can't really have it's source code released. SMACX isn't unfortunantly though. Not sure why, you wouldn't think the licensing would be that much more.

	30-12-2004 00:15									#11
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

If it is still being repackeged, why there are no new patches? Everybody knows that there are many bugs left. Why its page has been discontinued? Why the patches are no longer available for download?

	30-12-2004 02:50									#12
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

There aren't many bugs left. You can play through the entire game multiple times without crashes or problems. Yes, there are problems still, but really nothing serious.

And you can still find the patches online. Right here: http://www.avault.com/pcrl/patches_temp.asp?patch=smac for example. Took me less than a minute to bring up and this is on dialup. Things aren't as horrible as you make them out to be.

	30-12-2004 05:50									#13
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It's the end of an era

	31-12-2004 23:23									#14
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SMAC will never die!!!

	01-01-2005 00:57									#15
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

And Gamespot still has decent coverage (with all the downlaod patches):

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy...salphacentauri/

And a readable strategy guide and scenario/map designer help:

http://www.gamespot.com/features/alpha/

	01-01-2005 04:22									#16
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Drat...so we've lost all the psych profiles of the faction leaders?

	01-01-2005 08:48									#17
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quote: Originally posted by Clear Skies Drat...so we've lost all the psych profiles of the faction leaders?

Not at all. You can still get them at Apolyton itself

Here's a cut from that page with the 7 SMAX factions, profiles, etc. The 7 SMAC ones will be on the smac page

(EDIT: Apologies - for SMAX, only the Angels and Cyborgs full data is there - the other refer you to the now extinct official Firaxis pages)

	01-01-2005 11:30									#18
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Well, it was either now or later. Ah, but what's the difference. Either way, Firaxis is still more screwed up than the U.S. government and the UN combined...

	02-01-2005 14:45									#19
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

I think we better try to recover the page of SMAC. Anyone who has anything what was there previously better make an archive copy of it - patches, data files, graphics, etc.

	02-01-2005 15:17									#20
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

You could try pulling up Google's caches of the pages, if you know what to look for.

	02-01-2005 15:29									#21
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quote: Originally posted by Clear Skies Drat...so we've lost all the psych profiles of the faction leaders?

Do you know how I realised this page was gone?
I am for last few weeks trying to make a comprehensive alternative history data that describes 21st century, collapses, events and faction leader backgrounds that lead to UNS Unity. I used heavy faction profiles and GURPS Alpha Centauri handbook for this and I managed to complete a canon base of the project, thus completing stage one of my project. For use, I saved most of faction profiles from Firaxis page some time ago as webpages for easy reference. I was checking my data last week and decided to check on SMAC homepage faction profiles to see if I got anything wrong - this is when I found that profiles and whole page is unavailable.
Thus said, I have most of original faction profile pages, but not all - this is why I went to see SMAC page after some time and realised its maintance was discontinued. I have original profiles for Aki, Corazon, Domai, Deirdre, Nwabudike, Zakharov, Yang, Roze, Miriam and Svensgard. I don't have progenitor profiles, nor Lal's or Cha Dawn's, but this doesn't matter, since faction profiles from GURPS handbook include far more data on faction leaders as well as those given in original SMAC faction profiles.

	02-01-2005 15:30									#22
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Notice that most all wallpapers, some bonus scenarios and concept art are probably lost too.

If anyone is interested in faction profiles, I will be able to publish them as part of my fiction project in fiction forum in a week or maybe two, complete with graphics, quotes, and all available knowledge about them from both faction profiles from manual, game datalinks, GURPS handbook and firaxis profiles.

	02-01-2005 18:28									#23
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

I checked on archive.org and they have a backup from February 2004. Look here.

It's not very fast and some images seem to be missing, but it's something.

Shall we annoy Firaxis into getting the site back?

	02-01-2005 18:31									#24
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I've already mailed Firaxis asking what happened, will they get it back and ask them to get it back No response yet.

	02-01-2005 22:38									#25
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

How about all sending mails to Firaxis?

	02-01-2005 23:29									#26
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quote: Originally posted by Earthling7 I checked on archive.org and they have a backup from February 2004. Look here. It's not very fast and some images seem to be missing, but it's something. Shall we annoy Firaxis into getting the site back?

Let's make a bargain with Firaxis...

We tell they they don't have to bother with "wasting" server space for SMAC...

BUT, they give us the source code.....

I wish

	03-01-2005 04:25									#27
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Originally posted by Lord Nword BUT, they give us the source code: I wish

Maybe not so fanciful

Sid is writing Civ IV with a new game engine, so maybe the old Civ/civII/smac/x and civ III code is now expendable .......

	03-01-2005 08:34									#28
	Put an end to popups!

We could black mail them...

"Yo, Firaxis, put your site back up or will fry your server by sending too much mail..."

	03-01-2005 14:38									#29
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Greetings. Please accept our apologies for the difficulties you are having accessing the SMAC site; we have not purposefully discontinued fan access or its maintenance. Launch of our new corporate site seems to have created this temporary glitch. Every attempt will be made to restore SMAC access as soon as possible as we are committed to supporting the SMAC fan community. Give us a few days, and then feel free to contact me if you have additional questions. Again, sorry for the difficulty. Deborah Briggs Director, Community and Corporate Development FIRAXIS GAMES 410-891-3001 x 193

I got reply. They still haven't forgotten us after all. However they claim to be dedicated to supporting SMAC community. Why don't we make a petition to release the source code or start a sequel if they are really dedicated to this community?

	03-01-2005 15:31									#30
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Why would they release the source code if there are still fresh copies of SMAC being released?