Discussion about game

[Igor Kulakov]

Although in september this year marks 10 years since the release of version 1.0 "Soldiers of Empires - 1", and despite the emergence of "Soldiers of Empires - 2", I decided not to close the project "Soldiers of Empires - 1." By the fall of 2012 scheduled release "Soldiers of Empires - 1" version 1.7 and the transfer of the shareware project "Soldiers of Empires - 1" to donationware
For those who do not know what it is, read here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donationware

[Khanti]

I hope you will NOT abandon SOE1. I still consider it as very nice game and still have it on my PC. You could publish new version with some better/fixed material.
Example:
1. Economy is too big. It's possible to build too many things (cars, horses, tanks, guns).
2. Economy. There should be random factor in production - should be not possible to increase production 1 tank per day (it should COST to increase factories capacities).
3. Units. There should be possible to disband a unit and get all its equipment/soldiers into pool.
4. Units. There should be possible to replace equipment in division and put into new one (example: replace T-34 with KV-2).
5. Units. Names for new units (like in SOE2).
6. AI manages elite reserves really bad, should be algorithm that only units of more than 60 exp are supplied by elites manpower.
7. AI. Better target to attacks?
8. DREAM. Aircrafts in SOE1?

Good job anyway and Good luck.

[trurle]

As i understand, for SOE1 developer produce only compatibility fixes (support of new screen resolutions and re-build for newer Windows versions).
No new features.

[Igor Kulakov]

I hope you will NOT abandon SOE1. I still consider it as very nice game and still have it on my PC. You could publish new version with some better/fixed material.
Example:
1. Economy is too big. It's possible to build too many things (cars, horses, tanks, guns).
2. Economy. There should be random factor in production - should be not possible to increase production 1 tank per day (it should COST to increase factories capacities).
3. Units. There should be possible to disband a unit and get all its equipment/soldiers into pool.
4. Units. There should be possible to replace equipment in division and put into new one (example: replace T-34 with KV-2).
5. Units. Names for new units (like in SOE2).
6. AI manages elite reserves really bad, should be algorithm that only units of more than 60 exp are supplied by elites manpower.
7. AI. Better target to attacks?
8. DREAM. Aircrafts in SOE1?

Good job anyway and Good luck.

Thanks for your opinion.
SOE-1 - first version - 2002 year. Now 2014. This is good and bad.
Unfortunately, I have no time alone while supporting the development of two large projects such as SoE1 and SoE2. Fact. Only SoE2 now. The main problem is that the income from SoE2 not allow me to do just game development. Any idea? (change shareware model to donate system, etc...? ) If there are interesting ideas, allowing me to give up other work and focus on developing SoE1/2, ready to hear them. (8 hours for SoE2 better than the current 1 hour a day? )
Three months ago, I quit my last job (software developer in http://www.prognoz.ru/company ) and doing now, as before, a freelancer. In both cases, I can develop for SoE2 only 1 hour a day ((( No quit...

[Khanti]

SOE1 was a good game. I can still play it with pleasure. It was very comfortable with interface and FAST with AI turns. Good thing.
It was not completed anyway.

SOE2 is nice when playing small scenarios. There are errors in scenarios but they are fully playable.
But main feature of SOE2 is monster super scenario. I remember it in beta version: it took HOURS to wait for AI turn. UNPLAYABLE.
Now I use 1.3 version and it takes 30 minutes on my computer for AI to play all countries.

I tested it as Australia. AI needs 5 minutes for USSR, USA, UK, Germany, Japan (that some 25 minutes). All other countries takes 6-8 minutes.
That's better but NOT ENOUGH.

People from the west (USA, western Europe) will not play a game when they need to wait 30 minutes for a turn. You want to sell the game, you need fast AI processing. There is no other way for them to buy it.

My PC is: Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-3220 CPU @ 3.30GHz Windows XP Memory (RAM):3564 MB and the game needs those 30 minutes and not run in background (when alt-tabed). 30 minutes on screen when I can't do other work while waiting?

2.
How to reduce AI time? Maybe change game scale.
Some scenarios are small and plays well with regiments/battalions.
Big scenarios does not play well with small units. MG battalions are useless in divisional fighting. Even regiments are useless against divisions. Try it in Kursk scenario: attack Soviet inf divisions with German rifle regiments Wonderful experience.
So limit unit scale in super scenario to divisional level (plus some special units like engineers). Less units on map = less time processing?

If you could make it to less than 10 minutes, it could be possible to find more customers.

Remember how was SOE1 - very fast, reliable, easy to manage. In SOE2 I can't find my troops on map (no mini-map to click on it and the world is HUGE). After AI turn I don't know WHERE I lost troops and how many (need to manually write last turn casualties!). That some things that could be improved, maybe?

[trurle]

The problem with too long AI turn is 2-hand:
1) I suspect developer use O(2)-class artificial intelligence algorithms (nonsense for super-scenario)
2) Developer do not cooperate in AI algorithms development. I`d like to fix, but can not.

Actually i am now more concerned with reduction of workload in human`s turn. With advanced country (Britain or Germany) human turn takes about 2 hours.

[Igor Kulakov]

about turn AI in the super-scenario. I can still significantly reduce the time required, slightly ignoring historical accuracy in question is true dislocation units (attach closely spaced)