GC Discussion

@ Ankaar Awesome post.

@Blue: I was interested in doing that myself. At this point I`m considering just making a new game.

yawn . . . Someone just email me when Stephen is ready to sell this game for a reasonable price \**/

There are a lot of suggestions like my previous one - NPC`s, infra stuff, etc. I think I saw daily rewards for logging in 5,6,7 days in a row etc. I have to admit, in some phone apps I play, thats DEFINITELY something that keeps me logging in daily.

Something else is rotating events. I realize GC has sort of it`s own events if people are doing UW`s. Thats a nice global event. But I thinkit would be great if we had some Kalzul or other invasion type events. Schedule them regularly and just let them be automatic - they can function like NPC`s or they can be staff controlled accounts, doesnt really matter. Automatic seems easier and less dependant on peoples schedules though.

Game should be able to keep track of PR damage done and players should get rewards for amount of damage done, just give tiered rewards for attackers.

So the player has stayed, theyve gone through some missions and have a basic understanding of the game. But terran seems very vanilla - Marauder seems cool! Maybe I should restart.

Oh but the weeks worth of infrastructure research I put into this is for nothing huh...Im bored with terran but I dont feel like having literally everything go to waste...What do I do? I think a lot probably quit due to this. I know Ive quit multiple times due to GC giving you a blank slate upon restarting.

I know in the past I was against this, but I really do think allowing players to carry over some infrastructure levels would be beneficial. UC allows you to carry over all. That is one option - but I think we could just as easily say no more than x levels can be carried over, or we could say 50% or some % of levels gets carried over. Either way, I think once boredom kicks in a restart can certainly help, but the thought of losing a lot of time invested is really a pretty ugly thought.

NPC`s were cool when introduced, but very quickly I felt like they became pretty difficult to beat without a lucky spam. There was something about them having a higher than listed PR after taking a few losses or something? a range of +/- 30% or something? I wasnt a huge fan of this. I felt like they were introduced in part to give new collective or maru something to hit with low player count, and sure we dont want it to always be free wins but without the ability to recon them with a soft hit, its a spamming / guessing game to win especially at lower pr`s.

---Second Impression---
Ok, so the game caught my attention. Now what do I do?

The missions are not great, and not every race has them. Actually, before the missions, is there a way to let new players choose any of the three races? Why force everyone to go terran? At least offer both explorable, terran or miner?

Anyways, the missions I think often tell you to do things that can inhibit players. For instance, do terran missions tell you to go commercial? Thats a very meh income source. Certainly easy for a new player to grasp, but as is, its not good. Theyre going to be pretty poor for a long time if they follow that advice.

Lets make sure all races have missions, that the missions they do have actually benefit them, and the missions are engaging. These mission screens would be a great place to have some graphics that the game otherwise lacks that can allow players to enmesh themselves more into the game - maybe pictures of the alien races, space battles, etc, whatever the missions are really dictating here.

A tutorial is also a great idea. The missions really SHOULD act as a tutorial - I dont want something that outright forces me to do x and y for the first hour of gameplay. If the missions are engaging, if players KNOW they should be doing missions early on and theyre getting solid benefits out of them, then they will do them and they should learn a lot of basics from them.

---First Impressions---
We could send the link to this game to every person on the planet. If they all clicked it, I think the result would be only a very small number actually staying. Why? The game looks old as dirt. We get very few clicks to the game, so I think it is important to maximize the % who click and then continue playing.

*Some Graphics
We dont need to make this a full on graphical game. I dont even think we need any animated graphics. Images of ships while researching or building, some better images of planets maybe, the exploration page could have a star trek or star wars esque lightspeed travel sort of image. If nothing else, the very black background doesnt look great. Its an extremely boring game to look at and if I hadnt got myself addicted back when 70% of games looked like this, there is no way Id still be here 10+ years later.

With graphics though you can always have an option that players can turn off most graphics and have the game look like this as it is now, if theyd like.

A few of you may have seen UC`s high graphics option? I think that would be an amazing improvement. UC had it in a separate window I assume because Stephen is either an not-smart or requirements at the time of creation made it easier, but that high graphics type mode can easily be done in a browser tab. idk, I think the brighter look is definitely great - only reason I didnt typically use it is because I couldnt have multiple tabs open, which as mentioned is something I think that can be easily done in the browser nowadays.

@Knight: More infra levels gained only by combat may stimulate people to attack in late game. As has already been mentioned though, that really only caters to much older players. I think more is needed for the endgame (and in every part of the game) to really get GC moving again.

I disagree with adding more infra, it will cause more people to leave than to join. we are trying to bring in new players, not satisfy the old ones.

let us post RM at 0 to encourage goods

once you hit 255 infra, you should gain 1 infra for every 250 to 500 battles won over 2 planets( not including npcs) upto a max infra for 325 (does not count current wins only wins gained after max infra)

@Spartan: I sent you a message! It will be easier to talk about that there. I think that it would be manageable to create a game like GC without it being GC.

Well I would like to see the new races come out, but I remeber long time ago, I think it was 2009 that if nothing major happen The Kalzul would appear and try to UW, I would like to see that come back, And Also I think If NPCs are left alone to long, they could have ability to UW.

@ TheRemnant oh yes thank you for your long post. All good points & ideas.

@FISTFUL email blast me to remind me the reason i left GC is because GC is dying & nothing new happens & no serious updates. I`d probably leave again & throw GC to spam mail the reminder of my life possibly to not remind me of how depressing GC has gotten.

@ TheRemnat, whats the legal ascpet of copying and the game or making something similar? If so i`ll be glad to make the new game lmao.

@ Everyone new game features ideas always welcome. Lets spin life into GC.

Is it possible to make a very similar game, but one where the admins (then devs) can actually get compensation for what they do, and the game can be more effectively improved? If it were still "GC" at the core, would people be willing to play that?

@FISTFUL: That would be good! We just need to make sure they have something they want to come back to. If they left, there`s probably a reason they haven`t come back.

@Mirazatha: That sounds terrifying, haha!

something i always thought would be cool would be if you could cluster u.types together to make like a cluster large or a cluster fertile

I just thought of a great idea! Why not use Admin power to email blast all old players - anyone who has ever played this game to get them to come back and remind them GC is still alive and exists. Rekindle that old flame :)

By newbies I mean people who already play, but don`t get active in the ranks and just sign on to explore a couple planets then leave.