Breakdown- moving through stages.

If that works that would be great. I'm just worried that we might have too much stuff going on for the computer handle without lagging and stuff.

Inca wrote:

If that works that would be great. I'm just worried that we might have too much stuff going on for the computer handle without lagging and stuff.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that separating the game into multiple parts would make it any faster.

Howewer, computers will surely advance more when we relase game. Just look how before only 20 years, games with more than megabyte were like humongous, or there were only flopy disks, so we would need to use several of them.

Well, I don't remember any Indie game having a disc, and since Thrive is an Indie game, the only limit is how much content we can fit within the download files.

So the game would be able to run everything all at once? I don't know, but wouldn't this be too intensive for the computer? If not, then we're ok.

Everything? It will run whatever it has to run, and no more. I dont get how spliting it would make it work any better at all.

Inca wrote:

So the game would be able to run everything all at once?

I believe you may have a wrong conception of how the program will work. For each gameplay stage, we only run what's necessary for this particular stage. When the player is in the microbe stage, there's no need to simulate anything from the creature stage. Once the player is done with the microbe stage and advances, we more or less "throw away" the microbe stage stuff and switch to the next stage. So no, we don't run everything all at once. It's too early to estimate the minimum system requirements, but rest assured that Thrive will not need a high-end machine to run.

Ok fair enough. Thats ok then.

I just started going through the site, wouldn't make sense to break up some of the stages or at-least create substages within each stage? The substages would be slightly different depending on the evolutionary process of the organism from simple organism to Space-faring Civilization.

Some examples:
1. Microbe stage -Definition: contains the use of an evolving single-celled organism)

2. Multcellular stage -Definition: contains the use of a simple cellular organism evolving into a more complex multicelled organism like the bilaterians (worm, slug like creatures from before the Cambrian era)

3. Aware Stage - Definition: Period in which a simple organism evolves into a complex organism with the needed intelligence to become sentient.
Substages:
Aquatic Stage -Definition: Simple organism evolves into a diverse creature recognized as a member of major animal phyla and is able to satisfactory prey on and defend itself from other species without being preyed on into extinction.
Emergence/Amphibious Stage - Definition: The successive and successful evolution of an aquatic organism into a land-based animal
Terran/Dominance Stage - Definition: The period in which an organism gains the physical and mental capabilities needed to become sentient
4. Awakening Stage - The beginnings of sentient culture as tribes
Substages:
Hunter, Gather/Nomadic Stage -Definition: Sentient beings use simple tools, relies on the environment for the majority of its success, and lives in family groups
Village Stage - Definition: Sentient beings build a small village, use more complex tools, and live in larger groups

And so on

No, because the player can reach the awakening stage without going from water to land. Geography shouldnt even be concerned with the stages. Stage breaks are only at points where the game changes drastically. Thats why nomadicism and settlement are both under Awakening. What's more, we already have plenty of stages, it's a bad idea to try to add more.

I'm not trying to add more stages just substages, or at-least objectives to help move the game along.
In the Age of Empires series, each game worked within a time period or stage and then advanced through substages until reaching the threshold, in which then came the next game which basically continued on from the previous stage.
In Spore you had to fill a meter which was split into parts, once you completed a part of the meter, the creatures' brains were increased and they gained additional objectives. The substages would basically be the points of the meter. In The Awakening Stage you starts as nomads once you've completed enough objectives, ding ding your brain increases new technologies open up, and you choose a location for a village and it goes on from there.

If there's a way to look at the history of a player's organism, the substages could be used as reference points for the player to look through different stages, instead of spore in which you had to go through everything and only when you weren't about to go to the next stage.

Stages, substages, sub-sub-stages, call them whatever you want they are still more divisions. The player is free to name parts of their history however they want, but the official 7 stages are good as they are. Age of Empires used discrete game ages, as did Spore, except with stages. Those are both unlike Thrive. Stage transitions are nominal, and its the gradual transition that counts.

All right, you are basically the boss after all, my inspiration came from the fact that Earth is divided into Eras, which is divided into Periods, which are then divided into Events. And I thought it would work in a similar way with Thrive.

However, you mentioned that the players could divide the events in the game themselves under these parameters, does that have any significant with the game's organisms development as a culture or merely a way for players to divide the game for reference do to the varying times in each stage?

As a mod I can move threads and merge them, fancy stuff like that, but it doesn't make my word the only word on matters of gameplay or concept.

Since periods of history are entirely a human invention and up to the people who create them, it will be the same in Thrive. The player will have a timeline of their species from when they first became a tribe, and on that timeline they will be able to highlight periods into "Ages". They will also be able to place markers for historical events.

Ah, thank you, that clarifies it up then.

NickTheNick wrote:

As a mod I can move threads and merge them, fancy stuff like that, but it doesn't make my word the only word on matters of gameplay or concept.

Since periods of history are entirely a human invention and up to the people who create them, it will be the same in Thrive. The player will have a timeline of their species from when they first became a tribe, and on that timeline they will be able to highlight periods into "Ages". They will also be able to place markers for historical events.

For ideas for ages of technology and such.

Since other creatures are going to evolve in the Auto evolve concept. I got the crazy idea that once you become a Sentient species and create your own tribe you go to war with other races. BUT PLOT TWIST. Image if you just became sentient, but this other race of species became sentient before you became . So its an alien version of the Romans vs the Barbarian Germans in gaul. Or the Spanish conquers vs the Aztecs. Or hell the movie Avatar.

Or it can be the other way around.

But still i like the idea that you can lead massive barbarian invasions against more civilized people. Like spamming thousands of tribesmen to invade a city of another advanced species.

This has been discussed a few times. WE still want the player to have a chance, so we bar sentience until the player gets it. But once the player gets it, there is a chance other species will reach sentience the same time as you...(its a programming restriction), I'm pretty sure this was agreed on when I brought this up when i started.....Not sure though.

I dunno, not trying to start an argument, just trying to contribute.

I think I heard on the misc. thread since I joined that it had something to do with settings, like you could enable other species to gain sentience/sapience before the player. Either that or it was tied into the difficulty, harder difficulty meant another species could get to higher stages before you.

Either that or it could happen anyway, not sure.

No it was never an option for other species to become intelligent before you, because it would mean it one day they would go from stone age hunters to landing on other planets. It would be literally impossible for a player to catch up, because the timescales are so dramatically different.

NickTheNick wrote:

No it was never an option for other species to become intelligent before you, because it would mean it one day they would go from stone age hunters to landing on other planets. It would be literally impossible for a player to catch up, because the timescales are so dramatically different.

I agree with you there, but it should still be possible for another species to gain sentience at the same time as the player. once you reach the awakening stage another species could come up and as time goes by you could develop civilizations and explore the planet together,and maybe even go into space together! or you could wipe them out early and develop like they never existed.