frozen_swe
Squire
posted 01-15-11 09:00 AM
CT (US)
1 / 1201
You can find pictures of it on the forums if you search.
ES_MattP
VIP
posted 01-15-11 05:43 PM
CT (US)
4 / 1201
I just added some (1998) AoK pre-release screenshots (along with a couple shots from the Stratos demo) to my facebook page. I should post them here when I get a chance.
At one time town Centers were 5x5 and then 8x8 tiles in size. Castles were 8x8 tiles for a while also.
maximusSVK
Squire
posted 01-15-11 06:00 PM
CT (US)
6 / 1201
I was impressed too. 11
Btw, It would be nice if u could post them here. 8x8 TC rofl want to see
ES_MattP
VIP
posted 01-15-11 07:11 PM
CT (US)
7 / 1201
Basse > Seriously? Someone from ES still bothers about this game?
More than you realize...
ELiTE TEUTONiC
Squire
posted 01-15-11 11:20 PM
CT (US)
8 / 1201
I have found my pile of old PC magazines, but it's going to take some time to go through them all...
ELiTE TEUTONiC
Squire
posted 01-16-11 00:10 AM
CT (US)
10 / 1201
ES_MattP I thought Ensemble Studios had been disbanded?
ES_MattP
VIP
posted 01-16-11 02:44 AM
CT (US)
11 / 1201
ELiTE TEUTONiC> ES_MattP I thought Ensemble Studios had been disbanded?
It was. Quite the sad story of its demise.
Myself, I had left ES in late 2004, though I'm still in the business at another game developer these days.
I've got some spare time for a while, and I'm looking to see and learn about all the things people have done to mod and extend the Genie engine games.
The genie engine has always held a special place in my heart, as I wrote (coded) a good chunk of it (perhaps more than anyone except for ES_Deperado if you count the tools I wrote). I still remember it, and the development years, in great detail.
All of the final patches for AoE, RoR, AoK and AoC were done almost entirely by me. Most everyone had moved on to AoM or G2 (the long suffering console/non-RTS game project, that eventually resulted in Halo Wars) but even then I felt more of a desire to serve the existing community with updates to the 2d games.
Perhaps I can give back a little in the form of information about the games and engine (like in the other forum where I just explained a bit about the technical details behind 255x255 tile limit).
It totally humbles me to see those games still sold at retail, and to see the community that still exists around them.
maximusSVK > Btw, It would be nice if u could post them here. 8x8 TC rofl want to see
I just went looking again, and realized that they were AoM images (when it was called RTS3, before the MS buyout). I do have a couple alpha/beta AoK images, but most are not very interesting. Is there a way I can upload them here, or do I need to get image hosting before I can imbed them in a post? I have another machine I can check for images, as well as some of the CDs sent to beta testers (but by that time, the graphics were close to final (if not already).
The 5x5 and 8x8 town centers were experimented with early during AoK's development (first half of 1998 I would say). Mark T was the designer then, and (if I remember correctly) for a little while we tried a gameplay style that had far fewer building, and more upgrades to the buildings themselves. That building dynamic didn't work as well, and the large flat areas needed for and around the large town centers caused issues with random map generation.
I also remember we had 8x8 castles for a while, and tried to make it where the units came visibly marching out of the castle gates. That just got in the way of things.
The color palette during that time (early 1998) was darker in tone than what we wound up with. In fact, Tony G (the studio boss), decided to brighten up the palette by 10% just a few days before our first release candidate. I had to convert all the existing graphics and internal tables (like the ICMs used to blend terrains) rather quickly to accommodate the change. When we added snow terrain to the conquerors, there weren't enough white-ish colors in the palette, and the palette got reworked and all the graphics re-converted.
Cheers all...
ELiTE TEUTONiC
Squire
posted 01-16-11 04:56 AM
CT (US)
12 / 1201
Thanks for the information, really gives us a good perspective.
From memory I think 0AD was meant to be a Age of Empires 2 mod? They aren't using the genie engine are they? I didn't think they were because they released all the code.
If you want to upload imageshack.us is very good for hosting images I have found.
Also, you obviously don't have to answer this because I realise you are/were probably contract bound why was Ensemble Studios disbanded, was it a financial issue or was there just no more projects to justify keeping them.
maximusSVK
Squire
posted 01-16-11 03:41 PM
CT (US)
18 / 1201
That snow is not so bad, at least it does not hurt my eyes. 11
dukla
Squire
posted 01-16-11 07:31 PM
CT (US)
21 / 1201
Can you comment on what changes were in the works for the patch that was being worked on? Was it a balance patch or a bugsfix patch?
Please say Huns CAs being more expensive.
ES_MattP
VIP
posted 01-17-11 04:27 AM
CT (US)
25 / 1201
Arktoc > I liked Koreans and Saracens changes.
Also we would need to solve wall problem.
What is the wall problem you refer to?