An Introduction To Uber's New Director of Production, Focusing on PA

Welcome !
Hope all will be well !

nice to have one more GPG veteran here .. welcome!

Good to see more energy put into PA.

I´ve got a feeling somebody will restart asking for shields or (unlimited) experimentals now...

Anyways, good to see the team growing!

I've got a feeling that everyone's going to be re-pitching their pet feature suggestions

(And on a related note; you should totally look into implementing better terrain features, especially continuous cliffs. )

Thats a good idea. I like shields.

I wonder how the new pathing in the PTE will work with your cliffs? They are cool, but tended to freak out with masses of units trying to path them.

somebody try it :> I love the screens of that cliff mod.

Dear God what have you started

I know a game they can kickstart if they want experimentals or maybe shields.

Really? My mind's gone blank. I really can't think what you mean.

Welcome, enjoy your stay.

welcome, can't applaud enough this management decision

Uber guys, PLEASE CONSIDER KICKSTARTING PLANETARY ANNIHILATION EXPANSION PACKS AND/OR SEQUELS. PA is 1000 times the game HR could never hope to be. Flat maps and "hundreds" of units are the past -- PA is the future. Thanks for reading and godspeed.

I actually wondered myself why they would not kickstart a PA addon instead. Maybe they're trying to go for more diversity, that's a good thing to do usually.

I agree, but only if they don't lose track of their priorities, which should always remain PA. At best, I see HR as Uber's Colonization (the Microprose/Firaxis game) -- a nice side-adventure to the main effort that should be PA. But does Uber see it the same way? Before this announcement I wasn't sure.

It does not have to be a sideadvnture. If they have grown enough to have 2 main adventures I am all for it. These guys make good RTS basically, so let them make more.

It's hard to explain what I mean by side-adventure without talking about my theory of games/art. In short, complexity defines progression, and PA/Civilization are by their nature an order of magnitude more complex than HR/Colonization, hence why they are so much more successful and have such a greater future ahead of them. And hence why the companies that make them should prioritize them. Firaxis realizes this, and I hope Uber does too, or will eventually do so.

To be more precise, everything that's going into HR would have been MUCH more effective it if went into PA instead. Extra factions, ravaged cityscapes, native populations, cool graphical effects, more art, more music, etc. It's like having a Ferrari and a Ford Fiesta and spending all your money adding leather seats, custom wheels, etc. to the Ford Fiesta. Maybe this somehow makes more sense from a business perspective (easier sales of inferior products to poor people), but artistically it's almost a crime.

I think it would easily be far too complex for one game. By going for a new game, they have more gameplay and art freedom.