The Open Source Future
Submitted by John on Sun, 10/11/2009 - 12:38
This article originally appeared on The Next Generation blog at Simtropolis.com. If you're not familiar with Sim City 4, Cities XL, or the city sim genre of game, you can read some background for this article here.
It's beginning to look like Cities XL is going to be a major disappointment for all of us who were waiting for the next Sim City 4; I know a lot of you are still optimistic, but my personal opinion is that, succeed or fail, Cities XL will not be what we all hoped and believed it would be. So now, with our hopes dashed by three commercial releases and EA giving no indication that they will so much as lift a finger to make Sim City 5, where do we go next?
The basic responses have been:
- "Keep playing Sim City 4!"
- "Well, I guess I'll give Monte Cristo my money and hope for the best." OR "Guess I'll have to wait for 'them' to get it right next time."
- (kind of an adjunct to 1): "Maybe we can finally convince EA to release the Sim City 4 source so we can fix all its glaring limitations!"
- "There's lots of talent around here, lets get together and make our OWN game!"
And 5. "Heck with this, I'm off to play Tropico/Dragon Age/Puzzle Pirates/what have you."
Well, I guess 1 is an option for now, but for how long? Sim City 4 is still great but it's showing its age, and like it or not there's a limit to how far the old engine can be pushed. At some point this game will need to move into the future. As for 2? Well, frankly, I've been thrice burned, and neither Monte Cristo nor any developer has given me any reason to believe they will step up in the future. And in the end, there's a good reason: commercial studios need to make a profit, and making the game we want the traditional way, with all the depth and features that we've dreamed of, for such a niche group of players, is almost definitely not going to turn a profit. It's starting to look like it might eventually come to 5 unless we can pull off 3 or 4, and as for those:
WHY COMMERCIAL STUDIOS WILL NEVER OPEN THEIR CODE, OR AT LEAST NOT WHEN IT'S STILL USEFUL
This one doesn't take too long to figure out. Game companies put tons of money and development into writing games; a game like Sim City 4 represents countless man-hours of work and development cost. Even when a game is finished and done with, they can still reuse those nifty algorithms in the game's codebase and cut down on development time for their next title. Why would they want to give that away? They have nothing to gain and everything to lose; not only can they not sell any more copies (and they do still sell copies!) but all that valuable code would be sitting out there in the open waiting to be poached by a competitor. Would you want to just hand your core assets to a competitor and give him a free edge over you? Of course not, these are businesses, not charities, and getting the source code is a pipe dream.
Beyond that, even with the source in hand there would still be the fundamental limitations of Sim City 4. These go beyond some fan hotfix, they are issues with the core architecture (grid, no 3D, etc.); eventually there will have to be a new game, the next generation. Which brings us to 4...
WHY THE COMMUNITY WILL NEVER DEVELOP A GAME ON ITS OWN
Urbs Urbis, which started on the Simtropolis forums, was an early attempt at a community city sim. It has since been abandoned.
I don't mean to step on any toes here, or belittle the dedication of the people attempting this, but this is my honest opinion. In the first blush of optimism, it seems like a community-built, open source game would be the answer to all the prayers of gamers everywhere. "The community will add every feature I've ever dreamed of! And if I don't like it, I can just adjust the code to suit myself!" So, why aren't we knee-deep in amazing, evolving open source games? Well, writing a game is hard. REALLY hard. Game development is in fact one of the most complicated kinds of software development there is. The days when any guy in a garage could write a blockbuster game are gone; there is no way for that one guy to compete with experienced teams of software and graphic professionals working full time on the latest next-gen game. The same goes for a team of hobbyists, however enthusiastic: if it took 50 guys working 80 hour weeks at EA for three years to make something like Sim City 4, how can 4 or 5 people in different countries working nights and weekends accomplish the same? But don't take my word for it, just look at:
THE CURRENT STATE OF OSS GAMING
The evidence speaks for itself: Of the many things that threaten the profits of commercial game studios, OSS development isn't even a blip on the radar. Look around and you will basically see three kinds of OSS games: Fun, simple "casual" games, clones of existing classics, and projects that, while well-intentioned and maybe even good-quality are simply second-rate in a lot of areas when compared to top-tier commercial titles. Oh, and of course I forgot the fourth kind: pie-in-the-sky projects that begin and end their life as a single page on Sourceforge. That's not to in any way denigrate these or imply that they aren't good games in their own right (well, except that fourth kind, I'll go out on a limb and denigrate those,) but basically, (to my knowledge) there has never been a major, high-profile game release created on the open source model.
Nethack is a great game, but no one would call it graphically compelling.
Or course, there may be some breaking development I don't know about. But the fundamental reasons why open source doesn't make sense for lots of mainstream games are laid out pretty succinctly in this article written 5 years ago and haven't changed much:
To summarize what he says briefly (and correctly so, I think) open source makes no sense for blockbuster games like (his example) Doom 3: Users don't want to play a level over and over, add minor tweaks and improvements, and contribute to later enjoyment for others; once they've played it through they have no investment in making it better. What most gamers want is a polished, complete game out the door, which would be impossible for a team of hobbyist coders to put together on that level.
BUT (as should be screamingly obvious to all Sim City 4 players) what this article misses is that not all games are Doom 3, and
OPEN SOURCE DOES MAKES SENSE FOR SOME KINDS OF GAMES
What kind? Well, roughly speaking, games that don't have story, but instead focus on replay value... where constant small additions are desirable and useful... games like, oh, I don't know... Sim City! In this case, users don't mind seeing minor improvements add up as they play the game again and again; in fact, the incremental improvements become a reason for playing again: new buildings, new transit options, new features.
Again, the evidence bears this out: even on the six-year old Sim City 4 platform, there is still a vast reservoir of modding talent improving the game and adding more fun and replayability. And that's for a game whose source is still closed! Can you imagine what they could have done with access to the source code from day one? And that's just one of the hundreds of thriving mod communities out there! It is blatantly obvious that, given the right framework, a mod community is capable of great things.
So again, why has no open source game ever been able to harness this wellspring of creative input and make a groundbreaking game from scratch? Simply put, a modder needs something to mod. Anyone who's ever done a mod knows how easy it is to dream up some cool idea to improve a game and how hard it is to actually add it in to a game's functionality; and the gap between all those cool ideas and actually designing a new game from nothing is many orders of magnitude greater. Communities have shown that they have great power in contributing many small discrete improvements; but in game design the strengths of a mod community, namely diversity and large numbers, become weaknesses. It's hard enough to get people working together in the same company on the same page, never mind a widely distributed group of people who've often never even met. Designing a strong core game needs discipline, focus, teamwork, and singularity of vision, and these are hard elements to forge out of a massive and disparate fanbase.
So let's step back a second and look at the things that made Sim City 4 such a lasting success:
THE ELEMENTS OF A SUCCESSFUL GAME
I'd argue that the amazing success and longevity of Sim City 4 is due to four key factors:
1. Strong core gameplay: the game is deep and engaging but fun to play; it can be enjoyed on different levels by different people; and it offers endless replayability. Of course that's the hope for all games, but what's especially pertinent about this point is that Sim City 4 was all those things from day one. That the game has been improved vastly by the community is undeniable, but it's important to remember that there would be no community if there had been no Sim City 4 in the first place. But of course, Sim City 4 also had...
2. Moddability: This is the factor that's kept Sim City 4 from being another relic in the dustbin of gaming history. The ability for the community to add its own content has not only given us all the chance to enjoy seeing our own creations in-game, but has collectively enhanced enjoyment of the game for everyone. The fact that even with many aspects of Sim City 4 still closed the mod community had flourished so greatly is a testament to what the ability to add to, tweak, and create does for a game's longevity.
3. Innovation: I know it's a bit hard to remember now, but a lot of Sim City 4's features were wildly innovative at the time it came out. The idea of simulating individual paths for each Sim, for example, was frankly revolutionary. Would Sim City 4 have attracted so much attention, and built such a strong community, if it was only Sim City 3000 with slightly better graphics? I'm inclined to think not. New is not always good, but something that is just a rehash of the same formula is going to have very limited appeal.
4. Visual appeal: Yes, I know, games are not all about graphics, and the next generation of city builder doesn't have to be Crysis, but the pendulum swings both ways here. Even a fun game that is boring (or even ugly) visually is just not going to appeal to a lot of players. Who cares about appealing to a lot of players, you say? More players=larger community=more mods=better game. Sim City 4 was graphically stunning in its day and a lot of people have put in tremendous effort since then to make it even more so. And with something so aesthetically focused as a city builder, this is an important consideration. Let's face it, who doesn't like to have gorgeous screen shots of their city to show off? Think of how many hits you would get if you counted the number of times the phrase "eye candy" has been used on the Simtropolis forums over the years.
So which of these three can an open source model accommodate? I believe the answer is: all of 2, part of 4, and a small but important part of 1 and 3. Let me be more specific:
WHAT CAN AND CAN'T BE ACCOMPLISHED BY CROWDSOURCING
There is a lot that a wider community has to contribute to game development (before and after release). The most important things are:
New content/game assets: I'm sure this is obvious to everyone at Simtropolis, so no need to belabor the point. Let me just note that even outside of art assets like models and textures, modders on other games regularly produce high-quality scripts, storylines, and other kinds of content.
Fan repositories have literally thousands of custom game assets.
Incremental improvements: This could mean anything from optimizing code to run faster and smarter, to adding more diverse kinds of game decisions (think ordinances), to tweaking gameplay mechanics for appeal to a different style of play, to substantial improvements and the addition of new features (think NAM). Again, communities have shown that they will accomplish amazing things in this regard if you let them.
Beta testing: This is nothing new, commercial game companies have been, whether intentionally or not, gradually offloading this to the wider user base; it makes sense for them because they save money on QA, but although we may get indignant about that it is actually a necessary part of perfecting a game: Give it to as many people with as many different setups as possible and let them break it in ways you never expected (very annoying when you didn't volunteer to be a beta tester, though...).
Generating raw ideas: This is both the most powerful and the most treacherous thing a community can contribute. Gamers have a literally limitless number of ideas about how their favorite game could be improved, some of them inspired, many of them very, very stupid. (Again, not to demean anyone, I've come up with some incredibly idiotic suggestions myself over the years.) But if you can filter out the dross in this mountain of input, there is a veritable goldmine of brainstorming to be had. The past two years on the Cities XL boards demonstrate this perfectly. This is the main place the community can contribute to 1 and 3 above.
So where does the open source model fail? Well, there are several areas where implementing a purely open source approach is Herculean at best, impossible at worst.
Core architecture: As I mentioned before, a software project as complex as a game engine requires the careful balancing of a mind-bogglingly large number of different elements; there are literally an infinite amount of permutations in the way it can be put together. Unfortunately, as just about any forum on the internet demonstrates, there are roughly as many advocates for different ways of doing things as there are people. How do you get them to agree? Who gets to lead the project? Do you take a vote? Who gets to vote? How does the leader exercise any authority? A project of such magnitude needs decisions to be made, and it needs to be clear who will make them; anything else simply devolves into arguing and stalls progress indefinitely.
Even then: let's say some charismatic individual does become the de facto leader, and has a plan to make things happen. How does that leader compel anyone to do any work? How do you task volunteer programmers with completing work on a schedule? What if their work is garbage? It's not like you get to choose who will volunteer. What if parts of your "team" gets busy with something else, or just gets bored and drop out? While it's almost certain that many people will contribute to a project like this, there's no control over what, when, and how they will do it, all things that a real game designer needs to be able to count on.
Graphics Engine: If we want to use all that pretty art that people make for the game, their needs to be a framework to hang it on. This is the boring, unsexy side of nice graphics, and the people with the patience and talent to do it right are generally getting well paid for their work. To be sure, there are lots of very good quality open source graphics engines out there, but you still need someone with the knowhow to adapt that generic engine to the project at hand.
Design Consistency: This is an important and often overlooked aspect of making a polished and good-looking game. Lots of people can make a nice building, but unless there is some consistency in the design the result will look amateurish. What if one person's work is highly ornate, while someone else's is sleek and stylized, and yet another is colorful and cartoony? What if one person's house uses 20 polys and someone else's 200? What if one person shows glass with a blue gradient, and someone else uses transparency? Even if all are nice individually, when you put them alongside each other they will look awful.
This goes even more so for those too-often-forgotten art assets, the UI elements. Can you imagine a game where different menus had different fonts, or background colors? Even with less obvious variations than that, a disunified UI design will look sloppy and unprofessional. There must be centralized decisions about what the game is going to look like and what the guidelines for art assets will be, and then arbitration of what makes it into the release and what doesn't.
Quality Control: This is distinct from beta testing, and it needs to be done consistently and completely. You can't rely on volunteers to be rigorous enough in their attention to detail. Are the coders conforming to the standards set for the project (or, god help us, ARE their standards for the project?) Will they be forced to put in the time and effort necessary to make sure their code is playing nice with everyone else? Will they comment their work so that others can build on it without wasting days figuring out exactly how the code works in the first place? This is, again, a really unsexy part of the development process that is nevertheless vital, and good luck putting together a competent QA team from volunteers that has any authority to accomplish anything.
So with a rough idea of what we need, let's take stock of the situation:
WHAT RESOURCES DO EXIST
At the moment, the Sim City 4 community (and the wider city builder genre fan community) has everything we need to fulfill the open source side of the equation above, in large numbers:
- Talented content creators.
- Programmers who are good at modding games incrementally.
- Devoted fans who are willing to contribute by beta testing in the absence of other skills.
- Tons and tons of great ideas and a willingness to share them.
And then there's the last resource, which people always seem to overlook when they talk about all the great contributions the community makes:
- Money. Lots and lots of money.
Seriously. I'm not even kidding.
Now, I know some of you are saying: "I don't have lots of money! I can barely scrape together the twenty bucks for Sim City 4+Rush Hour!" Fair enough, but multiply yourself by 50,000, or 100,000, or 500,000 and suddenly that twenty bucks isn't looking so shabby. Where exactly does the money to develop these games come from in the first place? From us! Collectively, we are sitting on a huge pile of cash that we are willing and able to spend on the game that meets our needs.
So, what are we still lacking when it comes to making a game?
WHAT IS NEEDED
All the four things I mentioned as lacking in a community-development scenario are exactly what exists in the place where quality games come from: a commercial game studio. To get a core game that is capable of being the successor to Sim City 4, it's going to have to be made like Sim City 4 was made: By professionals. That means:
A lead designer: Not just some guy with a few good ideas and a bit of programming experience, a real, professional designer who has produced real, successful commercial games. Someone who can plan the structure of the game, allocate the needed resources to get it made, and make sure everything is brought together in a finished product.
Developers: Programmers who have experience in the field, will work full time, and won't just give up because they're bored, or got a new girlfriend, or miffed because nobody liked their pet feature.
Testers: Testers who are playing not for fun, but to rigorously examine a wide range of failure scenarios and who have a direct dialogue with the programmers.
An art director: Someone who can set standards and guidelines for assets, and if needed hire artists to make them (a lot of the art design is boring, too! Think of all those menus...)
Etc., etc... basically, you need almost the same setup as any game studio has, right down to someone to answer phones. And once you've got all these people?
Hardware: Hard to program without a computer!
Offices: A location where they can work together closely.
And since you're getting an office you'll need paper, pencils, whiteboards, chairs, desks, duct tape, free soda (hard to hire good programmers without getting them their caffeine fix...) you name it.
Damn, you must be thinking. Where are we gonna get all that?
Well, how do commercial studios get all those things? They pay for them, of course! And where are we going to get enough money for that? Well, remember that giant pile of cash I was just talking about? Does anyone see where I'm going with this?
THE SOLUTION
The answer to all these problems hit me like a ton of bricks while reading people's comments about not wanting to pay for the Monte Cristo MMO. The exchange was something like this (apologies if I'm misquoting people)
"I'm going to get the Planet Offer, it's like an investment so that Monte Cristo will make something better in the future"
"I'm certainly not! If I'm going to invest in their business they can pay me part of the profits!"
Damn right, I said, but then I thought, well, why Monte Cristo? The problem isn't with the idea of investing, but with the fact that it's an investment in Monte Cristo's profits rather than the game. What would be the problem with leaving the profits out of the equation and investing for a return we all want... the next Sim City 4?
Why not turn the traditional way of making games around? Instead of companies making games for us in the hopes of profits, why can't we make a game (or more accurately, have a game made) for ourselves, in the simple hope of a great game? Why must we be passive players in the marketplace? We have the capital to make it happen, we just need the right framework for organizing it!
Here's a rough outline of how this could happen: Organize a non-profit vehicle to collect "investments" in creating a game, whose overall direction can be decided by the community. I'm not talking major equity positions here, I'm talking 50 bucks, the same as you would pay for a game. If $50 from every player is enough to fund commercial studios' games (plus profit!) why not ours? Those who donate would be the "shareholders" of the project. Each 50 dollars would give you one vote in issues that the community wants to decide, for example how important the inclusion of a certain feature is. Figure out a reasonable game budget beforehand, and assemble that amount of capital.
"Ha, yeah, right," I hear you saying. "Good luck with that. Who wants to donate to some project that might not even happen? You'll end up with a thousand bucks and some sad-looking 'GOAL' thermometer all stuck down at the bottom." While it's true that this is the most challenging part of the whole equation, I think it could work if you do it incrementally. What do I mean by that? Well, let's face it, it's true: nobody wants to put their money towards something that doesn't exist yet, unless they can be sure that it will exist in the future. The way around this is to gradually build support without scaring people off by demanding that they get their wallets out. How? With a very pedestrian fundraising tool well-known to walkathons the world over: the pledge drive. You don't ask for money, you just ask people to pledge that they will pay when the pledge goals are met. This is a first step that people can take without all the commitment anxiety. It's easy for people to say "Sure, if this thing takes off I'll be in, let me know then!" If the pledge goals aren't met? Nothing happens, so nothing lost. And if they are? Then people will feel more confident investing, since they know that 400,000 other people (or whatever) are on board with them! You can even take some steps to make the donation process less of a leap of faith... but more on that later.
So, if that part can be done, the next step is to decide what we want; create a framework for the community to decide what the broad goals of the project are, what is important, what is secondary, and what kind of commitment people can make to help. This would be a lot like what Monte Cristo did with the Cities XL forum, with the difference that we would be able to set policy rather than simply suggest it.
Next, hire a lead developer. Someone with solid industry experience. Obviously someone like Will Wright, if he would do it, would be the holy grail here, but there are plenty of other talented developers out there. Lay out the foundations of the game and figure out what kind of resources and time frame are needed. Then, assemble a team and start making the game!
During the development process, maintain a continuous dialogue between the community, who are the "shareholders" of this project, and the developers. Let users share their suggestions and ideas with developers, and let developers sound out the users on features they are thinking of including. This way the community can be part of the game's creation, and make sure the most important and desired features make it into the release.
"Now, wait a minute," you're thinking. "What if they make this game and I'm disappointed? Or they don't finish before the money runs out? I'll have wasted fifty bucks on a crappy, half-finished game!" Well, I won't lie, that could happen. Life doesn't always go the way we planned. But ask yourself, aren't you already running that risk every time you buy a game? How is that different from when you spent fifty bucks on City Life and didn't like it? Or Societies? The difference with this model is ownership. Unlike every commercial game that's ever been released,
This project would be open source from day one.
A lot of the frustration people feel when they get burned by a bad game stems from their lack of ability to do anything about it: You bought it, the store won't take it back, the developer can't be asked to support it, and you're stuck with it as is. But with an open source game, even with some rough edges, even blatantly unfinished, the user has the ability to take it and make it their own. As a little thought experiment, imagine if Cities XL was being released as it is now, but with the source wide open. Would you be disappointed? I wouldn't be! I'd be excited! Even if it wasn't exactly what I wanted from the get-go, I would be pretty certain that all the talented mod teams out there were gearing up to make it spectacular, and furthermore, I would know that it would continue to get better, without having to be beholden to Monte Cristo or anyone else for support and releasing improvements.
So even in a worst-case, utter failure scenario, you're still left with something you can build on, that you (the public) own. I'd certainly rather have that than some CD-ROM I can use as a very expensive coaster.
But I don't think it would fail. I think that are plenty of reasons why making a game this way could not only result in something as good as what commercial studios put out, but better.
WHY THIS COULD WORK
The fact is, this development model has significant advantages over traditional game development. The biggest ones are:
Cost Savings: With a wide base of content creators already existing and possessing a demonstrated willingness to do some of the heavy lifting on art assets, there would be a substantially reduced need for paid artists; in fact, many of these contributors are already organized into highly efficient teams with plenty of experience under their belts. On a lesser scale, some beta testing responsibility could be farmed out to the community, although this is not as significant an advantage since commercial studios tend to do this too. Both these, though, mean more money to spend on adding sophisticated features to the game architecture.
A community game can assemble the same budget as a commercial game with fewer people.
Direct Use of Funds: Another great thing about this model is how it scales down the need for broad support (that would be high sales figures for a commercial title.) The reason is, a lot of the overhead involved with selling the game after it's finished becomes unnecessary. Typically, developers only recover a fraction of a game's sale price: Retailers, publishers, advertisers, etc., all take their cut. I've heard the actual percentage that gets back to the studio is as little as ten percent, although I can't verify that. What does that mean? With this model, 100% of the investment goes to the developers, which translates to a need for far fewer "sales" (investments) in order to meet development costs. In this way a much smaller community of fans can assemble the same size budget as a commercial studio might have for a game with wider potential appeal. Which also goes hand in hand with:
Tailored Design: What I mean by this is that the developers don't need to design for sales. The game has already been "sold", so to speak, and the developers' one and only task is to make the game that the "customers" (the shareholders in this model) want. There's no need to try to appeal to a wider audience; They already know who the audience is, and can ask them directly when deciding on the game's direction. And that audience can literally vote on what they want from the game. Contrast that with a commercial studio: Typically commercial developers are being tugged in four directions at once. They want to make the game deep, but they need to appeal to a wide spectrum for it to sell well. They want to make a polished game, but they are under pressure from the publisher to make the game as quickly and cheaply as possible. With this model that tension disappears; the people funding the game and the people playing the game are one and the same, so the only things developers need to focus on is meeting the community's desires and focusing on quality. Frankly, I think a lot of developers would love to work on a game like that. Last of all?
No Profit: Unlike a commercial entity, nothing needs to be set aside as profit. The profit is the game itself!
But no matter how great any idea sounds, the only real way to decide if it's feasible is to take a cold, hard look at:
THE NUMBERS
So, with all of that in mind, could this really be pulled off? Let's look at some numbers.
First, we have to determine how much a game like this would cost. Not an easy thing to determine, since companies aren't always so forthcoming about their costs. But let's look at a high-profile example: Spore. Spore apparently had an initial projected budget of USD 20 million (which apparently ended up being more like 35 million by the end). Now, I imagine that you could make a solid city builder for less that that (after all, Spore is really about 5 games all crammed together) but let's err on the conservative side and say we would need 20 million. How many investments is that? If you assume an average of 50 dollars per investor, that means 400,000 people.
The number of contributors needed for a project like this seems daunting on the surface...
...but if we put it into perspective...
...it starts to look a little more manageable.
Now, there are some variances there. Some people (me for one!) would probably be willing to contribute more than 50 dollars: In fact, if the people who are planning to buy Cities XL plus the PO plus some GEMs were willing to make the same contribution to our project, the number goes down. On the other hand, there are probably people who don't particularly care about being a voting shareholder, and don't want to put in 50 dollars, but would maybe throw in five or ten dollars to see the thing get made. So again, let's play conservative and stick with 400,000.
Is that doable? In game terms, 400,000 sales isn't a rousing success, but it's not complete failure, either. Would we be able to drum up that kind of support? Well, of course no one knows for sure, but I've found a couple figures that encourage me: For one, the number of registered Simtropolis users is around 370,000. Now, of course they're not all active or necessarily willing to do this, but that's at least 300,000+ people who are interested enough in Sim City to register on a Sim City themed web site... and that's just one site (albeit the largest). Second, I was looking at some sales figures for Sim City 4. It appears that Sim City 4 sold 284,000 copies... in 2007 alone. That's right, four years after its release Sim City 4 was still selling enough copies every year to meet a major chunk of the goal. I can't even imagine what Sim City 4's lifetime sales are, but I imagine they're well into the millions.
All in all, I think the interest is there, and with enough publicity and support the requisite amount of money could be assembled.
WHAT TO DO
So if this is possible, how does it start? Well, another nice thing about this model is that it can grow gradually. There is no time limit on collecting pledges, since there won't need to be any action taken until the requisite numbers are there.
For the moment, I'm setting up this blog, and I plan on shopping this idea around informally to gauge what the community thinks of something like this. Your comments and criticism are welcome! There's obviously a lot to flesh out with this concept, so I'll be posting further details and ideas as time goes on.
Of course, we don't really know what the Cities XL outcome will be... I know that I personally will be waiting to see what happens with that before expending a lot of energy on this... maybe it won't even be necessary!
But if it turns out that Cities XL disappoints us, there's nothing else on the horizon to look forward to, and there seems to be some interest in a project like this, then I may undertake to do this more seriously: Establish a website, start collecting pledges, and start codifying exactly how the project would be organized. Of course I don't expect that something like this would be successful overnight; but I think from something small it could grow and develop into something really amazing... and that's something that Sim City fans can definitely appreciate.
35 reponses to "The Open Source Future"
1. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member danielches
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REALLY REALLY awesome idea :)
i would be willing to put cash into this type of thing for sure....
Just yeah, as u said the hard part would be convincing people to donate money,
and deciding what parts of the game must be privatised etc,
but the idea of getting a vote if u pledge $50 or whatever sounds good to me,
2. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Intoxination
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Very nice post. EA did finally release the original SimCity source code after 19 years (see micropolis). It would be nice to see this gain some momentum, if anything just for a group to get together and start investigating possibilities.
3. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks! Yes, there is definitely a lot of detail to think about with this, but I think the basic idea is sound... the challenge is getting everyone else to think so :)
@Intoxination: I remember hearing about the SimCity source code, although I hadn't seen micropolis yet. I think there's a tipping point where the old code becomes worthless enough that it's more valuable to open source it as a public relations gesture than keep it hanging around. Unfortunately, I don't really want to wait twenty years for the same to happen with SC4 :)
4. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Intoxination
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Using the original SC code as a point of a fork would definitely not work, but it is great as a learning tool, especially trying to figure some of the logic behind the actual simulation part of the game. By far the hardest part of the game would be the graphics engine, and that you would in no way want to base off a 20 year old code base.
I haven't really looked at any of the OSS graphic engines in awhile, so I'm not sure if there is anything out there that would work for an SC style game. Thinking about that it would probably be a better candidate for a custom engine, which adds in a lot of work. Going that route though could open up a larger base to pull developers in from. Split a project like this into 2 - one for the gx engine and the other for the actual game. By doing that we could see a larger group contributing to the engine since it could feasibly be used for other style games like a Civilization or AOE clone.
On the simulation side, the basics of the logic involved isn't all that complex. As matter of fact it is one of those things that can follow an awesome OOP model (each item is a class built from more common factories like houses, cars, sims, etc.) . The big obstacle on this would be finding a way to run the calculations on each turn that doesn't bog down the system or spike a super processor to 100%. Of course given the turn/time based nature of SC you have a way in which you can distribute those calculations over a period of time.
I believe a first good step in an endeavor like this is to get a basic gx engine out there. Something where you can start plopping down some basic roads and limited buildings. If the route is 2 projects of the GX engine and SC project then having the engine totally opened and hosted on something like Source Forge would generate a lot more interest and help bring in those developers who might be interested in the engine but for another style game.
I spent most of the day yesterday with this in my mind. The money aspect is a tricky one. I don't know how many people would donate on the premise of "maybe a project". I think the first step would be getting out a very basic project like I mentioned above, then look at starting a donation system up. A good model for that would be how Drupal does it with the Drupal association. They basically handle all the money and have elections for things like officers and deciding how money will be spent. It's a very viable model. I have spent the last 5 years of my life making a living based off of Open Source web software (Drupal and Wordpress), but that wouldn't really work in the gaming world. We wouldn't get companies wanting to customize our game for their business. On the other hand we could end up with support from universities. Say civics courses finding our game realistic enough to use in a academic type setting and willing to donate $$ or man power to help improve it.
Another instance where money could come into play and provoke people to donate. Having a nice exchange set up. Imagine being able to click a button in the game menu and browsing user created content - buildings, cars, mod files, etc. Then from that menu you just click to download. No having to "extract to this directory, modify this file, etc". It's all point and click.
I don't know if you noticed or not but I responded on the thread in the forums to you. I also found LinCity yesterday. That's an OS SC style game. It's very basic. They actually use 2d graphical tiles for the buildings, but I found the source code to be pretty interesting.
5. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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I imagine that while the original SC code might be interesting to look at, I doubt it would be much use even from a simulation point of view, the simulation in SC4 was already light years beyond the original.
I do realize that typically open source projects start with some kind of base and then attract developers based on that, but what I have in mind is different; I think the solution here is not to attract volunteer developers, but to hire full-time ones. And while I agree that people would most likely be unwilling to *donate* to a "maybe project" I do think it's more feasible to build support in the form of pledges until there is a solid base of interested fans.
A purely OSS approach has a lot of strengths, but relying on volunteer developers means a lot of uncertainty as far as the direction of the project and particularly the timeframe; And if you're asking people to invest money in something that they won't see for at least a couple years, those are two important factors in building their confidence.
Public or private grant money is another option though, no such thing as too much funding... Planning to post more on that later!
I've tried LinCity too, it's fun... but I have a hard time getting over the dated looking graphics.
6. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member pultava
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I think the only way to get what we want from a CB is to make our own game and this article + the comments really get most of the ideas right.
We have had tons of great ideas and even concepts for OS CB in recent years, but as the momentum has gone we still hang on with SC4 (which by the way is still great) and hope for the best on upcoming releases.
I am quite confident that we should try arranging the core ideas and objectives to a one white paper, get some active community members to organize a foundation behind OS CB. Maybe we could get some backup and ideas how to organize this "foundation" from other OS communities (for example OTTD, Ubuntu, whatever).
After we have a clear agenda it is easier to market the cause to the rest of the CB communities and maybe get some funding from the outside. The "shareholder" aspect is quite an interesting thing and I think it could really work.
I am personally willing to contribute some minor financial and major organizational resources to a project like this - it would be nice to have a new CB before my retirement days (in ~2040) XD
7. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member meseb
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Great idea man! A lot of these thoughts have been brewing in my head for sometime now too. I've even thought of writing the game myself - until I realized how much time that would take! My only concern is that computers aren't fast enough to develop what we really want. Real-time, dynamic, city-simulation is pretty demanding on even the fastest PC's. I think this is one of the problems Monte Cristo ran into - that and budget overruns. But this project could learn from their mistakes. I suppose parts of the code could be written in assembler or C to boost performance in critical areas such as path-finding logic and other expensive real-time calculations.
Even though I am working full-time right now, I would love to contribute time, resources, and even some money! I am a software developer with a passion for open source development, graphics, and realistic city simulation.
8. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Mark
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Actually I gave up SC4 a long time ago because it lacked the UI moddability needed to provide a fluent user experience with the countless addons that are available. If it would have that, I'd probably still be playing SC4 and not thinking at all about the next city builder.
However, your article is right on the money. As I went through IT land myself, I started out as graphics designer, then software developer, then lead developer and also doing a lot of professional testing and software design along the way. I can only say that finding a team capable
of creating something that is actually equal or better than SC4 is near to impossible if not done by a 'real' game development studio. This has a simple reason...
Because besides the things you mention, you also need:
+ A bookkeeper who pays the people who work on this a salary, because if they're good enough, they can make $10.000+ a month on creating the next CRM or FPS.
+ A producer who keeps in check that there will actually be a little profit or at least a break-even, while maintaining the open source goal.
+ The BEST lead designer in the world, because he has to fit squares into circles and vice versa. Did you try to think of the various mechanisms needed to build a city? then you must have noticed that is a LOT harder than regular FPS/RTS design, at least if you want people to be able to build realistic cities.
And also, the cost of content/art almost cannot be underestimated. Where are the 100+ freelance designers mentioned needed to create the buildings/vehicles that adhere to the art director's standard?
Some programmers might be able to work for free. Good game developers who won't complain if their pet feature doesn't make it into the game? they most certainly won't.
It'd be stupid of them and if they still would work on this project and deliver results, I'd phone them up and ask them to work for me instead ;-)
Alright, I present these things as if they're the thruth, but it may well be a lot easier than this. However, I'd start out first with one simple project:
Ask around who is interested in working on it and what they have to offer for how many hours a week and ask them to leave their e-mail address.....also take geographical location into account. If you can't meet, you also most likely can't create a game because there needs to be a certain 'critical mass' of design before you can get started with actual development. That is hard to do with people who live in a different timezone and speak a different language.
A final note: menu design is NOT boring ;) (at least to some, and you need only one)
9. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Ha, yeah, actually I like UI design too... it's just considered a lot less sexy than designing buildings by most people. :)
@pultava and meseb:
Thank for your input! I realize there is a daunting amount of work to do on a project like this but no reason not to try... And if the funding can be assembled, I think at least a solid base for the community to work on can be made.
@mark;
The designers I was thinking of are, for example, the BAT teams on the SC4D forums, but I agree, there will have to be some paid artists on the dev team.
As for sounding out designers, I think the first step is going to be getting funding... once there is a budget it is a lot easier to figure out what kind of team can be put together.
10. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Intoxination
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Just to give an update. I still been searching out open source city builders and such. Here is a very nice list with some decent projects:
http://freegamer.blogspot.com/2009/02/simulate-thi...
FreeTrain is very interesting and looks like it has a lot of potential. It doesn't look like its getting much attention right now and looking for people to get on board. It's written in C# and they even have a port for OSX.
11. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member jumorgan
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This (and part 2) is really genius! It realistically states the problems and potential successes of making a for-fan-by-fans city-builder. You did a great job researching and contemplating all this.
I'm surprised that over a quarter-million copies of SimCity sold two years ago and that's still not enough to get EA to create a suitable successor to it. Not to mention the SimCity Creator for the Wii! The retail store I work at sold it last year, and it was a big hit! Even though we no longer have it in the store, people still ask me for it. Coincidentally, someone did today! The best I could offer him was Spore.
I agree with IntoxiNation concerning getting a nonprofit group to help with the funding. Colleges and universities with urban planning programs could be willing to help--particularly if those schools also have Comp Sci programs and grad students looking for some sort of capstone project. Also, the American Planning Association (www.planning.org) would likely help if asked too. I know for a fact that many real life planners and academics in planning theory are familiar with SimCity, and like the idea of an "operations model" that helps everyday citizens learn how real cities work. The APA could help with the realistic incorporation of concepts like sustainability and SC:Societies-like cultural aspects, as real-life planning is shifting more towards that than just land-use issues.
I'd certainly contribute well over $50 to this. However, I worry that if it really started to take off, what if EA announces they will make a SC-Five? Could that prospect hurt this movement? But if we remember the way SC:Societies turned out, such news might actually inspire people to donate more!
12. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks Intoxination, I took a look at some of those... but while some of them look like fun I still stand by my assertion that there's no "A-list" titles that are open source right now; The current OSS offerings seem to be trailing commercial games by about 5 years.
Jumorgan, thanks for your comments! I also think there could be funding to be had from other sources, planning to do a post on that soon; As I said, no such thing as too much money!
Also, I thought that possibility with EA too, but on balance I don't think it would hurt anything... first of all, it would draw attention to the project if it looked like EA felt threatened by it, which would work more to our favor than otherwise; Second, more city builder games on the market is good, there's room for more than one (if the project accomplished nothing but spurring EA into making a good SC5 I would consider it a success). Last of all, I don't think people would lose interest in this just because there's an alternative, I think it's actually a better way to make this kind of game and not just a measure of desperation. :)
13. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member bluespottedhorse
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I've played/tested simutrans and I like it. It's obvioulsy primitive and
is probably similiar to simcity 2. What I really liked was you could make the maps anysize you wanted without any problems. I always thought that this has the most potential to be modded out of all the games mentioned. I would
obviously remove the transport part of the game and turn it into a city
builder if possible.
14. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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I don't think modding any existing project is going to do the trick, although they can be a good source of ideas. The engine for something like Simutrans simply isn't sophisticated enough to use for a top-tier game.
15. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Grakelin
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To the person who wrote this article (EDIT BBCode for URLs doesn't seem to work, so I will post the entire link here: http://blogs.simtropolis.com/nextgen/index.cfm/200...), selling to a niche market is actually an extremely popular and effective method in today's business world, due to relatively inexpensive advertising (everyone in the market share will find out about it through word of mouth) and incredible ease in selling your product to everybody in the niche. If it was impossible to make money by selling to a niche, B-Movies wouldn't exist, graphic novels and comics wouldn't exist, various forms of novels (Fantasy, Science Fiction, etc.) wouldn't exist, Stardock wouldn't exist, and things like video games, anime, etc. would never have taken off (remember, these were all niche products to begin with, it is only recently that they became mainstream).
How exactly did Maxis perform so well during the 90s? They were selling to a niche (simulation gamers) with another niche (video gamers). By all accounts, the view most people had of video games during this era should have implied they would fail. The idea was that only very young people played video games. Yet, few elementary-school aged children have the attention span required to play Sim City or a Tycoon game, simply because there is so much down time where you just wait for things to happen.
Stardock is similar in the present day. They are a relatively small company that produces extremely niche games (Who still plays 4X Space Games anymore? That's so far detached from the main market share it's not even funny. And Political Machine? My God, man, you'll never sell that!). These games are a very high quality (Gal Civ and Sins of a Solar Empire are both very critically acclaimed), had a small budget (by modern standards), and made oodles of money.
Cities XL had plenty of chance to be great. If MC had been playing the business game properly, they would have given us (the consumers) a high quality product, because that is what is required from this niche market. If the Planet Offer aspects had been strong from release, they might have actually done quite well and sold a lot of subscriptions. As it is, they've made several mistakes, beyond just the poor release quality (which has caused extreme detriment in the niche market's word-of-mouth advertising, the most important factor):
1) The advertising they did for Cities XL was aimed in the wrong direction. Yes, MC knew what they were doing by targeting people here at Simtropolis, but why is the biggest ad (that I've seen, anyway) on Steam? I purchased my copy on Direct2Drive, a download retail site that reaches far more strategy and indie gamers than Steam. The primary market share for Steam is for First Person Shooters, because the advertisements on Steam will pop-up when you play Steam games (Half Life, Counter Strike, Left 4 Dead, etc. are all action based games. If I was in the mood for some city-building, I wouldn't be playing these)..
2) The subscription feature inhibits modability. Sim City 4 mods keep Sim City 4 generating a revenue. People still want to buy it, because people still release new stuff for it for free. This is why, after 6 years or so, I can still find Sim City 4 at my local retail store. You can't mod an MMO game, unless you want a nasty letter from management. So why would I pay $6.00 American per month to get something that a hobbyist will give me for free?
Monte Cristo has likely profited from Cities XL, and this is because they got people excited within the niche. They will not receive as tremendous a profit as they would have liked, however, because they proceeded to alienate the niche upon release.
Niche Product = Profit Product. If the niche is there, you will profit. This is basic business.
I feel that MC has engaged in distasteful practices by trying to charge us a monthly fee for the features promised to the consumer from the very beginning.
EDIT: Also, having subscriptions = 35% off on future content packs in addition to receiving additional content seems shifty to me. What is this bull? This isn't just a matter of a bad quality product. This is a bad quality firm. Yeah, doing unethical things makes money sometimes, but not when you do unethical things to your consumers. Cities XL isn't an established megabrand like Coca-Cola or Pepsi who can get away with being jackasses. They're a small business, and small businesses need good PR.
---
That's what I posted over on Simtropolis.
As to the Open Source topic, I'd point out, if you were unaware of it before, the existence of Ur Quan Masters, a very successful rendition of Star Control II that popped out after the Source Code was released. Somebody just produced a Wii Port, in addition to the PC and PSP versions.
http://sc2.sourceforge.net/
16. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks for commenting, Grakelin! Excellent post, and I absolutely agree with your points. I skimmed over the whole "commercial companies aren't meeting the need" part a bit in my main post, it was already 13 pages long :) You summed up the mistakes of CXL very nicely.
I think the support for this particular niche product definitely exists, and is substantial enough for a company to profit from it; And I also agree that MC might have been able to do it but they made some very grave missteps on the way. Of course, CXL hasn't failed yet... but I think it's "failed" in the sense that it has failed to be the successor everyone was hoping for.
What it comes down to though, is that with the past three efforts in this market having flopped (and nothing else in the pipeline, as far as anyone knows) game companies are going to have a hard time finding backing to make more games of this type. This is a golden opportunity for the community itself to step into the vacuum and take things into our own hands.
17. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member nitpick
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thanks for writing this as i was very disheartened when i played CitiesXL i thought it would be more at get go. So im back ready to play SC4 again i have played it many times over the years and still love it .So now to the point
. youv've got my money and support if this should happen But hurry up im old LOL. 50 bucks is nothing i spend more on smokes in 10 days.
18. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Cathy
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Your articles made for interesting reading and your suggestion about contributing money towards a new game has a lot of merit to it.
With regard to a open source SimCity game, there is already one in development over at SC4 Devotion called CityMania
http://sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?board=365....
19. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks for the comments, guys!
@Cathy: I've definitely checked out CityMania; I think it's awesome what they're trying to do, but to be brutally honest I can't see a next-gen successor coming out of their work, at least not for a long, long time. That's just my personal opinion, of course, and I certainly hope they will prove me wrong. :)
Considering how much time and work and money went into making Sim City 4, though, I'm pretty well convinced that making something *even better* is going to need to be a professional effort. But that's no reason it can't be open source and community-guided too!
20. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member croxis
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I'm hashing my way through this blog, and there is a specific comment I want to address.
"I've definitely checked out CityMania; I think it's awesome what they're trying to do, but to be brutally honest I can't see a next-gen successor coming out of their work, at least not for a long, long time. That's just my personal opinion, of course, and I certainly hope they will prove me wrong."
As mentioned elsewhere it takes time to generate something playable. It takes time to even generate a prototype. One can not just throw a bunch of components together and announce "Hey a game!" Just as part 1 says it will take many iterations for anything to become a true successor. No matter the project
21. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Hi croxis, thanks for your response! I couldn't agree more with your comment... there is no way to get around the fact that a certain number of man-hours are needed for a project as large as a simulation game. That's why I think the time investment for a small group of independent programmers, especially if they are not working on the project full time, is going to be a great deal longer than for a paid group of developers working together closely. What kind of timeframe do you guys envision for CityMania?
22. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member croxis
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Right now a time frame for me doesn't exist. Two part time jobs and part time uni student keeps me busy. My goal is to have a basic region view and city selection within 2 weeks.
23. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Matt Chambers
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This was a very good article, I'm impressed. I especially like the pledge idea and to allow paying a professional team to develop an open source game. Also, because compiling the source code and hosting the downloads for a multi-gigabyte game is not a trivial (or free) task, it may feasible to sell the game on digital download services like Steam. The source code license would need to be free-for-non-profit w/ royalty-for-profit option (I think Creative Commons has a variant for that). Then the initial "investors" could even get a return on their investment - if not make a profit, then break even. This latter quality could make investment quite appealing given that SimCity 4 has had such a lasting appeal (and how much more it would have if it was open sourced from the beginning).
I have a few criticisms of the article itself:
- You say that the article at http://www.osnews.com/story/8146 fails to consider long-lasting games as an exception to the non-viability of open source game development Actually several examples are named at the end of the article: "Examples include BZFlag, FreeCiv, and FrozenBubble." I will add OpenTTDX as another exception.
These quotes need rephrasing or source citations:
"Spore apparently had an initial budget of USD 20 million (which apparently ended up being more like 35 million by the end)."
"It appears that Sim City 4 sold 294,000 copies... in 2007 alone."
24. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks for commenting, Matt! You're absolutely right on with your criticisms, my bad... I will have to dig up the links to where I read those figures.
As for the investment-for-profit idea, that's something I also gave a lot of thought to; The big benefit is that the potential for profit will attract more initial investors. And while I think it *is* also a valid model (especially for something more linear, like an RPG) on balance I think it has some larger disadvantages compared to what I've proposed. To name a few:
-When you promise a monetary return on investment, you re-introduce the imperative for profitability at the expense of gameplay; That is, you can't choose a more deep approach with a more selective appeal over a more profitable one geared to a wider audience, since you have an obligation to the investors.
-Selling the game for profit introduces some conflicts with keeping it open source, and although it's still doable, keeping it as pure FOSS simplifies things a lot.
-There are many, many more hoops to jump through, regulation-wise, if you are selling shares for investment (with my method the contributions would fall under the legal category of "donations," even though they would offer a non-monetary ROI.) This isn't a showstopper but it requires a lot more effort and risk in setting up.
But as I said, I think it is a valid possibility, if not for this game than maybe for something else.
25. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member Pete
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I've read the first couple of posts. I like what you have to say. If the city-sim community is ever to see something really good, we will have to take matters into our own hands.
City sims is too much of a niche market to attract enough commercial development.
Open source development is the way to go. There is some good stuff out there. look at Blender 3D, a community spread around the world managed to produce a very capable application.
Actually, if you think about it, a city-sim is more like an application than a "game".
We start with a blank canvas and apply our creativity to a set of algorithms in order to achieve an aesthetically pleasing result. Kinda like playing with filters in photoshop.
It's a long road, but with some commitment and organization it can be done.
I'm on board with the idea. I have some experience as an artist in game development. Hopefully I can contribute.
I'll be following this blog.
26. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member ScaryMonkey (aka John)
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Thanks for your post, Pete! Interesting that you mentioned Blender, that's a perfect example of this kind of funding succeeding, although in that case they were buying the rights to an existing software rather than building one from scratch. But I'm convinced the assurance contract model can work for a game, too... and once it happens once the idea could really take off.
I agree that classifying a city sim as a game is kind of counterintuitive when you think about it... makes you realize what a genius Will Wright was to start such a genre. I'm writing a new post right now about game vs. simulation and it's kind of doing my head in :)
Thanks for the vote of confidence! Working on a new site right now, so keep an eye out!
27. Originally posted by
Originally posted by Simtropolis member oka01
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I just want to tell you that you have a great idea and I am sincerely hoping it will evolve in something more than just a widely accepted idea: the step from idea to work is not just a step, it's more like a giant leap.
I will soon read some more of your blog posts - this really got me going and proves that the world is full of great ideas, regardless the subject or person itself, thank you!
28. I think that this is a good
I think that this is a good idea, and essentially the only way that a project of this nature would ever work in this situation.
I do however think that the SC4 game engine and such wouldn't be much use even if the source code was released. It's now around 7-8 years old, and hence while you could get inspiration from it, it would not be of much technical use because of its age.
Also, computers can run much more complex games. However, some people don't want really complex games, even Simtropolis members have their limits i'm sure. Ever since I started playing SC4 i've always thought there should be some form of varied depth when it comes to playing, or at least a strong tutorial of sorts. I know it doesn't have to have a wide reach, but it can still try to attract new players.
29. I think that it would be a
I think that it would be a good idea to try to get the source code for the ill-fated 3D SimCity 3000. It had slightly over a year of development. It required a mainframe to run it at the time but the average computer sold this year can run it perfectly.
"Words are words; explanations are explanations, promises are promises, but only performance is reality."
Always do your best and you will always be better than the best in my eyes.
30. I don't think EA would sell
I don't think EA would sell it to us, for the same reasons I stated in the article. That's assuming they even still have it.
31. The code is useless to them
The code is useless to them but whatever, your article is most likely correct.
"Words are words; explanations are explanations, promises are promises, but only performance is reality."
Always do your best and you will always be better than the best in my eyes.
32. The thing is, even if that's
The thing is, even if that's so (and they may have reused portions of that code in SC4 or other games) it's still not in their interest to have a competitor (which is what we would be) using it. Also, since the 3D SC3000 was never released we don't really know what there is and even if it would be worth buying now.
33. From an earlier post.... A
From an earlier post....
A city sim game is great but maybe if we added more RP to it, it would really shine. Perhaps we can borrow a few ideas from 2nd Life.
Perhaps we can create a land in which people can build what they want. You can create the island of Manhattan and allow people to build what kind of buildings they want with a choice of different 3D programs to choose from.
People will build their dream home on the outskirts of the city. The developer team can decide exactly what kind of buildings can be used in the city. People will have to make relatively realistic looking buildings in the city. Or, you can allow people to build whatever they want in an area outside the city called 'the junkyard'.
The developers can create an economic system with different goods to make from manufactured items (furniture, appliances, cars) and artisians can build shops in the city.
Those who are succesfull at their crafts can build multiple shops in the city, their own succesful chain. They might even make real money off of it like those in 2nd Life.
The devlopers can make models for apartments and allow users to rent rooms to construct their dream room with assorted 3D models, etc.
Groups of people can organized into engineering clans. They can agree to purchase whole districts in the virtual city. They can infact create new districts like Little Italy or really anything across the world.
Finally, you can allow real world advertising into the game. Public video screens, posters, and signs on the sides of trucks can be used to get advertising income.
Of course, alot of this freedom will require a trust in people. Some people will want to make realistic models of famous buildings and others will make six story models of penises. This may require an army of admins.
Still, this would such an epic game.... or is it just a copy of 2nd life?
Basically, for any open source game...
-Players need the freedom to build what they want, not trapped by a strict list of items
-A light authority made of volunteer admins and a few of the staff of the game. Though, vote options to kick players or destroy abused lots would be good to. These authorities would help guide the type of architecture or work into the game. For example, two story homes shouldn't fit in the buisness district. They would keep the type of architecture relatively the same.
-Cities XL showed the mmorpg and city building does not work. Most games today require social activities to help make things more interesting. In addition to city building, more forms of RPG can be put into the game especially with a somewhat complicate but realistic economic system allowing for supply and demand. I am putting the most for artistic crafts like painting and furniture.
-A basic but realistic like world with needs of transpertation, limited government, division of labor, etc.
34. It sounds like you're
It sounds like you're thinking in terms of something online though, which isn't what most people in the community want; Our first priority really needs to be creating a strong single player experience; After that, if there's demand for some kind of online dimension, that's something that could be a subsequent project.
35. It looks like we both had the
It looks like we both had the same idea. The problem is that this would have to be made by Linden or EA.
http://themetropolisproject.org/forums/game-design/different-kind-city-sim
"Words are words; explanations are explanations, promises are promises, but only performance is reality."
Always do your best and you will always be better than the best in my eyes.
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