When I was a younger man, before I became the old and decrepit 24 year old before you, there was a little-known game not much unlike this one. It was fun, nerdy, made by a small yet very active company (before Microsoft got it, I guess), and had a small, dedicated community of players. Okay, not "Holy crap there are 200 people on ICO at the same time?!" small, but you get the idea. The game was Mechcommander and one of the leagues formed around it went by the name of Steel Command.
The SCL was a heavily role-played league which used Mechcommander as a vehicle to wage an enormous interstellar war between the various Battletech factions (faction websites still exist today, in all their 1998 glory). Factions would fight for territory and resources. They would commit Mechs and other resources to battles, then play out those battles in the game. There was diplomacy and even an enormous map which was manually updated to reflect faction ownership changes (this was back before the web was "dynamic"
I think a league like this would work well in Sins for a few reasons. First of all, it is asynchronous. That is, factions can schedule games or just issue orders ("Explore this planet", etc.) and won't need to randomly have a whole lot of players on at the same time (this is the main reason clans don't work right now). Secondly, Sins is very customizable, which is required for this sort of thing to work. The Map Designer is quick and dirty, but the real power lies in Galaxy Forge (assuming it gets fixed) which allows maps to be custom-tailored to battles. With this customization combined with the fact that different battles can have different supply caps, sizes and so forth, games can be long or short depending on the battle setup and include any number of other variables.
Sins games can be incredibly long, back and forth, intense experiences even though the action isn't necessarily constant -- that's what I love about it. You have to make big decisions -- do I build up and dig in or rush? Do I save that planet being attacked or do I counter? -- which can affect where you are an hour later. But what if the game didn't end in an hour, a day, or a month? What if there were an entire Universe to conquer and not just a star or two at a time?
If there's a game out now that could be used to resurrect the enormous scope and breadth of Steel Command, it is almost certainly Sins. However, this is no minor task and will require dedication and effort from many -- not to mention players! I'm not sure if we have enough people yet, but we'd have to start somewhere. This would be a considerable undertaking and I am already extremely low on free time, so I'm putting this out now to see what sort of interest there is, if any. Please provide feedback!
P.S. If you're wondering who would actually make the site for this, the answer is me. I do it for a living so we've at least got that part covered.
IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT!
Like what you've read so far? Then check this out!
Okay folks, it seems like we have enough people interested to make an official inquiry here on the boards. The way I see it, we need a minimum of 25 people to start really getting the ball rolling in an official way on this thing. To that end, I have created a form that interested parties should fill out. It shouldn't take more than 30 seconds and will give me a way to keep track of people with serious interest.
One of the questions asks what you want your "role" to be; I have created the following roles with my recommendation of minimum numbers to fulfill in parenthesis (assumes 3 initial factions; one for each race):
Fill out the form here: http://binjured.wufoo.com/forms/sins-league-signup/
Thank you in advance!
(Entrenchment required for membership for the time being; with more players, hopefully we can have two leagues... but that's a dream for now.)
I should be there, If you dont mind me having to pause the game every so often.
OH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Before I forget!!!!!! Binjured said go ahead with out him, he has RL in the way atm. So let get this swinging!!!
Im on right now, ill be alt-tabbing back and forth untill most of you arrive and have a game set up.
Sorry i haven't been on, i have torn cartliage in my right wrist, trying to learn how to use a left handed mouse.
Oh that bites, Wb.
Also carbon, I'd like to know, on your map, Which side is closer to the galactic core, as, the closer it is, the more planets there should be.
In theory we (TEC) would be closer. But we are at the edge of trade space so the density wont matter to much, if we expand the map you will see the TEC getting more and more systems and planets.
Just a FYI for everyone, me and carbon have agreed that a lobby room be set up specifically for anyone apart of either faction to gather players and set up a game. Lobby name should be "Steel Command". So when anyone wants to set or join a faction game, that lobby should be the place to go. If no such lobby exists, you should create one when necessary.
On another note, i understand we all live scattered across the globe with different time zones, so i was wondering if everyone can agree to a day where we all meet and have a game. A team/faction game, comp stomp, ffa, what ever the majority wants.
Ive posted up a draft of the confrontation between the TEC faction and Advent faction. If anyone is interested, head on over to the "Illumina" faction thread and give it a read.
Very good read!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But you took my thunder for my story!!!!! lol, back to the drawing boards.
Bumb for intrest.
I need a buttscratcher...
Well im back from my vacation, seems its been quite over here the past month or so. Anyway, looking foward to get some games over the weekend if anyone is interested.
Woot! There is breath again!!!! Yeah, its been beyond quite over here at -Ue_ I feared the worst!
I should be on late tonight like 9pm-10pm CST if you wanna play =D
Umm... errr... i forgot what time that is here... Hopefully my game isnt still broken by then.... it decided it doesnt want to turn out off cinematics mode...
I was thinking a game sunday perhaps? what time is good for you guys on that day?
Umm errr ummm, Idk, I guess i'll know on sunday
Hmm, after reading over what i have written up i feel i should rewrite the whole thing and make some alterations. If anyone from either factions have read what i have put up and have any suggestions or opinions or even characters of their own that they wish to add, please let me know and i will do my best to include them.
Also Carbon, have you finished what you were writing up?
No, I never really got far after you stole my thuner with your TEC vs Advent story. It was great. Mines not so much. Ive been trying to keep -Ue_ alive internaly recently. Its not looking good for us.
Its been rather slow on my end as well, ive been rather busy with work so even i havent had as much time to play the game lately.
Sadly Im think Im gonna have to call -Ue_ dead. My member disappeared on me, with out a trace. And I honestly dont see the league gaining anymore popularity.
With that said, what do you plan to do with the Iumminate? I like to take what RP elements we made and create a fan site for SoaSE for us to further our stories and add more. What are you thoughts?
Sadly i would have to agree that the league isnt going to expand further. There are just too many games out there and not enough players on SINS as it is to keep it alive. I dont want to abandon the whole concept entirely, i think a brief hiatus and perhaps return to it later would be good.
As for the RP elements and lore we've all worked on, i'd hate to see it go to waste so i feel perhaps a fan site would work great.
I intend to rewrite what i have so far and change up the dialogue so that it doesnt read like a play script. Im still going to work on that comic style story of our factions so hopefully that might draw up enough interest when its complete.
Great ideas all around! Feel free to hit me up with anything you need from our faction. I will open up our entire site so you can read some of the stories we made. They aint much but you might get some dynamics of it all.
I smell a SoaSE MOVIE! Yeah um.. vasari faction is like... dead...
Yeah I figured as much cuz Shadow has been to quite. Desamator are you going keep working on the Vasari stuff? Maybe rework it?
Oh Im reworking the history of -Ue_ to keep up with current events and to better understand what -Ue_ is actually.
Im really excited to see a comic book style story of our factions!!! If there is any way I can help, Plz Plz Plz let me know.
Dont worry, i will certainly enlist you carbon and anyone who is interested and willing to contribute to fully complete the comic. At the moment its in the story/plot phase and then once i got that down, its off to the story board where ill start drawing out everything.
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