Become a fan of Slashdot on Facebook

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Games Entertainment

Master of Orion 3 Released 346

Posted by michael from the master-of-the-cash-register dept.
Kintaro writes "The long awaited Master of Orion 3 is now in stores. The reviews so far have been unusually mixed, but rest assured the game is still complex - in fact that seems to be a recurring complaint among those that don't like it. And as an added bonus, the game actually runs on Linux right out of the box."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Master of Orion 3 Released More

Master of Orion 3 Released

Comments Filter:

  • finally! (Score:2, Funny)

    by borgdows ( 599861 )
    It's time for DukeNukem Forever now!

  • "actually runs on linux" (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Prizm ( 52977 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:52PM (#5387866)
    So how many games is that which "actually run on linux" out of the box? I guess it is quite a bonus, as the author put it.

    • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:5, Funny)

      by Jonny Ringo ( 444580 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:56PM (#5387914)
      What a fantastic quote. They should slap that on retail boxes for linux software every where.

    • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:5, Informative)

      by Feyr ( 449684 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:02PM (#5387971) Journal
      actually is doesn't run on linux "out-of-the-box". if you read the thread, it needs wineX

      too bad

      • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:4, Insightful)

        by DashEvil ( 645963 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:37PM (#5388234)
        That's one of the bad things about wineX, I guess. Now people are going to start claiming that their products run under Linux, even though they don't have native support for it. Ah well.
        • Who cares, really? If it's either no port or winex, I'll choose the latter. And if enough games say on the box "Runs on Linux" with a WineX symbol next to it then great! Once we have enough gamers we'll see native ports. Why? Because if 20% of their market is on Linux then they'll want them happy, and a WineX version is not that.

          Any promotion of gaming on Linux, whether native or WineX, is positive. I know this because of my gamer friends, who only use computer for games. They're fascinated by Linux, and would be happy with WineX, so long as it runs close to the same as windows (doesn't need to be perfect for them).

      • And even then there are a few glitches here and there, too:

        "There were a few little problems with scrolling from within a window (via the desktop option in the config file) and planet rendering during combat... but he said everything else worked great."

    • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:4, Informative)

      by dark_panda ( 177006 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:18PM (#5388117)
      Unreal Tournament 2003 runs on linux right out of the box, but it doesn't mention linux at all on the box as I recall. No need for Wine, either, as it uses SDL, I believe.

      J
      • I've been wondering about this. If I purchase the UT2003 box from best buy, it'll run on linux? The box doesn't say so, as you pointed out.

        • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:4, Informative)

          by dark_panda ( 177006 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @02:02PM (#5388477)
          There's a shell script on one of the CDs that you run and that's pretty much it. There is a slight flaw in the script that you should take note of, though -- when it says to put in CD 1, it's actually refering to Play CD 1 and not the installation CD. Or something to that effect. There are probably some BBS threads out there or some FAQs that explain it better. It's been a while since I installed it.

          Loki seems to have been at least partially responsible for the port, as it uses the Loki update utility to install updates and such. It was the first game I installed on my new laptop and it runs great. I'm using gentoo on a Dell Inspiron 8200, which uses a GeForce 4 mobile. I'd recommend getting the Nvidia binary-only drivers for OpenGL if you're running the game on a linux box versus the XFree86 OpenGL drivers, as they seem to run better and the difference in framerate is noticible.

          I've compared the game running on identical hardware in linux and WinXP, and you can barely notice a difference. The framerate is pretty close on both, although my linux laptop seems to run slightly smoother, probably because I shut down pretty much every running process and play the game out of twm.

          The only issue I had on linux was getting the sound to not suck. I ended up using OSS that worked well. ALSA made things pretty choppy.

          J

          • Re:"actually runs on linux" (Score:4, Informative)

            by _xeno_ ( 155264 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @02:24PM (#5388688) Homepage Journal
            I wrote a journal entry [slashdot.org] on my experiences in installing it.

            Just the important details:

            The game itself and the Linux installer consider the disc labeled "Disc One" to be the "Play Disc" and the discs labeled "Disc Two" and "Disc Three" to be "Disc One" and "Disc Two" respectively. The Linux installer isn't mentioned clearly on anything that I found, but is on "Disc Three" in the root directory and is called "linux_installer.sh."

            I'd suggest copying the install script to a local filesystem and then executing it because the script will try and unmount your CD-ROM drive and then re-mount it. (I think it uses /mnt/cdrom as the mount-point - ensure you use the appropriate CD-ROM device for the fstab entry for /mnt/cdrom!)

          • Loki's only involvement is previously empoying the developers who did the port and writing the installer/update tools. Borland, Codeweavers, and Linux Game Publishing also used the Loki installer tools.
      • Unreal Tournament 2003 runs on linux right out of the box, but it doesn't mention linux at all on the box as I recall
        According to the developers it's because the boxes, manuals, etc. were printed before the game went gold and they didn't know Linux support was going to be included yet. Not sure why it doesn't have it on subsequent printings, though - perhaps to not confuse people?
    • From the Link:

      "I got it running on Mandrake 8.2 / Enlightenment with standard WineX installation and zero configuration."

      /me sighs

      I'd hardly call that "out of the box". It's not a Linux port. It;'s hjust wizards over at TransGaming [transgaming.com] That did the work, not the folks that wrote MoO3.

      O-Well. It sounds nice anyway... I guess...

      P.S.
      Yes, I'm a transgaming subscriber, it's just that this doesn't qualify as "out of the box" in my eyes.

  • great (Score:4, Funny)

    by haedesch ( 247543 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:52PM (#5387868) Homepage
    I was afraid I might actually pass this year :-)

  • Bah! (Score:5, Informative)

    by delta407 ( 518868 ) <.moc.xahjfrel. .ta. .todhsals.> on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:53PM (#5387875) Homepage
    And as an added bonus, the game actually runs on Linux right out of the box.
    ...under WineX [transgaming.com], of course.

    That statement is rather misleading -- there is no native binary version available.
    • "That statement is rather misleading -- there is no native binary version available."

      That's a bummer. That would have significantly expanded Linux's game library!
      • Significantly expanded? So what does one more game equal? A 25% increase?

        I kid, I kid, sorry... :)

        • Re:Bah! (Score:4, Funny)

          by Anonvmous Coward ( 589068 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @02:33PM (#5388758)
          "Significantly expanded? So what does one more game equal? A 25% increase?"

          Oh, I dunno if I'd say that. But it did up the number of genres available for Linux gaming to 4!

          Here's the current list:

          1.) FPS ports from the most popular Windows releases.
          2.) Penguin Racing
          3.) M.A.M.E.
          4.) All new! Strategy game set in space provided you have Wine up and running.

          Yep, Linux now has 4 incredibly broad genres of games to play!

          (I hope the Linux mods have a sense of humor today.)

          • Re:Bah! (Score:3, Funny)

            by Rebar ( 110559 )
            More genres than that even.

            The Linux games I find myself playing most often:

            1.) Kernel Patch Forever
            2.) The Hunt for Related Libraries (apt-get is considered cheating)
            3.) Theme Manager
            4.) Recompile the Compiler - a traditional UNIX strategy game

            It beats playing Windows-based games like Reboot-after-simple-install which I also find myself playing pretty often.

    • Re:Bah! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FortKnox ( 169099 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:04PM (#5387988) Homepage Journal
      Its a step. Why must it be 100% linux or I'm gonna bitch and moan?

      My mom used to tell me to be happy with what I got. You got it on linux, quit whining.
      • Not quite. It probably has nothing to do with linux. The creators of the game probably did nothing more than avoid windows-specific coding techniques, making it workable under wine. Emulating in my opinion is stupid. With hard drives as cheap as they are, just dual boot the stupid computer and have a windows partition for games. Just more pointless complexity.."Women always seem to have trouble with the wall..can't ever seem to find the door."

        • Re:Bah! (Score:3, Interesting)

          by FortKnox ( 169099 )
          Everything game-wise is written in DirectX. DirectX != SDL. So, you either have to hire game coders with experience in a multiplatform engine, or port (rewrite) the entire game to sell to Linux users (which will hardly be profitable, and, therefore, not worth the effort).

        • Re:Bah! (Score:4, Insightful)

          by swv3752 ( 187722 ) <.swv3752. .at. .hotmail.com.> on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:12PM (#5388054) Homepage Journal
          Either A) We do not want to buy a License for MS or
          B) Why bother dual booting when everything else is done in Linux.

          • Re:Bah! (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Anonvmous Coward ( 589068 )
            "Either A) We do not want to buy a License for MS or
            B) Why bother dual booting when everything else is done in Linux."

            Obviously your gaming's not done in Linux. So why cause yourself the pain?
            • Obviously your gaming's not done in Linux. So why cause yourself the pain?

              All my gaming is done in Linux. UT, UT2003, all the id titles, Tribes 2, all have native Linux support.

              • Re:Bah! (Score:3, Insightful)

                by Anonvmous Coward ( 589068 )
                "All my gaming is done in Linux. UT, UT2003, all the id titles, Tribes 2, all have native Linux support."

                That pretty much defines all the gaming done under Linux.

                So, out of curiosity, how long after the Windows release of those games did you have to wait? I'm asking seriously, not necessarily trying to counter-point you here. I honestly don't know the answer to that question. But if your answer is "well it took them a few months to port it", then my pain point is still very much in tact.

                It's one thing if you're mildly entertained with what is available for Linux. But if you're a gamer, then don't kid yourself. Dual boot with Windows. Even better, have a second gaming machine around. They'z not that expensive anymore.

          • Re:Bah! (Score:3, Insightful)

            by _xeno_ ( 155264 )
            or:

            C) Give up on Linux, and allow Windows XP to be your desktop platform. Install Cygwin for the Unixy things you need, and then realize that most of your development work (as in, for pay) is Java-based anyway and that you might as well stick with Windows for a better desktop experience.

            This isn't intended as an anti-Linux troll - I have Gentoo installed along with Windows XP, I got UT2003 running under Gentoo with almost no problems; but I found that for my day-to-day tasks, Windows was a far superior desktop environment than Gnome. (I personally like Gnome better than KDE, so don't try that route.)

            Sorry, Linux guys - I appreciate Linux as a server platform (I have a dedicated Linux server). But it isn't ready on the desktop yet. At least for me, since I do a fair amount of gaming. On the other hand, my Dad (who's a software engineer) has completely switched to SuSE. It's actually kind of ironic - he switched to Linux at about the same time I returned to Windows.

            (On the other hand, I still emerge rsync && emerge --update system && emerge --update world far too frequently considering I then have to reboot back to Windows to get actual work done. I even have a shellscript to help resolve new configuration files. So I have an up-to-date Gentoo system - that I don't use... I'm pathetic :))

        • I hate rebooting. It means I have to stop all of the background processes on my machine (including time limited things like news downloads) just to play a game. Plus I have to maintain an OS I barely ever use (It's not like you can just connect an unpatched Windows box to the net, and I usually want to play games online).

          I've found that if a game requires rebooting, I'm much less likely to play it because I have to deal with Windows again. That's why I still love my old Loki games [ceyah.org].
        • Emulating in my opinion is stupid.

          That's good because we aren't talking about emulation, remember Wine Is NOT an Emulator.

        • The creators of the game probably did nothing more than avoid windows-specific coding techniques, making it workable under wine.

          Actually, they *did* avoid windows-specific coding techniques, as it was developed SIMULTANIOUSLY on Windows and Mac. Probably has a lot to do with why it runs on WineX so easily.

          • Yes, but the package would almost lead you to believe they had a team busting out a native binary version for linux..which isn't true, and it would be better if this point was better conveyed.
      • One of the things that hurt OS/2 was that once OS/2 got decent Windows emulation (well, the ability to run Windows as a task), developers lost all incentive to develop apps for OS/2. Why bother, when they could just get users to buy the Windows version? Of course, this meant fewer native OS/2 apps, which meant less reason to buy it in the first place.

        Now Linux doesn't have quite the same problem, as there's a much larger application library out there for it, but if Wine runs lots of new games immediately, it does remove incentive for those game publishers to publish native versions.

        (Of course, Loki's failure likely killed the idea anyway...the trouble is that lots of Linux users demanded games, but didn't actually buy them...oh well...can't say that I'm any better. I waited for all the Loki titles to start selling for firesale prices before buying.)

  • MoO3 does *not* run on Linux right out of the box. (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The guy who had it running under Mandrake 8.2 was using WineX. Is there a native Linux port or not?

  • finally..... (Score:5, Funny)

    by iamsoscrewed ( 634047 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:53PM (#5387884)
    I can stop wondering when it will come out, and finally have my wife deny letting me buy it.

  • I remember.. (Score:3, Informative)

    by Gortbusters.org ( 637314 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:53PM (#5387887) Homepage Journal
    our first preview [slashdot.org]. I'm done holding my breath now!

  • Civ 3 Syndrome (Score:4, Informative)

    by briancnorton ( 586947 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:55PM (#5387900) Homepage
    I played it a little bit, and from what I can tell, it's got the same problem that Civ 3 has. It dosent really add anything of value, and it tacks on a bunch of semi-thought-out variables that add very little. It's fun, but not enough to make me read the whole manual.

    • Re:Civ 3 Syndrome (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Joe the Lesser ( 533425 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:04PM (#5387983) Homepage Journal
      The biggest problems with Civ III were the ten minute turns of 50 tanks slowly moving across the continent to your enemy, and that minute amount of resources availiable. (Not to mention the shoddy AI as usual, and countless other problems). So I don't think the games are that similar, although I've yet to play MOO3.
      • I always went bankrupt on the third or fourth turn. Clearly there was something critical that I was unable to figure out. I always seemed to have an income of 1 at the beginning, and so building one building would make my income equal my expenses. Blah, it was just not as good as Alpha Centauri.
    • Actually it reminded me more of Star Wars: Rebellion. Granted I enjoyed Rebellion for a while, it eventually started to seem like too much work.

  • The new trend in gaming (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DownTheLongRoad ( 597665 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:55PM (#5387904)
    The "strategy Guide" was out months before the actual game. It should really be called "The Game Manual You Have to Pay an Extra $30 For Because We Want to Rip You Off". I guess that is too long and honest though. Just another way to drain their customer's bank accounts. Oh how I long for the old Microprose Manuals. They seem like textbooks compared to the 20 page garbage included these days.

  • the reviews (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Joe the Lesser ( 533425 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:56PM (#5387910) Homepage Journal
    The naysayers seem to be complaining about the advanced GUI, but considering the amount of options they stuffed into the game, I'm sure they did the best they could to make the game n00b friendly, so that point is definitly not strong enough to stop me from getting the game.
    • "...I'm sure they did the best they could to make the game n00b friendly..."

      The beauty of this game is not that it's n00b friendly but that the time you put into learning it is rewarded. At least that was true for MOO2.

      When you have an overwhelming invasion picking you off system by system, then you quickly react and cause them to leave, that's a hell of a high.
      • Heh. I had a moi-versus-7-AI game of MOO2 lately, in which instead of playing in my usual brutal, repulsive-so-no-diplomacy, there-can-be-only-one style I played mostly peacefully in a rather relaxed style.

        The Trilarians picked a fight (they deserved it, whining about a single barely-armed scout on a border system) and got eradicated, as the time I hadn't spent building soon-to-be-obsolete warships was partly invested in making sure I could quickly build ships with MIRV / FAST / ARM / ECCM / EMG merculites...

        The real fun came when there were only three sides left -- my creative telepaths (Cre/Tele/+1 Prod, with low-grav and ship att/def penalties) versus a tiny Elerian side (only one system left, away from their homeworld) and a huge, seriously teched Sakkra side. As far as I could tell, the Sakkra had stolen large amounts of tech from invading Psilon, Trilarian, Human and Elerian worlds so not only did they have the 66% discount on ship building (confederation) but they also had certain tech advantages over me (mostly in ship and planetary shields, and having stargates and artemis minefields).

        Yep, a Feudal state with a larger population, a larger fleet, and, in some respects, better technology... ouch.

        It was rather interesting fighting what was initially a brutal war of attrition (e.g. roughly sixty titans meet; one titan leaves) until (a) I countered the Sakkra's heavy dependence on plasma weapons and anti-matter torps with stand-off tactics + death rays + auto-repair, and wide-area ECM jammers for the torps, and (b) decided that the gloves were off and developed a series cloaked titans whose sole purpose was obliterating lightly-defended colonies to cripple Sakkra fleet production. Better tactics, some tech advances, and tweaked ship design made the battles go from messy attrition to one-sided slaughters, and the bombing campaign combined with sabotage crippled its ability to make good on its losses.
        • One of my favorite moments in Moo2 was building a ton of 'Buttkicker' class ships which were really cheap, plus they had only 1-2 semi-powerful weapons. I researched the hell out of the right tech so that I could use them in the smallest ships possible.

          Oh dear. You haven't had fun until you've had one of those space battles where it takes 2 minutes just to get all the ships on your side to take their turn. Damn that was cool, though. I seriously messed up their fleet.

          The Buttkicker Class lives on!
    • The naysayers seem to be complaining about the advanced GUI,

      Well, you do have to wonder about a web page with black text on a dark background.

  • Galactic Civilization (Score:5, Interesting)

    by lobsterGun ( 415085 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @12:58PM (#5387929)
    Masters of Orion was OK, but I always perfered Galactic Civilization. I just liked the feel of the game more, and I never got the feeling that the computer was cheating me blind. Word on the street is that Stardock is close to releasing a new version of GalCiv [galciv.com] any day now.

    It will be interesting to see how these old rivals stack up to each other now.
    • Yes, it seems that it should be out soon.

      Brad Wardell from Stardock has been pretty active on comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic fielding all sorts of questions about the game; the curious might want to check it out in addition to Stardock's own web site.
      • Speak of the devil... Just got an email from Brad that says that Galactic Civilization goes gold on Monday. (I hope he doesn't mind me sharing that.) Lot's of work went into this and I can't wait to see it.
    • Pax Imperia. That game was realtime, and it came out back when my Mac LCII was a pretty good machine. I'll grant you, it was buggy as hell, but how come in the years since, no one has made a game with the same features?

      The Imperium Galactica series is realtime, but not as open ended (and Hegemonia is even more closed off and linear). Star Control 3 is even more plot oriented, and has a very poorly thought out colony management system besides. The Master of Orion series, and its many imitators, are open ended, but turn based. Don't even get me started on the disaster that was Pax Imperia 2.

      I try to buy a lot of these "4X" games in the hope that one of them will be as great as Pax Imperia, but so far I haven't found one. Am I missing anything, has anyone else found a good one?

      • Pax Imperia had those great sound "fluorishes" whenever anything happened. Kind of campy -- sort of like the sound effects we assigned to every possible Mac system event in 1993 or 4.

        Takes a person back...

    • Re:Galactic Civilization (Score:5, Informative)

      by afidel ( 530433 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @02:11PM (#5388566)
      The great thing is the Moo3 box comes with an advert for Galciv. When someone came onto the boards complaining about this and asking why infogramer did this the developers of Galciv came in and basically stated that the people who saw it had already bought Moo3 so it wasn't harming Moo3 sales and it would allow a highly targeted audience of TBS players to find out about his game. He also basically said that with Moo3 and Galciv being the only games of their type to be released in years the sucess of both was important to the genre surviving.

  • What we can expect to read on the site tomorrow. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Bender Unit 22 ( 216955 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:00PM (#5387943) Journal
    Due to the overwhelming interest in MOO3, our site has been overloaded! Yes, it's true, people can't wait to get their hands on MOO3. The forcast of expected sales for the game has changed to 5 times as high. What does that mean to you? Well, you might want to get your hand on the game ASAP!! Don't delay, buy it today!

  • Not out for Mac yet (Score:3, Informative)

    by FredFnord ( 635797 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:00PM (#5387946)
    But apparently soon. We shall see... that's what they said about Neverwinter Nights, too... and where is it?

    -fred

  • Don't get your hopes up (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:00PM (#5387949)
    I was 'fortunate' enough to be a beta tester for this game, and I was extremely disappointed with the game. Simply put, there are fundamental issues here.

    I highly recommend that people read the review at http://www.quartertothree.com

    From this tester's perspective, that review is the clearest picture of what I feel is wrong with MOO3.
    • I was 'fortunate' enough to be a beta tester for this game, and I was extremely disappointed with the game. Simply put, there are fundamental issues here.

      This deserves a +5 mod for "No Shit" factor. You were a beta tester and you found issues with the software. Gee, what a surprise, a beta version had issues. The real question is, did you do your job as a beta tester and report those issues, or did you just complain about it? How do you know that those issues were not fixed in the final release?

      "Beta testing" and "Test Marketing" are two different things. Let's not confuse them.

    • Re:Don't get your hopes up (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Xentax ( 201517 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:57PM (#5388436)
      Hmm. I was a beta tester too, and I feel no need to remain anonymous. Are you afraid of NDA-related trouble, or are you pretending to be something you're not?

      I think the game is great. By no means perfect, and the learning curve is one of the steepest I've encountered in a "game", but it *definitely* grows on you. As I recall, it was little different for MOO2, just to a lesser degree.

      In general folks, don't take a reviewer's word for it, unless they're VERY specific on what's not to like, and if that applies to you or not. I mean, the graphics will probably get slammed, but eye-candy isn't a must-have for everyone. Also, too many people will sell this game short because they haven't put enough time into it -- the first stages of the game aren't very compelling, and your first game or two might feel more like work than fun as you're learning the ropes.

      I'll say this -- if you want something *simple*, this is not the place to look. You don't really have to micromanage in the MOO2 sense of the term, but there's a lot going on there, maybe more than some people will want to deal with.

      Otherwise, it's a great game. The battles in the later stages of a game are amazing and fun; real-time combat means you FINALLY have a space strategy game where maneuver is a non-trivial factor in the outcome. Also, combined arms are there and fairly balanced -- you can't win with JUST fighter or missiles or beam weapons, you probably need all 3 against a savvy opponent.

      Xentax
    • Disclaimer: I've only spent about an hour with this game, which obviously is not nearly enough for an in-depth analysis, but I have to say I'm pretty appalled with the offering so far.

      It seems like all the life, colour, and magic has been taken out of the game. Let me give you an example... in prior MOO games, when you colonized a planet, you were treated to a nice full screen animation of a spacecraft landing on the planet's surface, and saw one of your colonists putting up a flag, and then it asked you to name your new world. (You could skip these sequences if desired, of course)

      In MOO3, you get a log entry. That's it. Hooray. This "reduction to bare data" seems prevalent everywhere in the game. Yes, it's efficient, detailed, and deep. So is a spreadsheet. But is it fun??? The interface is also very bland... I mean.. flat shading everywhere??? This isn't 1989 anymore, how about some gradients or textures people!? And the few space battles I've seen so far have literally been single pixel ships wandering around on a 2D grid.

      The first two MOO games grabbed me like a steel clamp and didn't let go. They had so much personality and polish. This one, I am finding myself having to force myself to try and get into it.

  • Mixed Reviews... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by LordYUK ( 552359 ) <jeffwright821@NOSPAm.gmail.com> on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:03PM (#5387978)
    Of course a game like this is going to get mixed reviews. First, the games feature list has changed numerous times, note that isnt necessarily a bad thing, but you say one thing will be in there, and then it isnt, well, thats not very good. Two, the release date got pushed back several times, which can have a negative effect on the reviewer. Third, its COMPLICATED... Pick up Diablo and you can play it in about 5 mins (if that) and after an hour or three you can have a pretty good feel of the game to review. MoO3 is long and complicated (Civ3 took me about 6-7 games before I started realizing how everything worked, and what I needed to do and when, which was about 25+ hours) and a reviewer with a deadline probably doesnt have that kind of time to sit with every game, so the ones that liked MoO2 probably got into it faster, and rated it better than the more casual gamer.

    Of course, I am not a reviewer, but I was expecting (on my own personal scale) a 7.5/10 star game. The graphics arent that great, which weakens the rating, and if its like Civ, enduring long hours to play one game is not always a bonus, so it loses points there.

    With that said, I cant wait to get my hands on it!

    • Re:Mixed Reviews... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      What's wrong with the people today?

      It's a strategy game, thus
      a) It doesn't need great graphics.
      b) It needs to be complicated.

      This isn't about running and killing everybody in sight, this is about managing an empire.

      6-7 game learning curve ensures that after that you can enjoy dozens of games. In fact many people still plays games like MoO1 (released in 93), Master of Magic (released in 94) and MoO2 (released in 96). How many are playing Diablo in singleplayer mode?

  • Probably good, but needs some time (Score:3, Insightful)

    by t0ny ( 590331 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:05PM (#5387992)
    I have noticed that when opinions are polarized regarding a work, ie some love it, some hate it, it is generally very good.

    I noticed some of my favorite movies were like this. If it applies to this game, it is quite possible a very deep game.

    From what I have read, however, the learning curve is really very high, which may be what is putting off many early adopters who havent had time to work through the curve.

    I think the real test of this game will be the review it gets in one or two months, and then if it has enough to keep people playing it a few years from now, pushing it into "classic" statis. From what beta testers have said, however, it sounds like they may have a classic.

    Hopefully the complexity will not prevent it from selling well.

  • Online costs (lowest & highest) per Froogle (Score:5, Informative)

    by TastyWords ( 640141 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:09PM (#5388033)
    Least expensive: CompuExpert has it for $39.90 and BuyPCSoft has it for $39.85. Most expensive: Chumbo.com for $52.99 It looks like standard retail is $49.99

  • "runs on linux"? (Score:3, Informative)

    by kwiqsilver ( 585008 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:10PM (#5388034)
    I don't think this really qualifies as running on Linux. I started using linux to get away from proprietary software and crash-prone dll libraries.
    And now to play moo3, I'd need to install WineX, which if I'm not mistaken is a proprietary extension of Wine, and requires authentic windows dll files to run.

  • doesn't work (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:15PM (#5388086)
    # apt-get install moo3
    Reading Package Lists... Done
    Building Dependency Tree... Done
    E: Couldn't find package moo3
    # apt-get install master-of-orion-3
    Reading Package Lists... Done
    Building Dependency Tree... Done
    E: Couldn't find package master-of-orion-3

    OK, so what's it called then?

  • Doesn't work for me (Score:5, Informative)

    by yamla ( 136560 ) <chris@@@hypocrite...org> on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:18PM (#5388111)
    Note: Moo3 does not currently work for me with the latest version of WineX. Early on in the game, it seems to forget that I have a keyboard attached and also stops registering mouse clicks, though I can still move the mouse cursor around. I strongly suspect this will be an easy fix but at the moment, Master of Orion 3 does not work in Linux for me.

  • Lol (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jayhawk88 ( 160512 ) <jayhawk88@gmail.com> on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @01:20PM (#5388129)
    Some guy gets a pre-release or beta version (check the post dates, 2-16) to run on a certain version of Linux via Wine, and suddenly it's "runs on Linux right out of the box".

    "If I read it on the Internet, it must be true!"

  • Ha. Moo... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Stanl ( 646331 )
    Here's an indication I need my morning coffee. I am reading all of your posts with Moo this and Moo that, and I think to myself, aren't they supposed to be talking about .. Master Of Orion Then it dawned upon me what was going on. At first I was thinking cows...perhaps it's because I live in the dairy state [wisconsin.gov]
  • It's unfortunate that I discovered A Tale in the Desert [slashdot.org] last week ... I was quite looking forward to MOO3, but I just don't have the time for two games. I'm sure MOO3 will be around for some time, but right now ATITD fills in all those psychological voids that society is otherwise unable to provide. ;)
  • Linux nerds, it's time to put your money where your mouth is. I for one am going to show my support for games such as MOO3 that support Linux by actually buying them. No, I won't "dl l33t w4r3Z". I'm gonna pay $50 or whatever it is at my local EB for a copy of this game. Actually, I might want two copies. One for playing at home, and one for playing on my Linux laptop.
  • Stars! Supernova Genesis [crisium.com] would, I believe, surpass MOO3 in many ways. It is unfortunate that as a small developer, they have been unable to obtain a publisher.
  • "Right out of the box", provided that /your/ box is already completely pre-configured to run it.

    I have a hat that can get you to mars, right out of the box.
  • I have never understood the hoopla about MOO. If you compare it to the complexity and fun Stars! offers, it is blown right out of the water.

    Also Stars! will work with your old copy of Windows-3.11 for Workgroups :-)

    Free demo here: http://crisium.com/stars/stars/demo.htm
    Newsgroup here: news://rec.games.computer.stars

  • Rough around the edges.... (Score:4, Informative)

    by Ephemeriis ( 315124 ) on Wednesday February 26, 2003 @04:26PM (#5389833)
    I picked up my copy of MoO3 earlier today, and I've been playing it ever since. The transition from MoO2 (which I was playing just last night) is rough, to say the least. Many, many things have changed. Not better, not worse, just very different. I don't know if I like it yet. Some things seem to be more complicated than they need to be... Others seem too simple... The in-game documentation is either well hidden, or missing. There isn't much of a tutorial. Numbers appear to be the preferred representation...rather than any kind of graphical charts or meters. And there's an awful lot of AI assistance available to keep things moving along. Visually, it's a disappointment. The graphics are very dated. The GUI is stark, dull, and cluttered. But... I'm still being drawn back to it, to play some more. We'll see.

    If anyone is curious, I'll be posting my impressions to my blog [tripod.com].

    yrs,
    Ephemeriis

Slashdot Top Deals

If I want your opinion, I'll ask you to fill out the necessary form.

Close