Birth of the Empires space TBS game (open source)

[StandYourGround]

I'll give it another try... I uninstalled everything, and I will install libpng first before wine as the macports page suggests. I'm also using a cool GUI on top of MacPorts to make this easier, despite how much I love using my Terminal.

EDIT: By the way, I highly sympathize with that guy in your avatar. I too have great difficulty finding complete outfits in my size.

[Malvoisin]

alright. hopefully that fixes it.

[StandYourGround]

No more freeware GUI for MacPorts for me. Dumb thing installed only for 64bit arch, so I had to manually reconfigure all the dependancies in the Terminal to +universal. That aside, BotE runs quite well in WINE now. The major glitch is loading the galaxy map, which it often never fully loads (I got it to work twice). Also, in the main window (not the sidebar), text on the buttons vanish on mouse-over, and don't reappear unless I refresh the window. Aside from that, I can click through everything, and the music and sound effects are good.

Can't figure out what in the galaxy I'm supposed to do in this game (not my genre), but it behaves as well as I could ever expect from a Windows-only alpha project in a 32-bit Unix window system in a 64-bit Mac OS.

[Malvoisin]

interesting, seems like the upper right "main" window contains a bug maybe. It doesn't occur in windows though but funnily enough in Windows - on a few machines - it happens that all the other windows (the sidebar and the lower area of the screen) sometimes do not load at all and stay blank until restart while the main windows loads properly. There should be some difference in the code of these window views explaining it. Gotta search for it sometime.

btw. would be nice to know if it does also run the other two ways Jetrel mentioned, i.e. with Windows boot or VMWare/Parallels if you got those on your computer. but thx again for testing. When you click on a fleet symbol on galaxy map in your home sector you see a list of available ships and when you click on one of it, mouse changes and you can plot a course for this ship on map. It uses several GDI+ techniques to do so, maybe worth testing it out if that works in WINE on a mac too .

[StandYourGround]

I don't really have the budget (or desire) for a Windows license and a copy of VMWare. I should point out that emulators like VMWare are not designed for gaming, and I would be surprised if it worked well enough at all. WINE makes it possible for Windows apps to run natively on Mac/Linux. Besides, this is (currently) a freeware game, and I don't feel the need to pay $210 ($130 for Windows, 80 for VMWare) to keep testing it. That aside, I'm positive it would work just fine on a Windows dual-boot, and for the same reasons as VMWare, I won't be testing that area. Thanks anyway, and maybe when I have enough time I'll see if I can begin to fathom how this game works and try to actually play it.

[Malvoisin]

sure, no need for you to pay money for anything like this .

yes, the Windows Dual Boot obviously should work as long as the Mac doesn't feature exotic hardware but I assume when it's running intel processors, it should be quite standard. I actually could look the hardware specs of their computers up sometime, never did that.

If you need any help getting through the jungle, just tell me and I'll try and do my best .

[Jetrel]

sure, no need for you to pay money for anything like this .

yes, the Windows Dual Boot obviously should work as long as the Mac doesn't feature exotic hardware but I assume when it's running intel processors, it should be quite standard. I actually could look the hardware specs of their computers up sometime, never did that.

Apple strongly supports running windows XP on all their intel machines. It's not some "cheap basement hacker project" - it's an officially supported sales point. In fact the "safety net" it offers has probably been singularly responsible for them multiplying their market share recently, because people no longer have the risk they used to. It's the ultimate guarantee - if you discover that apple's silly "mac os" thing isn't for you, you've lost nothing - you've simply got a very nice windows laptop on your hands that happens to have an apple logo on it.

Apple goes so far as to supply a complete set of drivers, including special drivers for all the peripherals (such as the built-in webcam on their laptops), and I believe even special drivers to allow windows XP to read/write to mac volumes. They're really serious about absolutely guaranteeing it will work. In fact, not only does it work, my macbook is probably the best windows laptop I've ever seen (it actually goes to sleep when you close the lid. How novel).






What's not supported is running the mac os (which now essentially runs on generic x86 hardware) on non-apple hardware. That is the project that's dirty and hacky.

[Malvoisin]

got a new update: Version 0.8 / Alpha6 Download (142mb): http://star-trek-games.com/index.php?op ... nfo&id=434

Some screenshots showing the new (pre-)combat tactical menu implementation (preview jpg's have <100 kb size each, hope that is okay, if not, I can remove some of them; clicking on them leads to full resolution png's):








Tutorials on gameplay mechanics and game controls are planned for Alpha7, so in short, what you need to get started once you are in the game is:

• Options menu bar is by default hidden. You need to move your mouse to the upper left edge of the screen to make it show up. There you can save and/or quit a game.
• Fleets can be selected by clicking on the race icon on galaxy map in the respective sector. Then on the lower panel on screen the available fleets and ships are shown.
• Right click and drag will let you quickly move and scroll around galaxy map. Also, using mouse-wheel, you can zoom in and out of map. Cursors and extra mouse buttons can be used to quickly switch between systems in build menu view.

[Lord-Knightmare]

This game sounds interesting. Download links and requirements for Mac OS X please.

[Malvoisin]

Several ways are possible (see previous posts here in this thread; download link is the same as in my previous post above with the new screenshots):

1. Windows on Dual-Boot
2. WINE (run it with its own virtual desktop, otherwise at least under Linux/Ubuntu10 there are some graphical glitches)
3. VMWare

It's not natively mac-compiled, one reason being no one at our team possessing a mac . Thus I personally have not tested it myself if it runs outside Windows/Linux(WINE-only there too, since old-fashioned MFC classes are used for ingame GUI). So if you want to try, you might find out it doesn't work that well or in the other case, please post your findings in here, it'll only help in future occasions when people ask for mac instructions. Maybe we can even find and fix a bug that way if one occurs with you.

[MCP]

Well it's easy to install into Crossover Mac, however the galaxy map doesn't appear to work correctly. I installed it into my Warcraft 3 bottle just because I have that bottle configured nicely.

If you saw a picture you'd probably just say 'WTF is going on?' because it certainly looks nothing like your screenshots. In fact the whole GUI looks like crap compared to this picture:
http://web9.delta442.server4you.de/bote ... alpha6.jpg

However interesting this game might be, I'm not going to spend the time to try to figure out how to configure wine to support this. I already tried with Fallout 2, and that was not fun despite learning some very helpful settings.

[Malvoisin]

sure, no one requires you to do that . There is a strange bug in the GDI+ implementation of our galaxy map that we cannot get hold of. Before, when the galaxy map ran on simpler GDI (Alpha 4 and earlier), it worked perfectly under WINE and screenshots were like those we made from Windows OS. Still, if you might have an idea where the bug might be with your vast knowledge of setting up WINE, we would be very thankful for that. It is probably not a large thing to fix code- or settings-wise with respect to the full playability under WINE we had back then in Alpha 4. Btw. if anyone has got the time and is curious of the problem, the code is hosted at http://bote.codeplex.com/ .

[Kalajel]

Ghah! Can anybody point me to the "freakin' press here to download for freakin' Mac OSX" section in the WINE and/or VMWare websites; I'm sick and tired of running around like a freakin' mouse in a maze trying to find what I'm looking for and figure out these freakin' websites!

I mean darn! Is user friendly so hard to do!?

[Malvoisin]

that would be too easy wouldn't it . I use to download my stuff from a german computer magazine website called chip.de, they even got a english subsection, so you might find it there: http://download.chip.eu/en/WINE-for-Dar ... 53815.html

seems like there is no regular macosx port but either third party applications or self-compiling, see MacOSX-FAQ here: http://wiki.winehq.org/MacOSX/FAQs

vmware isn't for cheap I assume, their download section is here though I have no idea what the difference between vmware fusion or workstation is: http://www.vmware.com/support/


I'm adding some gameplay and essential game control hints in here, it's a bit long but essentially the first 4 entries are the ones you really need for starters. The rest is also quite useful since many things in-game are still undocumented (or only in german manual which is not very useful for most of you here I think ).

• Options menu bar is by default hidden. You need to move your mouse to the upper left edge of the screen to make it show up. There you can save and/or quit a game.
• Fleets can be selected by clicking on the race icon on galaxy map in the respective sector. Then on the lower panel on screen the available fleets and ships are shown. Three clicks are needed, first on galaxy map race symbol in the upper right corner of the sector in question, then one left-mouse-click on the ship/fleet in fleet panel below on screen, then on the sector you wish to fly into.
• Left-click and drag will let you quickly move and scroll around galaxy map. Also, using mouse-wheel, you can zoom in and out of map. Cursors and extra mouse buttons can be used to quickly switch between systems in build menu view.
• Outposts can be build by transport class ships, just go over the order buttons on bottom right after selecting such a ship, you'll find the correspondingly-named button there. After finishing an outpost, (an)other transporter(s) can even upgrade this outpost to a full starbase by essentially clicking on the same button again for this ship
• Use resource routes right from the start after you colonized your first world. Most likely it will need titanium for its structures to build and your homeworld has more than enough at the beginning. Resource routes are laid similar to trade routes but work resource-wise, so just one resource per route is possible. Also I would not recommend laying more than one route per system since only one route is for free, more than one go at the cost of trade routes, i.e. for each further resource route you can lay one less trade route from that system.

• After meeting another alien race (mostly a so-called minor, major homeworlds are not supposed to be close to each other at game start, but it can happen), you can set up diplomatic relationships with this minor. If he is in favor of you, i.e. neutral and above, try to convince him to sign a trade treaty with you. Once accepted, lay a trade route to his homeworld.
  In order to do that, go to system->trade menu and click on trade routes (use your homeworld as starting point first, could be you need to wait a few turns into the game before a trade route is allowed population-wise, you'll get a note however in-game about that), then lay it to the sector in question. After that you'll have the benefit of evergrowing relationship values with this minor. It is slow, but overtime you will see that he becomes more and more friendly towards you (depending on his race traits of course, not all minors act the same way) and eventually offers you better treaties and at last membership.
  Trade routes can be laid to other majors as well when you have a trade treaty or higher with this major (non-aggressive pact does not count here). Since majors mostly got more than one star system under their control, you can lay a full set of trade routes towards their systems (1:1 relationship there, so 1 sector to 1 other sector). Income from that route is calculated by both systems' population so it helps when you have some intel about their system pop. Cancelling a trade route works the same way as laying a trade route, you'll notice it becomes pink on galaxy map and ends in 5 turns.Then you can for example retry to lay a more profitable route if you choose a wrong one the last time (so to sum it up, try to lay evenly routes, i.e. a 30bn. star system should do trade with a 30bn. star system of another alien race and so on, having a 50bn. system doing trade with a 10bn. system is a bit of a waste of credits).
• Diplomacy menu works as follows: Once you get to know / meet another race, it is added to your diplomatic menu in the list at left hand side. You can click on it and see how this race is seeing you (hostile, friendly, optimistic, etc.). By giving gifts you can try to improve your relationships with them. Once they are neutral or higher towards you, you may want to consider offering them a trade treaty. Once accepted, you can lay a trade route towards that race's home system. This gains you money/credits and continuously but slowly improves relationship with them. You can also bribe them if they already belong to another major or have higher treaties with another major.
  This holds for the "minors" in-game. A "major" is a race that can be played by humans or AI. These majors expand their territory just like you and they have slightly different diplomatic options, but in the end it should be self-explanatory what a "non-aggressiveness"-pact means and what effects an affiliation or a defence pact with another major race has.

Here some more advanced hints start, you may want to find out about them yourself (you can get behind it yourself certainly, they are pretty logical when you think about it ):

• Helping minors terraform their planetary system helps increasing your popularity with them too. That way it can boost relationsships even from hostile towards neutral or above and then you can do as mentioned above to get that minor into your empire.
• I'd only terraform planets that do not take more than 10 turns at the beginning as a general hint. Also, multiple colonization in one star system boosts population number - though it costs of course a lot to build that second colony ship and works only if there are more than 1 planet in that system and that other planet(s) need(s) to be unterraformed, otherwise it gets colonized too by the first ship colonizing this world - is a thing worth thinking about. When you have >7bn. population in a system, you can build a so-called star-dock. This orbital structure increases range of your fleet and is one of the most useful things at early-game alongside researching engine tech towards level 3 at 100% RP allocation, ignoring the rest a bit because engine tech also increases maximum range of your ships making it possible to colonize and explore worlds that could not be reached before (or only when building expensive outposts to get there).
• I'd rather not invest too much credits into convincing minors at the beginning, buying colony and transport ships is IMO a bit more useful, but there are several ways to play the game (also depending on the race you choose to play with of course, each has its own special prowess), I just mention my way here.
• Short explanation on internet connectivity of BotE: The game does not connect to the internet unless someone connects you or you connect to someone outside your LAN for a multiplayer game. Sometimes people misunderstand it and think the game's underlying server-client structure would mean it would connect to some host server on the internet. This isn't the case, it uses just the client applications that you run.

• Auto-build (AI governor for colony management) can be activated system-wise by going to Empire->Systems menu, and there clicking on a system of your choice and pressing the 'a' key on your keyboard. It then tries to build meaningful things whenever build queue of that system is empty. It cannot be set to different goals however, so you can't tell the governor to focus on ship-building for example. It does what it seems best-fitting for this system.
  The governor is into effect as long as you press 'a' again in the Empire->Systems menu. you see the difference immediately, a system set to auto-build has a red-colored "auto-build" mark in that menu.
  Basically it is the AI that controls this particular system then. It looks up which structures can be built according to system resources storage and then decides for one of them to be built. Sometimes even buys buildings/ships when you have the credits. It also sets workers to places and puts structures that require energy up in energy menu.
  In Alpha7 it is planned to have a menu for the governor to allow/disallow him buying, scrapping, reallocating labor units, etc., also to tell him which direction the colony should be developed to.
  Right now, it's just a testing feature, that's why it's a bit hidden.You can always interrupt the governor by filling the build queue manually. Then all items in the queue will be built and after the last item was built and the queue is empty again, the auto-build automatically kicks in again. So you don't have to press 'a' in the menu to completely switch it off when you decide to take manual command again over that system for a short period of time.
  So basically, it kicks in only when the build queue is empty.
• In late-game, you can try to build resource allocators (if you have more than 5 colonies in total). These allocators let all your colonies including your homeworld access that specific system's storage for the given resource type. It'a "master-resource-route" so to speak. Very powerful. Yet you should build it in a safe system deep within your own territory and of course with enough mines producing enough of the resource for all your colonies (have a look at planetary bonusses for that resource for example).

Btw. it is "allowed" to take screencaptures from in-game, maybe even create a trailer if you know how to do such stuff. Having a gameplay video surely helps people see quickly what the game is like, more so than screenshots. Also it can help explain game control issues like the ones mentioned above.

We also put up our german manual as an html manual here: http://translate.google.de/translate?hl ... dbuch.html

In order to understand battle outcomes better, we have a combat simulator that is used in-game in the background when you hit "Fight", where you can see a tactical view of the combat or statistical data for repeated combats: http://botf2.star-trek-games.com/viewto ... =19&t=1731

[Malvoisin]

as someone on our german boards pointed out, using winetricks (http://wiki.winehq.org/winetricks) and installing native gdiplus libraries in console (sh winetricks gdiplus) solves GUI issues with the galaxy map. We haven't tried it out ourselves but if someone wants to do it on his mac or linux distribution and post feedback, it'd be welcome.