Rule the World Pitboss (CDZ Earth)

[akots]

quote:Originally posted by Matrix
...less than 1% of the Civ4-players play pitboss.

IMO, this will change in the near future.

[Matrix]

Why do you think so?

[akots]

Well, the Internet is spreading and hosting PB is not that tough and expensive compared to what it were a year or two years ago. You can actually host it from your house and since people do buy PC every 3-4 years and throw away the old ones, the desire to host makes them less inclined to throw these old machines away especially if they can run Civ4 on a PB level. With modern easy to set up networking equipment, putting these old machines to work as PB servers seems the nice way around. Another thing is that Internet is getting cheaper all over the world. Take Russia for example. Unlimited broadband now in Moscow is about $20/month and one with fixed IP is about $30. Many people can afford that. Same is true for China and India and many other countries which were never mapped on the Internet maps. Of course, one can say that Firaxis does not care because in these countries there are not that many legal users of their software. I really do not know how the things are in China or India. As far as Russia is concerned, there are more and more people who are using legally bought software. It is spreading and the companies realized they can actually make money even though cost is usually half or third of that for Europe and US. Legal copy of Civ one can buy in Russia for about $10 and Warlords are also about $10 and BTS is scheduled to be published within a couple of months for about same price. Pirated disks of course are cheaper, about $5, sometimes $4. But they are usually of horrible quality and cannot be patched normally thus actually stimulating people to buy legit stuff.

The market is huge. Take for example WoW. There are about a million people on this globe playing it sometimes for free, sometimes paying $15 a month. So, MP fever is spreading to places previously unknown and unheard of and so is PB. Actually, PB is pretty much close to an ideal MP setup for turn-based games and many people like TBG.

I'm not saying this will happen overnight. But it will eventually.

[Robi D]

I agree with akots here. I think Pitboss games will definately grow, especially as more people are able to host games. Without a doubt it is the best way to play MP games. PBEM are to slow for more than a 4 player game and internet games are a shortened 2-hour bash-a-thon. Pitboss is the only way to get an SP like game against humans.

The DM issue with pitboss is one that can be easily fixed. Its is the only real problem there is with pitboss. In internet games DM's are a legitimate tactic since the other player is online and can defend against them so they don't need to rewrite the whole MP side of the game, just add the option for pitboss games. Once thats done i think you will find a lot more SP playing willing to play pitboss games to go along with more people being able to host games. Then that 1% will grow very quickly.

[Matrix]

You've got a point.

[Robi D]

BTW Matrix, Perth would be 1 tile NW, thats Albany

[Beam]

New turn but the uploader is disconnected.

[akots]

Yes, I finally managed to get a scientist after 5 artists at 5-15% probability in a row.

[Stapel]

The previous turn took less than 5 hours, I think. I was surprised to see that the game was waiting for ME, with about 19,5 hours left....

[Robi D]

quote:Originally posted by Stapel

The previous turn took less than 5 hours, I think. I was surprised to see that the game was waiting for ME, with about 19,5 hours left....

You slacker