Battle of the Bulge - iPad - Kickstarter announcement

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

Hi,

As far as I know this is the first wargame that tries to get funded
through Kickstarter

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-the-simulation-game-for-the-ip

$10 will get you the iPad game - not a bad deal.

If you want to find out more about the game and the ongoing
development head out here :

http://www.shenandoah-studio.com/

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 27 apr, 14:02, <adel...@inbox.com> wrote:
>
> I don't understand how the developer will deliver his BotB app to his
> backers.  Apps for the iPad must be installed thru the App Store.

Presumably I'll get a key or such - for $10 I'm not losing sleep over
this :)

> Unlike PCs, iDevices have fixed storage, so
> there is no way to increase that once my 16GB (effectively 14GB available
> to the user) is used up.

That's why I got the 32GB version :)

> Why are ports of PC wargames taking up
> so much space once installed?

In-game video ? - fancy graphics ? I dunno. What I do know is that
there's a boatload of iPad wargames coming down the pike so I'm a
happy puppy

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[BasKa]

It's going fast! Check http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-the-simulation-game-for-the-ip to see where it stands now.
Within one day already $ 8,346 of $ 20,000 they are looking for in a month.

Bas

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 28 apr, 21:53, BasKa <curt...@hetnet.nl> wrote:
> It's going fast! Checkhttp://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-th... to see where it stands now.

> Within one day already $ 8,346 of $ 20,000 they are looking for in a month.

$12K right now - nah, Kickstarter will *never* work for digital
wargames ...

It's the only thing I regret forgetting to ask the Slitherine guys -
what they think about Kickstarter projects

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <4717572c-a4f9-4ac5-811d-b2fb5fd192da@
36g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> > It's going fast! Checkhttp://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-th... to see where it stands now.
> > Within one day already $ 8,346 of $ 20,000 they are looking for in a month.
>
> $12K right now - nah, Kickstarter will *never* work for digital
> wargames ...

I'm not sure what to think about this dealie. I thought computer
wargames were crushingly expensive to develop.

$20,000? Six weeks CRM bill @$ork.

--
Giftzwerg
***
"The president looks in the mirror and sees FDR. Increasingly, the rest
of the country look at him and see Jimmy Carter, perhaps even James
Buchanan."
- John Steele Gordon

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On May 1, 3:06 am, Giftzwerg <giftzwerg...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> In article <4717572c-a4f9-4ac5-811d-b2fb5fd192da@

> 36g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com says...
>
> > > It's going fast! Checkhttp://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-th...to see where it stands now.

> > > Within one day already $ 8,346 of $ 20,000 they are looking for in a month.
>
> > $12K right now - nah, Kickstarter will *never* work for digital
> > wargames ...
>
> I'm not sure what to think about this dealie.  I thought computer
> wargames were crushingly expensive to develop.

Well, they are - if you're stupid/pigheaded about how to design them.
But these guys started out with a paper design - incidentally : the
cardboard version of the game is available too - not too grand in
scope and no fancy 3D models. Work out the design kinks in the paper
version within days instead of programming for months before you come
to the conclusion that a certain feature doesn't work etc. You know,
just like I've been advocating in here for years ...

This is going to date me, but for those unaware who Eric Lee Smith and
John Butterfield are : they started and were the core of Victory
Games and designed classics like Ambush and Civil War. And now they
ask $10 for a Bulge game on the iPad ? Biggest no-brainer of the new
millenium.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <c8c96e99-5b64-4697-9c27-f13484e001e8
@e15g2000vbt.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...

> This is going to date me, but for those unaware who Eric Lee Smith and
> John Butterfield are : they started and were the core of Victory
> Games and designed classics like Ambush and Civil War. And now they
> ask $10 for a Bulge game on the iPad ? Biggest no-brainer of the new
> millenium.

Don't recall the names, but do (fondly) remember the games.

The only problem, as I recall it, was that the replayability factor -
particularly for the AMBUSH series - was practically nonexistent. This
sort of thing would be greatly ameliorated by an iPad version, I'll
wager.

And you're right. $10? If I get 90 minutes of fun outta the thing,
it's already paid for itself, entertainment-wise. Worth $10 just to
keep them building games. IIRC, I paid $25+ for AMBUSH - *in 1983* - as
a working copper staring in horror at the ConEd bill. And then more $$
for the add-on modules that expanded the system and doled out fresh new
scenarios.

It's exactly the way I view Dave Kershaw and his 'droid wargames. A
*dollar and a half*?!?! Some of his titles (QUATRE BRAS, IE) have given
me more raw entertainment value than "mainline" wargames that cost me
$40.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 1 mei, 23:06, Giftzwerg <giftzwerg...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> It's exactly the way I view Dave Kershaw and his 'droid wargames.  A
> *dollar and a half*?!?!  Some of his titles (QUATRE BRAS, IE) have given
> me more raw entertainment value than "mainline" wargames that cost me
> $40.

He just reported on having finished a proof-of-concept game in one of
those IDE's that let you compile to various tablet platforms from the
same code-base. Could have been Unity ... or Marmelade. This in
essence means that you can expect his games to become available for
the Android, iOs and Win8 platform in the future. Everybody wins :)

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Pelle Nilsson]

"eddys...@hotmail.com" <eddys...@hotmail.com> writes:

> This is going to date me, but for those unaware who Eric Lee Smith and
> John Butterfield are : they started and were the core of Victory
> Games and designed classics like Ambush and Civil War. And now they
> ask $10 for a Bulge game on the iPad ? Biggest no-brainer of the new
> millenium.

If they make an iPad-only Ambush! port I will buy an iPad.

Not sure about buying yet another Bulge game, even if I had the hardware
to play on. Well, OK, I would proabably pay a few $ for an Android
version.

--
/Pelle

[Pelle Nilsson]

Giftzwerg <giftzw...@hotmail.com> writes:

> The only problem, as I recall it, was that the replayability factor -
> particularly for the AMBUSH series - was practically nonexistent. This
> sort of thing would be greatly ameliorated by an iPad version, I'll
> wager.

From what I have seen, replayability was low in Ambush!, yes, but it
don't have to be. You could easily make a scenario that could branch out
in countless possible directions, and could remove much of the scripting
if you wanted to. The basic system is very flexible, but they only used
it in some very limited ways (probably because of having to do all
cross-references manually).

I wrote a lot on this topic on bgg a few years ago, and posted some
scripts to help with generating new missions:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/299841/diy-ambush-missions

I have two quite complete (but on hold at the moment) boardgame projects
based on my experiences from that project (but designing new game
systems, not making missions for Ambush!).

One thing that is fun about using a text script to generate a
paragraph-driven scenario is that (if you take a little care in how it
is designed) you can also make a frontend to allow you to play a digital
version of the scenario.

--
/Pelle

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 2 mei, 10:52, <adel...@inbox.com> wrote:
>
> Not to rain on your parade and not to besmirch wargame developers, but the
> first Kickstarter game development scam has already been exposed.

uh, I was the first in here to say that I was fully expecting the
Kickstarter bubble to burst a bit due to fraud, given that everyone
and his dog is throwing money at projects as if there's no tomorrow.

So this puppy is *very* careful about which projects get my backing.
But throwing $10 to a team with *their* track record ? I can't get a
mediocre pizza delivered to my door for $10.

> I will be waiting for it to the games to be out on the App Store before
> parting with my money...

My guess is that that $20K is not really covering all their
development costs but is more a kind of security/check to make sure
there is a demand for such games on the iPad.

And they've just reached $15K this morning.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 2 mei, 10:17, Pelle Nilsson <krigss...@pelle-n.net> wrote:

The Android market has a problem. The problem is that there's no
single Android market, but a dozen different ones. Developers face an
administrative nightmare to get their game on every one of those,
whereas with Apple there's just this single process and your game is
ready for all the I-devices.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 2 mei, 10:54, Pelle Nilsson <krigss...@pelle-n.net> wrote:
>
> I wrote a lot on this topic on bgg a few years ago, and posted some
> scripts to help with generating new missions:http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/299841/diy-ambush-missions

Interesting. Not such an Ambush fan myself - never saw the point of
playing solitaire wargames when there's other players about, but on
tablet to kill 10 minutes : sign me up.

> I have two quite complete (but on hold at the moment) boardgame projects
> based on my experiences from that project (but designing new game
> systems, not making missions for Ambush!).

Anything you would like to divulge on that ? I'm always interested in
design ideas and new concepts.

> One thing that is fun about using a text script to generate a
> paragraph-driven scenario is that (if you take a little care in how it
> is designed) you can also make a frontend to allow you to play a digital
> version of the scenario.

Ever heard of the game Tales of the Arabian Nights ? It's also
paragraph based and a recent edition has like 4 times the number of
paragraphs compared to the original version because computers today
allow for a quicker check of all the possible combinations and
permutations.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Giftzwerg]

In article <2paa1rx...@bacon.lysator.liu.se>, krig...@pelle-n.net
says...

> > The only problem, as I recall it, was that the replayability factor -
> > particularly for the AMBUSH series - was practically nonexistent. This
> > sort of thing would be greatly ameliorated by an iPad version, I'll
> > wager.
>
> From what I have seen, replayability was low in Ambush!, yes, but it
> don't have to be. You could easily make a scenario that could branch out
> in countless possible directions, and could remove much of the scripting
> if you wanted to. The basic system is very flexible, but they only used
> it in some very limited ways (probably because of having to do all
> cross-references manually).

Perhaps it's strange, but I was never one for designing my own
scenarios. I appreciate editors, but mostly in the context of modifying
existing scenarios to reflect "what-if" stuff that interests me.

[Giftzwerg]

In article <4aa90e39-6303-45bc-b324-
20e00b...@a5g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com
says...

> > Not to rain on your parade and not to besmirch wargame developers, but the
> > first Kickstarter game development scam has already been exposed.
>
> uh, I was the first in here to say that I was fully expecting the
> Kickstarter bubble to burst a bit due to fraud, given that everyone
> and his dog is throwing money at projects as if there's no tomorrow.
>
> So this puppy is *very* careful about which projects get my backing.
> But throwing $10 to a team with *their* track record ? I can't get a
> mediocre pizza delivered to my door for $10.

That's my take on it, as well.

Shit, Arjuna or Mr. Dean can have my $$ for the next iterations of their
games right now; they're going to build the things, and I'm going to buy
them, so the matter of when the money changes hands is virtually
irrelevant.

Norm Koger used to be a member of this elite fraternity.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 2 mei, 12:46, Giftzwerg <giftzwerg...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> In article <4aa90e39-6303-45bc-b324-
> 20e00b0a4...@a5g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>, eddyster...@hotmail.com

> says...
>
> > > Not to rain on your parade and not to besmirch wargame developers, but the
> > > first Kickstarter game development scam has already been exposed.
>
> > uh, I was the first in here to say that I was fully expecting the
> > Kickstarter bubble to burst a bit due to fraud, given that everyone
> > and his dog is throwing money at projects as if there's no tomorrow.
>
> > So this puppy is *very* careful about which projects get my backing.
> > But throwing $10 to a team with *their* track record ? I can't get a
> > mediocre pizza delivered to my door for $10.
>
> That's my take on it, as well.
>
> Shit, Arjuna or Mr. Dean can have my $$ for the next iterations of their
> games right now; they're going to build the things, and I'm going to buy
> them, so the matter of when the money changes hands is virtually
> irrelevant.
>
> Norm Koger used to be a member of this elite fraternity.

Norm who ?

Frank Hunter is on that list for me too - always interesting concepts,
often with a seriously flawed execution, but this time it looks as if
he got at least some help in the graphics department

http://www.strategycore.co.uk/news/we-spot-a-landing/

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 2 mei, 12:01, "eddyster...@hotmail.com" <eddyster...@hotmail.com>
wrote:

David Kershaw posted some tips on 3 of them

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/798259/app-markets-android-for-developers

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Pelle Nilsson]

"eddys...@hotmail.com" <eddys...@hotmail.com> writes:

>> I have two quite complete (but on hold at the moment) boardgame projects
>> based on my experiences from that project (but designing new game
>> systems, not making missions for Ambush!).
>
> Anything you would like to divulge on that ? I'm always interested in
> design ideas and new concepts.

Not much to say yet. Both use similar python scripts to generate PDF
files with scenario information and paragraphs. There are some graphics,
some test scenarios, a few pages of rules, but neither is playable yet,
so file under vaporware. At least one has a deadline since I plan to
complete it for the bgg solitaire game design contest this summer. Both
are designed with the possibility of a digital version in mind.

> Ever heard of the game Tales of the Arabian Nights ? It's also
> paragraph based and a recent edition has like 4 times the number of
> paragraphs compared to the original version because computers today
> allow for a quicker check of all the possible combinations and
> permutations.

Saw the game but never played.

Problem with using a computer to generate paragraphs is that it can make
it too easy to make lots of generated paragraphs, without addig much fun
for the player to do (or that is what I experienced when playing around
with my Ambush! script). Thinking very hard how to keep the number
of paragraph lookups down and the games playing fast.

--
/Pelle

[Giftzwerg]

In article <491926391357706722.03...@news.aioe.org>,
ade...@inbox.com says...

> Am I the only one who thinks that Arjuna's click friendly wargames would be
> an ideal match for tablets? I would love to play them on my iPad.

I'm betting tabs need a little more juice, RAM and CPU-wise, before
they're up to the task.

[Giftzwerg]

In article <1977757995357727241.1...@news.aioe.org>,

ade...@inbox.com says...

> >> Am I the only one who thinks that Arjuna's click friendly wargames would be
> >> an ideal match for tablets? I would love to play them on my iPad.
> >
> > I'm betting tabs need a little more juice, RAM and CPU-wise, before
> > they're up to the task.
>

> IANAP, but they already have Unreal Engine quality stuff, Infinity Blade I
> & II, running, so RAM and CPU should be adequate.

<shrug>

I won't speak for Arjuna, but I don't think a real-world representation
of the raw processing power necessary to do all the calculations
necessary in BFTB is found in a first-person shooter released 15 years
ago. There really is a lot more going on than the counters moving
around the map.

--
Giftzwerg
***
"We all know about 'undocumented workers.' Now we have Elizabeth
Warren, the undocumented Indian."
- Howie Carr

[Arjuna]

What's the horsepower of the cpu in the latest IPad? How many processors are in an IPad ( 1,2,4 more? ) Do they support multithreading? WHat type of graphics card or integrated graphics chip do they use?

[Giftzwerg]

In article <573036963357784217.18...@news.aioe.org>,
ade...@inbox.com says...

> Lastly, I have to be upfront with you. It is probably unlikely that you
> will see a significant expansion of your paying customers by releasing on
> Android/iOS/WP7 simply because the top of the charts on these platforms are
> dominated either by casual time wasters such as Angry Birds or by freemium
> games that employ psychological hooks akin to gambling, like those released
> by Zynga et al.

Not to mention the fact that AppStore browsers are gonna shit themselves
when they see the $80 pricetag.

Hey, maybe there's something in a melding of genres - KAMPFGRUPPE PEIPER
VS ZOMBIES VS ANGRY BIRDS! Sorta like the collaboration between Beatrix
Potter and Sven Hassel that produced PETER RABBIT, TANK KILLER and THE
TALE OF SQUIRREL NUTKIN' AND SS DEATH BASTARD REGIMENT.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 27 apr, 09:09, "eddyster...@hotmail.com" <eddyster...@hotmail.com>
wrote:
> Hi,
>
> As far as I know this is the first wargame that tries to get funded
> through Kickstarter
>
> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2102739237/battle-of-the-bulge-th...
>
> $10 will get you the iPad game - not a bad deal.

They've upped the ante - $20 will now get you both the Bulge game and
an El Alamein game designed by none other than Mark Herman.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 4 mei, 10:13, Giftzwerg <giftzwerg...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> In article <573036963357784217.181402adelphi-inbox....@news.aioe.org>,
> adel...@inbox.com says...

>
> > Lastly, I have to be upfront with you.  It is probably unlikely that you
> > will see a significant expansion of your paying customers by releasing on
> > Android/iOS/WP7 simply because the top of the charts on these platforms are
> > dominated either by casual time wasters such as Angry Birds or by freemium
> > games that employ psychological hooks akin to gambling, like those released
> > by Zynga et al.
>
> Not to mention the fact that AppStore browsers are gonna shit themselves
> when they see the $80 pricetag.

IIRC $20 is the highest level allowed by Apple.

> Hey, maybe there's something in a melding of genres - KAMPFGRUPPE PEIPER
> VS ZOMBIES VS ANGRY BIRDS!  Sorta like the collaboration between Beatrix
> Potter and Sven Hassel that produced PETER RABBIT, TANK KILLER and THE
> TALE OF SQUIRREL NUTKIN' AND SS DEATH BASTARD REGIMENT.

A scaled back version of the Command Ops engine could work very well
on the iPad. It has about the computing power of a Win 98 pc and I ran
HTTR on that machine IIRC

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 4 mei, 13:46, <adel...@inbox.com> wrote:

> Nope I remember buying apps that cost like $49.99.  Must dig out my iTunes
> receipts as the App Store removes their prices on apps that I had
> purchased.

My bad. That's what you get when you believe everything you read on
the 'net without double-checking it :)

I did check now, and there are even $1000 apps

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/barmax-ca/id345722008?mt=8

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Arjuna]

On Friday, 4 May 2012 11:03:51 UTC+10, ade...@inbox.com wrote:

> > What's the horsepower of the cpu in the latest IPad? How many processors
> > are in an IPad ( 1,2,4 more? ) Do they support multithreading? WHat type
> > of graphics card or integrated graphics chip do they use?
>

> For iPad 2012
>
> CPU: 1GHz Apple A5X (dual-core)
> GPU: PowerVR SGX543MP4
>
> Source:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/iPad_(original)
>
> However, do keep in mind that the whole thing runs on iOS, so a direct
> comparison of the beefiness of the CPU and GPU with PCs may not be directly
> applicable as the OS overheads will probably differ.

>
> Lastly, I have to be upfront with you. It is probably unlikely that you
> will see a significant expansion of your paying customers by releasing on
> Android/iOS/WP7 simply because the top of the charts on these platforms are
> dominated either by casual time wasters such as Angry Birds or by freemium
> games that employ psychological hooks akin to gambling, like those released
> by Zynga et al.
>

> Instead, what you might gain by targetting the tablets is actually
> retaining your existing customer base who are slowly moving onto those
> platforms instead. As an example people like me.
>
> I probably may not be indicative of the majority of your customers, but I
> do buy a lot of games every month. Way back when you released the original
> HTTR. I was still gaming on the PC. Since then I shifted over to console
> gaming and have am now exclusively gaming on my iDevices.
>
> Reason being I rely on my PC for work and cannot take the chance of any
> games DRM (not yours, but EA's etc) screwing up my Windows (happened before
> more than once). So it is PC for work and iDevices for work/play (a
> misbehaving app does not take down my iDevice).
>
> In the final analysis, is it worth it financially and in terms of coding
> enjoyment for you to port to tablets? Obviously I hope to see an iPad
> version of your games and I will buy them, but it is increasingly unlikely
> that customers who have gone tablet will return to desktop/laptop gaming as
> tablets are just so convenient, light and not hot on their laps.
>
> PS, if you do indeed port to iOS, could you keep the installed size small?
> Battle Academy and Command Mission, while fun, were way too big. Most of
> us have the 16GB model, and iWork takes up 1GB of that and other utilities
> and apps need space too, not to mention my music. An installed size of
> 300MB or less would be ideal, if possible.
>
> Just my two cents. :)

Thanks for that Ade. Interesting. Much to ponder. My gut feeling is to wait. The power will only improve. I really don't want to have to wait for routes to calc on a slow machine. And that's the killer really. Users hate waiting for the machine to process things.

Forgive my ignorance but do IPad's have persistent storage like a hard drive or is all into flash ram? If so then I can see why you are worried about the footprint and that's a real concern for something like BFTB which occupies over 1 Gb of space. I know that a good portion is taken up with tutorial movies and such but there is still a fair bit of data.

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On May 4, 3:14 pm, Arjuna <d...@panthergames.com> wrote:

> My gut feeling is to wait. The power will only improve.

It's not so much a power problem : programming a game for the iPad
will *never* be worth it if you have to convert an existing engine to
it. Especially one the size of Command Ops.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[ade...@inbox.com]

x-no-Archive: yes

Yes, iPads only have non removable flash RAM that cannot be expanded.

[Vincenzo Beretta]

> Hey, maybe there's something in a melding of genres - KAMPFGRUPPE
> PEIPER VS ZOMBIES VS ANGRY BIRDS! Sorta like the collaboration
> between Beatrix Potter and Sven Hassel that produced PETER RABBIT,
> TANK KILLER and THE TALE OF SQUIRREL NUTKIN' AND SS DEATH
> BASTARD REGIMENT.

"CAT SHIT ONE" would make an excellent tactical shooter "a la" Jagged
Alliance:
http://www.wipido.com/video/J3iwqETqPGAP

[Vincenzo Beretta]

>> IANAP, but they already have Unreal Engine quality stuff,
>> Infinity Blade I> & II, running, so RAM and CPU should
>> be adequate.

> <shrug>

> I won't speak for Arjuna, but I don't think a real-world representation
> of the raw processing power necessary to do all the calculations
> necessary in BFTB is found in a first-person shooter released 15
> years ago.

I guess he is talking about the latest iteration of the Unreal engine. I
have seen Dead Space running on an iPad 2.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreal_Engine_3

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

On 4 mei, 10:36, "eddyster...@hotmail.com" <eddyster...@hotmail.com>
wrote:

In case anyone doubted it - they made their target easily. It'll be
interesting to see if other pc wargame developers go this way too.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx

[Arjuna]

What was there target Eddy?

[eddys...@hotmail.com]

> What was there target Eddy?

20K - I've got the distinct impression this wasn't so much to finance
the development of it, as that seems to be as good as done, but to
test the waters if there was a future for this type of games.

And it looks like they're very happy with the response and now an El
Alamein game by Mark Herman got announced and is up next. I already
pledged for that too. I mean Mark Herman - that's the guy behind Gulf
Strike, Empire of the Sun and We The People / Washington's War. If he
does a $10 iPad wargame you'd be nuts not to buy it.

iPad certainly isn't the miracle platform that will safe pc wargames,
but at least it's a platform where stuff I like is getting developed
for : well-developed medium difficulty thinky games I can play in an
evening, while the pc wargame world is going for either micro-manage
monster or beer & pretzel wargames.

Greetz,

Eddy Sterckx