Be Excellent To Each Other

I hope at least some of you lot have played Alpha Centauri. It's a really bloody good strategy game. Civ, but future-history sci fi. Really well written, and a tonne of fun.

Anyway, I am interviewing the Lead Designer, Brian Reynolds. Anyone got any suggestions for questions for him?

"Why was it so relentlessly brown and purple?"

That or something about Dune. I am not helpful.

I'm sure I can think of some, it's one of my favourite games ever.

... erm.

Oooh! Wait! What inspired the lore and feel behind Alpha Centauri beyond the traditional end scenario of previous Civ games? Did he have a hand in plotting the 'future history' of the game, and in the Datalinks concepts and quotes? Does he think that games need better plotting akin to novels or riffs on current global awareness rather than the old 'it was a time of darkness' / 'in the future is only war' type stuff.

Gagh. That's a terrible question. I'll think of something better hopefully when I'm not tired and having just got back from the pub.

Ask him if he has any questions for the Beex forum.

How about what was the rationale behind the factions? Did they start out intending to have them with their own strengths and weaknesses and themes, or did that come about later on? At the time, it was a pretty radical departure from Civ, where your choice of side was basically cosmetic.

What ideas were they unable to fit in? Did they manage to work them into something else, were they bad ideas, or are they interested in using them in future still? Has the genre gone the way he would have expected back then? Better? Worse? ANSWERS DAMN YOU I NEED ANSWERS

To this day I can't complete a game of Civ because I just end up wishing I was playing AC. Instead of identikit meaningless nations (Gandi invades Poland! etc) the ideologies of the factions was fascinating and made the AI seem like actual I.

Ask him about them.

On a more depressing note, according to wiki it seems he's moved to work with Zynga (Farmville facebook people) to make Zynga East. Ask him how he feels he can balance his typical depth and strategy and balance with a business which generates revenue by selling 'help' and 'money' in game.

Thats really depressing, he did more good for taking Civ forward that Sid ever has, and Civ IV and by the looks of it V are just taking it further down the wrong route.

Bearing in mind he works at Zynga now.

BRIAN REYNOLDS IS ONE OF MY FAOVURITE PEOPLE I REALLY LIKE COLONISATION AND CIV2 AND SMAC AND SMACX AND RISE OF NATIONS WAS ONE OF MY FAOUVRITE RTS GAMES I THINK IT WAS ALMOST PERFECT YOU MUYST ASK HIM ABOUT THIS.


Actually, ask him:

Why did he do RON after a history of TBS games?
What did he like most about RON?
What was the goal behind ROL? What does he think about the game in retrospect?
Given that RON had such an amazing interface, why did they change the keyboard shortcut system in ROL? (I am fanboi angry about this)
What the hell does he do these days? What does he work on? Is it an RTS?
What does he think about RTS games in general; the directino they've taken, what does he think of Starcraft 2?

How does he feel about the fact SMAC is clearly better than Civ3 and that Civ3 never bothered to use any of the great ideas he came up with, resulting in the worst Civ game todate? (including CTP)
Does he want to make a SMAC2? I know there are licensing issues around this. Can't they just forge ahead with the same gamestyle but change the plot?

What other genre of games does he like; or rather games he'd like to design?
Infact, does he even like TBS or RTS games?
What sort of TBS games does he like? Simply 4X like Civ, or other forms?

Does he play any boardgames?
Why did he ditch Big Huge?

Does he want to design a game for me to make?!

Questions for LewieP:
Why/how did you manage to interview him? :3

More:

How much of a role in Colonisation did he have? He did come up with the clever idea of trade goods, with everything being a map-moveable item? How does he feel that none of his brilliant Colonisation innovations (or even the SMAC ones) are taken up?

I mean; YOU COULD CHANGE THE GROUND IN SMAC AND CHANGE THE WEATHER TO DRY OUT YOUR ENEMIES CITIES SO THEY'D RUN OUT OF FOOD.

Why doesn't modern Civ do this? (natch you could only do it late game, so maybe it's a useless point)

Does he wish to return to Firaxis in anyway?

Does he like Sid? Does he HATE Sid? Does Sid smell? If so; what of?

It's for a feature I am writing.

HAS HE ANSWERED MY QUESTIONS YET WHAT DID HE SAY WHATDIDHESAY?!

not yet

You need to hit him harder.

>?!

Editorial limbo. I'll keep you posted.

zynga stuff http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/ ... ent-drain/

Aww, this died in editorial limbo

What does that mean?

"ended up not happening".

Did he get sent the questions? Did he write replies? Enquiring minds want to know.

Nope, none of those things happened.

This is a disaster, I'm truely unhappy.

Just send him the questions anyway, he might even reply. Just PM him on QT3. (SEMIEDIT: It looks like his account has been deleted )