Game version 0.95.131 released

First of all, sorry for the delay. My last few months of professional life was so intense, it drained all my enthusiasm and energy from Open IG. The current release is just a couple of easy-fixes:

• If the player goes into a trade agreement with another empire, the Trader ships travel to those planets as well (cosmetic) [Issue #596]
• Intro English subtitle corrections [Issue #725]
• Fixed crash when ship-walking on level 4 [Issue #727]
• Fixed the research tip on lab reorganization [Issue #733]
• Fixed earthquake frequency [Issue #737]
• Fixed hyperdrive availability problem in case of the Pre-Hyperdrive trait [Issue #747]

From this version on, the game requires Java 7!

Unfortunately, the main issues (such as the balance) and developments (multiplayer) are still on hold. Balancing usually can't be expressed scientifically, but worked out by testing, testing and testing. The issue with the multiplayer is that I need to change many things from the ground up, which is on the borderline of redesigning the whole game. 

I don't have the time nor the commitment anymore to do this now. I feel with each change and improvement, I only get diminishing returns, and many problems faced are becoming harder and harder to fix within the confinement of the (original) game. 

I'd rather put my efforts into a completely new game. I have some ideas, but nothing substantial yet.

Anyway, If you find any issues, such as things that worked before not working anymore, don't hesitate to report an issue (I messed up the ground battle due to the MP and tried to restore it to a playable state).

Progress on MP and some other news

I hit some functional roadblocks with the multiplayer part of Open-IG, namely how the game can handle multi-participant space and ground battles.

Ground battle is the simpler one, but the spacewar has some serious implications: how can other parties join in the fight, where can enter into the battlefield, what if the nearby planet wants to join the battle? Not to mention, if there is a huge many-to-many battle, how can I compute the battle statistics? Allies and enemies together complicate matters quite a bit.

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Java 7 update 25 has been released with tons of vulnerability fixes.

Eclipse 4.3 has been released which promises performance boost over the quite slow 4.2 series. I found its "Whats new?" here.

Google Drive and updates

I've checked out the capabilities of the Google Drive in terms of programmatic access. Here is an example for the main game file:

https://googledrive.com/host/0B4T7ZW3brESKeU1jWnpqMGVnZ0k/open-ig-0.95.130.jar

Luckily GD has this host feature for a public directory where each file and subdirectory can be accessed by its proper file name instead of the cryptic File ID (this allows even hosting web pages).

So, the procedure will be as follows: game files will be kept on Google Code site, but changing bits will be now served from my GD account. One drawback is that there is no download counting on GD yet.

Google Code won't support file downloads any more

I came across this blog post about changes in the Google Code hosting. This is kind of sad, since the project relied heavily on the download section for the game files. Now I have to find a place for them. Google Drive is mentioned as a candidate.

In theory, this should not affect the self-update capability of the game, since the version check URL already points into the SVN, and the inner links may point to anywhere I choose. Hopefully, the Google Drive links are static and don't get disabled for too much traffic.

Java 6 support to be dropped

I'm about to drop the Java 6 support in Open Imperium Galactica. This means the game won't run on Java 6 anymore, nor the source code will be compatible with Java 6.

The reason for this is twofold:

• Java 7 language features allow me to write less code for the same purpose. This helps in maintaining and improving the game.
• The official Oracle support for Java 6 has ended, which might leave your system vulnerable to Applet based exploits, not to mention the performance drawbacks.

The upcoming version 0.96 with the multiplayer will use Java 7 only. My expected delivery time is about 1 month from now. The change will affect the Launcher as well. Since Java 6 won't run Java 7 class files, I'll add a small Java 6 bootstrap code that warns the user about the version problem.

Multiplayer started

I started working on the multiplayer. To simplify the development process, I designed the multiplayer setup screen with regular Java UI elements instead of Open-IG graphics.

Game organizers will be able to set up all game parameters similar to a skirmish game. AI players may be added to the game as well, which can be in the same group as the human players.

Game organizers may allow the client users to select their own properties: race, icon, traits and groups.

Announcement: Permission received from DR

ANNOUNCEMENT

I'm happy to report that I signed a contract with Digital Reality (the original developers who own the rights to Imperium Galactica again) and I received the official permission to use the original Imperium Galactica resources in this Open Imperium Galactica project, and make them or any modified/derived resources freely downloadable from this site.

In other terms, Open Imperium Galactica is now a completely legal project and you, the users can freely and legally download and play the game.

Soon I'll compose a FAQ about the subtle details of this contract and how it affects the LGPL part of the project.