One of the things most lacking in Creatures Docking Station were connectable agents, and to this day, few agents incorporate this fun and interesting feature of the C3/DS engine. It really gave users a hobby of sorts--to create useful and fun complex gadgets.
I recently discovered my love of connectable agents, have began to incorporate them into C2toDS.
This was of course a controversial decision, because it requires editing sprites to incorporate ports, and breaking some of the immersion one might have between C2 and C2toDS. However, after carefully weighing the decision, and by that I mean I thought it was cool so I kept going, I’ve been incorporating connectability into many of C2toDS’s agents.
From call buttons, to the cheese machine, to teleporters, to tomato launchers, all kinds of gadgets are hooking up!
Hate it or Love it, let me know. :)
Definitely a nice feature. And anyone who wishes to go total C2 style can just ignore the ports.
ReplyDeleteConnectable agents are great. I like it when third party agents incorporate it, although it's not always useful. Some of the machines in C2 Albia, like the Zander fish launcher, teaching computers, fishing line and THE PUNCH GUNS would become really useful with the capability added.
ReplyDeleteWould it be possible to have connecting agents in the older games, without hacking the engine?
I never used the connectible agents in C3. I found it boring to connect agents and machines and watch them do things. But then again I play the game for the genetic engineering part myself, the more organic parts.
ReplyDeleteI know it's possible in C3/DS to basically manually code in the linking mechanism, so provided the older games have the codes to do it, it would certainly be possible to provide a make-shift port system--though it would take a good bit of ingenuity and time.
ReplyDeleteI'm basically putting ports on any machine or vendor I can find, even if there's even the most remote possibility that it will be useful. lol
That's an awesome idea! :) I've never played too much with the connectable options myself, but I like that the option is there to fiddle around with. And I don't see any issue with adding extra features to C2toDS. This makes it more C3/DS adapted, and it'll be fun to play with the well-known C2 objects in a new way.
ReplyDeleteA great improvement for these nice C2 objects! :-D
ReplyDeleteWhile I can see the interesting complex machines that can be made by linking C3/DS and C2 agents together, ultimately this is one of the few decisions made about C2 to DS that I don't like very much. Sure, for the larger agents such as the cheese machine I can see it working without too much issue, but for the smaller agents adding ports might really screw up their appearance. In addition, a lot of the C2 stuff doesn't look very openly mechanical (such as the seed launchers), so putting ports on them makes very little to no sense at all. :/
ReplyDeleteYes...the seed launchers give me pause as well.
ReplyDeleteI actually spent some time today seeing if I can create more visually appealing and believable ports for the seed launchers, but met with little success, and will most likely be removing those ports altogether.
I had hoped that ports on the seed launchers would allow for ecology regulation machines to be set up, provided I later created a monitoring device, but I think I'll just make another agent for that altogether, because it really doesn't look good. lol!
The tomato gun was also a bit small and hard to convincingly modify without obliterating the visuals, but it was a must for me because it's just too darn fun to link up to other agents! However, the alteration is so small you'll barely even notice the port in game. :)
Also, not all agents have both output and input ports. Only what I feel they need or can convincingly hold, and agents only have ports if I think there could be some remote use for them.
In my opinion however, ports fit quite naturally on most of the agents, and shouldn't detract from the game-play much.
If in the course of development, you notice any you think need reconsideration, please let me know.
Is a very good idea. After all the shee spaceship have linkable agents... Why they use that technology before any tests?
ReplyDeleteThat give a interesting new dimension :)
Def. love! the reason many don't use connectables is they aren't in DS, and there aren't any third party ones. When I played vanilla C3 I used them all the time.
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