MOO III

A place to discuss Master of Orion III
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Thrawn
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MOO III

Postby Thrawn » Wed Jul 27, 2005 8:02 am

I was just wondering how many people had tried MOO 3?
Also how many agree with me that it had alot of good ideas but turned out very bad?

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siron
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Postby siron » Wed Jul 27, 2005 8:44 am

Which ideas do you mean?

I just remember the 3d galaxy map. Nothing else.
Even the pseudo 3d real time battle was simply crap.

I bought it for 4€ at ebay. I still feel I have been ripped off.

Only good thing. Because of crappy moo3 I went back to moo2 and started moo2 online games.

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Thrawn
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Postby Thrawn » Wed Jul 27, 2005 8:51 am

Mostly I ment the ideas with the govener AI and much more complex diplomiacy. As I saw it the game had quite a lot of good ideas but all were implemented either badly or very badly.
I also loved the hugeness of the galexy and the star lanes. Oddly enough I never even played a ship to ship battle.

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siron
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Postby siron » Wed Jul 27, 2005 9:19 am

more complex diplomiacy: I had no close look. But you are prolly right that it is better. moo2 ai really sucks. thats why we play without it. (just in strat combat it can compete)

govener AI: Actually, I HATED it. As a moo2 freak...I wanna have AN APPROPRIATE OPTION to control everything. (Thats not possible in moo3.) I am a perfectionist. In a huge galaxy i cant control everything in the late game. Thats true. A time limit for mp is very fine. But to correct a suboptimal govener AI at the begin of the game drives me mad.

"I also loved the hugeness of the galexy and the star lanes."

Yes. galaxy map was nice.

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Gusset
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Postby Gusset » Wed Jul 27, 2005 12:27 pm

There were things I liked and disliked. In general, though, the game seemed to lack personality. I also thought it was a huge oversight that there was no way to chat with your opponents between turns...once you finished your turn, there was nothing to do but stare. BIG oversight. This is evidence to me that nobody on the development team ever played a multiplayer TBS game, or at least never MOO2.

I like the combat concept A LOT, but the execution needed help, and was buggy. Long range beam combat was messed up because all you could do was either tell the ships to attack or move, and when you said "attack" the ships always moved toward the target, which pretty much made long range weapons of zero benefit...the "attack" button needed to be independent of movement so you could implement tactical navigation. Also I seem to recall difficulties with pont defense, where missiles could head into your fleet and there was nothing you could to to priotitize targetting on them. Fix those two things, and the combat engine/concept was a winner, but as it stood it was unplayable and fighters were the only viable strategy (ie no variety possible).

The Viceroy concept didn't bother me a whole lot, but I never did learn how to get it to do what I wanted...I got frustrated that I could not cause certain individual planets to focus where I wanted them to, it always seemed to want to balance things to some extent. That's fine for most planets, but when I find a place that could be a production powerhouse, I'd like to be able to have confidence that Roy wasn't going to start farming part of the planet simply because it was green.

When it became evident that Infogrames was not going to provide adequate documentation on how Roy makes decisions (they seemed to be relying on players to figure it out and post it on their forums, which means you need to sift out the good from the bad) or fix the problems wtih the combat engine, I went back to MOO2.

-Gusset

gaultesian
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Postby gaultesian » Wed Aug 10, 2005 9:51 am

I too felt like many MOO II fans when they announced MOO III - I thought it would be a bigger, better MOO II.

I did not mind the plans to change the game.

I pre ordered it and waited....

I got the game and started reading the manual.

The manual itself was a good indication of the quality of the game. It was generally incomprenshible, had very little hard data on how to play the game, and rambled on and on about the new 'history' of the MOO universe that made me almost throw up (man they really screwed with the original concepts of both MOO I and II).

I was like most people who bought the game - I surfed the Infrogrames (then it was taken over by ATARI) forums for a hope that the game would be patched.

The temp patch was sad and pathetic.

Once people started really getting upset, the tech support dwindled (I believe that the design team was split up or went elsewhere) and support for the game died.

Now the game is being modded by a hard core group of individuals who are trying to beat the odds and design a better overall game.

I wish them luck.

But, as one person commented, the crappy play of MOO III made them wistful for the solid, old fashion gaming of MOO II.

Sincerely,

Gaultesian

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siron
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Postby siron » Wed Aug 10, 2005 5:50 pm

OK. We are quite good so far. But lets improve our moo3-bashing style a bit. :twisted:

Here is my preferred moo3-bash thread:

http://www.neuro-tech.net/2003/03/14/moo3-sucks/
MOO3 sucks.
Master of Orion 3 sucks. Let me say that again - Master of Orion 3 sucks. It is literally one of the worst games I've ever played. ...
Edit: link fixed
Last edited by siron on Fri Sep 22, 2006 2:55 am, edited 2 times in total.

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PK
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Postby PK » Mon Aug 22, 2005 4:55 am

I lost my cash on moo3 too :/

I ve heard newest patches and mods fix some errors. But the first impression was a doom for this game i think!
PK

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martock
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Postby martock » Mon Aug 22, 2005 9:07 am

Like Siron, I got my MOO III off of ebay for $5 or something and played a single game. I had at that point already read the worst about the game but was hopeful I would still enjoy it.

Well, I didn't. Some day I'll post it back on ebay for $1 or it'll end up with all my AOL CD's and become a nice drink coaster.

I remember the map and remember :evil: HATING :evil: with a passion the 'star lanes'. What's wrong with open space?? That alone made me shelve MOO III.

nasor
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Postby nasor » Wed Aug 24, 2005 8:32 pm

Mostly I ment the ideas with the govener AI and much more complex diplomiacy.
The main problem with the diplomacy in MOOIII is that it’s almost totally divorced from what happens in the rest of the game. You can launch an all-out invasion on another race and it hardly affects your diplomacy at all. Or a race that you have great relations with will suddenly declare war for now reason at all, even though they can’t even attack you due to the star lane setup. The senate was an interesting idea, but it appears that they never bothered to try to make it work. You can introduce proposals for all sorts of things, but the other ambassadors never vote on them, so it’s totally pointless.

Off all the things that I hated about MOOIII (and there are many), the worst was that there wasn’t any option to fight a final war against rest of the galaxy if someone else was elected leader of the senate. Having the option to say “F*** you, galaxy! My empire submits to no one!” was always a great part of the first two games.

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Da_Brick
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Bash only what U REALLY try!!!

Postby Da_Brick » Fri Oct 07, 2005 5:20 am

:shock:

U ppl R 2 lazy! Apply budmod1.2, and the gm wrx fine. I will send it 2 anyone. Ask me.

Learn it 4 a real challenge. I will teach anyone.

Gusset, we use Teamspeak to chat at will. Also, set the gm up 2 only allow 3 human-controlled combats/t and a max of 3min./t (and 3min./combat). Design more focused armadas to get beamers that work (slow missile ships...). ALL ship designs are worth it, when U learn how 2 design properly... like in MOO2. To get more focused viceroys, go 2 the Empire tab and on the 1st screen, pick Specialized, over Balanced or Normal.

Diplo works fine. Other empires vote on stuff, once they have good relations w/u 4 a long time. If U all-out invade any empire, they will turn on U FAST. The declaring war unexpectedly is b/c they were bribed by another empire that is @war w/U or is about 2B.

Once U R on top 4 awhile, way past all others, U will automatically be @ war w/ the whole galaxy.

Free space: travel outside gravitic slingshot lanes (starlanes) is slower, but is present as an option at all times.

Governors work great, if U set the DevPlans up RIGHT and chg them as U pass from expansion to solidification and then to aggression. And U can turn off any governor... look closer, Siron. I always set the DEAs up when I get the planet, then turn on the governor once the planet is set up... until my empire is 2 big 2 do that. Then I lv such minutiae 2 the 'roys and focus on armada mvt.

Atari bought Infogrames and fired everyone on the MOO3 project. So h8 Atari, but give the game a real shot. U need the Prima guide, and U MUST read almost everything ever posted in the top 3 forums. Or I have the essential posts compiled. Anyone else out there wanna' flex that IQ muscle? Come ON!!!

Babies.

:roll:

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siron
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Postby siron » Mon Oct 10, 2005 6:37 am

And U can turn off any governor... look closer, Siron.
I meant that the UI was soo bad you better let control the AI everything. Just click turn.

IIRC we had this discussion at 138 some months ago. After I saw some of the Realtime battles I decided to delete moo3 from my hd. They are simply laughable.

aevil
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Postby aevil » Mon Feb 06, 2006 10:38 am

After I saw some of the Realtime battles I decided to delete moo3 from my hd. They are simply laughable.
Yeah, and i bought this "game" at the first day for 49€ :oops:

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ALEX|D
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Postby ALEX|D » Mon Feb 06, 2006 3:42 pm

hehe

I got it from eBay for ~45 or so ... just a waste of money.

Better I had bought some beer ... !

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Time
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Postby Time » Sun Apr 02, 2006 8:10 pm

ya,
I remember it was the only game I new I would like before I bought it, so I preordered at $49.99 and the Handbook $10 more.
Boy, was that a waste of money!

Most of you have covered most of the bad stuff.

1. Star Lanes Suck!!!!!!
I enjoy the whole freedom of movement thing. Their my engines, let me go where I want to!

2. Diplomacy? I could get a trade treaty and not know how I benefited from it. Not to mention terms like casis belias? (or something like that) why introduce strange terms like that? Games are still played be young people too.

3. Too little info. on how anything is done.

4. Too little control.

5. The grant system sucked! I want to spend money to protect my colonies, not just watch forces come in and do little to respond.

6. I can't stand screen flipping! Minimize this.

7. Strange names on the tech list, instead of familiar names, made it less easy to adapt too.
If you stole antiagathics, just what did you get? How about a T.R.A.P.S. Logistic System? Frame of Reference Simulator? Public Service Ethos? Z Storage and Basing Facilities?
Just keep it simple. Keep the learning curve simple enough to get enough players to like your game, and you'll keep your fan base.

8. Races seemed too similar. They seemed too much like +1 here -1 there, lame.

9. They hid Subteranean in a readme file saying Klackon had it, but, not the actual effect, or if could be stolen, traded, replicated, researched, or purchased.

10. Complicated ground combat system. When I actually got some ground combat, I just used nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare'd every time. I didn't know any better, it just seemed like it would get this pain over faster, lol.

11. Senate. I could look down the guide, say wow, I'd like to suggest that and be unable to.

Any pluses?
few.

1. I tried to like the combat system. When you think about it. MOO1 stacks spacecraft, MOO2 forms lines like battlefield warfare from 200 years ago. and MOO3 did improve this. Fleets had rings of smaller ships around it to protect it. (of course, perhaps not every race may have thought of this at the same time, lol, and it was the only configuration available)

2. More ship sizes, MOO1 had 4, MOO2 had 6. 8-10 might have been a max I could live with. Of course, they couldn't stop there, there went to 14 different hull types (overkill).

3. When I heard that there were moons and zones to planets, I thought wow, now allies could inhabit moons of each other, and zones where appropiate. Such as Plains, Mountains, Ocean, Atmosphere, thinking an Aquatic could live in the Ocean while a scilicoid could live in the mountians, etc. Boy, that blew up in my face.

4. You could have more than one Orbital Platform around your planet
(nice). Of course, I couldn't figure out how to upgrade the weapons, they remained old and easily beatable later on. Nor could you build many missile base like MOO1. Geez, between the US and USSR during the cold war, we had a combined ICBM total of over 3000 missiles. (someone could look up the actual total) That would trash any alien attacking this planet, if we upgraded them correctly over time. But, MOO2 and 3 gave us 1.

5. I liked the seperation of races by type, Humanoid, Aquatic, Cybernetic, Geodic, etc. I would have simplified this to terrain types and created sub-classes of breed types (Harvester, Humanoid, Cybernetic would all inhabit normal terran worlds; Insecoid and Geodic, Subtanerrean worlds; Aquatic, Saurian water based worlds; Ethereans, (glad they added them, but, they sucked) Gas Giants worlds.

6. Different race modifiers for race in ground combat(Initiative, Number of attacks, hits, etc.) Nice, though I wished i could see a comprehensive total somewhere, so I could tell what was better.

probably more.
This is just getting too long for me now, lol. :lol:

Bottom line. MOO4, if created, has to be better than MOO3, they better listen to customer feedback, or they will be doomed to bomb again.
Last edited by Time on Mon May 21, 2007 9:58 am, edited 1 time in total.
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).


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