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[Mailman653]

That article says 1816 was the year for the first steamship to go out to sea but in a post further up which is a quote from the devs, they stated something about Waterloo being past the time frame of the game, that battle if I'm not mistaken was 1815.

So....we need more info, lol.

What also I would like to know is if the US is featured in its own storyline, does that mean for the grand campaign they won't be playable?

Overall, I think any news right now is good news and I hope by this fall we will have the first in game videos coming out.

[Jack Lusted]

That article says 1816 was the year for the first steamship to go out to sea but in a post further up which is a quote from the devs, they stated something about Waterloo being past the time frame of the game, that battle if I'm not mistaken was 1815.

So....we need more info, lol.

In Empire if you want you can research tech from slightly beyond the time frame covered by the game if you put the effort into it. So that's why you might see Steam ships in the campaign.

And America will be playable.

[rajpoot]

In Empire if you want you can research tech from slightly beyond the time frame covered by the game if you put the effort into it. So that's why you might see Steam ships in the campaign.

Right, that makes sense.

[Adrian II]

In Empire if you want you can research tech from slightly beyond the time frame covered by the game if you put the effort into it. So that's why you might see Steam ships in the campaign.

And America will be playable.

Right. I have the feeling you are also going to tell me that Empire will have sails and ensigns that 'follow' the wind direction, as per the screenshot I posted above in this thread. If that is the case I will gladly give up sex for this game as well - at least until Trafalgar...

[Jack Lusted]

Right. I have the feeling you are also going to tell me that Empire will have sails and ensigns that 'follow' the wind direction, as per the screenshot I posted above in this thread.

Yes sails and flags will be affected by the wind direction.

[Adrian II]

Yes sails and flags will be affected by the wind direction.

There you go. A certain lady will be crying in the pillow for a few years. What can I say, it's a gamers' world.

[rajpoot]

While the wind direction thingy is impressive, it is not something brand new .............I believe Pirates 2 had it too.....?

[Sheogorath]

My main fear regarding naval combat is that CA's interface looks an AWFUL lot like the Imperial Glory naval interface. And anybody who has played IG knows full well how impossible it was to manage anything more than two ships at once. It was also virtually impossible to, say, form a line of battle, and most fights basically turned into 'run in circles, then suddenly change direction to catch the computer by surprise' matches.
Hopefully CA was kind enough to include some formation controls, or at least will allow the deployment of ships prior to battle (which seems likely, from the other preview on the battle).

As to rockets on ships, I recall something about them seeing limited use with the British and Russians (two nations with the most contact with Eastern nations), mostly as a means of setting fire to rigging and so forth. They never really saw a lot of action, however, and were never really made famous. I dont think they were 'dedicated' rocket ships, either, just ships with rocket-launching apparatuses on them.

Steam ships were AROUND in the 1820's, I believe Russia launched its first naval steamship in 1821, the British some time around 1815 or so.
I believe MOST steam ships were of the 'gunboat' variety until the 1850's or so. Basically they had four or five big guns (howitzers, perhaps?) mostly intended for shore bombardment.

[Martok]

And America will be playable.

Is the USA going to be playable in the main campaign, or just in the American Independence campaign?

[Mailman653]

Is the USA going to be playable in the main campaign, or just in the American Independence campaign?

Both.

[pevergreen]

I disagree with Mailman. I think they wont be playable in the normal campaign, they will be an emerging faction, like the Romano-British.

[Martok]

I disagree with Mailman. I think they wont be playable in the normal campaign, they will be an emerging faction, like the Romano-British.

That's what I'm thinking as well, but I dislike making assumptions.

It wouldn't make any sense to have the US as a playable faction in the main campaign. Both for gameplay reasons (i.e., they won't appear until later in the game); and also because, quite frankly, we just weren't that important back then. (To have us as a playable faction in the main campaign would be like having one of the numerous small German principalities as a playable faction.)

[Mailman653]

, quite frankly, we just weren't that important back then.

How true

[TenkiSoratoti_]

That's what I'm thinking as well, but I dislike making assumptions.

It wouldn't make any sense to have the US as a playable faction in the main campaign. Both for gameplay reasons (i.e., they won't appear until later in the game); and also because, quite frankly, we just weren't that important back then. (To have us as a playable faction in the main campaign would be like having one of the numerous small German principalities as a playable faction.)

Agreed on that 100% but CA must make money, if the game went onto 1900 then yes though, no argument.

I'm a little concerned that working around the politics and mechanics of the 13 Colonies as a special case will divert attention away from the 'real' Empires.

[AlJabberwock]

Surely the one cautionary note in all this heady hysteria is that there may be a piper to pay...

IN fact,
we should consider it most probable the Prophet in his great and kind wisdom would tell us SEVERAL pipers will have their hands out... named NVidia, ATI, AMD and Intel. You can add mobo and ram and other hardware makers to your particular taste.

When we had gathered a rough idea of the needs of MTW2, the last round up of improvements I made for the kid's machines was to add the 7900GTX and, when it came out, the 8800GTS EE (both oc'd versions) and similar levels of speed elsewhere to prevent bottlenecking. Both no longer in the primary series, these vid cards along with now-soon-to-be-lame 3.2 gig dual cores and 4 gigs of Corsair 800 ddr2 dual-channel and very fast perp drives and so forth, required new system builds to accommodate.

Unless the new engine is extremely more efficient than the previous generation, the leviathan-level mind-numbing computing power likely to be required by the physics detail and rendering that is being suggested is perhaps beyond these current upper end systems' capacities judging by our experience with MTW2 without these added confections.

The Physics of buoyancy, wind and impact, the issues of physical cover and its vissicitudes, cross-ai interpretation and true-form translaton of satellite imagery to the proximate battle's field all have to use resources. The question has to then be, not whether, but rather how much and from whence shall they come...

May Allah and the price of hardware be merciful,

AlJabberwock