tyree wrote:
Poohshoes wrote:
I know that coding something like this is TONS of work, and I know that its being done for free, but I still gotta ask, does anybody know when the next update will be done? A week, 6 months, a year? I am very excited for it!
I will get more to the point. How much would it cost to implement improvements and additions to the game system? Many not for profit groups put out wish lists of things that they want or need. It might be helpful to publish on the website how much of a donation would be required to get the additional programming done. A web based "Broadside a Thon" if you will. I understand that this site is run as a hobby by the programmers, and making it a job might make it less fun, but it might be worth thinking about. "New Wind Direction Rules paid for by ARMYOFDAVIDS" might make a catchy banner on the top of the site.
Years ago Michael Stackpole auctioned off the rights to name a character in one of his Battletech novels, with the proceeds going to charity. If I remember correctly, so much money was raised he did it for at least one additional book. And for all the programmers, may the wind always be at your backs.
I hope I understood what you mean. I try to give you our point of view about this interesting topic. I also highlighted the thread a few days ago to Nick asking him to give an answer. As many of you knows he is the guy that program most of the web site. A lot of discussion about what to improve has already been done in the past. We also setted up a beta testing team and had an international conference call with them and shared a few documents on google.... I know the IT market quite well for professional reasons and I can tell you honestly that the economics of this web site do not allow us to "upgrade" to a professional management and programming. The basics are the following: (1) donations are concentrated at the beginning of the years and last year reached an amount of about 2.000 euros. (2) the hardware is hosted in a server farm that provides basic backup services and high speed internet connectivity. The year cost of this service is almost equal to the income. Last year the rest was used to upgrade the disks. (3) a professional programmer (NOT working in a software house i.e. working as a free professional) in Italy costs around 200-500 euro per working day. If you buy him from a software house it costs 400-1000 euro per day. (4) to be able to evolve our code a few days are necessary only to start: the learning curve is steep.
In synthesis to evolve WSIM we need Nick and only Nick (the only exception was last summer that I developed the black and white smoke when the ships fire; it took me a part of my holidays...).
Some changes are simple and other are bigger but every change can introduce errors in the code already working. Therefore Nick is reluctant to make changes if he is not available also the days after to fix errors. A new version of the game (called basic) is almost ready but a few bugs are to be corrected. The new version includes drifting and melee. The beta test team is able to create games using this set of rule. If you want you can ask them to create and play a few games with them.
ciao Alex
