Ask HN: What are you working on (August 2024)?

I am working on a strategy game. I call it The Lost Age Of Abundance. A multi-player, real-time war-and-economics game. It is the kind of game that most developers would typically take a turn-based approach to, but I think turn-based games are mostly boring, so in this case it is real-time. My plan is that at least 100 players can play at once, but perhaps I might be able to get that up to 1,000.

There are some unusual things about the game. To win, you have to conquer all of the land. However, no player is ever knocked out of the game. If you lose all of your land, you can simply become a guerrilla leader and engage in guerrilla warfare, in the hopes of turning your situation around. Being a guerrilla leader is difficult, but if all of the guerrilla leaders form an alliance, they might have the strength to reduce the power of whoever is winning at that moment. Every player starts off as a Noble Lord but you can become a Priest or a Communist or an Anarchist. (The Anarchists have a unique way of winning, which does not involve conquest.)

I have been working, for months, on the economics, which are very complex and I think very interesting. All prices start off randomized (within certain bands) so there are no "good units" or "bad units" only those that are under priced or over priced. There is an economic cycle that runs once every 60 seconds. It takes all purchases and turns the money spent into inflation. Specifically, the percentage of total world GDP that was spent on a particular product is the inflation rate, so if all of the players collectively spent 2% of their income buying swords, so 2% of total world GDP was spent on swords, then the price of swords goes up 2% for that minute. In this way, with players buying what is under-priced and thus driving up prices, the prices are pushed to their rational levels. Also, the inflation rate tells you something important about what other players are doing. If you notice the price of horses is going up at an alarming rate, it means one (or more) of the players is spending heavily to build a large cavalry force. The economics are entirely deterministic, based on the activity of the players, there are no random events. There are no randomly generated earthquakes or floods or NPC invasions. Every change arises from the actions of the players.

I was originally going to give the game the historical setting of the Chinese Warring States period, but then I decided to go with more of a fantasy theme. But there is nothing overtly fantasy in the game, it's simply that there are many myths, which the peasants might genuinely believe, that explain how the Empire Of Abundance was transformed into the Ruined Lands. The peasants are looking for some leader who can restore the Lost Age Of Abundance. The peasants (NPCs) will switch their loyalty to whoever they think can win. Occasionally some peasant will become a True Believer, in which case their loyalty is fixed for the rest of the game. That means even if their chosen leader is defeated and becomes a guerrilla leader, the peasant will remain loyal to them, and secretly send them small amounts of money, to help them recover.

If your peasants think you are doing a terrible job with the economy, they will emigrate to the lands of one of your enemies. You can seal the border, to stop the emigration, but the peasants treat this as tantamount to putting them in prison, so their morale will plunge. If their morale gets low enough, they will switch their loyalty away from you and to any nearby guerrilla leader.

There are 3 games in this game:

1. the military game

2. the economics game

3. the spy game

The military game and the economics game are entirely deterministic. At no point does the software "roll the dice". Combat is as deterministic as in the game of chess.

The spy game does use probability. If you torture a peasant then there is an 80% chance they will tell you the true. If you are wondering if one of your peasants has become a True Believer for one of your opponents, you can torture the peasant to get them to confess. There is an 80% chance that whatever they tell you is the truth.

I have almost zero graphics for this game, so I think it will only appeal to a limited set of people who are interested in a game with a very dynamic economics system. The point of view is basically that of a ruler sitting on their throne in their capitol -- they only hear the reports brought to them by messengers. They cannot see the economy, they can only read the reports and graphs given to them by their court scribes. Likewise, with battles. In that sense, the whole game is a bit abstract, but I hope it will appeal to some niche that wants something complex.

Your game reminds me of some ideas I've kicked around, with players being nobles of some type, and having the same point of view (receiving updates and sending orders).

In my game these player nobles would functionally act as kings/queens, governors, generals, admirals, or travelling mooches, depending on their goals and how well they are doing. The map would be broken into cites and towns arranged into territories, nothing super granular. I wanted to feature politics, where players would normally need to interact with each other, with shifting alliances, etc. A general might decide not to obey their king, perhaps planning a coup with some governors for example. Kind of like the board game Diplomacy. A king would need to coordinate tax incomes from governors, dispatch generals and admirals, expand alliances, and be wary of threats. Governors could influence trade and improve their territories, cities and towns. Generals could perhaps take on mercenary jobs, or raid. An ambitious admiral might want to take a city and move up in the world, or be happy enriching themselves in trade or pirating, etc. There would be gold and various other resources, population morale, seasons, spies, etc.

I was going to have this game be turned based, with each turn being a month of game time, and players only being able to take one turn per day of real time. The world would be one month in diameter - so that a fleet or army or inter-player message could be dispatched to anywhere in the game in a single turn. I figured that this would avoid the possible problem of players gaining an advantage by being able to coordinate outside the game, and to keep the programming as simple as possible. A minor character might not have a lot to do on any given turn. A king or queen could be a very busy person. Players might be on autopilot for some number of days if they don't log in. News in the game would travel also, so any player could hear about most of what was going on in the world. I shared your sentiment on graphics, figuring I would leave room to add those later.

I like your ideas for your in-game economy, and what you described about the effects of morale, and true believers, which I'm sure dovetails with there being priests. And it's cool you have a place for anarchists. They get a bad rap.

Be sure to do a Show HN when it's ready!