Post New Civilization and Game Designs HERE - Age of Empires III Heaven Forum

posted 04-30-05 05:17 PM EDT (US)

If you have suggestions for improvement of this thread, post a reply or e-mail me (llamamasterjoe@hotmail.com; subject: AoE3HListCiv).

Follow the Code of Conduct!

Use the "control+f"-hotkey to explore the page.

Only serious civilization/game designs desings, please!

You have to provide a link to a thread/site/download on your civilization/game design. This thread is only meant for compilations.

You can 'claim' a certain civilization/game design, when you haven't finished it yet, so other people know you are working on it. This in order to prevent 35 threads on the Inuit civilization popping up at the same moment

If you are a modding clan or a modder, please contact the creators of the civilizations/game designs before using their work for a modpack: otherwise, it will be called piracy.

SPOTLIGHT
This section is for game designs or civilization plans which are interesting or special in some way. Be sure to check them out! (If you are interested in nominating a design for the Spotlight, post on this thread. Feel free to self-nominate.)

Back to the Old World (by Jaguar6) A series of AoEIII civilization plans. New and exciting!

IDEAS FOR TOTALLY NEW GAMES

Game designs being designed at the moment

Meditteranean: First Empires (by Lord Iarune)
Insight (by Empror)
Wars of the Prophets (by Empror)
Twilight (by Empror)
Kanenas; Rise of a Nation (by Empror)
Age of War (by Lord Iarune)
Age of Mythology 2: Warriors and Crowns (by Brocktree101)

Current game designs

Africa (by Empror)

Age of �sir (by skystrider)

Age of Antiquity (by Mythos_Ruler and AoE3H Civ Designers)

Age of Astarte (by Empror)

Age of Criminals (by Digitall)

Age of Dictators (by WartyX)

Age of Economics (by QwertyUiop_1)

Age of Emperors (by jonathan1222)

Age of Empires I: Age of Civilization (by Lord Berminator)

Age of Empires: Age of Wars (by Smertios)

Age of Empires: The Great War (by Awilla_The_Hun)

Age of Empires 1 Remake (by Underpants Man)

Age of Empires 1 Remake (by Dieneces)

Age of Empires II: Age of Kings (by Lord Berminator)

Age of Empires 2 Remake (by Novoa20)

Age Of Empires IV (by Gunner1)

Age of Empires 4 (by Novoa20)

Age of Empires 4: The Age of Superpowers (by Merlin MCLXVI)

Age of Empires IV: Brave New World (by clashcityrocker)

Age of Empires 4: Contemporary Tacts (by Marcus Varro)

Age of Empires 4: The Fall of Rome (by Cheruscan)

Age of Empires 5 (by SupaCrunk19994)

Age of Empires 5: The Fall of Man (by King_Ali_Skahir)

Age of Empires: Soldier of Fortune (by lytyrstorm)

Age of Epics (by (NotInvolved)

Age of Evolution (by Dogbert)

Age of Faith: The Holy Warriors (by Empror)

Age of Faith II: Path of the Believer (by Empror)

Age of Fantasy (by Hailstorm)

Age of Heroes (by Servant_ofKronos)

Age of Inventors (by skystrider)

Age of Legends (by GFGJ)

Age of Lost Civilizations (by Empror)

Age of Mythology 2 (by Shala and AoE3H AoM Civ Designers)

Age of Mythology 2 (by Clownfoot)

Age of Mythology 3 (by skystrider)

Age of Mythology 2 (by Yamato Take, Shala and AoE3H AoM Civ Designers)

Age of Mfecane (by GoForGoldenJarls)

Age of Renaissance (by GoForGoldenJarls)

Age of the Aegean (by Mythos_Ruler)

Age of the Ancestors (by Lord Iarune)

Age of The Empire VI (by Orowac Shelikov)

Age of Empires 4 (World in War) (by Arcanjo Zero and HeavenGames Forummers)

Age of the Far east (by Acamas)

Age of the New World (by Acamas)

Age of Empires V: Age of Space (by Shala)

Age of Time (by tHuNdErBoLtZ)

Age of World Wars (by strategy noob)

American Anarchy: Tribes at War (by Lord Iarune)

City of Gold (by KrakenBits)

Days of the East (by Empror)

Legends of Lost Earth (by Shala)

Lore (by skystrider)

Man of War (by Cassador_Chris)

The New USA (by NotInvolved)

Prehistoric: Dawn of Civilization (by Empror)

Sand (by NotInvolved)

World War 3 (by Empror)

IDEAS FOR CIVILIZATIONS WITHIN AGE OF KINGS

Civilizations being designed at the moment

Khmer (by Usac)
Burgundian (by Usac)
Magyar (by Usac)
Mughal (by Usac)
Toltec (by Usac)

Current civilizations

Berbers (by Usac)

Hungarians (by Ghosthic)

Incans (by Novoa20)

Incans (by Usac)

Russians (by King_Ali_Skahir)
(link)

IDEAS FOR CIVILIZATIONS WITHIN AGE OF MYTHOLOGY

Civilizations being designed at the moment

Sioux (by Hiawatha II)

Polynesians (by Lord Iarune)

Indians (by KrakenBits)

Polish (by KrakenBits)

Current civilizations

Aborigines (by Yamato Take)

AKS (by Mash_Kig_Sima)

Ainu (by skystrider)

Atlanteans (by Empror)

Aztecs (by Compa_Mighty, Rodya_255 and Zalpacuiztli)

Babylonians (by SilentScreams)

Carthaginians (by Yamato Take)

Celts (by SilentScreams)

Celts (by chosenone)

Chinese (by Natus)

Egyptians (by Empror)

Etruscans (by skystrider)

Filipino (by Yamato Take)

Finns (by Yamato Take)

Hawaiians (by skystrider)

Hebrew (by chosenone)

Hi'anger (by Mad Jacks)

Hindus (by Thot_Celay)

Hittite (by skystrider)

Inca (by GoForGoldenJarls)

Indians (by chosenone)

Inuit (by Yamato Take)

Iroquois (by skystrider)

Japanese (by Sp3ctre)

Japanese (by Zappos)

Japanese (by chosenone)

Java (by skystrider)

Koreans (by skystrider)

Maori (by ScreamingHippo)

Mayans (by Underpants Man)

Minoans (by skystrider)

Mongols (by skystrider)

Native Americans (by Yamato Take)

Norse (by skystrider)

Nubians (by Yamato Take)

Persians (by skystrider)

Romans (by Theris264)

Slavs (by Mahdi)

Slavs (by skystrider)

Sumerians (by just_attack)

Taino (by Yamato Take)

The Valar (by Yooda)

Tibetans (by Yamato Take)

Tupi-Guarani (by TatsuEnguia)

Vanir (by TheJohnmeister)

Welsh (by skystrider)

Zulu (by skystrider)

IDEAS FOR CIVILIZATIONS WITHIN AGE OF EMPIRES III

Civilizations being designed at the moment

Civilizations/X-pack Ideas

African civs (by Coach shogun 20)

Back to the Old World Expansion (by Jaguar6)

Chinese (by Cy Marlayne)

Colonial Resistance (by CheTzu)

Italian States (by Jaguar6)

Italy (by Custergrant)

Japanese (by Yamato Take)

Māori (by NotInvolved)

Mughal Empire (Yamato Take)

Native Races (by Yamato Take)

Northern War Expansion (by SupaCrunk19994)

Opium Wars (by Innovan)

Polish (by SilentScreams)

Pirates (by ThEOldCoW)

Revolutionaries (by Novoa20)

Sweden (by ofaloaf)

United States (by King_Ali_Skahir)

X-Pack Civ Ideas (by Devon_)

X-Pack Civ Ideas (by Novoa20)

Current Civilizations

BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO CIVILIZATION DESIGNING (Geared towards AoM)

Keep in mind, that this is a guide for beginners, so if you have designed one or two proper civilizations yourself, this guide will not be of much use to you.
In this guide I will try to put some emphasis on the why and the research part of the how, for both are, in my opinion, the most important aspect of civilization designing.

Why?

You should always consider why you are doing this, because you have to be prepared that only a few dedicated civilization designers will read your civilization design.
Although you will end up in the above list when you have designed a civilization, do not expect too much enthousiasm: there are few other civilization designers out there, and your purpose should not even be to try to make people think what a genius you are on civilization designing. Nobody cares.
Rather, the best way to consider such a design is as a practice, a practice for doing research and learning the basic principles of translating this research into gameplay. I suggest you make one or two civilization designs, and if they are good, go on and start to make your own game ideas and try to convince a modding clan (or maybe a gamescompany

) to turn your ideas into a modpack or game. But beware! You have to be really talented and be willing to put a lot of time into your projects in order to achive such.
But, not everything needs a purpose. It can also be plain fun to design the civilization you wanted for Age of Mythology (or Age of Empires).

Step 1: research

This is the most important part of civilization designing: research, research and more research. When you do proper research, you will find out the actual civilization designing is far less time consuming than this step. (although often both steps -research and the actual designing- take place at the same time, and not after each other)
Good research is time consuming, and can often be frustrating, but if you want to design your own civilizations you have no choice.
Before giving you some sources you could use for your research, I will first give you some general tips on researching itself. There are two ways to do research: the first way is like: go to Google, type the name of the civilization you want to design, and read the first ten hits. This, obviously, is the wrong way. The other way is far more time consuming, but gives you far better result. The most important thing you need to know about this is that your sources can be untrustworthy or biased. The Internet gives you the most and easiest results, but also the least trustworthy: everyone can say anything they want on the Internet. If you run into a two sources saying something completely different on a subject, decide which one is the most thrustworthy, or do more research.
Some good sources of information are:

Your history teacher: he/she can give you good sources (books, websites, etcetera), and he/she will give you sources you can trust.

Other persons you know of, that know something about history: if any of your family members or friends is a historian, or knows a lot about history, consult him/her.

Your local library: Encyclopedias, history books, links to good websites and books on history, you can find all those in your local libray. But beware! Consult trustworthy books: encyclopedias, books written by historians, and so on. Not books like: "The Middle Ages -a children's encyclopedia" (although you can find some interesting things in books intended for children, you are more likely to find what you are looking for in a more adult level book).

The Internet: As been said before, beware of information on the Internet! There are a lot of good information sources there, but even more really bad ones. Some good sites are:

Pantheon.org: a very good site on a lot of mythologies around the world

History.com: a site that gives comprehensive information on world history. You will not have much use for this site when doing in-depth research, but it can give you some general ideas of the civilization you want to design and its history, and it gives really good references to books on the subject.

The National Geographic Society: a very respective organisation, which provides lots of information on cultures all over the world and their history. If you know someone who is subscribed to the National Geographic Magazine, well this is a wonderful resource.

AoMH's very own mythology forum: this forum is visited by quite some mythology fanatics, so maybe they have some answers to your questions.

HeavenGames' very own history forum: this forum is visited by quite some history fanatics, so maybe they have some answers to your questions.

Wikipedia: THE online encyclopedia: by and for users, this is one of the most non-specialized encyclopedias on the web.</ol>

Step 2: translating the research into game elements

I am really sorry, but for this, I cannot give some simple tips: you need to be creative and have talent. Just make sure you do not include some overpowered options like: Godpower Apocalypse: destroys all your opponents units.
To get some general ideas and inspiration, again, see the above list.
Keep in mind though, that you want to design an Age of Mythology civilization, so consider the following:

a unique resource gather system

a unique way of getting favour

a unique way of getting heroes

a unique Titan

military starts in second Age

fortress-like stucture and almost all military units in third Age
And if you are designing an Age of Empires civ, make sure:

civ has the same power level (not overpowered or underpowered)

unique units/techs/buildings (if its going to be exactly the same, why even bother)

a fair and balanced economy and military
But the most important thing, in my opinion, is trying to 'break' the outline for civilizations as provided by EnsembleStudios: the best example of this is the multiple Godpowers for the Atlanteans in AoM's oficial expansion pack. Make sure though that your changes remain subtle: removing or adding an Age for a civilization, for example, will make that your civilization is no longer an Age of (whatever) civilization.

Step 3: presentation

In this section I will deal with how you should organise your thread or website on your civilization, which can be more important than you think: if you have the most wonderful design, but a poor presentation, no-one will read it.

Use counters or weaknesess against other civilizations to make it sound fair to fit in with each other.

When using images, use simple, conceptual images, so people can see how the unit would be like in the game. For some good examples on this, see Sp3ctre's Japanese civilization.

Put in some references to history, so people can easily see that it fits with history why you gave a certain unit a certain weakness or bonus. Good examples of this can be found here.

Use colours and different letter types to organise things, but do not overdo them.

Provide some technology trees, preferabbly at the beginning of you thread, so people can see in one view what it is all about.

Use the whisper format: [w](...)[/w]This way it is more easier to read, and people can scroll trough your text faster.

Step 4: you are never finished!

When your civilization outline is finished, expect some comments from fellow civilization designers. Use them to improve your design.

Thanks to Theris, who used to monitor this post.

[This message has been edited by skystrider (edited 12-02-2008 @ 08:30 PM).]