The only solution to this dawning issue of the end of Rise Of Nations is that the aspiring members who are capable of coding buddy up and save the game by raising it to modern standards. This would also likely spark similar events in other dying communities accross the gaming industry and would be quite an achievment. The question is, do we still have enough capable people left to do this or will we have to learn?

Rise of nations, despite it's age is an amazing game with a unique taste to RTS. Simply upgrading the graphical qualities and injecting it with tons of new content would do the trick for a sequel. But to truly make it amazing is to keep the ideas and charm that it currently has and enter it into a new dynamic RTS game engine, one where the world is dynamic and both the key to your survival as well as the hidden adversary. What I mean is imagine pumpign RON into a game engine with the same tactics and such but with the added level of terrain control and manipulation.

I am suggesting that we convince BHG to give us permission to create a sequel, whether under their name or another is up to us. Since they lack the resources and commitment to do it yet we still have quite a lot of active modders here, we could use their talents; combine it, expand it and then create those ideas in a new game engine. Call upon your contacts, ask your friends for help, we need everyone

For now let us discuss ideas to increase it's potential, moments in history that should be highlighted(perhaps world war 1 trench wars could be one), and new intresting game mechanics and units. One of the game mechanics I suggested before was the ability to edit the terrain using certain structures or tools mid-game to your advantage. E.g. placing your city on a hill will give it a strategic advantage in a large plain. Another suggestion could be making the game 3 dimensional , with the same interface and structures but giving the ability to look at things at all angles.

Currently we're trying to save a dying game in vain, all your work and effort will be and likely is in vain as there are little players to enjoy it. The only way all that hard work could be noted and serve a purpose is if we were to combine all of them, combine the amazing features of various major(perhaps also minor) mods and inject them into a brand new engine. That would be working for a purpose, the purpose to resurrect the game as Rise Of Nations 2. A worthy sucessor created not by BHG but by the users themselves, filled with grand new features of countless creative minds one that shows what the community wants more then any game creating company can ever create as we are the community.

Popularity for the project will increase as we go along, most advertisment will go via word of mouth which means we need to give a good first impression. Other areas covererd include a project blog so everyone is informed about what's going on and perhaps teaser videos , maybe our own forums/website with more appealing styles.

Important:
After careful discussion and criticsm from several individuals I have decided to scale down the project in a way for it to be realisticly possible whilst still achieving what we want: do resurrect the community and expand the game to modern standards.
Thus we will be creating not a sequel, but an expansion pack. This will include tons of new units and such, as well as making the historicly accurate major mods work together. We will still ask BHG permission to edit the source and release the pack as an official community-created expansion pack.
Main targets include: More unit diversity and strategic types, Improved graphics and Models[optional, you can still use the old graphic models], Unlimited units and configuration, in-game mod interface(select, switch,download mods), and most of the ideas list below. Dynamic terrain and more terrain levels is debable, it could be achieve by having multiple maps serve as layers for one another and treating terrain as a traversable, destrucable CP controlled building.

Draft:
Here is a draft message to be sent to BHG, I need everyone's advice and help to improve it; make it more formal, add missing information, fix grammatical errors, etc. This first message will likely decide our fate so it's important
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Dear BigHugeGames,


We are the modders from the last remaining active community for one of the best RTS games ever made: Rise Of Nations. We - the loyal fans, followers, and modders whom have stayed with the game despite its age and halt in development - would like to ask permission from you 'BigHugeGames' to bring together the modders and community of Rise Of Nations in a community project to create an official expansion pack for Rise Of Nations.

We have all developed various ideas over the years that we feel would improve the game, and who else is better to know what the community wants than the community itself? The project will be a labour of love to resurrect the game, in order to encourage modders to join us in this venture we will need official support for this project from the initial creators themselves.

Currently, modders are modding to try and rescue a dying community, and this project is our effort to save it from the dustbin of history. We will also do our utmost best to make the process of porting Rise Of Nation mods to the expansion as simple and easy as possible as well as even blending certain ideas and features from major mods into the sequel itself.
We have already motivated a sizeable team, with another large quantity of people who await official approval before they join. This includes creators of several major mods including 'Rise Of Kings' and 'Wrong Turn' . Both of which serve as prime examples of what the community is capable of achieving.

We would also like to request that you share essential information we will require to tweak the engine to increase or removing units,techs,nations,buildings;limits. Thus allowing more modifiability, and otherwise there wouldn't be enough space for the content we wish to add. We will need a way to edit hard coded files to accomplish this.

The expansion pack will concentrate on being user and mod friendly, allowing more mod-ability and less limits. We already have a sizeable list of ideas for the expansion pack including seasons, more unit types, strategic opportunities, and map 'layers'; more is being added as time passes.

We are open to discuss any concerns you may have with this proposal. If you so wish, it could be released under Big Huge Games name, but all the people who will spend countless hours and time working on the project should be given full credit for its creation. The expansion pack will be free-ware, but in-order to use it they need to buy the main game thus it would be profitable to Big Huge Games.

We would be honoured to be given the opportunity to save this game, and such an opportunity would give all the hours that have already been spent on mods a purpose.
Sincerely,
Project Resurrection Coordinator -HindosIRLNAMEHERE)


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Team Ressurection(name debatable):
If you'd like to join in with this idea please say so in this format:
Name(forumname):
Timezone:
Skills:
Role:

The following roles are possible:
Texturer
Modeler
Coder(please specify what languages you know,you'll be editing and impriving the engine)
Scholar(writer, historian)

Currently we have the following people:
Key: [M]= minor skills, [G] best skill, Mcoding=modding, Pcoding=Programming
1. Hindos ([G]Organiser,[M]Modeler)
2. PimpMasterflex ([G]PCoding, [G] Scripting)
3. Super7700 ([G]Texturer, [M] Research/coding/model
editing)

Pondering team members(willing to join but not currently for various reasons);

1. ColonelMolotov([G]Modeling,[G]Textures,MCoding

Contact:
If anyone knows a good way to contact BHG games, after we have put together our ideas please present it in the best way possible. Preferably someone who knows how gaming buisness work and such and has experience in pitching. Edit: I guess i'm doing it :P

Contact Team Members email:
1. Hindos : magmaorb@gmail.comcc

BHG/38 Studios Contacting Compliation:
I will use these contacts and attempt to initiate communication if our initial attempt failes.
Main:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/bighugegames
Linked-In: www.linkedin.com/company/big-huge-games
Fax: 410.842.0047
Email: info@bighugegames.com
Twitter: twitter.com/#!/BigHugeGames
Individuals:
Lindsey: LmcQueeney@bighugegames.com
Pranas Pauliukonis: www.facebook.com/pranas.pauliukonis
Brian Reynolds: twitter.com/#!/zyngagamechief


Current ideas for RoN1 Expansion pack:
1. 3D world-hindos
2. Dynamic terrain-hindos
3. More ages, from the cave man to the first astronaut!
4. More historical accuracy (eg Praetorian Guards in the Classical Age, NOT the gunpowder Age)-Super7700
5. Nations are far more unique - more UUs and also most units for a nation should have a unique appearance.-Super7700
6. More potential for maps - people should be able to make their own random map scripts, terrain should have more variation (eg multiple terrain types available on maps). More eyecandy as well.-Super7700
7. Detailed cities with walls and bridges, maybe they can automatically grow as your population and income increases.-Super7700
8. Vehicles that can transport units!-Super7700
9. More terrain levels, underground, underwater, various plateau levels. The ability to climb mountains and hills. The ability to alter the terrain through units and structures to give yourself an advantage, you could even fill up the water and create an island!-hindos
10. Naturual hazards, e.g. naturual disasters, disease, animals, etc. The ability to use the ecology to your advantage-hindos
11. Transport constructions, train tracks and trains, bridges, various age tiers of train transport.
12. More defensive structures, walls(with visable archers when garrisoned), gates(open/closeable), diggable mounts and trenches(not the sandbag oddness), traps(e.g. pitfall, mines), and more-hindos
13. Multi-mod support, allows for multiple mods to run side by side. Also an in-game interface connected to an online database to download and install mods. You can also download and switch between mod packages of your own creation-hindos
14. Increase limits, modders can create more units, entities, and such -hindos
15, More unit variants, currently we have siege, infilitration, grunt, leader, ranged types for varying terrains of battle(ocean, air, land). We could also have medical units/facilities, sniping(long range unit-to-unit combat), suicide units, saboteurs(sabotage enemy defenses and economical structures), diggers(for trenches and terrain editing, fillers (for creating hills and higher terrain), and more.
16. More realistic zooming range, rather then have units the size of provinces battles should be more concentrated and maps larger and more realistic. This also means , more gameplay time
17. Seasons, winter, spring, autumn, and summer. Seasons have effect on crop yields and ground unit stats. i.e. snow slower, summer slower, spirng/autumn normal.
18. Weather: Rain, Snow, Lightning, Monsoon, Hail, Fog, etc
Please suggest more . This only touches the surface of what we could do
19. Randomskins, varience in skins for troops of the same type will add a bit of variety to the game. This isn't a major difference so you won't confuse units between one another, e.g. add a beard, remove/add shield, etc. This is optional for modders so you can have just one skin if you so wish.
20. Moral/Happiness- Keep it to low and your citizens and troops may revolt, keep it high and it'll give slight working benefits. Buildings like taverns can bolster happiness, and you can spend resources on more effective but temporary solutions like feasts. Houses also help happiness and can be upgraded to provide even more happiness. If your morale is too low, your people may revolt against you!
21. Houses- Allow the construction and connection of houses. These are required to house citizens once you reach a certain limit.
22. Roads- Allow the construction of roads, you can build roads to connect your cities. Roads allow faster infantry movement and can be up to 3 lanes wide. When traveling troops will automaticly use these roads if it gives them a reduced travel time.
23. Random Map Generators- Allow the user to pick random generation which creates a random map. These use algothirms to make themselves and are supposed to be similar to real life terrain.
24. Improved Formations- Ability to change formation patterns if you so please. More formation movements(i.e. split up then regroup at point X. Better formation attacks, i.e. select destination instead of move forward a bit in formation. Ability to queue formations.
25. Revamped CityConstruction- Now you need a supply wagon to build a new city. Which makes more sense then a citizen with a single hammer.
26. Encourage a defensive strategy by having kills rack up morale boosts and loss of troops morale degredation. For exmaple if the enemy slaughters your army citizens may be dismotivated to work.
27. Balkanization- The ability for your people to revolt if morale is low and attempt to form their own indepence. They'll run off with some of your resources and build new cities and either actively battle you or show that they are much better then you. THe population will also have wants, perhaps they don't like a democratic government so if you want to stop revolts you go republic, or they prefer a different religion so you must compensate for this. Or you can respond with an iron hand and install fear to stop them.
28. Realistic age progreession- Factor in dark ages, declines, breakthroughs and such. E.g. not all modern countries can go to space, some even still live in tents.
29. Resource usage- Instead of the current infinite resources, woodcutting will remove trees. Mining will shrink a mountain, and farming will make the ground less fertile. Thus resource managment is key to survival, things like tree farms can help counter these degredations and effeciency is more vital.
30. Cross-Age interaction- Instead of suddenly jumping to a new age , nations are often faced with limited resources and must resort to older methods e.g. vietnam war, thus you could have cavalary with bows and arrows with tanks riding next to it. However this is limited to the point of realism , if you can't make bullets a unit could settle for a crossbow.
31. At the start of a game certain cities will lie unclaimed and abonded either because the populace escaped or there is no form of government there. Players will then fight quickly to control these locations and use it to their advantage. Cities can also be abonded due to fallout radiation, bad morale, or horrid living conditions.
32.More computer AI forms.Economic, offensive, defensive, normal, economic, expansionist, strategist.
33. Gold and dark ages- During specific times installed by rapid expansion or plentiful resources your nation will gain a temporary boost. Likewise you may enter dark ages from continued conflict and low resources.
Nations
1. The Vikings
2. The Celts
3. Babylonians
4. Expansion of current nations and more historical accuracy
Ages:

[This message has been edited by hindos (edited 05-11-2012 @ 02:37 AM).]