[AccessD] A rare experience

John Colby jwcolby at gmail.com
Tue Sep 19 15:24:37 CDT 2017


...beware it has the potential to be hyper addictive.


Tell me about it.  Over the last 25 years I shudder to think of the 
hours wasted...

The help file for the 2.1 version is interesting.  I purchased a 
production version from a game company, probably in the early 90s, 
though I have no way to know.  The game I play is more advanced and 
modified to utilize function keys etc.  Also the graphics are more 
detailed.  The concept is the same though.

The current game for sale is owned by Killer Bee Software 
<http://www.killerbeesoftware.com/kbsgames/edee/>  Who apparently 
purchased the game from the last vendor.  It doesn't appear that it is 
in active development.

I have always wanted to try a ground up rewrite in C#, utilizing modern 
constructs like objects, inheritance, lists etc. but it is quite an 
undertaking, especially if you desire to "go modern" with hex tiles and 
stuff.  I have researched lots of existing code which generically 
handles things like shortest path piece movements around obstructions. 
All by itself that is a complicated subject.

Anyway, quite the cool game, and I still play it.


On 9/19/2017 1:52 PM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
> Empire is a massive classic and can always be downloaded and compiled on the local computer. It runs on virtually anything.
> http://www.classicempire.com/
>
> Aside: Originally written in Pascal(?) ;-)
>
> (I ran it up on an old Linux box and runs just fine...at least for an hour...beware it has the potential to be hyper addictive.)
>
> Jim
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Bill Benson" <bensonforums at gmail.com>
> To: "Access Developers discussion and problem solving" <accessd at databaseadvisors.com>
> Sent: Saturday, September 9, 2017 9:23:31 PM
> Subject: Re: [AccessD] A rare experience
>
> Per their website: "Cool games come and go, but the Empire Series has had
> the longevity unfathomable to most computer games, and is older than many
> of its players. Not due to fancy and gimmicky graphics or cut scenes, but
> because of its basic concepts coupled with the constant and solid strategic
> challenge that it presents for the player. The community of players is made
> up of strategy gamers, some of whom have just started playing, and others
> who have been playing for a very long time."
>
> Seems you found a gem and it still shines.
>
> On Sat, Sep 9, 2017 at 7:40 AM, John Colby <jwcolby at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Understand I never said that the various Windows programs I use never
>> crashed.  What I said was that THIS specific program, the game Empire, had
>> never crashed until the other day.  That is just an extraordinary feat
>> IMHO.  I have played it since the late 80s.
>>
>>
>> On 9/7/2017 11:09 PM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
>>
>>> Agreed...once 32 bit programs are either history or running in their own
>>> sandbox, computer life will be easy (...ier). :-)
>>>
>>> Jim
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: "Jim Dettman" <jimdettman at verizon.net>
>>> To: "Access Developers discussion and problem solving" <
>>> accessd at databaseadvisors.com>
>>> Sent: Thursday, September 7, 2017 5:24:20 AM
>>> Subject: Re: [AccessD] A rare experience
>>>
>>> << to have a program which just never ever closes unexpectedly.>>
>>>
>>>      You must be living in a different plane of existence
>>>
>>>      I see Windows programs crash with regularity, although I have to
>>> admit, it has gotten far better than it was in the past and Windows itself
>>> is far more stable.    Isolating 32 bit processes was a big change.
>>>
>>> Jim.
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: AccessD [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of
>>> John Colby
>>> Sent: Monday, September 04, 2017 12:36 PM
>>> To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
>>> Subject: [AccessD] A rare experience
>>>
>>> To this day I play Empire Deluxe, a war game I have played since the
>>> nineties.  Today it had a page fault.  That has NEVER happened.  Which
>>> caused me to think about how rare it is, in the windows environment, to
>>> have a program which just never ever closes unexpectedly.
>>>
>>> Until today.
>>>
>>> New something with a Windows 10 update?  One in a million instruction
>>> path in the program?  God telling me I am wasting my life playing this
>>> game?  All of the above?
>>>
>>> No Se but it does give one pause to think about many different things
>>> all at the same time.
>>>
>>>
>> --
>> John W. Colby
>>
>> --
>> AccessD mailing list
>> AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
>> http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
>> Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com
>>

-- 
John W. Colby



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