Ilmari Heikkinen
3/26/2006 7:57:00 PM
Another interesting spinoff of this idea would be to use real data andrun the merchant AIs against that, e.g. stock data for some period oftime / goods prices for some towns + transport costs.On 3/26/06, Reto Schuettel <reto-ruby-talk@schuettel.ch> wrote:> Hi>> On Sat, Mar 25, 2006 at 09:27:25PM +0900, Gerben van de Wiel wrote:> > I have been following the Thread about Ruby quiz number 71, with great> > intrest.> > I have a few question about the effort to develop some basic functionality> > of a space merchant game.>> Well.. I found the quiz very interesting. I'm at the moment a little> bit frustrated about a game called X3 The Reunion. It's also a space> game, but well.. it has some 'more advanced' abilities compared to the> Space-Merchants (like 3d graphics, a story, ability to fight, etc..> a full game :)). But there are some interesting similarities: What's> the easiest way to get money. In X3 you can either fly your space crafts> (little fast ships, big slow transporters etc) by yourself or you can> use (if you have enough (in-game) money to buy the needed extension) a> computer which trades for you. The computer looks for interesting trade> routes, tries to find the best balance between the available money,> transporter-cargo-capacity, needed time (length of the route) and of> course the profit :). Well, the game is extremely buggy, slow and so it> isn't as funny as I first thought[1]. :/>> But, X3 & S::M brought me to a whole new idea:> We could improve the Space-Merchants and then give the people here the> opportunity to 'program' (of course in ruby) their own merchant AI.> There would be a whole predefined world (planets, stations, goods,> whatever), perhaps other predefined stupid trades (so that there would> be a big ecosystem), a limited amount of credits, a limited amount of time> (so that people would have to think twice about the algorithms) etc. The> aim would be to to create a good AI which tries to get most out of the> situation.>> The server would run on a central server (so that everybody could> compete against each other). Perhaps it would make sense> to have regular cycles: for instance the players could upload their> scripts/libs by the beginning of a week, and then the whole simulation> would run for 24-48 hours (I don't know how much in-game time this> should/would be). After this time the game would stop and the current> situation would be saved (which player has how much money, which ships,> etc). We could download the logs, improve our scripts etc. etc. And the> whole thing would start again next week. Perhaps after some time we> could 'reset' the whole universe and start from the beginning :).>> Welll... to be honest, it sounds like a lot of fun, but also like a lot> of work :). Kind of on-line game, but for programmers :). And, The> techniques> learnt and trained could also be useful in our every-day work (or> not :).>> Well.. what do you think? Interesting? Too much work :)?>> Regards,> Reto Schuettel>> 1: It isn't that bad either, so if you like the idea and a 3d space> game, take a look at the demo: www.egosoft.com>>