Re: Just popped in after many years...

<newpostcentral@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message 
news:0957cd424f.Andrew@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> In message <d337bd414f.SimonC@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>          Simon Challands <simon_usenet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>> In message <4b6a41414f.Andrew@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>>           newpostcentral@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:
>>
>>> In message <1c552a3f4f.SimonC@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>>>           Simon Challands <simon_usenet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>
>>>> In message <4733bded$1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>>>>           "Ian Robinson" <ianr@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Ian here, him of Karma fame ;-). Still fire up my acorns, mostly for

>>>>> code
>>>>> dev as StrongEd is still such a good editor.
>>>>
>>>> Good to hear that you're still keeping a slight eye on us, and still
>>>> using RISC OS a bit. Karma was a hugely interesting project (you may
>>>> recall me plotting an HR diagram from some of its stars), and nothing
>>>> has remotely approached it's ambitiousness in the intervening time.
>>>>
>>> Can you remind me how people were told about Karma's ambitions? I
>>> think I still have the review of the Flight Trainer in a Micro User at
>>> home and possibly there was a preview article in the same issue or
>>> surrounding issues but that was all AFAIK. It's so long ago, I only
>>> vaguely remember reading about other civilisations etc.
>>
>> I seem to recall reading a fair bit about it in one or two magazines
>> years ago. I'm sure the first contact Ian mentioned was in there, and
>> there were others about seeing ****ps commuting to work, and the whole
>> thing linked to the computer's clock.
>>
> What is baffling is how 81 civilisations could be updated continually
> on a 4MHz machine. It would have been good to see ArcElite with more
> continuity throughout the galaxies/universe but surely in both games
> there would have to be a limit on how much is updated at one time. For
> example, space could be divided into sectors and the game would update
> the civilisation when the player enters. But wouldn't that lead to a
> noticeable freeze in the game?
>
> Andrew
>
> -- 

Your bafflement is corect in appreciating the numbers involved. But put 
yourself in the position of the player, the game does not have to update 
everything, just what the player is looking at, where they are, a single 
solar system. Tbis is where the 'catch-up'cycle comes in on solar system 
entry. Sure, that could get to be very long on a 4Mhz acorn of old, but 
hell, that's triffling today. So I think the design was sound and
definately 
benefits from the hardware development that has occurred since.

Ian.