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Apolyton, a fan site for turn-based strategy games recently posted the fourth part in their series of previews of Master Of Orion III. For those unfamiliar with MOO3, it is the latest in a series of space strategy games, where players vie for control of the universe. The latest preview of the game covers diplomacy in the game, along with some of the finer gameplay elements.

Here's a snippet:

This leads us to the nucleus of conducting your race's foreign affairs. On the first pass, though, it lets you know if you have any incoming messages from those whom you have made contact with ('View Incoming Messages'). If you are a member of the Orion Senate you need not have to cross paths in order to be able to talk to other civilizations: you have their communications frequency as supplied by Senate officials. There is a similar function to this in Civilization III, but you generally have to either trade for or successfully demand for it. This is definite timesaver but it is also an advantage of being apart of a greater community with the technological capabilities required to transverse outer space.

The Silent and The Not-So-Silent
For the most part, my galactic neighbors were interested in talking to me only if I initiated contact first. At the time I suspected that they did not want to go out on a limb and risk my ignoring them. In hindsight, however, they were obviously devoting more attention and effort on building and strengthening their internal affairs than establishing outside communication. This is a pattern that I should have paid more credence to, but such are the paths ? good and bad ? that one can take in MoO3. As the game progressed, I made an effort to contact all of my neighbors individually every few turns with the exception of the New Orions. What a crew.

Apolyton MOO3 Preview, Part 4

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Quicksilver Software

Master of Orion III

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