PC World Review for Aurora

[Owen Quillion]

For comparison, (well, someone beat me to this so whoops!) just checking the Bay12 (Dwarf Fortress) forums, there are 45,000 members. Some of those folks aren't even there for Dwarf Fortress, but for the community itself (I almost only lurk there for the Other Games forum myself). The 'online today' numbers for the two are 32 vs 431 (no prizes for guessing which is which). Just back-of-the-envelope-numbers-wise, Dwarf Fortress showing up on a 'big' site is less surprising than Aurora.

Aurora is also fairly niche and a bit more difficult to approach (like the resolution and installation issues), so seeing it in the mainstream is a bit of a shock for those of us who just bunnyhopped here from various corners of the Internet.

I am glad it was reviewed though; Aurora may not be for everybody, but I'm sure there's lots of folks who'll find it through PCWorld and find it to be the game they never knew they wanted.

[Erik L]

We'll welcome them with open arms... Until they spam viagra. Then I ban them

[ardem]

Nice review well done.

And well done to the Aurora team, Steve may program it for free, and Erik does wonderful work with the forums and a host of people deliver support and encouragement. It really is a team effort for a great product.

[ShadoCat]

I tried to ad a user review but I couldn't get logged in.  I'll try again later.

The review was going to include the fact that when I play, I sometimes have to make the decision at 4am as to whether I should try of an hour of sleep or stay up and get ready to go to work.

[ardem]

There is no decision you play an hour.

No wonder my doc says I need more sleep else I will die, 4 hours is not enough. 

[Nathan_]

"Aurora is happy to let you dump naked colonists on an airless world, or give a ship orders it doesn't have the fuel to complete, or send a warship into battle with no missiles loaded. I imagine that Aurora giggles in delight when you do this."

That isn't totally true, it will warn you if you are about to trigger an extinction level event on your homeworld(removing the last mass driver when a kiloton of neutronium traveling at 5000km/s is headed for earth for example), not enough to rescind the order, but warn you all the same.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I notice there has now been a user review, although he doesn't seem to be a huge fan

Steve

[sloanjh]

I notice there has now been a user review, although he doesn't seem to be a huge fan

LOL - I don't think he fits the target demographic

John

[Marthnn]

LOL - I don't think he fits the target demographic

John

Well, one thing I feel he got somewhat right is about Aurora almost not being a game. . .  I myself prefer to consider it as a simulation, similar to, say, finite-element analysis or other modelisations, in that the result is dependent on time pulse and sub-pulse lenghts.  It became very apparent to me when I noticed my shipping line incomes triple when using 8 hours increments instead of 1-5days ones. 

But associating Aurora with casual gamers? No way.  None of my friends understood my appeal to Dwarf Fortress, and it's the same for Aurora.

[Shinanygnz]

But associating Aurora with casual gamers? No way.  None of my friends understood my appeal to Dwarf Fortress, and it's the same for Aurora.

Yup, my house mate refers to it as Database Wars

[dgibso29]

Yup, my house mate refers to it as Database Wars

That sounds like a viable new name!


Dwarf Fortress still kicks my ass. Partly because I only play it on my rather outdated Laptop. I invariably go to a point where things just STOP. Dwarves just stop working.

[Thiosk]

Yup, my house mate refers to it as Database Wars

Attack of the Spreadsheets:  THE REVENGENING

[ollobrains]

great review and DF in the next week or two is getting its big yearly update so numbers will spike over there.  I play both aurora and DF both are great games in their own right

[ardem]

I would play DF if I could understand the graphics, I never been good at figuring out asci.

[Marthnn]

I would play DF if I could understand the graphics, I never been good at figuring out asci.

The point of DF graphics is to look like what it represents using ascii, if possible, and if not, use a relatively distinctive letter. After a while of using the look (k) or view (v) options to check what that grey "d" means, you eventually end up seeing the war dog, or knowing it's one and not a donkey. Like the Matrix. Except with dwarves. Drunk ones.
Better wait the bug-resolving versions after this big update. Then will come the time I melt my laptop by running both Aurora and DF, with a YouTube video on the 2nd screen.