That sounds interesting Bastian. I look forward to reading it. Can you give us more of a taster of what it will be about?

You are a young noble of the mighty fantasy empire of Silena. Once the empire ruled most of the world, but centuries of decline have resulted in heavy losses of territory.
There will be some magic and dragons in the game (I love dragons) but the focus will be on human interaction. There is a fairly detailed world but I will try to spare the reader from too much detail.

The game will follow your career through a period of several years, in which you must try and become emperor or empress.
There will be three ways to achieve this: 1. Impress the current empress so much that she will choose you as a heir. 2. Stage a coup 3. Get voted as the new emperor/empress when the current ruler dies without progeny.

You can collect status, military resources and votes. Love affairs can lead to happiness or heartbreak, status or scandal. Eventually, you will probably marry and/or have a consort. Following some choice-of-games conventions that I like, you can die only in a few situations so you will usually play through the whole game, and both gender and sexual preference will be optional. You try to "win" by getting an ending that reflects your preferences the best.

Your paired stats reflect personality more than skills. For example, honor vs. reputation
(honor means doing what you know is right, even if unpopular, while reputation means doing what people would like to see)
and wisdom vs popularity (wisdom means you can listen and understand people well and that your advice is usually right, popularity means you can talk and convince people and people will trust and follow your advice).

I have lots of ideas and seeing how much time a chapter takes, this project will be for the long run, but I will post the first chapters next week to get some feedback.

This sounds interesting. Let's see what you've come up with!

One important, quick question: when it comes to romances, will you go the Choice of Romance route and have gender and orientation be irrelevant, or will the heir club, alliances and such lead to consequences?

Sounds wonderful! Can't wait to give it a spin!

I've been waiting for this! I'm excite.

This. Sounds. *SO*. Awesome. I absolutely cannot wait.

Gender and orientation will not be irrelevant. You can have lovers of the same or of the opposite sex, but marriage (which perpetuates families) is heterosexual. On the other hand, this is a society in which (at least among the nobility) most jobs are open to both men and women. There might be the possibility to have kids in the game (haven't decided yet) in which case gender is of course very important.

Sounds great... Hopefully nothing will come up that will end up cancelling it

Is going vain of politcal packing of Roman Empire, with crap load courter drive for favor title of honor and postion fo power? Or is going something simlar to Or in Tradtional china?

More like China, the Empire will be relatively stable.

My friend stablilty can argue, I was getting more what sources of the Emperor legitmacy.

You no the things with big empires. They decline after a while then etc. What would really be neat is the empire is in chaos and you try to arise to the thrown and save the world.

Empires do not tend towards entropy on their own; the great thing about nepotist oligarchies is that they are really good at maintaining the status quo, only collapsing due to exceptional circumstances. The Roman Empire fell because of religious schism, the Chinese Empire fell because of Hun invasions and an over-reliance on mysticism and the British Empire fell because of changing social attitudes towards colonialism as well as economic concerns brought on by the Second World War. The Realm fell because the Empress was abducted by the Ebon Dragon.

The unifying aspect of all these societies is that they lasted for centuries just fine (by the standards of the respective eras, at least) until something from outside their control upset their balance of power, at which point they rapidly fell apart.

Actually, the Chinese Empire didn't fall just because of Hun invasions but it did put a drain on imperial resources. Also, not just hun by xiong nu as well. Over-reliance on mysticism is largely untrue, although some emperors who were obsessed with attaining immortality did do stupid oppressy stuff.

But many Chinese dynasties, if we assume each dynasty is its own empire, have fallen because of revolution and/or civil war.

Religou is fare to simple of answer for fall of the roman empire, it deline was slow to it about 300 hundred easier other aruge it around even longer if out count how long Eastern Empire was around.

War on the 'Red Empire': How America planned for an attack on BRITAIN in 1930 with bombing raids and chemical weapons

Emerging world power feared British reaction to its ambitions
Plan Red was code for massive war with British Empire
Top-secret document once regarded as 'most sensitive on Earth'.
In 1930, a mere nine years before the outbreak of World War Two, America drew up proposals specifically aimed at eliminating all British land forces in Canada and the North Atlantic, thus destroying Britain's trading ability and bringing the country to its knees.

Previously unparalleled troop movements were launched as an overture to an invasion of Canada, which was to include massive bombing raids on key industrial targets and the use of chemical weapons, the latter signed off at the highest level by none other than the legendary General Douglas MacArthur.

The plans, revealed in a Channel 5 documentary, were one of a number of military contingency plans drawn up against a number of potential enemies, including the Caribbean islands and China. There was even one to combat an internal uprising within the United States.
In the end there was no question of President Franklin D. Roosevelt subscribing to what was known as War Plan Red. Instead the two countries became the firmest of allies during WW2, an occasionally strained alliance that continues to this day.
Still, it is fascinating that there were enough people inside the American political and military establishment who thought that such a war was feasible.

While outside of America, both Churchill and Hitler also thought it a possibility during the 30s - a time of deep economic and political uncertainty.

Any competent staff would have contingency plans for most potential war situations, regardless of politics.

Modern militaries even have contingency plans for zombie uprisings. These kind of plans are all about being prepared for anything and training commanders to be able to think outside the box more than they are about actually preparing to perform such operations. It's still pretty damn cool, though.

@Canisa- Your right about most of the empires I would say for the Roman empire apart from religious problems it just grew to big to manage without a number of co- rulers in addition to all the invasions it suffered. I like your point about the oligarches.

Basically if you have creative leaders who just do everything by the book it probably means your nation would fall(ancient times).

A plot point will be the conflict between traditionalist and progressive politics in the empire. Traditionalists think the empire is in trouble because people do not follow the way of their ancestors and have lost the old virtues, while the progressives think that only by change can the empire continue to exist. (The other fractions are imperialist and mercantilist).

TRY RULER OF THE RED EMPIRE!

OK, I've put the first chapters on-line. Have a look and tell me what you think. All criticism is welcome, that's why I started this thread. Please mark spoilers so people can avoid reading them.

http://ruletheredempire.webs.com/

Are you looking for typos? Too bad, I found one:

The slave makes an (a) respectful bow

Also, I'm not sure if it's just me, but I found the choices for the outfit you wear to the empress's palace to be confusing. I expected noble clothing to be traditional, and didn't know what the house heir clothing was. Also not sure if it is supposed to say "dress" on that page when you are male, but it does.

Anyway, is a good game, was looking forward to it for a while, and now I am looking forward to new installments. Hoping you let players be dragon knights.

*Spoilers*

1) "You love watching the capital like this." Be very careful about telling the player what they do, and do not like. It's a quick way to alienate some readers (depending on what you tell them they have to enjoy). If you are going to say such a thing, it should be phrased something more like, "You can't help but admire the beauty of the capital when the light strikes it in such a way."

2) #Choices should be capitalized, particularly if the are whole sentences. (seems like you did so with some choices, but not others)

3) It seems like the individual pages could be longer, particularly when first talking to your mother.

4) "We leave at third hour." should be "We leave at the third hour."

5) " "Esvan, have our floating house prepared." "Yes, mother." " Always indent to a new line when changing who's talking. There should never be two people with quotes in the same paragraph.

6) Some bits can use a little more detail. For example, the talk with your mother can include a few clues to her/the other characters mentalities or how things actually work around the house. Also, the part where you choose your apartment, I thought I'd get a little descriptor of what it was after I choose it, and how it made others think of me.

7) The part where you choose your hair and whether you like it or not could be combined into a multi choice. Multi choices work like:
*choice letter number
#Choice A
#Choice 1
A1
#Choice 2
A2
#Choice B
#Choice 1
B1
#Choice 2
B2
The first choice will be prefaced with "Choose a letter" while the second will be "Choose a number" Color and Reaction would probably be good choices for hair color and your opinion on it.

8) Elite soldiers: No clue how that's different from Grizzled Veterans, except maybe they haven't seen combat.

*/Spoilers*

An interesting story. And very extensive for the first beta release...

I just hope it won't go the way of Choice of Intrigues that wasn't my taste. ;-)

-Spoilers-





A few typos that caught my eye:

"Our counselors tell us that all of the exalted families have been summoned, house leaders and heirs, so we assume the sovereign will have a very important announcement to make. I expect that great changes at at hand."

I expect that great changes are at hand.
---
it is very uncommon, but it look pleasing to you. And how would you describe your face?

It is... ...but it looks...
---
with your beautiful, startling blond hair in a shimmering waist-length mass, adorned with some silver ornaments.

Is the waist-length hair intended for the male character? Just wondering.
---
Most live in the imperial dragon stables, a large walled building on its on island behind the imperial palace.

... building on its own island...
---
"Maxar, we have to decide about your future. Positions are opening up and I am hard at work trying to get you one." "Our family has many contacts and resources, but compitition is fierce."

...you one. Our family...

When ask family should, should able choice how family rose to from nothing High nobles, so you get understand of root of your family, and what titles they have.

Very interesting beginning. A few thoughts:

The character choices seem very front-loaded, it begins to feel like a survey. It might be better to do a minimal sketch, then the details deeper into the story after things start happening.

In fact, things take a long time to start happening, and lack urgency or impact. The protagonist seems passive (a problem common to second-person narrative) and few choices carry weight for the character or the player.

Morar's visit was a good example of "showing," and letting the reader experience the situation for themselves. Most other events are "told" or summarized, and don't connect. Could the other vignettes be framed as unfolding conflicts that directly affect the protagonist? (This was true for my playthrough, I may have taken a boring path through the hunting trip, or missed other content).

Margins -- while they seem cosmetic, studies have shown the eye needs space around the text to track correctly. Readers read faster and retain more with proper margins. Between the reddish box's edge and the text there should be at least a double-return's worth of space.

Paragraphs need either a first-line indent, or a double carriage return. Since Choicescript separates paragraphs with <BR> instead of <DIV> or <P>, you'll probably have to use the double paragraph return, unless someone knows how to indent the first line after a <BR> using CSS. You must have your reasons for typing in *line_break each time, but it makes for difficult reading without clear paragraph breaks.

There were various typos that can be cleaned up later, but I found a humorous one when the brother and sister are talking about their magnificent horse: "Thank you, sir. He is our pride and joy. We reared him from a fowl."

I really like the game. With all those choices and customazation I get lost in it. Not to rush you but do you have a time for then the full game will be done?

Wow, thanks everybody for taking the time to try out my game and commenting on it.
Below, I won't refer to people pointing out mistakes in spelling or layout but that doesn't mean it's not appreciated, all the errors pointed out were indeed errors.

@peglegpenguin
Yes, I'll rephrase the bit about clothing, so you can make a more informed choice. And I didn't realize that "dress" came of silly for a man. English is not my first language.

And yes, of course there will be situations where you can try and become a dragon knight. But it will always be kind of a gamble.

@Reaperoa
1. I think you are right, you should give people at least a choice in what they feel.
3. and 6. Sometimes the text just flows from my keyboard, sometimes it doesn't. But some pieces could use a bit more text, and the talk with your mother is indeed a good point to start. And some more of a description of your living quarters would work too.
7. Didn't know you can do that. I'll try it.
8. Yes , I could make this a bit more clear. Elite soldiers are young, supremely fit, and very well trained, while veterans are older, slower but with more endurance, and less likely to do things "by the book". In a straight battle, the elite would win, but the veterans would probably think of a trick to alter the odds in their favor.

@Vurguzz
I haven't played Choice of Intrigues very far yet, so I can't comment on your remark.

And yes, waist-length hair is intended for the male character! Silenans take their hair very seriously, as we shall see. It is a status symbol, denoting one's social class. Women of the high nobility wear it ankle-length.

@Rogar
This is like a caste society. Being noble means that you descent from 20 or 30 generations of nobles, so what these ancestors exactly did is rather distant. The Silenans do worship their ancestors, so they will know.

The basic story is this. After the first emperor of Silena conquered the whole island (Silena is a large island/small continent), he divided the country into estates and appointed people to rule over them. This is the landed nobility, and since the are thus the oldest noble class, they feel a sense of pride over this. The common people became tradesmen and farmers, while the non-Silenan population was enslaved.
Generations later, a prosperous merchant class had developed which was ennobled to allow for some intermarriage between them and the landed nobility. Centuries later, the Silenans were contacted by outside civilizations. They had thought their island was the entire world, and since almost all of the coast are cliff-like mountains, had not developed sea ships. War ensued, and in the aftermath, the emperor decided to found an overseas empire. Since not many nobles were willing to leave the island, he instituted a new class of nobility, and invited enterprising members of the landed and trade nobility to try their luck overseas, including some of his own close family. So high noble families have very large holdings overseas. Since they became immensely rich and had the ear of the emperor, the high nobility eclipsed the others in status.

So there are no real titles like duke or count.

@HoraceTorys
You are right that a bit more action in the beginning would help. I'll think about how to work that into the story. Your choices do matter for your stats!
The amount of text you get does depend on your choices, and in some cases will make your story a lot shorter. The hunt does not have very many good pieces of drama yet.
I'll look into the paragraph breaks. I do some CSS work professionally, and Ruler of the Red Empire has its own stylesheet, so I'll probably figure something out.
And thanks for the foal/fowl thing, you really made my kids day when I told them what I had written.

@Nack
It is a quite ambitious project so it will take a long time I'm afraid. But I will try to update this.

Love the story so far! I would like to see more romance. :)

Absolutely enjoyed the beta game. My tip is to add a little more detail in some places, which someone already mentioned. Give the reader an idea of characters personality, and also affiliation (progressive ect).
Great first beta, keep up the good work (:

@melonhead66
Spoiler:


There is a way to get a lover in the first beta ;-)


End spoiler.

I want to offer several possibilities for romance in the game, which may affect the rest of the story in many ways.

@Raven:
Your personality and affiliation (and that of your family) is up to you, I won't force anyone to play just one type of politics or personality. Making the most of personality traits and affiliations should be the key to winning the game.

Hmm thats cool. I epected of course i could choose my own lol but didnt expect to be able to choose my familys? Interesting way to do it luv this game (:

So far, I'm getting the feeling that there's far too little stat change for each action. The actions should probably be more influential in general, especially in the early game.

@Ramidel: I'm not sure how much chance per action is appropriate.
Just because you wear a traditional dress shouldn't make you into a complete traditionalist. The idea is that you must be consistently choose to be progressive or traditional or whatever.

However, I agree with you that there should be enough stat changes to make it seem something happens to the player, and to see significant differences in play.

I'll try to see how it works if I tune up the stat changes a bit.

As someone's mentioned before, each page seems to be too short, but I just think it's a result of the strange pacing throughout the story.
Like at the start, it takes too long to actually get to the palace for some story progression. Then, the choices when dressing makes the pace kinda stuttered as some comments a thrown in. You can also lump the description of the trip to the landed nobles into one/fewer pages.
Consider, like other games, setting more back drop with texts at the start of an arc, then presenting the choices to determine some stats.
I know it's difficult, but after choosing your gender, it still feels like there are bits and pieces (like "House company reporting for duty, madam.") that leans towards the protagonist being female.
It seems like a very good game so far! Good luck!

Congrats on releasing your first few chapters. Well done, so far.

My feedback:

1. As others have said, the beginning feels more like a survey than story-driven character building. My game has been criticized for that, and I have only 4 choices for character development.
2. I did like the depths of choices, most having more than eight options, which adds to customization.
3. I also was not sure of the goal of the story prior to character dev, so I didn't know how I wanted to set up my character. There are allusions to it by the title and some of the beginning, but you may consider giving more of the goal upfront, so I can build my character accordingly if I choose.
4. You seem to have a great level of details to the setting and story, so I am intrigued to learn more about it.

Great job!

So when comes to the noblity more old roman sense where thought sental rank get all best postiom honor, honorfic title thrust on them.

Awesome game! I liked it alot. But I was wondering about the hair part. You said the men wear their hair waist length & the women ankle length, because hair is very important to the culture. Soo would it be possible to have the reader choose how long they wanted their hair to be? Like men could choose from very short, shoulder length, or waist legneth and the women can either choose shoulder, waist, or ankle length? I'm asking because it could help the character choose between what's traditional or be rebellious.. I don't know if I'm asking too much or it just might be stupid idk. Lol but it's just a something I was wondering about..

@huuuuhwhaaaat Plus there's the matter of practicality. You don't see a lot of fighters with long hair, particularly in pre-firearms societies, mostly because of the practical reasons to keep it short.

Speaking of long hair, it's another one of those things where a bit of information would be nice.

Chinese warriors all had long hair, because everyone did. But they all tied it up so that it doesn't fly around and obscure their vision and stuff.

@ScarletGeisha, I said a lot, not none, and most warriors who had long hair kept it 'tight' most of the time, only letting it down when somewhere they felt relatively secure. It sounds like, in the Red Empire, having loose hair is the standard (just my interpretation of what we've seen so far).

One benefit to having short pages of text: you don't have to scroll the page down to click through parts you've already read. Though, some of these pages are too short, which makes for unnecessary clicking.

The Spartans were famous for their long hair and spend the eve of the battle of Thermopylae doing their hair and that of their friends. Their hair was long because Lycurgus said that long hair adds beauty to a good face, and terror to an ugly one.

Sikhs are other famous warriors who never cut their hair, although they don't wear it hanging free.

The vikings as well never cut their hair well on rare occasions. There owas once a Norse king who let his beard grow 10 years before he cut it

Actually, a lot of ancient warriors have long hair. The Romans, Shaolin monks, Japanese warrior monks and Edo-period samurai are the few exceptions I can think of off-hand.

*hang head and skitters out*

Roman was first true proffesional army in the western world. Of course they are. Question is dragon Knight a honor or postion of power or influnces?

@Rogar Romans were not the first professional army? They were probably the best at what they did, but the Zhou chinese dynasty, Greeks, and Egyptians all fielded large peasant/ slave army in the same structure of the romans. What set the Romans apart was weapon technology, better training, and tactical genius in its leaders.

As mean professional it was trues of profession as being lawyer statmen. It standard where truely untouch in it era Of compare to there counterparts. Another rome so famous western would the Empire last 2000 years. Of course the china last a lot longer.

It depends on how you define their reign. Do you count the Eastern and Western Roman Empires?

As for China, it is variable too. If you consider Han rule as true Chinese rule, then it has fallen twice already. First to the Mongolians and then to the Manchu who founded the Qing Dynasty. But most scholars consider Manchu as Chinese. Even so, there's still the matter of the Mongolian Yuan Dynasty. Unless you also apply the modern assimilation of Mongolian peoples as one of the Chinese ethnic groups, then China has indeed never been conquered.