Make yourself lighter to drag

[formerly known as hf]

People have been saying something similar for some time now. Cantr is a prime example of feature creep. Sure, most of those features have been welcomed, but they haven't necessarily been obviously an integral part of a whole, nor has the creep been consistently in a similar direction. That seems to have changed more recently, though.

But, that's kind of what we have to expect. Who is gonna write the mythical Cantr II Design Doc? Who's gonna be able to implement it fully and coherently rather than piecemeal?

When people are fighting lag and herding lemmings, it's not surprising the bigger picture seems never to have been drawn. Publicly, people still get refered back to Jos' roadmap of almost four years ago. Now, much of that has been implemented, much of it hasn't. Many things have been introduced that aren't touched upon at all in there.

Part of me likes this organic, anarchic growth of Cantr. As a game though, I'm sure it doesn't help at all.

To be honest, though - I'm happy for the staff to continue to smooth over rough edges - as and when they can (such as this dragging malarky) - and keep the game ticking over for now. Cantr's not been growing for some time. It's highly unlikely to begin to again.

[Tiamo]

Solfius,

i have reached the same conclusion (Cantr is in dire need of a good (re-)design document) several months ago. I also concluded that no design document has ever existed as such, although in early development someone must have had a clear view of what to achieve, and in some wiki pages a few design goals are still shining through.
I even took some preliminary steps towards creating the outlines of such a (re-)design document.

I happen to be (have been) a software engineer as well as a games designer. I also think Cantr is a game with huge potential, worth the effort of professionalization (not commercialization!). So if fkahf asks:

Who is gonna write the mythical Cantr II Design Doc?

i can wholeheartedly say: "I can do that!".

But this is completely off topic. We were in the middle of a discussion about redesigning the dragging process, i believe?

[marginoferror]

I disagree that it is off-topic. As a programmer, if dragging is going to be modified, I want to have to modify it exactly once.

[Solfius]

A design document isn't just for new features either, proper documentation of the game enables the impacts of existing features to be analysed and can also assist in optimising the features we already have.

[Zanthos]

i think if anyone is gonna write a design doc it should be jos. Now I know he doesnt have the time to devote to Cantr, which is not something i mind too much, but this is his brainchild. His vision was what made Cantr a game that I kept coming back to since i started playing years ago, and I feel that getting back to the roots would be great for the game (i might even start playing again)

As I dont actively play any characters anymore, I can't say how the maintanence recenly done has effected anything, but from the forums it seems to have helped.

[Tiamo]

Writing a design document would in this situation merely be a registration process. Jos would be the main source of information regarding game goals and (intended) game structure, the other main source of information being the wiki.

Any decision making, if necessary, would have to be done by the GAB/GAC.