A Classic Rant

[MOBAJOBG]

Trust me when I say, ...I can play both versions of Classic maps -Shapes & Art!.

[owenshooter]

I do know THOTA has an idea for a new map, reffered to as the Mondriaan map.

i don't trust a clan to design a map that doesn't understand the basic physics involved with reflections in water... ZING!!!!-0

p.s.-but it is a nice effort... as good as what the options were.

[nesterdude]

Can we get a MAP, with uhm continents, and oceans and er, territories?
C'mon now, let's stop kidding ourselves here.

[Mysteron]

In England we have a little saying and it goes like this......If it aint broken, don't try and fix it.

Unfortunately we didn't seem to get a choice whether we wanted to play the new abortion, it suddenly appeared and apparently seems to be as welcome as a turd in a swimming pool.

Just admit it's not a winner and we'll all admire you for it, the original Classic is better so can we have it back please????

[jiminski]

Can we get a MAP, with uhm continents, and oceans and er, territories?
C'mon now, let's stop kidding ourselves here.

Ok... the catch 22 is, and i am only interpreting and reading between lines here, the dilemma is that Lacks Lawyers have advised against any similarity at all to the Classic Hasbro Risk Board.

they have advised that if we maintain Gameplay similarities the best way to avoid infringement is to utterly avoid the representation of land or any conventional cartographic representation.

What does that leave us with to play with .. not a lot!

The second half of this catch 22 and again i am genuinely reading between the lines (i have been spitting the dummy all day today at that horrendous map choice) is that if Lack overtly describes to the community how to avoid copyright infringement he is in effect accepting prior copyright infringement and the site gets shut-down.

so the poor bastard has to steel our map and can not explain why.. it is like a horrendous Shakespearean tragedy (or perhaps more like a shit episode of The O.C.)

Now how have i arrived at this piece of sleuthful conjecture?

it is very simple:

1- The maps are so shit that he can not possibly have a choice
2- Only a friggin idiot would not explain themselves when his entire customer base is crying for information and latterly, due to his snub, his blood!

I am happy at this? No... am i happy at taking heat of the site to help allow one of these abominations to represent my beloved Classic .. i would rather crap glass!

But can i see any other motivation or way forward? not a lot.... It may be that working within my conjectural parameters that some genius could help to better the options .. but these were created by some talented chaps and they have to have metaphorically had their eyes poked out and have been operating the mouse with their tongues, hands tied behind their back, to end up with the awful map choices we have.


So again.. i am not sure we have a lot of choice... heheh i would love Lack to correct me or confirm these wild assertions but i don't think that he can!

[owenshooter]

jim... i think you are forgetting the contest to replace the map over in the forum. these options are not the final product.-0

[jiminski]

jim... i think you are forgetting the contest to replace the map over in the forum. these options are not the final product.-0

where would that be mate?... you mean the thread that will never hold a competition, as Made by MaxisG8 or is there a new one?

[Hatchman]

It's simple - To get the old Classic back, the site has to stop charging people to play here. (After all, it's lost revenues at the heart of all copyright violation claims and lawsuit threats.)

In the meantime, do what I'm doing: get your Classic fix elsewhere, and keep playing here for the other lovely maps (which no other site can match!).

There is no way I'm ever going to play our so-called Classic. It's a freakin abomination.

[Ditocoaf]

Hmm...

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

[Hatchman]

Hmm Bizzaro-Classic....

How about something somewhere between Doodle Earth and World 2.1?

[mpjh]

Why not make each former continent a planet or galaxy?

[hammocksleeper]

Hmm...

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

why can't each continent have its own diverse ecosystems? that's more realistic than having a whole continent be a prairie.

[Ditocoaf]

Hmm...

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

why can't each continent have its own diverse ecosystems? that's more realistic than having a whole continent be a prairie.

What I'm saying is that instead of continents, we have different natures. For isntance, instead of europe, there's a wooded part of the area. Instead of asia, there's a prairie. It's no longer on a world scale, instead, it's probably zoomed to somewhere between age of realms and siege.

[hammocksleeper]

Hmm...

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

why can't each continent have its own diverse ecosystems? that's more realistic than having a whole continent be a prairie.

What I'm saying is that instead of continents, we have different natures. For isntance, instead of europe, there's a wooded part of the area. Instead of asia, there's a prairie. It's no longer on a world scale, instead, it's probably zoomed to somewhere between age of realms and siege.

that's still not realistic at all. you've been reading too many tolkien novels.

[Ditocoaf]

Hmm...

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

why can't each continent have its own diverse ecosystems? that's more realistic than having a whole continent be a prairie.

What I'm saying is that instead of continents, we have different natures. For isntance, instead of europe, there's a wooded part of the area. Instead of asia, there's a prairie. It's no longer on a world scale, instead, it's probably zoomed to somewhere between age of realms and siege.

that's still not realistic at all. you've been reading too many tolkien novels.

Meh, where I'm from, there's often a fairly obvious boundary between where there are trees, and no trees. And I'm not giving an exact description of a map, I'm giving an example. I'm just saying, we should still have an actual map-map, but without it being a world map. It can be a fictional (or real) place, on a much smaller scale. That way, its not abstract (which people really seem to be annoyed by), but it also doesn't resemble RISK at all. And it should be something generic, since this is supposed to be the standard.

So, imo, the ideal graphics to replace classic would be:
generic
non-abstract (an actual map, but not of the world)
zones and regions rearranged so that it looks even less like RISK (but still plays the same)

What I was saying before was just a (bad) example of such.

[premio53]

I have to agree with this post. I only got on this site in the first place because of the classic maps, I don't really play anything else. I guess I'm reliving my childhood, when I played a lot of risk. but this new map really takes the fun out of the game. I know there is the looming threat of a lawsuit, but there must be some middle ground. like I've posted elsewhere, no one should be able to copyright the world. maybe some of the shapes of the countries can be changed, some of the names, the colors can be changed, eliminate the big whale south of africa, etc. but give us a real map of the world to play on.

I'm finishing up all my current games but doubt I'll start any new ones until this gets resolved somehow.

thanks for listening.
jr

I also agree. I am 55 years old and the only reason I came here to start with is because of the draw of the Classic map of which I grew up with. I like Conquer Club but will probably abandon this site and go to another one after my current games are completed. If Conquer Club ever does come up with another map that is similar to the original Classic I may return. I'm not bashing the administration because I understand how lawsuits work. It is simply a matter of preference.

[Dancing Mustard]

I think all people want is an actual land-based map... so just map out a fictional "CC battleground" with perhaps the "woods" being one continent, the "prairie" being another, and the "desert" being another, etc.

Since the regions can be rearranged however you want as long as they still border the same others, you could flip this around completely, make it resemble planet earth in no way, and just use the same gameplay in a map of a fictional battlefeild. This wouldn't resemble the RISK map in any way, but it would have the same gameplay if you thought carefully about it.

Precisely.

I don't know precisely what copyright moratorium CC is buried under, but surely it can't be too hard to come up with another set of graphics that has precisely the same underlying qualities as original classic.

Make it look like Canada, Ethiopia, or whatever you damn well like... and bingo, problem surely solved? If it's ok to keep using other maps that don't look like classic (but play like risk) then surely this problem is most likely to be remedied by some bright spark coming up with a map that looks nothing like classic (no octagons in the same arrangement, no "Classic with more corners, by THOTA), but essentially plays the same. You know, rearranging classic entirely (so Aus is in the middle and Asia is in the bottom left, go nuts...), keeping the basic properties intact (which 'countries' border which, bonuses etc), then whacking a crazy new skin on it (map of Atlantis, who knows, let's get crazy here)?

Anyway, just my two cents.

[King_Herpes]

Why don't you just smush it all together into Pangaea? -TM- so don't even try it.

[jiminski]

Why don't you just smush it all together into Pangaea? -TM- so don't even try it.

I had considered something similar to the Pangea map .. but with a Jurassic theme (a few Dinosaur hanging around the odd Ichthyosaurs leaping in the waves, one or two pterosaurs on wing in the sky and a some sort of Saur hanging about smoking fags on land. (no idea about time-lines so i am sure some of that could be from the cretaceous but hey!)

As much as anything i would just like a Jurassic Classic!

[Frop]

I had considered something similar to the Pangea map .. but with a Jurassic theme (a few Dinosaur hanging around the odd Ichthyosaurs leaping in the waves, one or two pterosaurs on wing in the sky and a some sort of Saur hanging about smoking fags on land. (no idea about time-lines so i am sure some of that could be from the cretaceous but hey!)

As much as anything i would just like a Jurassic Classic!

Word!