serisouly, what point is it to add 8 players, if 80% of the maps has still only 40ish territories?
map makers have a really hard time making any good large map, because they are very limited in space, furthermore, there are allready like 150 maps to choose from, people can chooce any map the want if they still have a bad monitor.
there are also people who DO have a good monitor and a good resolution, and for example i can have the currently biggest map open on large settings, and still have it only cover about 30% of my screen, with PLENTY of room to make it much bigger and stil be able to read all the rest on my screen.
so, why not increase the map size, if even by a few 100 pixels? maybe add another map size setting (optional) make it, small (for the small resolutions) medium and large.
(so no XML or Map updates are required for excisting maps) and all the new maps have 3 values, the small maps have the same limit as small maps have now, the medium have the same limits as large have now, and the new large maps have the limits as large have now +200, or +300 pixels or so.
it shouldn't be too much of a problem really, and that way everyone can play every map (ye, those with a small resolution will have a hard time to see the map if they really insist on keeping a small resulotion, but hey, that's their own problem, right?)
i say, allow bigger map sizes.
(btw, i'm quite sure a lot of people nowadays use 1600x1200 pixels, and when i get my new monitor, i will even increase it to 2560x1600 probably, i mean, why not.)
to make it a bit more clear:
currently, there is 2 images and 4 xml tags for the coordinates (small x, large x, small y and large y) to divine the position of the troop numbers.
let's say we add a new option, 'huge' or something. then all the maps would become un-playable you say?
well, no problem, just make it so, that if no 'huge' is defined, use large instead of huge. (that's not too hard, or is it?)
then, for the newer maps(or revamped maps) which do have defined 'huge' settings (so, in effect, they have 3 image files, and 6 coordinates) they will havbe the option to show the huge maps to those who want it to be huge.
then everyone will be happy.
if that's not possible then only 1 other option:
revamp all the maps, with a small team of dedicated mapmakers/xml writers (count me in!) and add the required values to all current maps, say like, 5 at a time. once every map is done (this will take a few months) then get the update done, and everyting will be good in the end.
so. any reason NOT to?
Display Resolution
The current trend is that most computers are using a screen size of 1024x768 pixels or more:
Date Higher 1024x768 800x600 640x480 Unknown
January 2009 57% 36% 4% 0% 3%
January 2008 38% 48% 8% 0% 6%
January 2007 26% 54% 14% 0% 6%
January 2006 17% 57% 20% 0% 6%
January 2005 12% 53% 30% 0% 5%
January 2004 10% 47% 37% 1% 5%
January 2003 6% 40% 47% 2% 5%
January 2002 6% 34% 52% 3% 5%
January 2001 5% 29% 55% 6% 5%
January 2000 4% 25% 56% 11% 4%
i will update in januari when the results of 2010 are updates.
this clearly shows that most users use HIGHER resulotions then 1024x768. and only 4% uses resulotions lower then that,
so, who you favor? the 4% who use low resultions (of which the most part likely uses laptops/pda's anyways, and therefore, use higher resultions on their main computers), or the nearly 60% with higher resolutions?
