Big Picture Status/ConsimWorld Forum Posts of Interest

On ConsimWorld, Charlie Spiegel asked me

What I want to know Bill, is do you estimate it will be ready for Prime Time this Origins?

I replied

It's not ready yet. AI work as been on hold since last Origins. I've
been concentrating on improving the user interface and the gameplay.

We've had no direction on whether to work towards an initial release
without the AI or with it. Ed said he hoped to get back to us on the
AI/no AI question last August.

And also

Oops. Previous post incomplete.

We've continued to work along even without the AI decision, but
we've been working in anticpation of a non-AI release.

Aside from that, things have been fairly slow going, between the
holidays and personal life.

I won't be at Origins this year, as it conflicts with my upcoming
wedding. The last time I spoke with Chris, he was still planning
to attend.

Generally speaking, the game is much more playable and user-friendly
than it was last year. All messages are now displayed in a Game
Messages window. Morale information is displayed in its own window in
a way that makes it easy to find out which commands are in trouble,
and which units are at risk. Game status information has its own
window as well. The Jump Map dialog is now modeless and it synchronizes
with the display pretty well. Movement execution is now animated...you
can see each unit move a hex at a time. The mouse cursor now changes
appearance to show where you can move and plot fire.