Curious about the possibility of an offline version
Started by BeatlesEternally (joined · 21 posts · 51 karma) , ago
Hey Harlin,
The game is gaining in popularity and you know I love it. Do you think that in the future there will be a purchasable version of the game to play offline? What concerns me is that with how ephemeral the interwebz can be that there may come a time when you may decide to shut down your server. I do know you have mentioned that at some point, you plan to charge a fee for the game - which is totally fair - but I find that I would be really disappointed if this game was no longer available to play.
2
Comments
Log in to leave a comment.
First, I really appreciate you saying that, and I'm glad you're enjoying the game so much. It means a lot to know that people are getting the same enjoyment out of playing it that I get from developing it.
I'm a software developer by trade, but ironically, there isn't much software I actually spend money on for myself. Sports simulation games are one of the few exceptions. I've always loved them, and I have a pretty strong personal motivation to keep ActionSims going. I say this because this is way more interesting to me to keep maintaining and supporting than some kind of SAS who has enterprise level customers. I plan to do this for a long time.
In fact, the original idea for something like ActionSims goes all the way back to when I was about 9 years old. I loved playing sports when I was a kid but for some reason I enjoyed being the neighborhood commissioner much more. Later, in high school, I discovered a computer literacy class in 1987 that I could take instead of yet another math class I needed to graduate. That was when my interest in computer programming and sports simulations really came together. I've wanted to build something like this ever since. I've experimented with a combination of software and my own table tops over the years. I'm 57 now, so you could say this project has been a long time coming!
For me, ActionSims is partly a hobby and something I genuinely enjoy working on. There's also the possibility that it could eventually become a small business that keeps me occupied during retirement, which isn't all that far away. I haven't made any firm decisions about that yet, but I certainly have every reason to want to keep this going for many years.
As for an offline version, I understand your concern. One of the things I particularly like about delivering ActionSims through a web browser is that nobody has to download, install, or maintain anything. You can simply log in and play. I also think this gives ActionSims a nice place in the sports simulation market, where distributing and maintaining traditional desktop software can present its own challenges.
There's another big advantage to the web-based approach, too. When someone reports a bug or suggests an improvement, I can often make the change and have it available to everyone almost immediately or a few hours or days at most. In addition to building, I also love fixing code. Nobody has to wait for the next service pack, patch, or software release. That flexibility has been extremely valuable, especially while the game is still evolving.
I will say that making a sports simulation work well as a web application has been a considerable technical challenge. And because of how ActionSims is built, converting it into a standalone application would be a pretty substantial undertaking. The support for such a project in the wild would be much slower.
So, at least for the foreseeable future, I don't have plans to offer an offline or locally installed version.
But I do want to reassure you about something: I have absolutely no plans to shut ActionSims down. I've wanted to do this for nearly 50 years, and now that I've finally built it and people are enjoying it, I have every intention of keeping it around for a very long time.
Thanks again for your support and for asking such a thoughtful question. I really do appreciate it!