My suggestions for SE5 (mostly to reduce file size) |
Here's my potential suggestions for SE5 and later ...
*** TCP/IP : Zip compress the files before sending them
I just compressed the files as a test and often the files were compressed with a 20% decreased file size. Since it is an obvious idea, I presume there were legal implications to integrate any freeware compressing software into SE5. However, it would still help considerably if you somehow can do it somehow.
*** TCP/IP Game Option : Delay sending combat replays until next turn start
Often, game turns in TCP/IP are prevented to be started earlier than possible. For example, the critical game data (log + game's turn) is just 1-2 megs but yet the combat replays is 10 megs big and every player is stuck to wait for it as well.
So, the suggestion is an option to basically only send the game data first and then the combat replays are only sent during the next turn to minimize overall wait at the cost of having to wait for them if you DO want to see the combat replays.
*** Keep combat replays of a same turn separate and only send those
I did notice that a good deal of the size of the combat replays is because it keeps resending the older turns' combat replays.
If the size was already big, it means having to resend the same size of data uselessly until a host's personal options to erase older combat replays after X turns kicks in.
However if the combat replays are in separate files per turn, it means the following advantages :
1) Only sending the current turn's combat replays minimizing the required bandwidth to use. Odds are each player will have the earlier turn's combat replays. In the unlikely case a player doesn't have it due to an absence of a turn, he/she can just download it off another player.
2) Being able to keep more of older combat replays without bandwidth penalty. Some players might like to keep older replays to review them again in the future.
Name-wise for combat replays, it would become something like "My_Game_gamedate_24012_replay_combat.cmb".
*** Game Option : Erase pointless combat replays
Basically "pointless" in this case implies combat that no concrete battle changes were done such as no guns were fired in the end. Classic examples includes a ship not fast enough to even shot a retreating colony ship or a lone ship without fighters pre-retreating from a base out of gun range.
However, it still creates 2+ megs of combat replays per turn for such scenarios and it would help to not transfer dead weight to other players.
Ultimately, it would only keep a log note of the battle with a mention such as "No meanful actions were done." and no combat replay is kept for it.
