| Start - Guide |
Introduction
Have you ever stared at the stars in a silent night dreaming of a world different than
yours? Have you ever imagined a planet on which others do the same? How many times
did you wonder what is there beyond Earth? Have you ever asked yourself how would
life be on a fantasy planet? Ever dreamed to be the captain of a space ship? Or just, do
you want to have a lot of fun while spending your time on internet? If your answer is yes
to any of these questions then you have come to the right place. It is here that you can
find all these and so much more.
Welcome to Universal War, Commander, a time and a universe where reality, visions and
dreams come together to aid you in your missions, a world where you can become the
leading force of a galaxy (sector) or even the universe. A Science Fiction Universe that
you may have never dreamed of now stands before you.
Entering Universal War will grant you with a planet and the leading position. You will
have to develop your own infrastructure, advance in technological fields, build and lead
your ships in battles. You will have to decide when to be ruthless and when
compassionate, when to be friendly or hostile and whether to make a friend or an
enemy. You can ask your system comrades for help and they might answer, but every
decision you make will be yours and yours alone. Every decision you make will influence
your planet, your people, your future.
The legends
Nobody knows when it all began, not even
the wisest scholars. Nobody knows when it
will end, perhaps only God. What everyone
knows is that millions of lives are lost daily
in what is considered to be the cruelest war
of all times. This is not a civil war, not even
a war between nations, it is a war between
planets and planetary systems.
When humans have forgotten their Creator, God, they wanted to become their own
gods. Researchers began hard work in their laboratories and in a few years they had it:
the first ship to travel trough space was ready. It was a small ship called Scout. Years
have passed as people scouted trough the universe finding new homes. They
established bases on different planets of the universe, each of them evolving differently,
according to the specific conditions each new planet had to offer. Several planets, in
each part of the universe, unificated and created alliances. Their main objective was to
assure protection. These alliances were called systems. Then, at a certain point, when
Alliances were still solid, several powerful forces enhanced in battle. We don’t know the
reason even now. It was the beginning of a long, never ending war, continuously
nurtured by smaller, upcoming forces. No one is left out.
No one except Them. We call them Universal Lords because they are the Greatest
Commanders of our World.They were granted the power to control all the actions in the
Universe and keep battles fair and square. In reality, they are the creators and
administrators of the game and their job is to assure that the players respect the rules
and help people with information. They have the power to change everything on a
planet, even destroy it. They reside in System 1:1.
“Universal War is the story of what our world can become if we don’t come back to our
senses and see that God created us and the real life is lived only when we believe in
Him. The game story takes place in our universe, habited only by humans (because
aliens do not exist), a few hundred of thousands from now on. It is fun to play against a
player in the game, to attack or defend someone, but imagine how it would be to sit at
your computer, TV, or if you would be reading or doing any other common work (such as
playing Universal War) and in a second the sky would go dark and in less than a few
hours your friends, family would be death and the planet destroyed.This is the story
trough which Universal War tries to help us come to reality. This is the war. On those
planets
are not only ships, OPS and probes, but there are also people. It is a warning and it is in
our hands to stop it. We have the key. I believe this is the main lesson we should
learn from the game: only God can help us survive.”, comments George Olah, one of
the game creators.
Universal War – a web game
As you already know, Universal War is a Science Fiction game. It is also a browser
based game, text based which uses ticks to run. You are probably confused by these
terms, so we will try to make a short description.
What is a browser based game?
“First and foremost, a browser based
game is any game that can be played
from *anywhere*. What does
"anywhere" mean? Essentially, it
means from school, work, cyber cafes,
and the library. Why didn't I say "home"
? Because any game can be played
from home and the purpose of play
anywhere games, is to play when we
should be working, or to play from
locations that don't allow downloads,
such as the Library and Cyber Cafe. With that in mind, the following conditions must be
met to qualify as a play anywhere browser based game.
1. The game must not require any user controlled downloads. So if you have to
download a .exe, .zip or .??? file, then it can't be played anywhere. This does not include
auto-download files such as the type that are used with Java or flash games.
2. Players must also be able to login from anywhere. Some of the methods used for so-
called play anywhere games to login often employ features restricted by public access
and work PC's (for example 2054 port logins just don't work from "anywhere"). “
(http://www.onrpg.com/ftopic57629.html)
What are ticks?
Same as a cycle, the smallest unit of time recognized by a device. For personal
computers, clock ticks generally refer to the main system clock, which runs at 66 MHz.
This means that there are 66 million clock ticks (or cycles) per second. Since modern
CPUs run much faster (up to 3 GHz), the CPU can execute several instructions in a
single clock tick.
In Universal War, Time (construction decrease time, fleet movement time etc.) is
measured in ticks. In the long game a tick will be 30 minutes or 1 hour, while in the speed
game it will be between 1 and 5 minutes.
The Universal Date will appear on the main page, under “Current tick”. This is the time
your Servants, your Warriors and the other Commanders use. In our Universe, Time
runs faster than in your reality. What you know as a tick is a full day here (in the
Universal Date). 24 ticks = 1 month (in Universal Date). 168 ticks = 1 year.
Planet Overview
In Universal War you are given a
planet to rule. You have to give orders
and lead your people to greatness by
developing your economy, technology
and military. You must establish
relations with other planets, mainly with
planets in your own planetary system.
This section covers information about
game objectives, your place in the
Universe, the resources you will need
and the way you can perform different
actions in the game.
Game Objectives
The main objective is to Have Fun!
Secondly, you will enjoy making friends from other countries and cultures, all over the
globe.
The third (only third!) objective is to win the game. The Planet and System with the
highest score in the Universe wins the game. You get score from ships, defensive units,
scans and probes. Your score accumulates with the score of all the other
Commanders in your System and builds up the System Score.
Where am I?
The Universe being infinite, smaller units of measure have to be established: Systems
and Sectors.
A System is made of up to 10 players which work together for the success of their
missions. They have a Leader, elected among themselves and three Ministers to help
him. Systems are democratic, meaning that no one can force anybody to do anything. If
you consider someone in your own System is oppressing you, ignore his actions or
better inform a Universal Lord about this (send a message to 1:1:3). Systems are
sometimes referred to as “y coord” or “y coordinate”.
Five Systems are grouped in one Sector. Travel within Sectors takes less time than
travel in the Universe. Sectors are referred to as “x coord” or “x coordinate”.
Coordinate 3:5:2 (x:y:z) refers to a location in sector 3, system 5, planet 2. This is an
exact position of a Planet. You will need this if you want to:
scan someone
attack
search in System
send message etc.
Resources
Our parents taught us that that nothing in the world is for free. This applies to Universal
War too. If you want to become a powerful force you must develop technologies, build
laboratories, construct ships and defensive units and so on. To do this, you must have
resources. There are three available resources: Mercury, Cobalt and Cesium. We leave
to you the pleasure to discover how to use them, but advise you to take good care of
your economy. Different probe types give resources of a certain type (e.g. Mercury
probes give 450 Mercury units; the same applies for Cobalt and Cesium).
Ships, OPS, Scans
You use ships in hostile or friendly missions. There are 13 types of different ships,
grouped in 6 classes. Each of them has advantages and disadvantages. As you learn
how to play you will decide which Ships are best for your fleets. Information on how you
can construct ships can be found at the bottom of Ships page, in the Council of Elders
Advice.
OPS means Orbital Protection System. The defensive units are similar to ships, except
that you can not move them from your planet and they are designed only for protection.
Knowing more about your friends / allies and opponents is vital to your success as a
leader. Scans can give you all kinds of information on targeted Planets, sometimes even
deep secrets which lie in their Vaults.
You can learn more about each section of the game if you read the “Council of Elders
Advice” located at the bottom of each page.
Getting started
Have you got your planet yet? If not, what are
you waiting for? If yes, continue onwards…
By signing up, the Universal Lords have
allocated you a Planet. Also, you have been
given a small amount of resources: 10,000
Mercury, 10,000 Cobalt, 5,000 Cesium and
5 uninitiated probes. You should use them
carefully because everything depends on your
start. By doing the wrong things in the
beginning you will lose a lot of ticks. While you should take the decisions on your own,
you might also want to use the advice of more experienced players.
After signing up you shall receive an e-mail from the Universal Lords containing your
username and password. Use them to log in the game.
If you have done this, you should be at the Base sector of your Planet. An overview of all
activities is displayed. First head to the Laboratories and start the construction of Probe
Laboratories which will enable the creation of Wave Amplifiers and Asteroid Scans.
Next get to the Technologies Centre and begin “Mercury Refineries”. This will
increase your Mercury income by 250 units. When you are done with this, forward to
resources and initiate your probes: 2 Mercury, 2 Cobalt and 1 Cesium.
You have finished with the practical part for now. Still, you have so much more to
discover, don’t you? Return to Base and look carefully. You will see written in green “You
are in the Universal Lords protection for X days.” This refers to in-game days or ticks.
Your planet will be in protection for 72 ticks. During this period you will be protected from
invasions and scans. However, you will not be allowed to benefit of donations from other
System comrades.
Now forward to Government. Read the topics your comrades wrote, reply if you wish and
present yourself. If you have made an impression on them and you think you know who
would be best for System Leader go to Senate and vote.
At the bottom of each page you can find a section called “Council of Elders Advice”.
Here you will find the necessary information on what you have to do in each page.
Different from any games, Universal War has an in-game dynamic manual. You can find
there the Tech Tree (a table with all the laboratories and technologies in the order of
their activation) which shows your current development level. There are also the Ship
Statistics, a page where you can find all the properties of the ships. This is useful
because you don’t need to load both the manual site and game site, but have them both
in one.
Commander, these are the steps you must take for a good start. From now on you are
on your own. Use your knowledge carefully, respect the others, be honorable, pay
obedience to the Rules set by the Universal Lords, take the best decisions you can and
lead your people to victory.
We wish you good luck and happy hunting!
Have you ever stared at the stars in a silent night dreaming of a world different than
yours? Have you ever imagined a planet on which others do the same? How many times
did you wonder what is there beyond Earth? Have you ever asked yourself how would
life be on a fantasy planet? Ever dreamed to be the captain of a space ship? Or just, do
you want to have a lot of fun while spending your time on internet? If your answer is yes
to any of these questions then you have come to the right place. It is here that you can
find all these and so much more.
Welcome to Universal War, Commander, a time and a universe where reality, visions and
dreams come together to aid you in your missions, a world where you can become the
leading force of a galaxy (sector) or even the universe. A Science Fiction Universe that
you may have never dreamed of now stands before you.
Entering Universal War will grant you with a planet and the leading position. You will
have to develop your own infrastructure, advance in technological fields, build and lead
your ships in battles. You will have to decide when to be ruthless and when
compassionate, when to be friendly or hostile and whether to make a friend or an
enemy. You can ask your system comrades for help and they might answer, but every
decision you make will be yours and yours alone. Every decision you make will influence
your planet, your people, your future.
The legends
Nobody knows when it all began, not even
the wisest scholars. Nobody knows when it
will end, perhaps only God. What everyone
knows is that millions of lives are lost daily
in what is considered to be the cruelest war
of all times. This is not a civil war, not even
a war between nations, it is a war between
planets and planetary systems.
When humans have forgotten their Creator, God, they wanted to become their own
gods. Researchers began hard work in their laboratories and in a few years they had it:
the first ship to travel trough space was ready. It was a small ship called Scout. Years
have passed as people scouted trough the universe finding new homes. They
established bases on different planets of the universe, each of them evolving differently,
according to the specific conditions each new planet had to offer. Several planets, in
each part of the universe, unificated and created alliances. Their main objective was to
assure protection. These alliances were called systems. Then, at a certain point, when
Alliances were still solid, several powerful forces enhanced in battle. We don’t know the
reason even now. It was the beginning of a long, never ending war, continuously
nurtured by smaller, upcoming forces. No one is left out.
No one except Them. We call them Universal Lords because they are the Greatest
Commanders of our World.They were granted the power to control all the actions in the
Universe and keep battles fair and square. In reality, they are the creators and
administrators of the game and their job is to assure that the players respect the rules
and help people with information. They have the power to change everything on a
planet, even destroy it. They reside in System 1:1.
“Universal War is the story of what our world can become if we don’t come back to our
senses and see that God created us and the real life is lived only when we believe in
Him. The game story takes place in our universe, habited only by humans (because
aliens do not exist), a few hundred of thousands from now on. It is fun to play against a
player in the game, to attack or defend someone, but imagine how it would be to sit at
your computer, TV, or if you would be reading or doing any other common work (such as
playing Universal War) and in a second the sky would go dark and in less than a few
hours your friends, family would be death and the planet destroyed.This is the story
trough which Universal War tries to help us come to reality. This is the war. On those
planets
are not only ships, OPS and probes, but there are also people. It is a warning and it is in
our hands to stop it. We have the key. I believe this is the main lesson we should
learn from the game: only God can help us survive.”, comments George Olah, one of
the game creators.
Universal War – a web game
As you already know, Universal War is a Science Fiction game. It is also a browser
based game, text based which uses ticks to run. You are probably confused by these
terms, so we will try to make a short description.
What is a browser based game?
“First and foremost, a browser based
game is any game that can be played
from *anywhere*. What does
"anywhere" mean? Essentially, it
means from school, work, cyber cafes,
and the library. Why didn't I say "home"
? Because any game can be played
from home and the purpose of play
anywhere games, is to play when we
should be working, or to play from
locations that don't allow downloads,
such as the Library and Cyber Cafe. With that in mind, the following conditions must be
met to qualify as a play anywhere browser based game.
1. The game must not require any user controlled downloads. So if you have to
download a .exe, .zip or .??? file, then it can't be played anywhere. This does not include
auto-download files such as the type that are used with Java or flash games.
2. Players must also be able to login from anywhere. Some of the methods used for so-
called play anywhere games to login often employ features restricted by public access
and work PC's (for example 2054 port logins just don't work from "anywhere"). “
(http://www.onrpg.com/ftopic57629.html)
What are ticks?
Same as a cycle, the smallest unit of time recognized by a device. For personal
computers, clock ticks generally refer to the main system clock, which runs at 66 MHz.
This means that there are 66 million clock ticks (or cycles) per second. Since modern
CPUs run much faster (up to 3 GHz), the CPU can execute several instructions in a
single clock tick.
In Universal War, Time (construction decrease time, fleet movement time etc.) is
measured in ticks. In the long game a tick will be 30 minutes or 1 hour, while in the speed
game it will be between 1 and 5 minutes.
The Universal Date will appear on the main page, under “Current tick”. This is the time
your Servants, your Warriors and the other Commanders use. In our Universe, Time
runs faster than in your reality. What you know as a tick is a full day here (in the
Universal Date). 24 ticks = 1 month (in Universal Date). 168 ticks = 1 year.
Planet Overview
In Universal War you are given a
planet to rule. You have to give orders
and lead your people to greatness by
developing your economy, technology
and military. You must establish
relations with other planets, mainly with
planets in your own planetary system.
This section covers information about
game objectives, your place in the
Universe, the resources you will need
and the way you can perform different
actions in the game.
Game Objectives
The main objective is to Have Fun!
Secondly, you will enjoy making friends from other countries and cultures, all over the
globe.
The third (only third!) objective is to win the game. The Planet and System with the
highest score in the Universe wins the game. You get score from ships, defensive units,
scans and probes. Your score accumulates with the score of all the other
Commanders in your System and builds up the System Score.
Where am I?
The Universe being infinite, smaller units of measure have to be established: Systems
and Sectors.
A System is made of up to 10 players which work together for the success of their
missions. They have a Leader, elected among themselves and three Ministers to help
him. Systems are democratic, meaning that no one can force anybody to do anything. If
you consider someone in your own System is oppressing you, ignore his actions or
better inform a Universal Lord about this (send a message to 1:1:3). Systems are
sometimes referred to as “y coord” or “y coordinate”.
Five Systems are grouped in one Sector. Travel within Sectors takes less time than
travel in the Universe. Sectors are referred to as “x coord” or “x coordinate”.
Coordinate 3:5:2 (x:y:z) refers to a location in sector 3, system 5, planet 2. This is an
exact position of a Planet. You will need this if you want to:
scan someone
attack
search in System
send message etc.
Resources
Our parents taught us that that nothing in the world is for free. This applies to Universal
War too. If you want to become a powerful force you must develop technologies, build
laboratories, construct ships and defensive units and so on. To do this, you must have
resources. There are three available resources: Mercury, Cobalt and Cesium. We leave
to you the pleasure to discover how to use them, but advise you to take good care of
your economy. Different probe types give resources of a certain type (e.g. Mercury
probes give 450 Mercury units; the same applies for Cobalt and Cesium).
Ships, OPS, Scans
You use ships in hostile or friendly missions. There are 13 types of different ships,
grouped in 6 classes. Each of them has advantages and disadvantages. As you learn
how to play you will decide which Ships are best for your fleets. Information on how you
can construct ships can be found at the bottom of Ships page, in the Council of Elders
Advice.
OPS means Orbital Protection System. The defensive units are similar to ships, except
that you can not move them from your planet and they are designed only for protection.
Knowing more about your friends / allies and opponents is vital to your success as a
leader. Scans can give you all kinds of information on targeted Planets, sometimes even
deep secrets which lie in their Vaults.
You can learn more about each section of the game if you read the “Council of Elders
Advice” located at the bottom of each page.
Getting started
Have you got your planet yet? If not, what are
you waiting for? If yes, continue onwards…
By signing up, the Universal Lords have
allocated you a Planet. Also, you have been
given a small amount of resources: 10,000
Mercury, 10,000 Cobalt, 5,000 Cesium and
5 uninitiated probes. You should use them
carefully because everything depends on your
start. By doing the wrong things in the
beginning you will lose a lot of ticks. While you should take the decisions on your own,
you might also want to use the advice of more experienced players.
After signing up you shall receive an e-mail from the Universal Lords containing your
username and password. Use them to log in the game.
If you have done this, you should be at the Base sector of your Planet. An overview of all
activities is displayed. First head to the Laboratories and start the construction of Probe
Laboratories which will enable the creation of Wave Amplifiers and Asteroid Scans.
Next get to the Technologies Centre and begin “Mercury Refineries”. This will
increase your Mercury income by 250 units. When you are done with this, forward to
resources and initiate your probes: 2 Mercury, 2 Cobalt and 1 Cesium.
You have finished with the practical part for now. Still, you have so much more to
discover, don’t you? Return to Base and look carefully. You will see written in green “You
are in the Universal Lords protection for X days.” This refers to in-game days or ticks.
Your planet will be in protection for 72 ticks. During this period you will be protected from
invasions and scans. However, you will not be allowed to benefit of donations from other
System comrades.
Now forward to Government. Read the topics your comrades wrote, reply if you wish and
present yourself. If you have made an impression on them and you think you know who
would be best for System Leader go to Senate and vote.
At the bottom of each page you can find a section called “Council of Elders Advice”.
Here you will find the necessary information on what you have to do in each page.
Different from any games, Universal War has an in-game dynamic manual. You can find
there the Tech Tree (a table with all the laboratories and technologies in the order of
their activation) which shows your current development level. There are also the Ship
Statistics, a page where you can find all the properties of the ships. This is useful
because you don’t need to load both the manual site and game site, but have them both
in one.
Commander, these are the steps you must take for a good start. From now on you are
on your own. Use your knowledge carefully, respect the others, be honorable, pay
obedience to the Rules set by the Universal Lords, take the best decisions you can and
lead your people to victory.
We wish you good luck and happy hunting!
