THE POPULOUS BIBLE
I.27 Archived News (2014)
Matchmaker 2.0
21 May by IncaWarrior
Big changes all around
Matchmaker 2.0.0.0 brings some of the biggest changes ever seen! Major parts of the back-end have been upgraded and changed for better compatibility with modern systems fixing many long-standing bugs (such as crashes with multiple displays) and allowing some new useful features (such as Unicode support). The front end has also been rearranged to improve the user experience and cut out unneeded panels.
New Lobby Panel
A new panel has been added containing all the settings of the now removed Game Settings window plus hut settings and map preview.
The players box not only contains the players and colors/start locations of the game, but now has a new ping field to preview what the in game ping will be once the game starts.
The lobby panels displays informational boxes such as the map of the day and welcome message when not in a hut and can be hidden entirely for those wanting a more minimalist view.
Better Hosting
Some people may have noticed that the last update wasn’t ENTIRELY accurate when it said everyone could host. The new update improves upon that with a revamped connection system including two-way NAT hole punching and full IPv6 support! The pings will show up for the players connected with a ? for those still joining and a X for the rare occasion when someone isn’t able to connect.
Port forwarding is still the best way to be able to host every one, and the Matchmaker makes that easier with automatic UPnP port forwarding and firewall rules plus an informational box with instructions for manual forwarding.
Pictures!
23 July by IncaWarrior
Front Page Pictures
Long time visitors of Populous Reincarnated may remember when we had a "Picture of the Moment" visible where we would update with a new picture every now and then if someone remembered. Even longer time visitor might know that was originally the "Picture of the Month" but there just weren’t enough pictures around to keep updating it! That was eventually replaced by a random fact about a follower, but recently it’s been replaced by more up to date content from current games.
The matchmaker has an option (Options > Populous > Send screenshots) to send screenshots once per minute when in game that can be found on the game results page by clicking on the population graph. When people who have this option enabled (or are streaming the game) are playing, the website will cycle through live images of the game marked as "Live Game" or "Live Stream". If no one is sending screenshots at the time, then an image from the previous day will be chosen instead.
Picture of the Day
After solving the lack of image submissions, we are reintroducing the Picture of the Day! Every day a screenshot from the past 24 hours will be selected and shared with our fans onour Facebook page a s well as being published to the new Screenshots Gallery on Populous Reincarnated.
Populations on Average
29 August by IncaWarrior
New Map Stats
In the recent matchmaker update, population counts are sent for each tribe a few times a minute allowing a nifty graph to be created showing each player's progress over the game. That has been taken a step farther on the map statistics page to show a graph of the average population over time for the winning players. The results show some interesting characteristics about some maps with a few highlights shown here.
One note about the graphs - you may see a regular bump appearing in some of the graphs making them not perfectly smooth. This is due to people playing the maps with fewer players than they are designed for with two of the players spectating.
New Worlds and Revamps!
5 October by TheGabber
"Old" Worlds revamps!
Good news everyone!
Populous Reincarnated’s very own "New Worlds" are currently undergoing some huge changes.
As you all probably know, New Worlds are the first mappacks that were released in the early stages of Populous Reincarnated’s services (more than 10 years ago!)
Over the past years we have had quite a few suggestions on how to improove these old maps, but we also had complaints about some maps being bugged or imbalanced.
Reason enough to double-check all the New Worlds mappacks and fix all the needed things on every map;
Stoneheads, base-sizes and structures, pathing problems, tree / wildmen imbalances and all other kinds of things will be finetuned to make the maps better playable and more fun!
You can already download the new and improoved version of "New Worlds 01: Oil Worlds" and an updated version of the mod "Populous: Reloaded" (which is now compatible for software too!).
The revamped mappacks will be listed as "01 - New Worlds: Oil Worlds" and so on, more revamped New Worlds will be released in the upcoming weeks, make sure you try them all out!
New Worlds 2014
Along with the revamps, we also released an additional mappack with completely new maps, check out New Worlds 2014!
This mappack has a very special map called "Jailbreak 2", this map is made for 2vs2 (Blue and Red vs Yellow and Green), every player has to multitask on 2 different areas; on one Island they have to build up their base and worship totems to connect their islands, on the other Island they have to maintain a strong defense as thats where the shamans are incarcerated.
I decided to post this info since many people are probably confused on how to play this map, while it can be great fun if all players are equally skilled and know what to do!
Enjoy!
Mobile Matchmaker
22 December by IncaWarrior
Populous Matchmaker now avaliable on Android
Just in time for the holidays, the matchmaker is now available on the Google Play Store. The new app created by long time community member Omkar supports chatting and PM. It’s a great way to keep in touch with the Populous community during those tedious family dinners or even just extended bathroom experiences.
Sorry, you won’t be able to play Populous on your smartphone.
We should be coming out with versions for other platforms including Windows Phone (for the guy that uses it) and iOS as soon as someone finds a mac to build it on.