Posted May 06, 2021
So this is a feature request that I 100% understand if it gets rejected, but I was thinking the other day about DEFCON, particularly the Office Mode game type.
In Office Mode, DEFCON will send itself to the Windows system tray and run in the background, over a the 6-8 hour period of the game length. And here's what's fascinating: when something critical occurs in the game (my memory's fuzzy, it might only be on nuclear launches), it will notify you with a popup.
The idea is that the game was partly designed around the notion that it wouldn't take up a huge part of your focus, except during critical decision moments, where you were 100% needed. The rest of the time, it would continue functioning outside your view, letting you get work done.
What I was wondering--as a single monitor gamer/worker especially--is whether I could get notifications from Astrox Imperium in the same way. Like, if I'm alt-tabbed out of the game, I could get a notification that my ship arrived at its destination, or that life support was low, stuff like that. Nothing too extensive, just things that are important.
Most games aren't designed around this sort of integration, probably not their game engines either. Games generally assume that, when they are running, they occupy 100% of your attention. Astrox Imperium seems like one of those games that does not make this assumption. One way a game like this can 'recognize' where they live (a workspace, a multiple simultaneous entertainment space, etc.) is by using OS notifications and cheerfully running in the background.
Anyway, just a suggestion, not something I demand. I'm probably going to keep playing this game, regardless. I will sometimes create a sub-window of the game using the application "OnTopReplica" so I can keep an eye on things while doing something else (again, I'm a single monitor user).
In Office Mode, DEFCON will send itself to the Windows system tray and run in the background, over a the 6-8 hour period of the game length. And here's what's fascinating: when something critical occurs in the game (my memory's fuzzy, it might only be on nuclear launches), it will notify you with a popup.
The idea is that the game was partly designed around the notion that it wouldn't take up a huge part of your focus, except during critical decision moments, where you were 100% needed. The rest of the time, it would continue functioning outside your view, letting you get work done.
What I was wondering--as a single monitor gamer/worker especially--is whether I could get notifications from Astrox Imperium in the same way. Like, if I'm alt-tabbed out of the game, I could get a notification that my ship arrived at its destination, or that life support was low, stuff like that. Nothing too extensive, just things that are important.
Most games aren't designed around this sort of integration, probably not their game engines either. Games generally assume that, when they are running, they occupy 100% of your attention. Astrox Imperium seems like one of those games that does not make this assumption. One way a game like this can 'recognize' where they live (a workspace, a multiple simultaneous entertainment space, etc.) is by using OS notifications and cheerfully running in the background.
Anyway, just a suggestion, not something I demand. I'm probably going to keep playing this game, regardless. I will sometimes create a sub-window of the game using the application "OnTopReplica" so I can keep an eye on things while doing something else (again, I'm a single monitor user).
