rofl, don't ever turn down an upgrade, you never know what Jim might come up with. :)

Okay, okay!! You talked me into it. Here goes. Final Wish:

**Wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight. I wish for my starfish to evolve by leaps and bounds, to use its tubular tentacles to get around.**

There. Done. whew! Thanks.

________________
wishy-washy Minn

Brittle Star, Brittle Star, I want a Brittle Star.

cuttlefish, cuttlefish -- I want a cuttlefish. They change color and texture and match background. I stood up close against the glass of a cuttlefish aquarium once for about 45 minutes watching it shift living color and texture and also facinated by how it moved. It doesn't move the same way fishes swim, kinda jet propels itself and also stay afloat in midwater. I think it was watching me back too after awhile. They are amazing, intelligent and wonderful creatures. Clint -- they found a specie of brittle stars that are light sensitive and change color when the light changes. I want my evolved starfish to have color changing abilities too when the light changes. Is that do-able?

**wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight. I wish for a cute little cuttlefish, to change with light and change with ground, when day goes to night and as it moves around.**

how many wishes do we get on this wishlist thread?
_______________
Minn Wisher

Seeing as how we have 30 pages so far, I see no reason of stopping now, wish away minn. :)

Thanks -- I did a search (after my wish) and see Jim says cuttlefish is planned -- yipee-yahooo!!, can't wait. hope it looks and moves and shifts colors and texture like the one i saw with black/brown/beige/flesh/translucent being the main colors. great. made my day. I think I'll go wish for something else now (not a fish).

Minn

hehehehehe go for it . :D

Majestic Angel is a must. Blue-face Angel needs actinic lighting ( blue phosphoresces ).

about Haplochromis compressiceps, listed as a marine fish, but this is a freshwater species. Might want to change this....

I wish that you'd get back to focusing on Marine Aquarium. I'm more than ready for features like individual fish behavior, fish interaction, inverts, and moving background now. (Yes, I know they've been planned). I'm an early adopter of MA, so I've been waiting for over 2 years. Goldfish aquarium is nice, but goldfish are such ugly beasts. The reef is where I'd rather hang out.

OhOh. Here comes mom. :D

Goldfish ugly?
Ha, I feel insulted.:)

Told you.

Laughing, was I quit enough for you Ed/:TU:

hehehehehe I knew you would have something to say Hon. And yes that was. I got into goldfish again after about 20 years because my granddaughter loves them. I have a 55g tank with ciclids and I was thinking of giving them away and having a discus tank again. But she ( granddaughter ) came around :D so I think I'll make it a goldfish tank for her.
God I love her. :heart:

Spreading the sweat making MA
 

Re: I know that people have grand expectations for this simulation, and I'll do my best. But before asking for the moon, take a look at all the state-of-the-art programs that huge teams of programmers and artists have ever produced, even with multi-million-dollar budgets. I think the Aquarium stacks up pretty well even in it's current form. Each of the hundreds of daily requests could take a whole career to fully pursue, and I have to walk a fine line of maximum effect for minimum effort, or I'll never get it done.

===

I much appreciate MA's unsung creators' efforts!
I know this question will show my ignorance at programming, but is there anyway that the labor for Marine Aquarium can be divvied up to fans via some kind of MA programmers kit if one wanted to create a new fish or plant or whatever from scratch and can contribute that work to MA. Even a partially created work would at least take a lot of the creator's time and grindstone out of perfecting MA. I think Linux is open-sourced in this user-contribution way, yes? Isn't SETI work-distributed too among thousands of users? You're the mavens!

One more thing; one of my tutees with relatives working at the Baltimore Marine Science center/Aquarium there says that programs as yours would gladly receive endorsements from major aquariums and marine institutions and that you shouldn't be shy asking. They appreciate great work relating their field, especially in a public education way. Makes great PR (sales) too!

Keep up the great work!

James Greenidge

Re: Spreading the sweat making MA
 

There was a time when it seemed like this might be possible. I don't know what put the final nail in the coffin though. Probably the extremely ugly Russian fish that someone hacked into the Aquarium. Jim didn't seem too happy about the 5 fish created by an artist at Prolific either. At one time, I had my sights set on creating fish for the Aquarium.

Jim fears this conversation 5 years from now: "Aren't you the guy who made that screen saver with the burping fish?"

Hi, JimWG - and welcome to the Forum. Since Morgan already replied to the first part of your message, I'll take on the last part. We have had some endorsements from marine biology professionals and conservation groups, but could always use more. If you know any, send 'em on over.

"Keeping it real" is one of the main reasons I can't open up fish design to the public. There are some real nitwits out there, and it would only take one to cause the Aquarium to lose all credibility.

I respect your business decision, but ...
 

Opening up the MA or GA products to allow hobbyists and entrepreneurs to create add-on fish, textures, rocks, etc would require you folks to create some kind of "dev kit" that you could sell for profit.

This has the potential to open up MA or GA to a wider audience. Think of the sucess of Adobe Photoshop and its plug-in architecture. It has helped make Photoshop king of the hill.

Think also of games like DOOM3 and UT2004. These are raging successes partly because they include map making tools. Users can make their own levels, extending the product enjoyment a thousandfold.

Games like Halo and Nanosuar arguably are less successful because once you've played the levels through you get bored and stop playing them. I play UT2004 daily with new mappage that I download for free. Nobody complains that UT2004 is a crappy game based on a few rough maps.

Jim, I don't think your screen saver customers will diss your aquariums because they downloaded somebody's free angelfish that sucked.

Thanks for the suggestions, John. Ain't gonna happen :) It might make more money, but artistic integrity is more important to me. There are other programs out there which allow the users more input. As you say, there's a whole world of opportunities out there for companies to make a fortune. If you want realism, that's my niche.