E3 EAW Feeddback 003

[Cain]

This topic is for feedback regarding the videos shot and infos supplied by Nick from MEMW Forums.

 

http://swempireatwar.10.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=93

 

Be smart, elaborate in your feedback post and be as descriptive as you can. Thank you.

 

" See before posting - Disclamer: I should mention that the developers are not obliged to read this topic or follow our feedback to the letter and i can`t guarantee that it will be found at a later date in EAW or that it will affect or help EAW in any way. Also the developers can`t officialy solocit feedback so this is made at our fan initiative. Developers may already have all our feedback sugestions in the game and we can not garantee, that what we say here will not exist already in the game at the date we post them. You must feedback here only if you consider your feedback to be impersonal and with no conection made to your real person. Also no new ideeas unrelated to LEC or Petroglyph are accepted here just feedback on know issues from the videos and official materials already released. This topic should be deleted by the moderators as soon as they consider it done and unproductive from a moment in time."

[Cain]

I've encontered more problems that I've seen until now in EAW. The excesive easy gameplay makes the game look a bit unrealistic and to easy to play.

 

Also known features that can be found on most of the RTS games are presented I think like something new in EAW by someone in the video.

 

In short:

 

1. The ships explode to fast. Targeting all subsystems manually seem obsolete. Ther is no pause for orders option.

 

 

2. The ships fist explosion seems unnatural in comparations with the cool destroyd stuff animations. A SHIP CANNOT EXPLODE IN THE SAME TIME ON ALL DEKS ! the explosion clusters should be diferentiated in time !

 

3. There is to much smoke and fire in space ! SPACE FIRES don't behave like that. Try to diminuate a little the earth like effects. LOLL so in space the smoke is going up ?! Ha, ha - its not funny

 

 

4. Space battles are to short ! There is no magic or difficulty in them !

 

 

5. Ships don't have names nor they have experience gain - this is extremly bad -

 

 

6. The Characters are not just cool units ! they are SW characters and they should look more real not bulletproof zombies.

 

 

7. Don't make the FORCE POWERS animations look like Lord Of the Rings MAGIC ! We don't need that ! (*Vader's force crush)

 

 

8. Two AT-ATs, a stormtrooper brigade, Vader, and 3 TIE tanks can do dust out of a Rancor if they open fire ! Be Realistic guys !

 

 

9. The Galaxy view looks BAD for a space strategy game ! It is looking like a children's apple tree .... See Nexus or Freelancer for GOD SAKE !

 

 

10. You cannot have tradelanes in Star Wars ! If you want them enable the direct jump to another planets but slow it down in comparation with aflyght on a so called tradelane !

 

 

11. My predictions are at this moment that the game will never beat RTW and RTW was a difficult and realistic game - and they make it to be the best ! Ask your self why ?!?!

 

 

12. Petroglyph put your gamedesigners to play right now extensivly for 10 days this games:

 

 

- Rome Total War (Better gameplay - better reallity than EAW)

- Ground Control II (Same scale like EAW but Better graphics and animations)

- Homeworlld I and II (Better Space battles reality)

- Homeworld Cataclysm (Better voices and game plot artistic feeling)

- Freelancer ( Better feel of space and galaxy )

- Nexus ( Better space battles and a way more cool and real GALAXY VIEW )

 

....

 

14. The galaxy is way to small and unrealistic.

 

 

15. The game looks desigend for 2001-2002 and ment to be played by 8-10 years old childrens !

 

 

- I really wish that in the next press release I will get a heads up from Petroglyph.

[Zerogravity]

The graphics for the base shields looked spectacular. I also liked that rebel artillery how it launched all those rockets and black smoke everywhere. It looked as if it was a big warzone after the battle had ended. The rancor killing an ATAT seemed a bit strange tho....ATAT's are much too big and heavy to be taking blows like that. Other then that, it looked pretty damn good.

 

- marcus

[Darth Nokia]

The game needs a subtitle option for all of us deaf players out there, like Starcraft and Thief 3 have, otherwise we're just not going to hear or understand the briefings and unit comments. (Yeah I know, unit comments are such a minor part of any game, but knowing what they're saying does add to the experience).

 

If this feature gets added I'll definitely buy the game even if it's bad- not enough developers acknowledge the needs of deaf gamers so those who do should be rewarded IMHO.

 

Darth Nokia

 

 

May the SMS be with you!

[Samheyn]

Hi there, another german has arrived to show that our knowledge of the english language is worse than you thought

 

I woul like to coment on the points you brought up cain as I looked at all these videos closely, too :

 

1. I don't think that the ships are exploding to fast. Surely, there is a differnce between the time a ship needs to explode in the movies and the ingame-battles. But if they need a couple of minutes to explode it could be that you can't decide wether it is a ship thats under fire (with explosions from rockets etc.) or a exploding wreckage.

 

2. You should have a closer look on other star wars games and the movies. Ships DO explode in the same time on all decks. Yes.. might not be realistic, but as we know star wars isn't meant to be realistic after all.

 

3. Same as 2. Star wars explosions never were realistic.

 

4. From what we've seen yet you're right. But did you notice that the fleets used in the videos so far were everything but well balanced ? If you engage 3 Star Destroyers + Bombers with only 1 Mon Cal it should be clear that the battle only lasts 2-3 minutes.

 

I think that the lack of space between two fleets is the greater problem. Maps should be bigger in space and on ground. I hate to jump right into the enemy fleet or landing ground units right into the front line.

 

5.

Right! I noticed this too.

In my opinion it would be great if petro would implent the possibility to rename ships. These guys should be able to do this in no-time.

 

6.

Agree

 

7.

Perhaps they just used the BFME animations

 

8.

One AT-ST should be able to kill a pack...

 

9.

I disagree.. it's a manner of taste. It seems like its just very handy and comfortable and has a certain "star wars atmosphere"

 

10.

I don't know what you are complaining about. Would like you to explain it in detail

 

11.

You can't compare an ultrarealistic game like ROME to a Star Wars Sci-Fantasy Style game as EaW is! They have nothing in comon. I don't want to have realistic gameplay in a Star Wars game. I want Star Wars. And that means that nothing is realistic. If you played the Star Wars Space Combat Simulators like the X-Wing Series you know that there is are no real physics in Star Wars.

 

12.

 

- Rome Total War -> Different Genre. Star Wars = Sci-Fantasy. Rome = Historical Battles

 

- Ground Control II -> Different Gameplay. Graphics and animations are good but use a different style. Can't be compared. Controls are complicated.

 

- Homeworld I and II -> My favourit. I played Homeworld for years, used all the mods you could get (the star wars and babylon 5 ones like Star Wars Fleet Academy or the first ones mod were just great) but it still ist a different Genre. There has never been a Strategic Map, no ground combat, it was more a game of tactics.

 

- Homeworld Cataclysm -> I don't think we should judge things like the voices or the "game plot artistic feeling" at this time. All we've seen so far are some "stand alone" scenes. Same as Homeworld.

 

- Freelancer -> Different Genre. Space Combat Simulator. It's like comparing the movies of final fantasy VIII to the graphics of rebellion. You can't have everything. A game that enables you to view the galaxie from a cockpit usualy has better graphics than the RTS ones. This will never change.

 

- Nexus -> I played Nexus some months ago. I was dissapointed with the gameplay. The Galaxy View was cool but it can't be compared to the EaW one. Why ? Because the EaW Galaxy Map is a Strategic Map with all the decisions to make whereas the nexus map is just a good looking progress bar. Yes, sometimes there was the possibility to "choose" .. but you never were in charge of everything your faction owned.

 

.....

 

14. Again. Star Wars is not meant to be realistic. And for the size... this isn't imperium galactica. We don't need 80 planets. 30 should be enough in my opinion.

[Cain]

Samheyn Welcome to our small home I should explain my self even more.

 

 

1. The first explosion looks to old game like - wile the dezintegration of a ship looks damn realistic the contrast betwen the ship's unrealistic moment of explosion and the desintegration after - is to big. You cannot have equal first explosions on multiple deks in the same time. Its looking to simplistic.

 

2.3 I know Star Wars is not the reallity but it should have a tase of reallity larger tham Lord of the Rings - for Example. The players that will play EAW will desire reallity. Th SW one I mean.

 

4. Yes it seems larger maps are require ships do kill each other to fast due to lack of space.

 

10. If I want to jump in hyperspace and not follow the tradelines - it should work - slower speed - some damage but it should work. EAW is not a Railroad Tychoon - there mus be freedom in it. freedom that Rebellion had it and was apreciated. BTW Rebellion also had this freedom and click ,drag fleets , point move, etc.

 

11.12 Do you think that a gamer who has played all this games will not compare them ?! Or he will not desire standard stuff that he had in almost all 2005 RTS games - especially the space related ones ?

 

As for comparations with RTW - it is done in concepts and options - and it cause it is the best saled RTS to date.

 

13. It was deleted by me.

 

14. 80 planets it is a must have or we will suffer the consequences. See how many people desire 80 planets on the LEC Forums.

 

http://forums.lucasarts.com/thread.jspa?threadID=44756&tstart=25

 

This is a hole galaxy and not a galactic yard of a few planets.

[Garbageben]

Well one thing I noticed that I liked was the recharging turbolaser banks. Lasers cannot fire continuous streams of laserfire without depleting. This is just something I noticed that I think will make the game more realistic.

[Samheyn]

Thanks glad to be here

 

1. Ok, you've got a point there. I've looked into it again and it realy a bit "confusing". Looks like self destruction's setting up some bombs. But perhaps Petroglyph still hasn't finished polishing these Animations ? You remember´the other errors in the destruction animations ? Doubled Parts etc.

 

2. I don't think so. I'm a great Star Wars Fan myself and a RTS Player since the good old Days of Dune2. So there is a high possibility that I'm not the only one who would not think about these graphic/reality issues. But I agree that there might be many players who enjoy state of the art graphics and would like to see more realistic smoke effects.

 

4. Agree

 

10. On one hand you are right concerning the possibility of "evading the raderoutes". But on the other this would make it impossible to "force drop" fleets out of hyperspace via the use of interdictors. I know that the interdictors could still be used to "bind" a fleet to a specific battle when they already emerged from hyperspace. It would still be a nice feature if you would be able to ambush the enemy fleet half the way....

 

11. You shouldnt compare them because in fact they are of different genres. In fact, every game in which you are allowed to command a group of units in realtime is called "RTS" today. But the games that created the genre (Dune2, Command&Conquer) define what features the game needs to be called a real "RTS". Now Petroglyph consists mainly of ex-Westwoodians, so it is quite clear that EaW is to be produced in the style of Command & Conquer. Ok, we can't close our eyes and say "the other RTS-like games don't exist". But some of their features perhaps aren't suitable for this game and not comparable. For example : Rome Total War has a completly different Gameplay. How can we say that it is better or worse ? There are no space battles in Rome (haha), we have massive amounts of troops devided into small groups, historical templates for all of the units... you see that there is a major difference ? you could compare Rome to Heroes of Might and Magic and say that Rome is a more realistic HOMAM without magic an with realtime battles. And if you think of multiplayer.. Rome only enabled players to use the skirmish mode. You were not able to do a cool game of "conquer the world" in 1 vs 1 or teams. EaW is designed to feature a galaxy conquest mode in multiplayer.

The Problem with Freelancer is that the feeling of space is different if you are used to fly a single fighter arround the galaxy. But... to shorten this :

 

I think the combination of all these features Petroglyph put in so far is what makes this game so interesting. The graphics don't even need to be "the best i've ever seen". As a Star Wars & Command and Conquer fan I would be satisfacted if we just get a great combination of those two with the possibility to compete in galactic conquest mode (multiplayer). Everything else would be just great but luxury.

 

 

14. Perhaps these guys at LEC are right. But what if they're not ? Perhaps LucasArts and Petro use 20 planets because of balancing issues ? These guys are professionals who made so many great games... don't you think they know what they are doing ? Another Problem : Do you remember Imperium galactica ? Even if they had random surfaces, the planets got boring after you had seen all the different tilesets(wood, vulcanic etc.). Most of the Star Wars Planets are unique.. thats a great part of the star wars atmosphere. If there would be sooo many planets it might get boring too. But yes, they could set the single player galaxy to 20 - 40 planets to enable the story line to be played without boring interruptions i.e. capturing 10-15 minor planets or so and let the players decide how many planets they want to use in multiplayer or free games.

[Cobra848]

Got to rember E3 is for show.

 

 

1. The ships need to explode fast, so screen is not full of debre when I select units. Plus I saw one SD blow up real slow.

Targeting sub system is new to RTS games I play.

Pause for RTS games is crap, it is not for a fast paced one like EaW. Go play a turn base game if you want pause, This is Real TIME stratagy.

 

2. That is to much detail, just let it blow up. This isn't a movie it is a game.

 

3. his is star wars and fire acts on how cool it loks, not realism.

 

4. Toearly to tell.

 

5.Names do not matter. Exp will come in time. Just wait.

 

6. The game is still in early dev, just wait.

 

7. Still early in dev, and they had to show someting, instead of the tank floating.

 

8. The Rancor was for show, to show what could happen in battle, they wouldn't be able to show it if it died in 5 sec.

 

9. I haven't seen theirs but calm down. Galaxy view isnt as important as gameplay.

 

10. Trade lanes are good for game play. It makes sense, You can move faster in trade lanes because you know if the path is clear. Those pats have no astroid bets or solar sytems in their way. You can think of reason why they can be there.

 

11. I am westwood fanboy, so I don't give a $*** about realism. And their fiction is cool with what they have done for their series. SW is so fiction of realism. Realism blow for sci fi RTS. This game isn't RTW, or is based on real life.

 

12. They should go back and play Dune II or C&C Dawn.

--Same scale like EAW but Better graphics and animations---the game is still in early dev.

--Better Space battles reality --3D space battling isn't that much better, and is to much work to command. You know how I feel about reality.

--Better voices and game plot artistic feeling -- It is star wars, and vocies are that big of deal.

 

14. It will be the size it needs to be for gameplay.

 

15. To early to tell, and you have not played it. You have only seen small demos, you have not seen the real game in play.

 

 

Stop trying to make a difference and just let them do their jobs which is to make the game. Grow up, complain when will have facts, not just small amount of info. I know we don't have much else to do but debate, but give it a rest. I also know how much you want to make a difference for this game, but it is hard

 

I know I am a fanboy, and my views are extrmely bias to what ever Petroglyph decides. But here is what I think so far.

I have seen no problems let, but there are things that we have not seen let. I feel this way becasue I trust Petroglyph 100% at this moment in Dev. Also it is early dev.

[Garbageben]

8. I agree that the rancor is way too resistant to damage. The skin cannot be so thick that lasers from an at-at will just do little damage.

 

Rancors:

Why does it seem like they are on every planet? They had one on Tatooine. That is totally unrealistic. Rancors are native to Dathomir alone. The only reason one was on Tatooine is because Jabba had it brought there. It is bad to have tons of them on all the planets, especially seeing the way they can trump infantry and vehicles. That's just what I felt like after watching the video.

 

Death Star:

Too close to the planet when it fires. If it fires that close to the planet it should be blown up too, because the explosion engulfs it. Also any fleet near the planet would be blown up too because of the massive explosion. The use of the Death Star in the video was very unrealistic.

[Ismael]

Cain relax you are worring to much ! Have faith in Mike and Petroglyph. I know you also love them and EAW and I apreciate your support / we will make it at the end. Keep up the good work ! / them and us

 

Thank you all for your help and love for EAW.

 

 

Feedback 003:

 

 

~ I have seen shuttles outside in space protected by ISD ?! Shuttles should stay inside ISD. Only big transporters should be out.

 

 

~ Ships look to static. They should have some reactions beside your move orders. Some standard stuff to make them more real.

 

EX: After they jump from hyperspace they start to manuver in a classic Imperial formation acording to the enemy they see. Then they wait for your worders.

 

A message should start:

 

The fleet has discovered the enemy ! Manuvering into combat formation !

 

~ Is Vader should not be only a unit - it should look more real like in SW Battelfront . They are also hard to kill there.

 

~ Ships are destroyed to fast : I will like 15 seconds more time before that Calamari was ded.

 

~ Some ships could not explode and remain just crippled in space. Dead.

 

~ I know AT camels dont have shilds but they have the best heavy armor in the galaxy. A creature with flesh could not destroy an AT with one strike. But it could resle with it fight and maybe break the camel's neak. Animals always go for the head.

 

~ I agree with the initail explosions. they look to much in the same time a 2-3 seconds delay should be considered in that animations betwen them. And the camera should follow them. Abdul sias that he thinks has seen something like that but with the destroyed animations.

 

~ AlL AT Camels when destroyed drop in theyr heads. What about another way of droping down ?

 

~ More planets and ships names : Abdul always names his ships after his cool stuff or name :

 

Like ISD : Abdul the Great : And it is so cool to shout at him from my room - NO MORE ABDUL THE GREAT : abdul !!! or The ISD Abdul the Great eats dust ! It is so funny to see him upset for one ship

 

 

If I see more I will post. I got to go to school now / Take care

[Cobra848]

Targeting all subsystems manually seem obsolete.

 

Also, there most likey be hot keys.

[Cain]

.... complain when will have facts, not just small amount of info. I know we don't have much else to do but debate, but give it a rest. I also know how much you want to make a difference for this game, but it is hard.

 

I know I am a fanboy, and my views are extrmely bias to what ever Petroglyph decides. But here is what I think so far.

I have seen no problems let, but there are things that we have not seen let. I feel this way becasue I trust Petroglyph 100% at this moment in Dev. Also it is early dev.

 

 

Well I agree with you. But it is the only way we can se our self useful. Second we have managed to convince the fans to generaly disscus official materials and not post tones of new game ideeas.

 

I also have confidence in Petroglyph but it is possible that they are still to absorbed in their work and they can do forget about some game small aspects. Of course they can be found later in the game but it is better to say them now from a producitve point of view.

 

I think the difference has already been made I agree I was a little bit to pasionate in 003 - it happens - you know

 

I'm relaxing....i'm relaxing !

[Jahled]

Right, i've neither had the luxory of seeing any glimpses of the game, so can only offer a rather blind piece of five cents!

 

Firstly, got to agree broadly with Cobra on one little aspact of gameplay. Games like Homeworld look good, but sure as hell are a hassle to play; rather like Force Commander. Where as the Command & Conqueror titles didn't look as 'real' but offered wonderful and fun gameplay, whilst still looking reasonably cool. I don't want a game that's going to take me two weeks to get to grips with; I don't devote that much time to playing games, I want a Star Wars title that will let me loose myself in some Star Wars mythos without requiring a diploma to play.

 

Space Battles: Please include the option of being able to switch gravity wells OFF during combat!

 

SW Characters: Lots of them! All our favourites!

 

Game Galaxy: LARGE! Anything under fifty systems at the very least is about as epic as a kid's jigsaw.

 

..oops! Overran my five cents....

[Ghostly_Substance]

I counted 30 and possibly there might be 31 since there was this dot under the zoom part of the minimap screen. Would be nice to have 80+

 

Since it was E3 video that was fast forwarded in combat i'll wait for another video which is more official to show us how fast combat is but that might also be sped up just for viewing. Space combat is great.

My only complaint is that ships fly through each other and an Imperial dreadnaught or whatever is it turned like there was a jedi pushin its front.

 

Vader alone ? Doesn't he usually have bodygaurds when going to places ? 2 Elite Stormtroopers ?

 

I didn't know storm troopers cost 800 credits, must be lots of troopers in that group and same with scouts, 800, damn must be the vehicle cost. wow.

 

Vehicles seemed a tad bit fast and same with the AT-AT turning on a dime.

[Cain]

 

5. Ship Names do not matter. Exp will come in time. Just wait.

 

 

 

Maybe this will convince you :

 

Ship names and or the ability to name ships are essential to creating a feeling of attachment to the game world. Without them, the player loses the ability to relate to what is going on in the space battles. When the player has the ability to name a ship, there can be a feeling a loss over the destruction of a ship that has served in five or six engagements. Ships without a name mean nothing besides what it cost to build them.

 

In interviews, it has been stated that Empire at War will allow the player to write their own Star Wars History. This is not possible if ships do not have names. Imagine a depiction of the Battle of Midway with all the ship names stripped away. What is left is not very compelling or very interesting.

 

Give ships random names, allow the player to name their own ships, and have someway of keeping track of what ship destroyed what instead of having a click fest where the thousandth capital ship produced means the same to the player as the first. It is more rewarding to destory a famous enemy ship that his managed to cause havoc for half the game then to go into battle against ships without any character of their own.

 

 

 

***********************************************************************************************

 

NOTE : Ismael wants to close the topic soon so I will add all the important links to all the new major feedback topics :

 

 

The EAW Petroglyph Galaxy:

 

http://forums.lucasarts.com/thread.jspa?threadID=44756&tstart=0

 

http://swempireatwar.10.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=82

 

The EAW AI:

 

http://swempireatwar.10.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=90

 

EAW Ship Names:

 

http://swempireatwar.10.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=119

 

Large Fleets in EAW:

 

http://swempireatwar.10.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=115

 

Multiplayer (in progress):

 

http://forums.lucasarts.com/thread.jspa?threadID=46045&tstart=0

[Lord Sidious]

hello there...

I would like to add one more thing... How many of you can forget Red Alert or C&C? what makes them so different? one of these aspects is that they have cutscenes, movies between missions.

 

Well, we have Darth Vader and the Emperor where C&C has Caine, a better replacement for bad guy I suppose

 

I would very much like to see cutscenes in the game... I also agree with Caine in his ideas, except that we must keep in mind that this is a game, and it is a Star Wars game, so it has fictional parts in it, and, for example, the explosions may not be that much realistic...

[Deadeye31_pff]

As for the new video, I thought it was ok for the amount of time they've been working on it.

 

The Ships do seem a little bit squished and boxy in the video when switched to that cinematic camera and I would have liked a bit more Homeworld type destructions for the fighters.

 

I think they might not have had a lot of death scenes for the ships yet because it's still early.

 

yeah, blown off parts should be floating around and not falling, as well as the smoke.

 

Ships should take more time to be killed but they stated it was an accelerated game and likely they sped up the action so we can see what happened.

 

I didn't like the little ball explosions when a ship died either; that just didn't seem very realistic at all. If you watch ROTJ, you'll see an ISD blow up above the SSD when Ackbar tells his crew to focus all firepower on the SSD. It blew up along the same line as the ISDs in the game but it didn't have those ball explosions at the hardpoints.

 

One major thing I see is that all the explosions look like they were in blue. Fighters blew up and a little blue cloud of dust took their place. nothing blows up in blue.

 

If they do the map like Rome: Total War's I'd like to see ships able to go anywhere but if they go Rebellion style (which is what it looks like) you should not be able to bypass huges fleets on the front lines to attack the light defended area in the back.

 

that's all for now, I'll post again if I have any further comments.

[Lord Sidious]

have you wachted stargate? blue explosions are very nice and add a very beatiful mood to the game...

[Deadeye31_pff]

but where's the big yellow fireballs we all know and love from ROTJ?

[Makwu]

Assumptions abound!

 

I know (since we have no game to play and are excited about this one) that we have nothing better to do than sit here and make speculations. Many of these arguments are made with such certainty from a brief 5 minute demo which was not designed to show off actual game play, but rather aspects of the game engine and some of the features. The game is a year away. Relax a bit.

 

I keep seeing references to this and that looking childish. Quite frankly, that argument in itself looks childish. Petro is a group of VERY experiences game designers. Please give them that respect.

 

Now, to answer some of these points:

 

 

1. The ships explode to fast. Targeting all subsystems manually seem obsolete. Ther is no pause for orders option:

 

 

Too fast: Early Stage Demo, hard to judge this.

 

Subgroups: Nobody said you can’t do a "general" attack on a ship and that you must target a subsystem. You are making this judgment because you saw that the subsystems show up when you put your cursor over a ship. Since Petro's goal is to make the game both simply and complex at the same time..the odds are that they will allow both depending on what degree of tactics you as a player want to implement. Further, obsolete? People have been begging for years for the ability to target subsystems, it has only recently starting finding its way into games.

 

2 & 3. There is to much smoke and fire in space:

 

True. But this game is not being designed for nasa as a flight simulator. No game that i know of has accurately depicted realistic space explosions. If they did, you would be like "Man, your explosions are too simple and childish. They don't look like star wars at all!"

 

4. Space battles are to short: There is no magic or difficulty in them:

 

After a 5 minute demo in which you were not even in control of and we see a few ships out of a fleet destroyed, It’s a bit to early to make a judgment on this. However, I do agree with the idea that battles should not be quick. The addition of hardpoints is an excellent strategic element that can only be used if ships last for a long time. If it only takes 30 seconds to destroy a ship…then why waste time choosing which hardpoint to attack first? In the spirit of starwars conflict…I think the battles should play out very slowly, more slowly than they are displayed in the demo video. Ships should be hard to take out, and should require thought and effort to do so. If you go into the battle and your ships just start shooting at random things, kill everything and then you win…it would be a shame. I think this concept is important for a starwars game where as it may be less so for other types of games which employ a much quicker combat style. (Ie most land based RTS games). My main points on star wars engagements is this:

 

A) It should take a lot to destroy a capital ship. They should be very valuable items.

b) I think retreating should be a very common practice; I think most engagements should end in retreat

c) If you loose a whole fleet, you should be just about done for

 

Battles should play out very slowly and tactically. IT should take a lot of strategy to take out just one cap ship. And when you do, it’s a big victory. Ships should be able to take a lot of fire. I think a "hardpoint" should take about as much work to take out as a whole "ship" is in other space conflict games. Once you loose your shields on a cap ship, you need to leave the battle. Rather than think "Oh well, its just a Mon Cal cruiser, I can build another one". The mindset, to stay true to the novels and such should be more along the lines of "Im gonna try to get one of his Star Destroyers!" rather than "Im gonna take out his whole fleet!". I think this would counter the "massive fleet" phenomenon that is so common in games.... while at the same time keeping to star wars tradition. This combined with ship naming and crew experience would make losses really hurt. When you lose a cap ship, it should feel like you really lost something.

 

5. Ships don't have names nor they have experience gain - this is extremly bad:

 

As I understand it, these features are in debate right now. I agree that ships should have experience and naming would be nice. The issue that Petro is dealing with right now is Heros. Figuring out a system that lets heros boost ship stats while having ship stats improve based on their own experience can be a tricky balancing act. Especially if the heros themselves have experience which improves their command effect. If these abilities are done using multiplication, you can quickly get a ship/hero that is simply ridiculously too strong. Petro has many months to play with this, don’t' get on their case about it just yet.

 

6. The Characters are not just cool units ! they are SW characters and they should look more real not bulletproof zombies:

 

Eh. Zombies just walk around and poke stuff. I’m not sure where this is coming from. There are just some practical things that can’t be changed. The weapons fire for example doesn't miss, it always hits. That is how the engine is designed. The engine uses math to calculate if the unit is damaged and if so..how much. My only suggestion is to perhaps have Vader use his hand to block incoming fire like he does in the movies.

 

7. Don't make the FORCE POWERS animations look like Lord Of the Rings MAGIC ! We don't need that ! (*Vader's force crush):

 

I agree that the force effect could use some improvement, but I am also very sure that it will get it. I suspect that the Vader unit was one of the most recent additions and the force powers he uses even more so.

 

8. Two AT-ATs, a stormtrooper brigade, Vader, and 3 TIE tanks can do dust out of a Rancor if they open fire ! Be Realistic guys:

 

This is clearly NOT balanced yet. I suspect they wanted to show off the Rancor (Because they liked his AI and animation) and therefore just tweaked his stats for the demo. Regardless if I am right or not, the game has not yet moved into balancing yet. So just wait on stuff like this. If you have a rancor take out your entire force come playable demo time, then get back on these forums and complain. I’ll join your complaint.

 

9. The Galaxy view looks BAD for a space strategy game ! It is looking like a children's apple tree....See Nexus or Freelancer for GOD SAKE !

 

I'm not even sure what a children’s apple tree looks like. Does it differ from an adult’s apple tree? Anyways, the aesthetic appearance of a strategic map is not very important in my opinion. Its functionality, ease of use, and ability to readily provide important information and statistics are important, appearance is secondary. Also, I'm sure the galactic map has a long way to go in development. This seems like a very minor complaint.

 

10. You cannot have tradelanes in Star Wars ! If you want them enable the direct jump to another planets but slow it down in comparation with aflyght on a so called tradelane:

 

They have not stated exactly how trade lines work yet. I agree that if hyperspace travel without tradelines is impossible, it will take away from the starwars feel. In my opinion, tradelanes should be something you can control, similar to a system. Controlling gives you tax revenue and other benefits perhaps, spy detection etc. Also, moving along tradelanes should obviously have movement bonuses.

 

11. My predictions are at this moment that the game will never beat RTW:

 

You predictions are that this pre-alpha non-playable star wars space RTS doesn’t beat RTW’s release candidate?(One of the best RTS ever made) RTW prolly would win though if they were trying to beat eachother...I haven't seen any units so far that could scale the castle walls. They would just sit out there on the wall stuck and all the soldiers inside with their little swords would be untouchable...unless you had some tie bombers in orbit that could come down and bomb them all....hard to say who would win. Oh, and the chariots could definitely outrun the rancor....but with the rancor set with its E3 demo stats, if it could just get close enough to the chariots it could probably take them all out in one swing....

 

12. Petroglyph put your gamedesigners to play right now extensivly for 10 days:

 

I’m sure all the designers are both gamers and business men who know they competition very well. A bunch of computer geeks willing to devote years at a time to making a video game (Not to mention the fact that they STARTED the RTS genre) don't know what those games are like? Or what goes into a successful game? Please.

 

14. The galaxy is way to small and unrealistic:

 

WAY TOO SMALL! There are generally about 300 billion to 500 billion systems per galaxy. Plus some of those systems have multiple planets/moons and asteroid belts which could offer resources. I refuse to play this game until they have at least 1 million systems. That is about .003 of a percent of a realistic galaxy. That is all I ask for…

 

Come on, even if they stopped adding planets and left it at 50-60, that is a very very long game. This is a game, and by its nature is not realistic. They are making a fantasy game, that is in a fantasy world, that is fun to play for a diverse audience. Not just you. They can't make a game that doesn't have at least one complaint from every person that plays it, because what people want varies so much from person to person. Once again, these guys know that they are doing. Next thing I know, somebody posting on here will be saying that they should remove force powers because they put some thought into it and decided it just isn't very realistic....

 

One has to remember that the starwars fan base is the largest fantasy fan base in the world. And within it, there is a very very diverse group of people. If Petro was to make a game that was ultra realistic with a high learning curve, they would instantly alienate about 90% of the audience. They have been given a responsibility in order to maximize profits and that is: Make a game that can take advantage of the huge potential market to the best of their abilities. Balancing a game to appeal to many types of gamers is never easy. They will do their best to make the most number of players pleased with the game rather than a few players who are super pleased. Making games is a hedonistic indevour.

[plokoon9619]

Cough unit scaling needs to be correct and Dathimor is where rancores belong.

 

Are we going to take every planet by force? How about using elemnts from swr like dimplomacy, assasination, capturing characters, esponiage, leadership commands like Adrimal, General, Commader. Also add more leadership commands like major, colonel, marshall, sqaud leader, etc.

 

People want ships from starwars not new ships.

 

Are we gonna be able to capture ships like have a assualt transport board a ISD Mk II then we can switch from inside the isd to control the boarding party and fight in space.

 

80+ planets is a must. We want kaut, thyferra, fondor, bilbrinbgi not made up planets.

 

Darth vader is just a bulletproof man. We also dont want made up characters.

[TSKNF]

Cough unit scaling needs to be correct

 

No it doesn't. It needs to be practical, not ships so tiny you can't see them properly.

 

People want ships from starwars not new ships.

 

No, no, please be bothered to invent new ships. Sticking purely to what's there makes it hard to add variety. Look at Battle for middle earth, for instance. No new units, very limited strategy.

[Cain]

Normally we close this types of topics when their mission is complete, but Ismael said that this one can remain open ...

 

Anyway the quality of the feedback here is excelent so maybe this is why the topic will remain open for now.

 

PS. I deleted all the messages from here that were not in the spirit of the topic.

 

Edit: Again I deleted some questions from here ... again ... pls. keep questions for PMs and have pacience until the next preview from Brett. Thanks.

[Makwu]

I broke my original post down into two smaller bits that are easier to digest. These are my main concerns after viewing the demo.

 

Trade Lanes: I can understand from a gameplay standpoint why this could arguably be good. However, do to your desire to make the game as linear as possible and due to the fact that you are using star wars technology as the basis for your game, I think ships should be able to jump anywhere they want. I think you can counter the gameplay issues that this represents by allowing ship movement information to be fairly easily discovered by spies and such. (Though I have no idea how much you plan to implements information gathering techniques, as they do tend to add a higher degree of difficulty).

 

Unit Scaling: I know that you as designers are aware of how far off the unit scaling is from the actual technical specs of the star wars ships. I’m sure this was done to make managing the units easier and to perhaps keep polygon counts down. However, I think great size difference in Star Wars ships is part of what makes the battles feel so spectacular. Star Destroyers feel so daunting due to their incredible size. They were designed to intimidate. That was their purpose. As the scaling is now, they do not look intimidating or powerful in the midst of the battles. When a star destroyer or even a MonCal heavy cruiser starts to look like just another ship in a battle, something that is star wars has been lost. (Also, I think the width/length ratio on the current ISD models is incorrect). Having the Star Destroyers and other capital ships stand out more is vital for both sides because it gives the empire the feeling of dominance while it equally gives the rebels a feeling of triumph when they actually take one out. If you have read some star wars books you know that taking out a Star Destroyer is rare and always a spectacular event.

 

The importance of the Star Destroyer to star wars is this: It is the iconic image of star wars space conflict. In the first scene of episode 4, we see a corvette and a star destroyer. The point of that clip is to show the difference of the empire and the rebellion; to show that the odds based on firepower alone are in the hands of the empire. Throughout the rest of the films the star destroyer is the image of imperial strength and formidability. I am not an empire nut; I enjoy playing rebels alike. But empire or rebellion fanatics are both star wars fans.. and I think most stars wars fans will agree when I say the star destroyer defines star wars space ships. Everything else compares to it. And thusly, I feel the star destroyer alone is the most important ship to get correct as far as scaling and appearance are concerned. I feel the models currently on display fall short of the image the star destroyer is supposed to define. They do not look formidable with the current scaling and texturing, they do not look sinister, they do not intimidate. They look like just another ship that blends in with the rest. Maybe this critique seems unimportant to most readers, but I think in any star wars game, it is paramount.

 

Space Unit Textures: I think the textures could be improved on the larger ships. And I am only comparing them to other star wars games (Taking into account that you have to fit a lot more ships onto the screen that other star wars games). Cap ships seem a bit blockish and don’t have the color contrast from lighted areas to shadowed areas as I think they should. I really feel that this could be fixed with better textures and maybe some bump mapping on the closer versions of the models. The imperial ships are a bit dark and drab looking. A much lighter grey with a higher reflectiveness combined with some contrast/bump map improvements could make a world of difference. The lighting quality on the rebel ships looks very good and much better than the imperial ships at this current stage of development.

 

Hardpoints: I’d like to make a suggestion on hardpoints which would require little modifying of the code (And may be how it is already programmed). If a ship has 4 turbo laser hardpoints, I do not think you should have to tell your ships to attack each one but rather assign the target “typeâ€