Teradyn_pff

Well, I don't know who would be bashing Petroglyph. I haven't seen anyone do so, but Lucas Arts? Oh, yeah. We don't trust someone who will sit there and tell everyone that we can "play all of the planets in the Star Wars universe" when we know full well that the planet (and moon) count is less than 50. We have the past games (very recent ones too) to go off of and our past experiences with Lucas Arts. I think our fears of the game being non-moddable are very well grounded given what the answer to that question was. And another thing, many games have their XML files sitting in a data directory or somesuch, but the fact that you have to have a tool to extract them means one of two things probably. First, that the XML files are compressed, and stored in such a way as to be accessed more efficiently by the game engine. Or second, the XML files and other such modifiable elements were locked away at the behest of Lucas Arts to protect "their" intellectual property (read: the expansion or sequel). I fully trust that Petroglyph was planning on (and still hopes to) giving us all the tools they could to modify this game to our hearts content. I think that they realize the life that gives to a game. Lucas Arts on the other hand has no motivation to allow us the tools since they go off of the big Star Wars fan base to pump up their initial sales. I am even willing to bet that Petroglyph had been pressured to make this game portable to X-Box 360 or some such nonsense, which I hope has nothing to do with the low PC specs. The people that are being negative, I feel, have every reason to be. Every detail that has been released since I found out about the game in September 05 has been a let down from what the game looked like, and was touted to be then. I don't think I have to go through all of those pieces of news that were letdowns, I think we all know too well what they are. The biggest problem is the fact that with each announcement the game is getting more restrictive and dumbed down. I wish that we could work together as a group and spread word on the net and convince people who have placed pre-orders, deposits and the like (things that Lucas Arts tracks to determine initial sales) to pull out. It would be a phenominal success on the part of the consumer if we could pull that off. The problem is, as the poll I started shows, the people who already put in their orders or deposits are not likely to do this. Add to that the ones who are blindly buying anything that is Star Wars without demanding quality, you get the history of Star Wars RTSs. They haven't been good, because they haven't had to be! Anyway, we need to be vocal about these things that are negative for the game and what it is turning into. Not flaming, that does no good, but we need to be vocal. Let them know what you think! Try to rise above the noise of the cattle who will buy anything Star Wars and who by their blind acceptance, furthur encourage bad Star Wars games.

I don't think balance is good at all when it means that a Mon Cal Cruiser is going to be designed to stand toe to toe with an ISD. The only possible way that should go for the Mon Cal is the fact that they have redundant shielding and their fighters should be able to take out the ISD's fighters and go to work on taking out its hardpoints. Not counting fighters, it shouldn't even be a contest. This is balance without cookie cutter, you balance a force based on what they bring as a group, not unit to unit. This is the type of thing I think we are going to have to fix to begin with when the game comes out. I see a realism mod being worked on very soon after the games release, unless someone gets clever with the demo...

Well, in Beowulf's defense, he is working off of the only information that we have so far. The videos like the one where the Rebel Plex soldiers and the AT-STs are shooting back and forth are the types of things that make the game seem slanted toward the Rebels in alot of peoples' eyes. For me, I worry about the feel of the game in general. If the AT-STs shots were missing the troops completely that is one thing, but if you have someone standing there with an explosive device in their hands getting hit directly, multiple times, by a blast that would split a tree trunk in half (remember the ground battle on the forest moon of Endor?) and not dying to the first shot, let alone multiple, it doesn't look good, it looks downright bargain bin cruddy. I think maybe we now know why it is like that... having units die realistically (and in keeping with the movies, the primary source of canon) would use up the piddly pop cap we have. Of course this explanation doesn't account for the apparent ease with which the Rebels can take down an Imperial Star Destroyer. Since the cap is 20 for space (and we still don't know if an ISD uses up 1 or more of that cap) you would think that the ships would last longer, but hey... that could an incorrect perception as well because all we have to go on are clips that are supposed to be pretty short which makes watching an ISD go from fresh in the battle to destroyed impossible. This is at least what I hope is causing the perception and that the perception isnt accurate. It seems to me that the main problem is not the "true realism" vs "all about balance" debate. I think what we want here, and what the people who don't know about this game will be expecting, is that it feels like Star Wars when you play EAW, not AOEIII in space with Star Wars units. The standing there getting pummelled by an AT-ST and surviving a rediculous amount of hits, feels like older RTSs, not one that is supposed to be ground-breaking and new. Once we get the Demo we should be able to make more informed statments, views and opinions about the game, but until then, we only have the videos and screenshots to go off of.

If you don't eat out for the time between now and the release you should be able to save enough money to get a very decent video card.

I think the demo will be very important given what we know now. I just hope they let us play like a 10 planet galaxy multiplayer to get a feel.

I respect what you are asking. But I feel the same way about unjust optimism. Only I would never express myself so rudely. Sorry about that, but right now im really mad, alot of people are bashing a game that they have never played before, and i my opinion right now this forum is geting as bad as the LA forum on the main site. Agreed. Since they're just arguing with what they barely know. Its like arguing about chocolate you never tasted or a drink you never drank but only heard about The real problem here is that it is not something we do not know... alot of people here know Star Wars, probably more than Lucas himself (silly as that sounds), and others know RTS games and alot have knowledge of both. I think alot of the people on this board are very informed and knowledgable about what they are talking about. Which of course presents problems when we see the game as it was described to us initially turning into a game targetted at the same snot nosed dribbly eyed teenagers like the one I asked how he thought Episode II compaired with the first 3 and he had no clue as to what I was talking about!!!

Seeing as the limit for space is 20... cheats will do no good really unless you can modify the limits, and then it will be cool to recreate some star wars battles

They are the ones who make you "spend time" with them and "cuddle" and etc. BJs are never free, don't let anyone tell you different.

All of their parents have the money. And the stupidity is hereditary or learned... either way, you know where it comes from.

I think the main gripe is that the announcement looked alot like a potential demo announcement. That set alot of high expectations and the last thing you want to hear after expecting that is for a delay in the release.

Hmmm, these questions are ones I would like to see answered, but I doubt they will answer the first. The second they may, but who knows.

Is anyone suprised by this news? I feel that this is one of those times where the pessimists look at the optimists and say... "told you so"

Um, the update you are referring to has been old news for a couple of days now.

Trouble is, you don't need a spark... that stuff is highly unstable, it is like trying to juggle snowballs underwater unstable. Basically if you leave this stuff in daylight it will explode, if you drop it it will explode, if you talk bad about it it will explode. Maybe not the last one, but it could...

Meh, according to canon you mean, maybe? Anyway, the modders have more time now to work on models... 2 weeks extra actually.

Nah, more like gargling with nitroglycerin.

Um, ya might wanta reset that timer there pardner. EAW got delayed... Kind of ironic that you posted this a little before that news hit.

Well, now. We seem to be getting flooded with all kinds of good news, aren't we? I certainly hope that the crash was caused by the many posts protesting this latest developement. Maybe someone will pay attention, but then again... probably not.

I wouldn't suggest that Delphi lied about anything. I think that the more likely scenario is that any contradiction that has emerged has been news to him as well. May he be thrown to the Sarlacc otherwise. The issue is the suits screwing with the product, a combination anyone who has worked in the business world knows is a bad idea, at least for the consumer. But, 20 is extremely noticable to me. I operate a type of blizkrieg type of offensive where I scout out my territories to make sure there are no immediate dangers, then if safe, I start wiping out my opponents defenses with my full force one by one. I usually stop if I suffer enough casualties to get close to being vulnerable to a counter attack, or if not, I blast through for the win. With this game, a blitzkrieg style (one that would fit the Empire's methods) may not be possible. If it is, it will be kind of contrived. Where we hit them with waves, fleet of 20, fleet of 20, fleet of 20 till we win. I wouldn't call that "depth of gameplay" very much.

Well, I think that as far as coding goes, we probably wont be seeing any of that without illegally decompiling the executables (which I don't recomend). The moddability when it comes to anything ressembeling code has to do with data and that should be in either straight text ini files, xml or something similar. Of course, with the new info on non-moddability out of box and for demo, there is no telling what will be possible any more.

Hehehe, I hope you don't mean "coding looks easy enough" to refer to all coding. I confuse myself sometimes after being away from my code for too long. (hate that my Comp Science teacher was right about documentation )

Oh? When did he say that? And did he say anything that indicated that those 3 fleets wouldn't have to be a total of 20 or less?

How about I let you know if I get in a better mood once I get ahold of the demo? I should have some well grounded feedback after that anyway.

Then how does the news that the game may end up being unmoddable or very difficult to mod affect your decision? *Holds mike up to Zer Teron*

Could you post a link to the questions, or list them here? I looked around on the Nexus site but didn't have time/luck to find them.