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Author Topic: Starsector 0.6.2a (Released) Patch Notes  (Read 214875 times)

Cycerin

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #120 on: December 28, 2013, 07:52:45 PM »

Wanna see dem ships
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Hopelessnoob

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #121 on: December 28, 2013, 07:53:58 PM »

So there is just Easy and Normal? No hard mode?
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ValkyriaL

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #122 on: December 28, 2013, 08:45:14 PM »

normal mode is hard for a new player, as many have already discovered, reducing credits and giving less ships and stuff won't cut it as hard mode, for that i would demand a perfect play AI, at the very least.
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Debido

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #123 on: December 28, 2013, 08:55:08 PM »

I'm glad to see the introduction of information pop ups in game to ease new players into the gameplay. Sometimes I think that older players who have been at the game for months or years lack the perspective of a fresh set of eyes.

Later on when polishing the help pop ups closer to the 1.0 release, I'd suggest having the pop ups presented with say...a graphic of stylish female female officer who is your "second in command" alerting you to the problem and with the information and recommendations on how to solve it. I'd leave the graphic of the officer in the top right hand side of the star map, and the border flashes and shows an exclamation mark when there is a potential problem.

Also at any time you can click on your second in command and they will give a report on your fleet health with suggestions. These are checks against CR, credits, fleet strength, fleet composition, supplies and usage that show green if it's all normal and orange if their is a suggestion or a problem. There could be good problems like unused fleet logistics points and credits that could be spent on new ships, to supply overuse or ships under a certain CR%. Certainly the first time the issue occurs hit the player with the pop up, but players (predominately male) won't become desensitized to a female first officer and will likely keep returning to check the fleet health.

Yes I know suggesting a female first officer is probably being a bit sexist, yet playing on well studied phenomena in young males I'm sure they'll pay more attention. On another note I think having a human like character giving tutorials and suggestions gives another level of engagement at a human level that new players will respond to and possibly keep utilizing further into the game to keep assured that their progress is going well enough up until the time their adept as a star sector pro. Kind of like the Civilization series advisors, they're useful up until later in the game at which point the "advisors" have done their job.
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Debido

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #124 on: December 28, 2013, 08:56:08 PM »

I'm fairly sure hard mode is Iron Mode perma-death  :)
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xenoargh

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #125 on: December 28, 2013, 09:53:03 PM »

Quote
I wonder at what point it becomes "too much information" and not something a player will reliably read because of that.
I really can't see that being a big problem so long as:

A.  They can just hit "Leave" / ESC and kill it fast, or turn it off entirely, I don't think you can ever really give players too much information that way.

B.  Make sure there's a way to turn it back on; probably needs a check box in the Options.


Oh, and... will mouse-steer as a checkbox ever happen?  I literally can't imagine playing this game any other way (the default makes my hand cramp after a while, amongst other things) and a lot of people find that easier.
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Thaago

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #126 on: December 28, 2013, 10:03:54 PM »

Nice to see whats up! New player friendliness is something thats been needing a workover for a little while.
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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #127 on: December 29, 2013, 05:04:12 AM »

Thank you - wrote those two down, will see about them tomorrow. One thing I want to avoid is "oh god the dialogs", which is a distinct danger a couple of things go wrong at once. For example, after a battle, a dialog talking about the increased supply consumption pops up, but that's where the speed penalty/bonus one should pop up, too. Hmm. Probably better to have the dialogs than not, though I wonder at what point it becomes "too much information" and not something a player will reliably read because of that.

My reaction when too much explanatory text is forced upon me is usually: "Let me alone with this, give me at least a chance to find things out for myself!... uh, but stick around, in case I miss something, k?".

So, I would suggest to just introduce a "gameplay" category in the codex where all help texts can be re-read. And to say clearly that they can be found there at the beginning of a campaign and give them a clear title under which they can be found, so there are no inhibitions to click them away when they are annoying.
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Megas

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #128 on: December 29, 2013, 06:43:51 AM »

There is always your robot buddy for exposition and tips.
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Jonlissla

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #129 on: December 29, 2013, 07:12:52 AM »

Wanna see dem ships

Yep, a teaser would be nice too.
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #130 on: December 29, 2013, 10:23:10 AM »

Wanna see dem ships

Yep, a teaser would be nice too.

Could happen. Will say no more. :-X

So there is just Easy and Normal? No hard mode?

Well, since the point of a lot of these additions was to ease the learning curve for new players, no :)

Also, it's really not a full-fledged mode, just the starting conditions.

a graphic of stylish female officer who is your "second in command"
...
Yes I know suggesting a female first officer is probably being a bit sexist, yet playing on well studied phenomena in young males I'm sure they'll pay more attention.

Just... no. One of the benefits of being independent is being able to ignore the practical aspects of an argument like this.

(I had been thinking about presenting this info through your actual officers, though. But as there are no officers at this point...)


A.  They can just hit "Leave" / ESC and kill it fast, or turn it off entirely, I don't think you can ever really give players too much information that way.

That's sort of the problem, right? If they cancel out of 3 dialogs because there are too many, but might have read if there was only 1, then 1>3.

B.  Make sure there's a way to turn it back on; probably needs a check box in the Options.
My reaction when too much explanatory text is forced upon me is usually: "Let me alone with this, give me at least a chance to find things out for myself!... uh, but stick around, in case I miss something, k?".

So, I would suggest to just introduce a "gameplay" category in the codex where all help texts can be re-read. And to say clearly that they can be found there at the beginning of a campaign and give them a clear title under which they can be found, so there are no inhibitions to click them away when they are annoying.

Hmm. Let me see how easy it is to dump it there. There's already a popup at the beginning of the campaign, too, so that'd be a good place to say all the stuff can be reviewed via the Codex.

I guess to some degree "dismiss without checking don't show this again" satisfies this, too.

Oh, and... will mouse-steer as a checkbox ever happen?  I literally can't imagine playing this game any other way (the default makes my hand cramp after a while, amongst other things) and a lot of people find that easier.

I'll take a quick look.

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xenoargh

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #131 on: December 29, 2013, 10:55:13 AM »

Quote
Just... no. One of the benefits of being independent is being able to ignore the practical aspects of an argument like this.
Aww, man... I was sooo going to make a cheesecake Barbie Doll "officer" illustration for my Newbie Guide thing, just to have fun with that.  I may still do that  ;D

Quote
That's sort of the problem, right? If they cancel out of 3 dialogs because there are too many, but might have read if there was only 1, then 1>3.
Yeah, but they know 3 things happened

Yeah, there's a point where it's like, "quit showing me pop-ups and let me play" but that's what a timer and "don't show these any more" option is for.  I know that that probably feels like Too Much Information, but with this kind of stuff, Too Much > Too Little.  Nobody has ever, ever complained that a game gave them too much help, in terms of understanding the mechanics.

They may click "leave" immediately on them, but when they get into trouble again, that time, they may actually read the things. 

I think that the ability to re-read it in the Codex would be very powerful, too, especially for the more abstract concepts where you'd want to explain how it works, like how CR gets affected by Logistics which gets affected by having too much Cargo, Fuel and Crew.
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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #132 on: December 29, 2013, 11:16:55 AM »

Nobody has ever, ever complained that a game gave them too much help, in terms of understanding the mechanics.

That's just not true, though. There are a lot of people who despise the hand-holding many modern games force upon the player. And consequently also a lot of people who rejoice about retro style games where discovering the game mechanics is already part of the game. Just google "games hand holding" or something like that to see what I mean.
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Thaago

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #133 on: December 29, 2013, 11:23:55 AM »

...
a graphic of stylish female officer who is your "second in command"
...
Yes I know suggesting a female first officer is probably being a bit sexist, yet playing on well studied phenomena in young males I'm sure they'll pay more attention.

Just... no. One of the benefits of being independent is being able to ignore the practical aspects of an argument like this.

(I had been thinking about presenting this info through your actual officers, though. But as there are no officers at this point...)
...

I don't know why, but its always annoyed the heck out of me when some cheesy 2d cutout comes on screen and had extraneous dialog distracting me from important information. Audio only, briefing style, is fine (ala X-Wing or original starcraft) as long as its concise, to the point, and doesn't splash a giant person on my HUD!
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xenoargh

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Re: Starsector 0.6.2a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #134 on: December 29, 2013, 11:27:03 AM »

Quote
There are a lot of people who despise the hand-holding many modern games force upon the player.
I'm going to have to disagree about this, because it's largely untrue.  Those old-skool games came with nice, printed manuals.  I think a lot of us old-skool players have pretty distorted memories of how things actually worked; we get nostalgic about games where we had manuals and we've ended up with the (false) image of "old-skool" being information-unfriendly.  

Player-unfriendly they may have been, with their crappy UIs and over-reliance on numbers-driven play in places and lack of modern physics and graphics technology.  Information-unfriendly, no; at least none of the ones I consider classics.

Master of Orion II presented its information to players in a way few modern games do- it had a detailed, piece-by-piece in-game manual, as well as a printed manual that covered the basics.

Anyhow, Space Barbie is, like, ready to help you, OMG!  I am totally going to do this when I get home, lol.

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« Last Edit: December 29, 2013, 11:34:10 AM by xenoargh »
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