12-31-2017, 03:22 PM
Starting off, I've been meaning to do this for a while now, but I was constantly lazy to do and since it's nearly new year time, it's time for reflection so here it goes: even though this is a new account with no posts, I've been playing Discovery on and off for about 8 years, since 2009 to be precise and I've seen the mod go from the chaotic state it was in 4.84 to the glory days many call 4.85 and to its present, weird version.
So, why do I think disco has been on a downward spiral for the last few years? I'm gonna try to bring up some arguments, listed below, in no particular order of severity.
1. The game has got old.
The truth is, Freelancer is an old game and it shows, even with the latest additions.
Its relatively simplistic nature doesn't leave much space for customization or for complex gameplay scenarios, and its outdated mechanics and netcode don't help either.
2. The community is an aging niche market.
Freelancer is neither a space sim like the preceeding Wing Commander and Freespace games, and neither a full blown arcade shooter, it's somewhere in the middle.
Another aging-related problem might be the users themselves, I was 12 when I first started playing, and as such, whenever I played I faction I was fully invested in that faction, developing an us vs them mindset, which made me irrationally hate the enemy factions, leading to hilarious flame outbursts, trolling and admittedly, toxicity.
Although I have no proof of this, I believe quite a few of the old members back then were also of a young age with similar... issues.
3. The various balancing changes to the game.
When 4.86 came out, the forum was ablaze with "bring 4.85 back" and "this mod sucks" posts, and although I don't remember what others hated about the mod because it was quite some time ago, I remember what my gripes with it were: the removal of many old jumpholes from 4.85 and the introduction of even more filler systems that made travels longer and replaced old and dear systems(read: minor), messing with hitboxes by making them smaller and harder to hit and thus making this game feel like it wasn't quite the Freelancer I used to know anymore (this might be wrong, although I have looked at hardCMP shield bubbles and varios vanilla ships had smaller bubbles than their vanilla shield bubbles, I don't actually know if it happened in 4.86 exactly or if it was just me).
When 4.87 came out, the gun rebalances happened(I think), and oh boy was that a mess.
Suddenly, most of the codeguns people used to like were now useless, having bad stats compared to the standard guns, for the most part.
But this wasn't the worst offender in my opinion, what was even worse was the change in diversity and uniqueness.
Back then, Krakens were sitting high atop the dps charts compared to the other standard weapons, but used more energy.
Vampires did crappy damage but used less energy, Buckshots also did crappy damage and used a lot of energy but had 750 m/s speed and range.
I won't pretend that this system was perfect or even good, I remember quite clearly how people rushed to play LN for their plasmas, outcasts for krakens and inferno and factions like IMG which had the vampire preferred codes whenever possible, but it was more interesting than having most weapons be either 650 speed and 3.03 fire rate with very similar stats or other damage, speed and rate of fire combinations that are so prevalent today.
Another thing that I didn't like were the new effects and gun types, having the souped-up but true to vanilla guns butchered into new types of guns like hornvipers becoming a green photon with skyblast B sound effects and is still considered tachyon.
4. The introduction of conn and lenghtening of popular raid routes.
When conn was introduced, access to pvp against a wide variety of people and ships without any roleplay required became instantaneous, as did the transferring of goods, making the game universe feel less significant and important.
I think this is particularly huge, because although Discovery is a roleplay server, a great part of the players did enjoy pvp quite a lot.
With ez conn access, people randomly waiting in space and eventually gathering up before bursting into a full blown raid slowly became less and less of a possibility, combined with the increased traveling distances meant that raids died a slow death. Why wait in space pointlessly until enough of you gather up for a raid when you can just do it in conn, right away, hassle-free? People will always find the best/easiest way to do things.
Furthermore, the sum of all the changes made Discovery's gameplay feel change from a mostly logical expansion upon the Freelancer univers to a game that kind of resembles Freelancer.
And that sums up what I can gather for now, I might edit the post later if more things come to mind, but for now I await your opinions on the matter.
So, why do I think disco has been on a downward spiral for the last few years? I'm gonna try to bring up some arguments, listed below, in no particular order of severity.
1. The game has got old.
The truth is, Freelancer is an old game and it shows, even with the latest additions.
Its relatively simplistic nature doesn't leave much space for customization or for complex gameplay scenarios, and its outdated mechanics and netcode don't help either.
2. The community is an aging niche market.
Freelancer is neither a space sim like the preceeding Wing Commander and Freespace games, and neither a full blown arcade shooter, it's somewhere in the middle.
Another aging-related problem might be the users themselves, I was 12 when I first started playing, and as such, whenever I played I faction I was fully invested in that faction, developing an us vs them mindset, which made me irrationally hate the enemy factions, leading to hilarious flame outbursts, trolling and admittedly, toxicity.
Although I have no proof of this, I believe quite a few of the old members back then were also of a young age with similar... issues.
3. The various balancing changes to the game.
When 4.86 came out, the forum was ablaze with "bring 4.85 back" and "this mod sucks" posts, and although I don't remember what others hated about the mod because it was quite some time ago, I remember what my gripes with it were: the removal of many old jumpholes from 4.85 and the introduction of even more filler systems that made travels longer and replaced old and dear systems(read: minor), messing with hitboxes by making them smaller and harder to hit and thus making this game feel like it wasn't quite the Freelancer I used to know anymore (this might be wrong, although I have looked at hardCMP shield bubbles and varios vanilla ships had smaller bubbles than their vanilla shield bubbles, I don't actually know if it happened in 4.86 exactly or if it was just me).
When 4.87 came out, the gun rebalances happened(I think), and oh boy was that a mess.
Suddenly, most of the codeguns people used to like were now useless, having bad stats compared to the standard guns, for the most part.
But this wasn't the worst offender in my opinion, what was even worse was the change in diversity and uniqueness.
Back then, Krakens were sitting high atop the dps charts compared to the other standard weapons, but used more energy.
Vampires did crappy damage but used less energy, Buckshots also did crappy damage and used a lot of energy but had 750 m/s speed and range.
I won't pretend that this system was perfect or even good, I remember quite clearly how people rushed to play LN for their plasmas, outcasts for krakens and inferno and factions like IMG which had the vampire preferred codes whenever possible, but it was more interesting than having most weapons be either 650 speed and 3.03 fire rate with very similar stats or other damage, speed and rate of fire combinations that are so prevalent today.
Another thing that I didn't like were the new effects and gun types, having the souped-up but true to vanilla guns butchered into new types of guns like hornvipers becoming a green photon with skyblast B sound effects and is still considered tachyon.
4. The introduction of conn and lenghtening of popular raid routes.
When conn was introduced, access to pvp against a wide variety of people and ships without any roleplay required became instantaneous, as did the transferring of goods, making the game universe feel less significant and important.
I think this is particularly huge, because although Discovery is a roleplay server, a great part of the players did enjoy pvp quite a lot.
With ez conn access, people randomly waiting in space and eventually gathering up before bursting into a full blown raid slowly became less and less of a possibility, combined with the increased traveling distances meant that raids died a slow death. Why wait in space pointlessly until enough of you gather up for a raid when you can just do it in conn, right away, hassle-free? People will always find the best/easiest way to do things.
Furthermore, the sum of all the changes made Discovery's gameplay feel change from a mostly logical expansion upon the Freelancer univers to a game that kind of resembles Freelancer.
And that sums up what I can gather for now, I might edit the post later if more things come to mind, but for now I await your opinions on the matter.