+- Discovery Gaming Community (https://discoverygc.com/forums)
+-- Forum: The Community (https://discoverygc.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?fid=4)
+--- Forum: Real Life Discussion (https://discoverygc.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?fid=16)
+--- Thread: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest (/showthread.php?tid=165001)
First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Rotorist - 10-05-2018
Hi everyone,
Thank you for all your support for my project
So I have been working on it since beginning of the year, and wow it's already October! I'd like to say don't ever under-estimate the among of work to make all the little details required for a game like Freelancer, so lots of respect for FL devs But here we go, I cleaned up the project and made a demo build to test the combat. I'd like to know how it feels to you. I don't try to intentionally mimic any particular game, so I'm just designing the physics the way I think feels good, but I could be wrong.
You can download the build from itch.io (feel free to play any of my other games there lol):
https://rotorist.itch.io/fringe-worlds
Once the game starts, you can read the instructions and press ESC to close it. The station right in front of you will spawn an AI enemy squad and once you kill them all, another squad will spawn. Though your hull will drain from damage but you won't die.
I wish you have fun
Edit: earlier I forgot to make the game public, now it works!
RE: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Durandal - 10-05-2018
Played around with it. The controls were very unintuitive and alien to me. This in and of itself would not be a problem were it not for the lack of a rebind function, which kind of sucked.
I did play around with keys and found some that were unlisted, particularly the cockpit view key (V), but was unable to figure out how to dock with anything, which probably wasn't your intent this early on anyway but I figured I'd mention it.
On to the actual physics - the gameplay is slow. It felt very, very similar to flying a 4.85 pre turretsteer era gunboat in a snub brawl, except that I wasn't packing nearly as heavy a punch. While the physics seem very similar to Freelancer, everything is slowed down to the point of it being frankly kind of frustrating for me. The weapon arcs also frustrated me, as it was very difficult to tell when I was able to shoot something or not. I did notice you implemented a sort of autoaim esque feature similar to Freelancer's, but it only functions on turrets that have an arc on the target, meaning one gun could be shooting at the target and the other off into space, which just feels kinda clumsy and odd.
Before giving this any sort of test run again I see two things as being absolutely essential - the ability to rebind keys, and some kind of sound cues for everything happening. Target locks, gun sounds, engines states, the works. It was very difficult to tell what was happening just by looking at the screen. Audio, even if just a primative test library of noises, is integrally important to determining the feel of a game.
Overall I'm not a huge fan of the way you have things slowed down right now, but I know there are a lot of people who find Freelancer's combat to be too fast paced, so maybe you'll find an audience there. The most important things for you right now are to get some sounds and key rebinds in ASAP.
RE: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Rotorist - 10-05-2018
(10-05-2018, 06:06 AM)Durandal Wrote: Played around with it. The controls were very unintuitive and alien to me. This in and of itself would not be a problem were it not for the lack of a rebind function, which kind of sucked.
I did play around with keys and found some that were unlisted, particularly the cockpit view key (V), but was unable to figure out how to dock with anything, which probably wasn't your intent this early on anyway but I figured I'd mention it.
On to the actual physics - the gameplay is slow. It felt very, very similar to flying a 4.85 pre turretsteer era gunboat in a snub brawl, except that I wasn't packing nearly as heavy a punch. While the physics seem very similar to Freelancer, everything is slowed down to the point of it being frankly kind of frustrating for me. The weapon arcs also frustrated me, as it was very difficult to tell when I was able to shoot something or not. I did notice you implemented a sort of autoaim esque feature similar to Freelancer's, but it only functions on turrets that have an arc on the target, meaning one gun could be shooting at the target and the other off into space, which just feels kinda clumsy and odd.
Before giving this any sort of test run again I see two things as being absolutely essential - the ability to rebind keys, and some kind of sound cues for everything happening. Target locks, gun sounds, engines states, the works. It was very difficult to tell what was happening just by looking at the screen. Audio, even if just a primative test library of noises, is integrally important to determining the feel of a game.
Overall I'm not a huge fan of the way you have things slowed down right now, but I know there are a lot of people who find Freelancer's combat to be too fast paced, so maybe you'll find an audience there. The most important things for you right now are to get some sounds and key rebinds in ASAP.
Hey thank you for taking your time to write the feedback
I actually sped it up some more recently than before, I can make the ship go even faster.
RE: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Rotorist - 10-25-2018
(10-05-2018, 06:06 AM)Durandal Wrote: Played around with it. The controls were very unintuitive and alien to me. This in and of itself would not be a problem were it not for the lack of a rebind function, which kind of sucked.
I did play around with keys and found some that were unlisted, particularly the cockpit view key (V), but was unable to figure out how to dock with anything, which probably wasn't your intent this early on anyway but I figured I'd mention it.
On to the actual physics - the gameplay is slow. It felt very, very similar to flying a 4.85 pre turretsteer era gunboat in a snub brawl, except that I wasn't packing nearly as heavy a punch. While the physics seem very similar to Freelancer, everything is slowed down to the point of it being frankly kind of frustrating for me. The weapon arcs also frustrated me, as it was very difficult to tell when I was able to shoot something or not. I did notice you implemented a sort of autoaim esque feature similar to Freelancer's, but it only functions on turrets that have an arc on the target, meaning one gun could be shooting at the target and the other off into space, which just feels kinda clumsy and odd.
Before giving this any sort of test run again I see two things as being absolutely essential - the ability to rebind keys, and some kind of sound cues for everything happening. Target locks, gun sounds, engines states, the works. It was very difficult to tell what was happening just by looking at the screen. Audio, even if just a primative test library of noises, is integrally important to determining the feel of a game.
Overall I'm not a huge fan of the way you have things slowed down right now, but I know there are a lot of people who find Freelancer's combat to be too fast paced, so maybe you'll find an audience there. The most important things for you right now are to get some sounds and key rebinds in ASAP.
Hey there! I just made a second build with faster paced combat, full sound effect, key binding setup (F10, note that there's a bug that freezes the game if you hit F10 before the HUD appears), and a power management feature. Would you mind test it out and see if it got any better
Thanks!
RE: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Durandal - 10-25-2018
Will try to give it a look shortly.
RE: First Build of Fringe Worlds! Combat Playtest - Rotorist - 10-26-2018
(10-25-2018, 03:04 AM)Durandal Wrote: Will try to give it a look shortly.
thanks!