UFO:AI pre2.2 Review on Free Gamer

[wastelandmerc]

Like in name of topic: Enjoy.

[freegamer]

I've been accused of being snotty and rude but I hope that, despite whatever negative noise you consider there to be in the piece, you can discern the positive and constructive criticisms in there.

[Punkiee]

This review sure is valuable for the moment. Too bad it is next to useless in a month. While i am happy with a review of the beta, just for the sake of hearing an opinion, i see little value in it for the audience of players. Those players will go for version 2.1.1 and the review will still be read in months to come, giving out of date information. Furthermore it mixed the development and the playing part. They are very different audiences and the issues are also not depending on each other.
While the opinions are valuable, the blogentry itself isnt as much.

I recommend an article on playing 2.1.1 or on 2.2 when its finished. I would recommend a separate article on an behind the scenes of the game, aka the development. But with the warning that the author did not take part in development and that the experience is only based on a svn co and make. The information sources, the background of the reporter and the method used are very very important for journalism but alas seldom recognised.

[Hoehrer]

FYI: You might want to read the read the follow-up thread (from a development view) in our mailing list on this blog-post:
http://lists.cifrid.net/pipermail/ufoai/2007-October/000172.html

Some of the issues Charlie encountered (aircraft stuff) are already fixed in svn or will be fixed in 2.2
General usability improvements are planned for later version. Right now (2.2)  making everything work consistently is out topmost priority.

Thanks for the review btw. It was nice to read (considering the fact that it was about a dev-version of the game)
Also charlie: make sure you use the ufoai_2.2 instead of trunk branch if you want to further test the current version.

Werner

[shaft350x]

Found my way to the game because of the review, but I kind of thought he missed some of the point of the game.  Since it is paying homage to X-Com where all of the "micro-management" stuff comes from, I don't think you can really just automate it all.  I haven't played too far into it yet, but I have enjoyed it so far, seems true enough to the style of play that used to keep me addicted for hours at a time.  I'm looking forward to the continued improvements.