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Author Topic: My Humble Suggestions  (Read 3645 times)

SlipperyJim

  • Guest
My Humble Suggestions
« on: August 31, 2006, 05:53:10 am »
My first suggestion is that when RIGHT MOUSE CLICKing over an empty space your soldier should turn but not move in that direction.

There doesn't seem to be a feature to turn your soldier in the direction you want them to face.   As the game exists now if you RIGHT MOUSE CLICK over an empty space your soldier will move to that square.  We already have LEFT MOUSE CLICK to do that.  Why not use RIGHT MOUSE CLICK as a way of changing the facing direction?

Pardon me in advance if this has already been suggested.

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My second suggestion is that it needs to be made clearer who is taking their turn.   Saying "team 8" doesn't make much sense to anyone but you developers, lol.

Sometimes I don't know when the civilians and/or aliens have finished taking their turn and control has been returned to me.  I just sit there wondering if it is my turn yet.

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I really do miss the ability to choose the fire mode of the weapon.  There is Primary and Secondary fire mode but I didn't have a clue what that meant (until I noticed the cryptic breakdown saying snapshot or aimed).

You must remember that probably the majority of people won't read the manual and won't know either. Perhaps you could make the icons for the fire modes a little clearer as well as the text that is displayed.

Aimed, burst, and full auto was a great system in Xcom :)

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Footstep sounds needed :)

Map related sounds would be great too ie if your camera is over trees you might hear birds chirping or over a computer panel you hear electronic sounds.   I know this is being picky and too much to ask for a game made by fans but I can dream!

Usually I find looping music really irritating in games so most of the time I turn off the music.  Without environmental effects the game sounds dead.

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Since the game isn't auto cycling through the soldiers like Xcom did perhaps you could have the corresponding number of the soldier at the top of the screen turn grey if you have moved him or used TUs.

The reason this would be done is to easily remind the player that they forgot to move one of their soldiers.  For example, if the number 6 is bright white still it shows that you never used any of the TUs available for that soldier.

Right now I am always paranoid I missed moving a soldier and wasting a turn.

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Have an icon to automatically re-center the camera on the currently selected soldier.  Perhaps middle mouse button?

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SAVE feature while in a mission.   Sometimes the missions take a while (especially if you move slowly) and I don't always have the time to finish the map before needing to go to sleep/work.

Would be annoying to lose all your hard work in a mission just because you had to leave for work!

ubequitz

  • Guest
Re: My Humble Suggestions
« Reply #1 on: August 31, 2006, 07:04:35 am »
Your feedback is great. I agree there is room for improvement. Some of the stuff you want is already implemented however, it is just hard to discover (there is a need for better tutorials/documentation!)

Quote from: "SlipperyJim"
My first suggestion is that when RIGHT MOUSE CLICKing over an empty space your soldier should turn but not move in that direction.

Middle clicking or using the ctrl key will do this currently, although it takes 1 time unit a soldier to turn.

Quote from: "SlipperyJim"
My second suggestion is that it needs to be made clearer who is taking their turn.

When you press the turn button your cursor will show a timer. It will return to normal when it is your turn again. In addition when it is your turn to move again there is a notification in the HUD and an accompanying sound effect. Finally you will notice nothing is going on since the camera normally follows any activity of the other "players" (aliens then civilians).

Quote from: "SlipperyJim"
Have an icon to automatically re-center the camera on the currently selected soldier.

Not a bad idea. There may be exactly this feature in the game that I haven't discovered. You can select/center your soldiers by pressing 1 through to 8 (keyboard or the numbers on the HUD). So if you remember which number your guys are you wont have a problem :-)

PS: regarding the sound. I play my own music during the game. I just launch with my entire mp3 collection playing in the background then it is not so boring.

Creating atmospheric gameplay through sound fx is difficult unless we have a dedicated sound engineer - it is quite a task to create 100s of sound effects and link them into the game (notwithstanding, there there are already quite a large variety of sound effects in there already).

SlipperyJim

  • Guest
Re: My Humble Suggestions
« Reply #2 on: September 01, 2006, 03:38:31 am »
Thanks for the info :)   I was up so late last night playing the game I was tired for work today and was grumpy like a five year old lol.

The difference between RC3 and RC4 is amazing.  RC3 seemed a bit lifeless and not much fun but RC4 captures the old XCOM felling much more than UFO:Aftermath.

Quote from: "ubequitz"
In addition when it is your turn to move again there is a notification in the HUD and an accompanying sound effect.


I hear the sound effect now but I always just thought it was an alien making a noise during the alien's turn.   Perhaps have a more military radio sound?   I do see the text notification but it is very easy to miss!

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Soldier Off Screen Animated Faster:

My next suggestion is sometimes when you have your soldier selected you move your camera around until the soldier is off screen and then click to tell him to move.  With the old Xcom because the soldier was off screen it would move him very quickly until he reached the edge of the screen and then he was animated at normal speed.  Would be great if that feature could come back.   Waiting for the soldier to slowing walk onto your screen is somewhat painful.

Of course once again this is just wishful thinking in terms of having the perfect version of an Xcom-like sequel.  I understand that you guys are busy :)


Which Ammo Is This?

There doesn't seem to be rollover text for the ammo types and weapons.   I know that you can select the "OBJECT INFO" tab on the bottom left but it would be great to also have simple hover text.

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Done Research??

How about a little sound effect to alert the player when a message/report is displayed on the Geoscape screen.  Just a little "beep" is fine.   Since the text messages are always shown on the same line sometimes I miss it.

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Exit Without Saving?

I accidentally exited the Geoscape screen without saving!  Please add some sort of confirmation box or autosave feature.

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OPTIONS

When you are on the Geoscape screen it would be great to have access to the SOUND OPTIONS screen and any other that you can add.  Control over the settings would be great without having to exit the game.

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Auto Reaction Fire

Ack!  In single player my soldier just got wasted by a fellow soldier who was set to auto react.  Is there something that can be done so that if a fellow soldier is too near the line of fire the auto reaction fire will not occur?  Of course with rocket launchers I know friendly fire will occur sometimes but today when I was playing it was frustrating to see my soldier shoot another soldier with a rifle when they were obviously too close.

UPDATE:  This happens over and over again.  Friendly fire is a major issue!  If one soldier is standing in front of another obviously the back soldier should not fire!!  Please fix :)

SlipperyJim

  • Guest
My Humble Suggestions
« Reply #3 on: September 02, 2006, 12:13:47 am »
Center Camera At Round Start:

In single player, sometimes the camera will follow a moving alien or civilian during the computer's turn.  When the player's turn starts the camera is far from where you want it (which would be over your soldiers).   Please have the camera re-center over Soldier #1 at the beginning of the player's turn.