Possible Errors in RC4

[Jonny]

Hi ufo-people,

big thanks for that game, it gave me some entertaining hours. Here some errors i found (sorry sometimes i don't use the original descriptions/terms, i'm playing the German version):


Possible game errors:

[list=1]

• After loading a savegame, all research in progress is set to 0%.
• Is there a UFO on the world screen, i want to pursue it. I click on the UFO to select the Interceptor to bring it down. But no matter which i chose, its always the team carrier following the UFO (and of course its too slow).

Both planes are equipped, manned & fuelled.
new: I tried to investigate the problem further: I demanned the team-carrier and i wanted to chose the interceptor to start a (terror) mission, but there is written i have to sign a team to the ship (the interceptor is equipped with 1 guy).
Then i tried to put 2 soldiers to the team carrier but chosed the interceptor to start the terror mission. Now it works, but when the mission starts i have the 2 soldiers i signed to the carrier. It seems no matter what i chose the carrier is chosen anyway.

• During missions i can't pick up dropped plasma guns (middle & heavy) left on alien bodies. Tried on several missions, hands and/or backpack are free. Other items work fine.
• After starting a mission (mapname village07d) i couldn't select any of my soldiers. None of them was visible on the screen and the soldier select buttons (1-8, on the top of the screen) were all grey. It was possible to end the round or to just abort.
  
  
• new: Mission on map pdi08d: teams seems to be changed. I'm in alien position with just 4 of my soldiers, aliens are behaving like civilians. After i end the round, there is just 1 other team. If i kill 1 "alien" civilian the mission ends succesfully with 1 civilian loss.
  
  [/list:o]
  
  Possible logical/minor errors:
  
  [list=a]
  
• Not all items dropped by aliens seem to appear in my hq storage after i finish a mission, but it seems i could buy them. A statistic "salvaged artifacts" after the mission would be helpful (including all dropped artifacts would be salvaged automaticly).
• Why is it possible to buy alien artifacts at all?
• Why is it far more expensive to produce weapons than to buy them?
• Why is there a limit of how many standart weapons/equipment (non alien technology) are avaible to buy?
[/list:o]

Other Info:

Game Version: RC4 / WindowsXP
Players PC: Athlon Thunderbird 1400 / 512 MB RAM
Players hair color: blonde


Thanks again for your great job, i hope you'll keep on!

[ubequitz]

Thanks for the bug reports and questions.

Issue 1 you identified is fixed in the current development version. I suspect issue 2 is as well but this would need testing (since I know that a very closely related bug was fixed which I believe would also fix this).

Issue 3 looks like a bug which is likely to still be present in the development version... I will investigate.

Issues 4 & 5 I'm not sure about. Both those maps have undergone heavy bugfixing since RC4 though.

The items that you collect on missions are meant to go to the marketplace for purchase. After a mission you should notice that you are awarded the value of those weapons.. so buying them back is essentially free. It might be better if the weapons went into storage and then you could sell them... but this could get annoying after a while (you would have to manualle sell a bunch of things after every missio to get money).

Your artifiact salvage stat screen is a great idea. Hopefully we can implement something like this.

I agree with you that more standard equipment should be available at the start of the game for purchase.

[Jonny]

Hi ubequitz,

thanks for your reply and help.

The idea to sell all items automaticly is great and comfortable for me, even if its confusing just in the first moment. The game gives such a fantastic X-Com feeling that even small differences should be more evident (i.e. with salvage stat screen you could give a hint what will happen with the items the players just collected).

I tried different things to bypass problem number #2. One of them was to build a second base with a new interceptor. But it didn't help. The second interceptor is signed to the first base (hq), even if it should be impossible (there is just 1 interceptor hangar in hq).

[Bandobras]

Thank you for the reports and analysis. Is the scarcity of human weapons at the beginning fun or woe? Is the problem that  it's different from XCom, or is the problem elsewhere? How quickly should the human weapons and ammo be available in great quantities (currently it's probably a month or two into the game)? Does the ammo scarcity lead to trying out all weapons and fun or to nervousness and trying to spare each shot? Would an explanation at the game start, that ammo will be more and more plentiful as the base organization is getting better, resolve the anxiety?

[Jonny]

Hi Bandobras,

the scarcity of human weapons isn't a gameplay problem, the player is more or less forced to use most types of weapons avaible, which is good. Using them he discovers the fun of the lesser usual weapons as the flamethrower i.e.. I can talk just for myself: I don't spare any shot in the game (except from far range shootings) - when there is an alien to shoot, i'm going after it (isn't that the fun of the game?).

But besides this its a question of logic: Why shouldn't an organization like Phalanx (its military, isn't it?) be able to buy more than 5 rifles? The answer could be high bureaucracy inside the organization.

An idea could be to have all human weapons avaible in high numbers from the beginning, but when the player tries to buy more than a few, there could be a message like "You reached the yearly weopon limit given by the government".

[...] Is the problem that it's different from XCom? [...]

In my opinion ufoai is as much as the X-Com games as it should be, i like the new ideas and details. Important is the basis analogy as the world screen, the base managment, the tactical missions and the atmosphere.

[Bandobras]

Yeah, I'm currently looking for a believable excuse of the weapon shortage. I'm not good at believable stuff, though. But, as the base is starting to operate after a long time of being (nearly) abandoned, Phalanx is just starting up, UN is just starting to supervise any miliary program after decades and wars are almost forgotten, excuses should not be hard to find, without even employing any plot twists for them... It all depends on whether any better initial equipment game-balance can be found and if not, whether the storyline guys will agree to cope with this particular balance...

[Jonny]

What of this:

The world is in peace united as one nation, so who needs guns? The restrictions are high and so are the prices to get weapons in big numbers (just the first few Phalanx guns are sponsored by the UN itself).
I image the situation as in "Demolition Man", all cops running around with phasers, giving tickets for swearing in public.

... or all weapon dealers got stoned to death by amnesty international.

... or all the people in the world got superstitious and threw the guns into the ocean, singing a childish rhyme.

... or the leaders of the UN are highly religious gurus who don't allow people to use things in the color of grey, black or silver (its the comeback of goldfinger then ... yeah )

[Bandobras]

Hehe. But we have to stick to the official backstory, see the wiki for the finished nations writeup (more will come later). I may be wrong, but probably the intro sequences on the wiki are from the final version, too. It seems soldiers are still walking Earth, even if there are no more wars...

[Jonny]

From what i read in the the wiki (in General -> Storyline), there is nothing written wether the rest of the world is armed or not.


While i continued to play, i had 2 new errors:

• 6. In map pdi08d:  The civilians have got alien skin and there is one fire ladder in the south east where the upper level is not accessible. From the ground level of the building to the next level it is possible to walk up the stairs, but not to the next (the roof level).

Screenshot

• 7. My second base got attacked by aliens, but i could not start the mission. The screen got black and there was written "Base is not under attack".

Some other small suggestions:

• e. The numpad number keys are not working, i would use them to access my soldiers directly.
• f. In the screen to arm the soldiers it should be possible to unload the weapons (i.e. when ammo is tight and some ammo is inside not used guns).

[dimon37]

Hi. I am playing RC4. It's February 23rd, i completed 14 missions and now my base is under attack. I started the mission, killed all the aliens (with no losses to my guys), but still when i enter the base screen, it says "the base is under attack". is this a well-known bug?

[dimon37]

I looked through the code (that came with RC4) and the only cases of setting baseStatus are either BASE_UNDER_ATTACK or BASE_NOT_USED. Shouldn't baseStatus be set to something normal if base attack is defeated?

[ubequitz]

The base status never being reset bug is fixed in the SVN version (thanks for dropping by on IRC BTW, and for planning to test SVN for us!).

[dimon37]

I downloaded everything, rebuilt everything with DevCpp, even managed to start the game. but when I wen to the first mission, it complained about not finding the map. So, now I am recompiling the maps. Will let you know how it goes.

Another thing I noticed. Aliens get tougher with each mission, right? But your equipment gets better only with time, because you have to research things to be able to use them. Or is this not correct impression?

[Bandobras]

Aliens get tougher with each mission, right? But your equipment gets better only with time, because you have to research things to be able to use them.

Yes, this is a race between you and aliens. This is why I badly need testing to know what should the intervals between missions be, etc.

[dimon37]

ok, it's January 27th and i just got my 6th mission. All 6 initial scientists are working on Advanced Plasma control still. We'll see how soon i can get Tachion Control and research Tachion sniper rifle :-)