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Kynesis

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Everything posted by Kynesis

  1. You mean a stand-alone game designed over years from the ground up with no other constraints to be a space dog-fighting sim?
  2. I appreciate that a lot of work has gone into it, several guys probably worked weekends for months to make the deadline, so with respect I offer just a few short responses. The Tutorial as many have stated is underwhelming and somewhat puzzling. I ran it a few times because things just didn't add up; I noticed a tiny icon on the left which upon mousing over notes that you need to hit the space bar to advance to the next section of the tutorial - I honestly gave up on it the first time because I that little icon didn't even register to me as being part of the tutorial, I simply thought that it was broken. The stop / start nature of the tutorial is jarring and frustrating - it distracts from the tutorials purpose and makes us wonder why things aren't working. In other news, the bold red text that flashes up which also alerts us that we need to press the space bar is as effective as it is elsewhere ie practically invisible - particularly when our attention is focused elsewhere. The blocks of text aren't terribly helpful, they declare things that we pretty much just assume and do nothing to tell us for example, how the pvp scoring system works or what the symbols mean. I found that the deafult keybinds are not well thought out for the most part and that I can't strafe with either default or re-mapped keybinds. Keybinds are per character, this is not convenient. The tutorial ends regardless of what you do after a few minutes, so figuring out keybinds with some kind of area to test them in is an exercise in frustration. The high skill cap means that the name "Domination" couldn't be more apt - entire matches are easily dominated by one or two people who score hundreds of objective points vs everybody else's tens of points; new players frequently scoring only a handful or just zero while they're picked off & have no idea how they've died. I flipped my view at one point to reverse, absolutely nfi how but after a while it returned to normal. As with most space sim games, much of the time is spent making tight circles, often just trying to figure out where the objectives and other craft are. The mini map is super tiny, people who don't have great vision must find that it's little more than a blurry box. Even with very good sight it does very little to inform me about my position relative to objectives & landmarks, let alone other players. The leading sights on the hud (diamonds) give no indication of distance, it's extremely easy to turn toward a given mark and either overshoot it or turn infinitely because there's no way of knowing the target's speed or distance; the issue is of course compounded if they're turning too. Weapons need tooltips of some kind to remind people of their ranges. The shield diagram needs some indication to let us know its orientation, this seems like a no-brainer. The throttle. Holding it down the entire time is flat out stupid, the default should be maximum throttle or have some extra cost / benefit for going faster than the default value. So far my feeling is that unless there's some kind of skill matching, it will end up like Firefall pvp (very skill based and the core of the game, as envisioned by its creators) - they have disabled PvP entirely pending a complete remake from the ground up. Just a few skilled players completely dominated the game and they ended up being the only ones who played it. The upgrade system has a nice amount of depth to it but it's definitely not casual friendly, I imagine most people will stab around at them without really having any understanding of what they should be aiming for or why various features synergize particularly well (or not). I wasn't going to mention the aesthetics of the ships, I suspect it's going to be a case of extremes, either loving or hating them. Personally, I think they're (generally) atrocious. I feel no connection to them, no desire to be associated with them. Again, speaking only for myself - the idea of a bit of paint making them look better is pure comedy. Lots of art direction (the blocky asymmetric junk, particularly. Not because of the asymmetry but because of how awful the pieces are) in swtor though really grinds my gears. It's a fantastic way to disenfranchise people.
  3. Are we talking about actual, meaningful class changes or (vastly more likely) a few minor tweaks, maybe an updated icon here & there that still cause massive uproar amongst the disturbingly large number of luddites?
  4. Just for reference here's a table for all countries who observe DST (and during which dates). ... and this rather handy page shows a map of the world with all current times (on mouseover).
  5. Timezones & daylight savings sometimes add confusion.
  6. Yknow.. if you've got a spare Sunday afternoon there Hazed, why not grab a nice flexible little Unity3D game full of fluffy friendly Python & Javascript and just plug it into say, a nice sparkly new Unreal4 (with a few little tweaks, like those you noted earlier of course). Show everybody just how easy it is - be sure to get back to us when you're done. Oh... don't forget full performance testing & optimisation for 30+ video cards, backend integration and asset conversions Bye!
  7. One day, when you grow up OP, you may find out that 'getting stuff out the door' or closing a deal tends to trump all other concerns; that deadlines are called 'deadlines' for a reason and that as much as it sucks, 'fix it as you go' is endemic to *all* businesses. On a side note, I very much doubt that even if the final encounter of the new Operations suite were a free kill that it would in any way affect you. It is unfortunate that sometimes BW make mistakes, suck it up princess.
  8. I wanted to post something along the lines of "Pick a day, any day, just pick one day on a regular schedule and stick with it." The other side of it all is that while Aussies grumble, Americans absolutely freak out at even the tiniest inconvenience - as far as that goes, I do sympathise with BW (and other businesses). We need to be able to at least plan for down time though, we've got our own lives and commitments; MMO's require quite a lot of time and particularly at the higher end of play, regular and well managed practice.
  9. We're looking for reliable Imperial top grillers from down under to fill a variety of roles. NiM progression ops run twice a week from 7pm to 11pm, Wednesday and Thursday (barring any patches). Contact Kynesis or Reyå via in-game mail.
  10. I've only found second hand information, a quote on an Aion forum without source. ===================================== Unfortunately Battleping is currently offline. Yesterday when working to swap some failed hardware we ran into some issues with the replacment. This has caused some delays and we are now swapping over to new hardware. Battleping will be online again sometime tomorrow 11th September 2013. We apologise for the inconveniences caused. =====================================
  11. Downloading the client takes an entire day, consumes 1/5+ of my monthly data allowance and doesn't reliably facilitate character copy, nor does it offer the alternative of test characters with suitable gear already kitted out. The gearing option for characters that do copy is flexible but overall very clunky and time consuming. By the time all of that's sorted out, I've used up most of the time I have available to do anything useful on the PTS - let-alone (repeatedly) go through the hassles of forming a group of like-minded *and capable* people who are also interested in spending a similar amount of time / energy investigating the same things. In short, it is quite literally a waste of time.
  12. Ahh patch week. I'm so glad you're here, those damn Aussies started logging in again. F'n sorted.
  13. -Are you paid subscriber or free-to-play Subscriber. -Do you think the game has a future or not say, let's be reasonable, a year from now without major cutbacks It'll tick along but its chance to really be all that it could be has long since passed. It is a great shame that that boat has sailed but there's no point dwelling on it. You'll be a much happier person if you just appreciate what is rather than what could have been. -Do you think the game is improved and will I see a difference if I left two months after release until now It's improved greatly, there are a vast number of under-the-hood improvements and non-obvious improvements and to their credit, BW are constantly fixing & tweaking little (and not-so-little) things. -Are you going to keep playing SWTOR, even with other titles coming out like Skyrim or Wildstar. Does it have your allegiance? Skyrim & Wildstar deserve their own audiences, they've got some nice potential and while they're on my radar its purely out of curiosity about what they can create. EverQuest Next looks very interesting, mostly because the devs seem to be thinking the same things that I do and have a wealth of experience to back up their grand visions. Having said that, I have serious doubts that they'll be able to bring to bear all the huge features they tout. Other games that promised the world have come and gone and delivered only fractions of their visions. -What are your highest priorities to see added or fixed in terms of content or game issues that would make you stay longer? This is problematic - MMO's by their nature draw on an extremely diverse audience, with very different interests and priorities. On top of that people's interests are affected greatly by previous games they've been involved with (for better or worse) and, as you've noticed, by as-yet unreleased games and even 'the grass is greener' syndrome. Speaking as an ex-WoW player, I feel strongly that if we can choose only one aspect of the game as the single most important priority, then the gameplay itself needs the most work going forward. It's in a good place for the most part but it still rests entirely on decade-old mechanics and principles. i.e. The classes need more dynamism, the things we can do and the choices we make need to be more interesting, visual effects need to be more carefully tailored, the 'look and feel' needs to be iconic and interesting.
  14. So very much this... and seriously, don't pull with your taunt, ever.
  15. The above is what you normally get from the rabble of a forum and is totally suitable when you're talking about the noise of hundreds of individual voices. That misses the whole point of using a class representative - which was to distill the most important issues from the masses of opinion and debate among the many people of all ranges of skill and interests and to have them presented by a spokesperson who as judged by the community, best understands the issues at hand and can present them in a reasonable and responsible fashion. The issues brought forth are those that need to be taken seriously, regardless of the Dev's opinions because the people who devote their free time to this hobby find that despite the devs best intentions and thorough analysis, things aren't working as well as they need to or because players have found through many, many hours of personal experience that there are pieces missing from the puzzle. Soliciting the legitimate concerns of an individual or a community and then dismissing them is the epitome of shooting ones-self in the foot. In case there's any doubt - the correct answer, of the least committal is something along the lines of "Well.. we don't agree that these issues are as serious as people think, but that in itself means that we need to investigate them. We'll figure out why our perceptions don't match and work to bridge the gap." *edit: not because it sounds diplomatic (though obviously I place some weight on that), but because there is a serious disconnect between the devs intentions and understanding and the real world application of their creations. Having said all that, I also recognise that they're under a great deal of pressure on all fronts and that mmo players particularly are demanding and often hold mmo game makers to very high standards, much higher than they might of... pretty much anything, because there is such a level of investment.
  16. Wow... that is some seriously impressive trolling BW. Months of work and discussions, theory crafting, building up peoples hopes and leading them to elect somebody to stand up and speak on their behalf in an officially sponsored capacity... and then slap them down with a trusty old "LOL L2P noobs". It's tempting to re-address the points of the discussion, like why being able to shoot back with Shoulder Cannon while stunned (and almost certainly being the focus target, particularly in a ranked / competitive environment) is meaningless... but that kind of answer isn't one that should need to be given to somebody who understands how PvP works, in any mmo. The same needs to be said of a dps class relying on heals to get them out of a bad situation... I honestly and in all seriousness can not believe that this answer could be given by a professional game designer or even a moderately experienced player. ... and gap closers / mobility vs pot shots... just... wow. That's some spaced out thinking. I take it that there's no room for debate on this, those answers sound rather final.
  17. Assuming BW can magically pull things together and create an expansion, I'd like it to be the exact opposite of everything they did with Makeb. Create areas that are interesting to visit, that have some kind of identity / character and reason to return other than the levelling quests (no, not grindfest "kill x mobs in a field standing around awaiting their turn" dailies). Create NPC characters that possess personality and some vestige of enthusiasm or emotion. Use companions to flesh out quest areas and thereby make them interesting to revisit. Use terrain other than flat fields with a few piles of rocks - don't separate a bunch of identical plateaus with loading screens... in fact come to think of it, make a real effort to cut down on loading screens altogether (including the pitch black overlays that make it look like your PC has crashed). Whatever happened to the 'second Belsavis' arc? The Esh'ka and the possible story arcs they might be involved in are infinitely more interesting than a bunch of dudes with guns on a nondescript planet in the middle of nowhere changing sides because the Hutts gave them money (while epic space battles we never see rage across a bunch of star systems). Breathe some life into the gameplay of the game (ie combat). It's nice that the abilities we possess grant us (and require) a certain level of competence and priority systems do lend themselves to the 'easy to learn, hard to master' grail but once you've got the hang of it there really isn't much in the way of capitalising on opportunities (outside of the occasional aoe pack, but those are their own encounters and (rightly) nearly never a component of core encounters).
  18. Nice work there BW, I was concerned that apac players might log in this week.
  19. Arenas will almost certainly be very good for the game but as everybody has pointed out, it greatly magnifies every detail of gameplay. I very much look forward to seeing the game grow and evolve, especially with regard to introducing new and interesting gameplay mechanics but the oceans of QQ the devs will face at every turn... brace yourselves guys, you're in for a whole lot of 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' choices and a very insistent player-base who demand that you make those choices, and that every different facet of the game will want their interests prioritised. We don't yet know if BW will walk a different path - the intention of WoW's Arenas from the start was to develop a competitive environment akin to that of games like StarCraft, DoTA and LOL. Each season offered very significant rewards for all types of players, from the scrubbiest scrubs to the elitist of jerks. For much of its existence, Arena gear was a totally viable alternative to PvE gear and significantly superior to battleground (warzone) gear. A great many people with no chance at actually competing joined in all the time to grind their faces away to grasp at the wonderful items on offer. Do you remember the waves of game-fixing, account selling, win trading and various levels of cheap tricks / cheats?
  20. OP picked the first game, Eric should have the option to challenge him in return. I think a nice friendly game of roshambo would be perfect.
  21. Need vs Greed is an archaic system, it makes the loot process a chore and is a hotbed of totally unnecessary and unproductive social issues.
  22. It's always been the obvious answer as it "inconveniences the fewest people" - which is fine, in absolute terms, but it chips away at APAC players because it inconveniences the entirety of a single region every time. They held off the issue of mergers as long as possible but have ultimately written off the APAC region as a total loss. There's no point changing maintenance times now because in real terms it really does inconvenience a very small number of people, we've lost that many. It gets harder every day now just to find enough to simply run content where once we had a bunch of world-class end-game guilds.
  23. I offer the following to the people who made the new Dark Ward. Swinburne University: Basic Design Principles. Please pay particular attention to the section on 'Visual Hierarchy'. While I am being deliberately snarky because there are a number of eye-gougingly bad visual design choices in swtor, Swinburne does offer some really good courses through iTunes U (i.e. free).. go have a look.
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