There’s a couple of mercenary ships you can also get at various points of the game that are extremely powerful.
AI module update is in QA now.
Re why even allow the option? The reason is that some people would prefer to focus on the story. A big challenge with Star Control is that it is an action arcade style game mixed with an RPG. What if the player doesn’t like the action part?
I’m considering requesting an auto-resolve option even for those players but I’d be curious to hear what you guys think.
Auto resolve is always a nice option when you just want to ‘get on’ with it. Like in Total War I use it when I do not have time to fight the battles, although I would think that Arcade fights in SC:O probably do not take upwards to an hour as the TW battles do.
Still haven’t had time to try this out, but hopefully soon :)
I like the option. This could also avoid AI pathing, targeting, and general ineffectiveness issues for those that just want to use the AI and not waste their time watching. I don’t see any downsides to adding it.
If you’re polling for opinions, I like the combat but I can see a time coming when I just kind of want to get on with things. An auto resolve option would be handy.
I’ve found a couple of powerful ships like that. I forget their exact point values, but one was maybe 20 or a bit more and another time I got 3 ships at once with one of them being around 20 points. The problem I encountered with all of these is they didn’t refill/repair their health at Earth or any other location I visited with them. Handy for a fight or two, but then I’m back to the same pile of mostly-useless ships. This is, in part, what sent me down the path of ignoring the fleet and just focusing on the main ship.
I’m somehow loving this game. I have not played a StarControl game before and I guess I like the formula. Combat’s fine to me, resource gathering is relaxing (although: planets do have real potential that isn’t quite used). I also like the ship movement on the maps - feels like a real journey ;)
So things are great BUT there is no situation in which entities travel through the stars and their only mapping tools are eight different colored crosshairs! : \ I want to know: on which planet I have already been, which solar system with which outcome I have already visited. I want to take notes and I want to make this the easy way! Best would be my advanced technology would take some notes for me. That’s my only main gripe.
@Brad_Wardell question Is the mission that asks you to follow clues to beta llovren [sic] just about contacting the Free Trandals? I’ve already done the Free Trandals stuff through some other means, including the virus clean up, so don’t know if this mission is about something else or can be ignored. Also those Harmony ships. Ouch!
Just a suggestion:
Add a Steam achievement for going into every options page.
Might get people to notice stuff they have otherwise missed :)
on the other hand, I suppose Achievement hunters already know how to use ‘options’.
So guess no reason to.
I’ll get my coat.
So is the game better with keyboard controls or a gamepad? (I have an Xbox controller I can plug into my PC.) I’m asking as someone who isn’t great at arcade combat but isn’t averse to it either.
I haven’t tried it with mouse/keyboard. It feels fine with my xbox one wireless controller that came with the oculus. Sometimes it does seem like it forgets that there is a controller, and you have to click something with the mouse before it realizes the controller is there again, but that has only happened to me with menu or dialog interactions, not in the middle of combat or anything.
I’ll agree with the rest; I love the action part, but I know it’s not for everyone and making a game more flexible for any given player is never a bad thing. If it doesn’t take up too many resources, I’d give it a go.
I recall the Sylandro probes of SC2 and how you eventually learned to auto-destruct them. That became a massive relief, because they weren’t very fun to fight. Just a thought, but maybe have a system where you “teach” your AI to fight, requiring one battle (win or lose) vs. each type to offer the option? Perhaps that’s too much, but just spitballing.
It definitely gets hard to remember where you’ve been and which planets and moons you’ve explored as the number of systems visited increases. I tried making little markers using the cross hairs, but it just wasn’t sufficient and hard to reference. I still use it all the time, but not for every little detail.
I’d LOVE it if there was at least a visual indicator of stars visited in the map, a visual indicator of planets I’ve already scanned, and a different indicator for planets I’ve landed on. I’d even be happy with something as simple as:
Map:
Star dots on the map become another shape (triangles?) if I’ve already been there
In a solar system:
Planets and moons get a visible line below them in the solar system if I’ve scanned them before.
Planets and moons get either a second line or a simple shape on the line (diamond in the center?) if I’ve landed on them.
Anything like that would be helpful, but more detailed notes in the captains log (or an alternate window) would be nice - especially if I can add my own. Oh, and searching. When the captains log grows huge, I wish I could have a little search box to find matching text.
Tagging @Brad_Wardell per @RichVR suggestion. I hope that’s the correct way to “tag” :)
As far as I can tell, it’s impossible to search for star systems on the sector map with a controller, nor can you zoom in/out on that map. I started the campaign with a controller, but switched to mouse/keyboard quickly. Fleet Battles is fine with a gamepad.
