FreeGameDev

Everyone is talking about weapon balance, but there some more serious problems with this game.

1. Hidden features like hiding gun or high contrast players (firstpersonblend and fullbrightmodels) and field of view adjustment. Tech-saavy players can look up the commands, but noobs will never find them.

2. Insane 5 seconds respawn delay. Seriously, I think we need a mass aimbot infestation so elite super-pros see how noobs feel having to wait over and over and over again... Having to FIND an opponent to fight on a medium to large map is already enough penalty. In CTF it's probably necessary, but it would be nice if the repsawn delay got shorter as you move away from your base. It'd also provide incentive for players to attack instead of camping.

3. Screens that are impossible to exit. There's a Sauerbraten map server. If you don't have Sauerbraten and try to enter it, you get stuck in loading screen, with no way to escape besides /disconnect (which noobs may not know).

4. Tricks are a pain to use because there's no quick indication how much energy you have left. It would be nice if battery meter was in the center of the screen instead of in the corner.

All these make this game a pain instead of pleasure to play. I know about alternative huds and mods and variables, but I don't turn them on because I don't want to be a cheater. (I still play the game because most fast paced shooter alternatives are based on bugs. At least RE has intuitive controls).

Weapon balance is a serious issue, but I digress.

1. What's your point? Those "features" are just gimmicks that ruin the spirit of the game to give an "edge"; minus FOV adjustment. Players are going to have to face the fact that due to the insane number of things the game can be customized through variables, documenting them all is no easy feat (which is done by fellow community members on volunteered time) and esoteric things more useful for debug purposes aren't going to be the first things to be documented.
   
2. If waiting 5 seconds kills players' interest, then they have ADD. Seriously...if you think 5 seconds is a long time, then never play the defending team in Attack/Defend in Team Fortress 2. You wait 20 seconds per death.
   
3. Never heard of this before, but it's a legitimate problem if it's true. (I still find it hard to believe that one wouldn't know "/disconnect" though)
   
4. There's already enough around the crosshair. Some players already hate the clutter. If glancing to the bottom left to see a large, multicolored bar is too much effort, then play at a lower resolution so you can see it easier or something. Or get familiar with how much impulse a particular chain of moves will cost.

I fail to see how these are "great issues".

lamefun {l Wrote}:Everyone is talking about weapon balance, but there some more serious problems with this game.

1. Hidden features like hiding gun or high contrast players (firstpersonblend and fullbrightmodels) and field of view adjustment. Tech-saavy players can look up the commands, but noobs will never find them.

You cannot hide gun or high contrast players, afaik. Field of view can be changed with /fov and /zoomfov.
I understand that some people will not be able to find them, but surprisingly, most of the good RE players are quite knowledgeable about the game's inner workings. However, I agree that they need to be more obvious.
UNfortunately, this would require adding options to the options menu, and quin has already admitted that it is an absolute mess and needs to be redone. Don't count on this big job being completed anytime soon.

lamefun {l Wrote}:2. Insane 5 seconds respawn delay. Seriously, I think we need a mass aimbot infestation so elite super-pros see how noobs feel having to wait over and over and over again... Having to FIND an opponent to fight on a medium to large map is already enough penalty. In CTF it's probably necessary, but it would be nice if the repsawn delay got shorter as you move away from your base. It'd also provide incentive for players to attack instead of camping.

Yeah, I agree, should probably be cut in half to 2.

lamefun {l Wrote}:3. Screens that are impossible to exit. There's a Sauerbraten map server. If you don't have Sauerbraten and try to enter it, you get stuck in loading screen, with no way to escape besides /disconnect (which noobs may not know).

There is a way, /disconnect, as you said, so it is not "impossible". However this would go along with our menu problems; if there is not a ticket for this, create one.

lamefun {l Wrote}:4. Tricks are a pain to use because there's no quick indication how much energy you have left. It would be nice if battery meter was in the center of the screen instead of in the corner.

Making modifications to the HUD is currently incredibly hard, and the entire code needs to be rewritten in order for any of it to be easily accessible. This is again a long-term thing, which won't be done any time soon.

lamefun {l Wrote}:Everyone is talking about weapon balance, but there some more serious problems with this game.
All these make this game a pain instead of pleasure to play. I know about alternative huds and mods and variables, but I don't turn them on because I don't want to be a cheater. (I still play the game because most fast paced shooter alternatives are based on bugs. At least RE has intuitive controls).

Respawn delay, and the position of the energy meter is more important than the weapons that make up the core of this game? I think not.
Saying these issues are more important than they actually are will not help your case or get them done faster.
By the way, good job trying to sound "pro" and "knowledgeable" about our game: there are no alternative HUD's for RE; modified vars or mods installed offline will not affect online. The only thing that would be cheating simply would be hacking.

To close let me quote Samual, lead dev of Xonotic:

Samual {l Wrote}:Do it yourself, or stop complaining.

While I am happy to engage in legitimate and specific debates over the game mechanics, this thread is nothing more than points raised in the past which have been dismissed (seriously, I am not taking out fullbrightmodels, nor am I going to turn it on by default and make the game look like shit for everyone), or are matters of personal opinion/taste (aside from the "getmap" issue, which I'm aware of too - non-default maps are not a priority for me and new bugs crop up each time I close one).

You've also made the mistake of saying things like "problems", "insane", inaccurate use of "impossible" and "how much of a pain" it is, while aggressively enforcing your point to a community who are quite proud of the game they've helped shape. This kind of thing will just spark a troll-fest (maybe read my article, "Understanding Open Source").

While I don't agree with most of lamefun's points or the way he presented them, I think we should cut him some slack. Even though the responses have been reasonable and not intended to accuse or offend anyone, he might still take it the wrong way and think we're discouraging people from criticising the game. People can get pretty defensive of their opinions on the Internet, and a flamewar is the last thing any one of us wants.

That said... where did the idea that using mods made you a cheater come from? I'd highly reccommend getting acquainted with RE modding, since most of your problems are personal preferences that might not go well with what the majority of players want. In particular, there are a couple of guis in progress that incorporate other commands, and if you run a server you can always make spawndelay zero or as low as you want it.

3) seems like a real problem though. Could there be a "cancel/disconnect" button on the loading screen?

greaserpirate {l Wrote}:3) seems like a real problem though. Could there be a "cancel/disconnect" button on the loading screen?

I will figure something out before the next release.

Even if it is annoying, I think it is not avoidable that new people come up with old suggestions.
Is is not wrong, if he says that new (unexperienced) players with vanilla settings have an additional disadvantage in comparison to experienced players that also like to play with their vars - closing this gap would make RE more attractive for new players, I think.
But yes, the huge amount of possibilities make this a huge mess, and indeed you can't await a solution soon.
For now, two links that might help, also hoping that other newbies find them too:
viewtopic.php?f=53&t=3106
viewtopic.php?f=72&t=3385&p=33517#p33517
I think there was a 3rd thread with a very big autoexec, that showed how huge the difference to a vanilla setup can be.. please add link or re-post, if you know what I talk about.

5 second respawn delay is good. Rush less, camp more.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:Weapon balance is a serious issue, but I digress.

Weapon balance is indeed broken, but not that far, and noobs can use same weapons as pros, so it doesn't give pros unfair advantage.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:What's your point? Those "features" are just gimmicks that ruin the spirit of the game to give an "edge"; minus FOV adjustment. Players are going to have to face the fact that due to the insane number of things the game can be customized through variables, documenting them all is no easy feat (which is done by fellow community members on volunteered time) and esoteric things more useful for debug purposes aren't going to be the first things to be documented.

Noobs won't discover them even if they are documented, this giving tech-saavy players an unfair advantage that doesn't official count as cheating. These options should be moved into GUI. I'm currently working on that.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:If waiting 5 seconds kills players' interest, then they have ADD. Seriously...if you think 5 seconds is a long time, then never play the defending team in Attack/Defend in Team Fortress 2. You wait 20 seconds per death.

Of course, highly advertised proprietary games can afford that...

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:There's already enough around the crosshair. Some players already hate the clutter. If glancing to the bottom left to see a large, multicolored bar is too much effort, then play at a lower resolution so you can see it easier or something. Or get familiar with how much impulse a particular chain of moves will cost.

It doesn't necessary have to be around crosshair, it could be screen edge dimming or a meter below crosshair or different sounds as you get tired or combination of these.

ball1stic {l Wrote}:UNfortunately, this would require adding options to the options menu, and quin has already admitted that it is an absolute mess and needs to be redone. Don't count on this big job being completed anytime soon.

I started working on options menu today, GNOME 3 style. Here's the current progress: http://wstaw.org/m/2012/12/20/Screenshot_from_2012-12-20_164006.png. It contains only the most important options that are sufficient for most players. Show other options button shows a mammoth menu that will contain all tweaks I can find.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:I fail to see how these are "great issues".

The Global Government has prescribed that PEOPLE don't know how to use any command line unless taught by an educational institution, so hiding commands that give players significant advantage is very bad.

And impulse meter... well, have you never lost a kick-fight because of it? The problem is, for a brief second, even if you're tired, it SEEMS that you still can dash or climb (it makes the same sound, etc).

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:Weapon balance is a serious issue, but I digress.

1. What's your point? Those "features" are just gimmicks that ruin the spirit of the game to give an "edge"; minus FOV adjustment. Players are going to have to face the fact that due to the insane number of things the game can be customized through variables, documenting them all is no easy feat (which is done by fellow community members on volunteered time) and esoteric things more useful for debug purposes aren't going to be the first things to be documented.
   
2. If waiting 5 seconds kills players' interest, then they have ADD. Seriously...if you think 5 seconds is a long time, then never play the defending team in Attack/Defend in Team Fortress 2. You wait 20 seconds per death.
   
3. Never heard of this before, but it's a legitimate problem if it's true. (I still find it hard to believe that one wouldn't know "/disconnect" though)
   
4. There's already enough around the crosshair. Some players already hate the clutter. If glancing to the bottom left to see a large, multicolored bar is too much effort, then play at a lower resolution so you can see it easier or something. Or get familiar with how much impulse a particular chain of moves will cost.

I fail to see how these are "great issues".

Stoc respawntime in enemt territory was 30 seconds, I sort of get this but 5 seconds isnt a big deal, I did reduce it on one of my servers but it never really made a huge difference.

Insane 5 seconds respawn delay. Seriously, I think we need a mass aimbot infestation so elite super-pros see how noobs feel having to wait over and over and over again... Having to FIND an opponent to fight on a medium to large map is already enough penalty. In CTF it's probably necessary, but it would be nice if the repsawn delay got shorter as you move away from your base. It'd also provide incentive for players to attack instead of camping.

Ok so theres a learning curve to every game out there, I played q3 for years and i still suck at fps games. My opnion here is that this exemplifies whats wrong with a lot of this generation, cant point and click, dont want it.
As for the map dload thing, ok so we cant just use the maps from sauer 1 to 1, I get it, but I know one can just grab a sauer map and retexture it in a short time. It would be nice to have download redirects for maps and such, getting maps from the server can be bandwidth-challenging.

The Global Government has prescribed that PEOPLE don't know how to use any command line unless taught by an educational institution, so hiding commands that give players significant advantage is very bad.

Im trying and failing to see the humor in this, again, this is whats wrong with a lot of young gamers today, they have to be taught to think for themselves, if there is no easy way to know something with a few mouse clicks, they wont even try to get past it.

fov, In past fps games has been regulated to a range most times, from around say 80 to 100 degrees, its not a game ender simly because it requires a more precise aim at higher fov's.

Blindman {l Wrote}:Ok so theres a learning curve to every game out there, I played q3 for years and i still suck at fps games. My opnion here is that this exemplifies whats wrong with a lot of this generation, cant point and click, dont want it.

In this game, you die, like, in 10 seconds after you get control. So you spend 1/3 of your game time in respawn delay. Not good. A better way to boost learning curve would make the game itself harder instead of depriving people of practice time.

Blindman {l Wrote}:Im trying and failing to see the humor in this, again, this is whats wrong with a lot of young gamers today, they have to be taught to think for themselves, if there is no easy way to know something with a few mouse clicks, they wont even try to get past it.

Because they can't. The Global Government has prescribed that.

lamefun {l Wrote}:

Blindman {l Wrote}:Ok so theres a learning curve to every game out there, I played q3 for years and i still suck at fps games. My opnion here is that this exemplifies whats wrong with a lot of this generation, cant point and click, dont want it.

In this game, you die, like, in 10 seconds after you get control. So you spend 1/3 of your game time in respawn delay. Not good. A better way to boost learning curve would make the game itself harder instead of depriving people of practice time.

Blindman {l Wrote}:Im trying and failing to see the humor in this, again, this is whats wrong with a lot of young gamers today, they have to be taught to think for themselves, if there is no easy way to know something with a few mouse clicks, they wont even try to get past it.

Because they can't. The Global Government has prescribed that.

Youre a funny guy.
Global government to me means a lot of left wingers screaming their fool heads off, must mean something different to you no?

Reducing spawn times isnt really going to do much for that, campers are campers and always will be. Might makes more sense to increase spawn shield time, more time to run.

lamefun {l Wrote}:

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:There's already enough around the crosshair. Some players already hate the clutter. If glancing to the bottom left to see a large, multicolored bar is too much effort, then play at a lower resolution so you can see it easier or something. Or get familiar with how much impulse a particular chain of moves will cost.

It doesn't necessary have to be around crosshair, it could be screen edge dimming or a meter below crosshair or different sounds as you get tired or combination of these.

I have added this as Ticket #279.

Here's an unfinished attempt to reorganize the menu. I'm currently working on other thing and tired of fighting the scripting language.

Blindman {l Wrote}:

lamefun {l Wrote}:The Global Government has prescribed that PEOPLE don't know how to use any command line unless taught by an educational institution, so hiding commands that give players significant advantage is very bad.

Im trying and failing to see the humor in this, again, this is whats wrong with a lot of young gamers today, they have to be taught to think for themselves, if there is no easy way to know something with a few mouse clicks, they wont even try to get past it.

QFT.

lamefun {l Wrote}:In this game, you die, like, in 10 seconds after you get control. So you spend 1/3 of your game time in respawn delay. Not good.

Lol, and what multiplayer FPS have you played that you didn't experience this when you first started playing it? Hell, what game in general have you not been bad at when you first played it? There's always a "fail" period when you try out a game you haven't played before. Not that strong of an argument...

If 1/3 of your game time is spent respawning, you're either playing for less than 3 minutes, mashing the "suicide" key, or just flat out suck really bad.

lamefun {l Wrote}:Noobs won't discover them even if they are documented

Lol no, that's just called being too lazy to peruse said documentation.

lamefun {l Wrote}:this giving tech-saavy players an unfair advantage that doesn't official count as cheating

You keep referring to "unfair advantages" yet only bring up firstpersonblend and fullbrightmodels which IMO really doesn't give that big of an advantage...if anything, the lack of a gun model would probably mess with my head and make me a little less accurate. Plus, fullbrightmodels really isn't a big deal anyway, because anyone can increase visibility of what they see by dicking with their gamma/contrast/brightness. I guess removing the gun model allows you to see more ahead of you, but think about players with high screen resolution vs players with low screen resolution; the former can see more than the latter anyway, even without removing his gun model with firstpersonblend. So...with the existence of monitor display options, anyone can have an "unfair advantage" over someone else, if you want to get technical. RE just has vars to "supplement" it.

lamefun {l Wrote}:Of course, highly advertised proprietary games can afford that...

...lolwut? So you're saying that just because a game is "popular", it can get away with an off-putting mechanic? Seems to me that statement was just a cheap stab at proprietary games for being evil and not FOSS. It was also entirely irrelevant to the point, being that a 5 second respawn time is peanuts compared to many other games.

lamefun {l Wrote}:It doesn't necessary have to be around crosshair, it could be screen edge dimming or a meter below crosshair or different sounds as you get tired or combination of these.

True, but that would just create more customization options for the look 'n' feel; which according to you is grounds for unfair advantages...what if some players can't see the default as well as another option? While you can argue that it can be placed in the options menu for those too lazy to look up the var to change it, I can easily counter that some people are even too lazy to go into options and see what they can change.

You can't make something 100% idiot-proof. Those who seek customization/enhancement to better fit their tastes will do so.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:Lol, and what multiplayer FPS have you played that you didn't experience this when you first started playing it? Hell, what game in general have you not been bad at when you first played it? There's always a "fail" period when you try out a game you haven't played before. Not that strong of an argument...

If 1/3 of your game time is spent respawning, you're either playing for less than 3 minutes, mashing the "suicide" key, or just flat out suck really bad.

Xonotic/OpenArena --- no, IIRC there's no respawn delay. Tremulous --- no respawn delay as long as many people don't die (spawn points have queues). Teeworlds --- no. I have been bad in all of these, just didn't have to wait 5 seconds doing absolutely nothing after I died.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:Lol no, that's just called being too lazy to peruse said documentation.

1. You fail to understand that most noobs are normal, complete PEOPLE. For normal, complete PEOPLE learning to use command line is prohibited by the Global Government.
2. They may also never realize that such options even exist to look them up in documentation in the first place.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:Plus, fullbrightmodels really isn't a big deal anyway, because anyone can increase visibility of what they see by dicking with their gamma/contrast/brightness.

Monitor developers usually don't hide brightness/contrast settings. Imagine fullbrightmodels AND high monitor contrast.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:I guess removing the gun model allows you to see more ahead of you, but think about players with high screen resolution vs players with low screen resolution; the former can see more than the latter anyway, even without removing his gun model with firstpersonblend. So...with the existence of monitor display options, anyone can have an "unfair advantage" over someone else, if you want to get technical.

Resolution seems to be the only unfair advantage we can't get rid of... The fact that we can't get rid of some of the unfair advantages doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to make the game more fair at all.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:RE just has vars to "supplement" it.

It does supplement the unfair advantage only for tech-saavy players who know how to use command line.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:...lolwut? So you're saying that just because a game is "popular", it can get away with an off-putting mechanic? Seems to me that statement was just a cheap stab at proprietary games for being evil and not FOSS. It was also entirely irrelevant to the point, being that a 5 second respawn time is peanuts compared to many other games.

Of course they can! Also, it depends on how long can you stay alive. If you can stay alive for 3 minutes when other players are just as skilled as you, 20 seconds is acceptable. Also, if there exist game modes without respawn delay, where one can train without having to do absolutely nothing for extended periods of time, noobs can train there and join modes with respawn delay when they're ready.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:True, but that would just create more customization options for the look 'n' feel; which according to you is grounds for unfair advantages...what if some players can't see the default as well as another option? While you can argue that it can be placed in the options menu for those too lazy to look up the var to change it, I can easily counter that some people are even too lazy to go into options and see what they can change.

See my unfinished menu project --- it has a simple options menu for noobs and a mammoth menu behind it where I planned to put all customizations.

ZeroKnight {l Wrote}:You can't make something 100% idiot-proof. Those who seek customization/enhancement to better fit their tastes will do so.

Except when they don't know such settings exist at all. The whole point of my complaint is that customization is hidden from players who don't know about the command line.