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Post by tenbsmith on Jun 13, 2014 13:55:38 GMT -5
Reading Cory's post again, I think maybe I can provide something helpful. If not you can just ignore it.
I'm pretty sure I played the tutorial because that nice lady from cover art popped up intermittently to tell me what to do.
Moving ships is intuitive enough.
First thing the lady told me to colonize a planet, so i did that. But I wasn't sure what to do next and didn't get further direction, so I started moving other ships at random. It might have helped if the lady said to colonize and then end turn so I didn't much things up by moving ship I wasn't supposed to.
The lady popped up later telling me to scan an anomaly, but I wasn't sure what that was, so I scanned some stuff. etc...
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Post by tenbsmith on Jun 13, 2014 13:56:22 GMT -5
Reading Cory's post again, I think maybe I can provide something helpful. If not you can just ignore it.
I'm pretty sure I played the tutorial because that nice lady from cover art popped up intermittently to tell me what to do.
Moving ships is intuitive enough.
First thing the lady told me to colonize a planet, so i did that. But I wasn't sure what to do next and didn't get further direction at that time. So, I started moving other ships at random. It might have helped if the lady said to colonize and then end turn so I didn't mess things up by moving ship I wasn't supposed to.
The lady popped up later telling me to scan an anomaly, but I wasn't sure what that was, so I scanned some stuff. etc...
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Post by Cory Trese on Jun 13, 2014 14:18:09 GMT -5
Your feedback is invaluable, those points are very well explained and I can see more clearly now which aspects of the tutorial failed to provide sufficient guidance.
This gives me a nice set of ideas on how to improve for the next update. Thank you.
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Post by Cory Trese on Jun 13, 2014 14:29:45 GMT -5
First thing the lady told me to colonize a planet, so i did that. But I wasn't sure what to do next and didn't get further direction at that time. So, I started moving other ships at random. This part confuses me. Colonizing a planet automatically ends your turn. When the next turn starts, the advisor returns to the screen and gives you the next set of steps. Did that not happen on your device? I've never seen this part of the game fail before, very curious. |
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Post by phantombudgie on Jun 13, 2014 14:44:19 GMT -5
Cory, have you ever played the tutorial for Civilisation II? (I am showing my age now!)
It tells you things like "now move this unit north to the mountain" (when that unit first becomes active) and "the first thing we will do is build a warrior to protect the city" (when you have just built the first city) and "build a temple in this city to keep the people happy" and "build a marketplace next to keep the economy going" etc.
After 40 turns, everyone following the tutorial in Civ II has an IDENTICAL empire, and they have a basic idea of how to start out in the first few turns.
It is extremely step-by-step, and therefore needs to be an optional game/mission, but it provides crucial help for people who have not played similar games before. It gives people an idea of what they should build, and in what sequence, for a typical new colony.
My first game in 4X fell apart because I did not know that you have to build lots of Mines as they are a source of income (for example).
I am learning the hard way, but I am still enjoying it, which bodes very well for the game. I look forward to clearing the sector of Xeno at some point in the future!
Sent from my GT-I9300 using proboards
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Post by Deleted on Jun 13, 2014 14:56:49 GMT -5
Besides gameplay I think that more involvement should be taken with the setting. In the Library in the Templar heading it mentioned that Shalun freed the traders and the Zendu from the Narvidians. I know information is sketchy in the verse. But I think some more attention should be made to explain who the Zendu were if you include them in mention. I'm a fan so I don't mind digging around the forum and facebook for tidbits. But newcomers to the series are going to get lost and possibly unwilling to upgrade to elite.
One good example of an immersive expositional library I feel was the library included in MechCommander 2. A more compact example was a similar history and encyclopedia web page Personae Studios built for MechWarrior Tactical Command. Cory and Lurker have something like it that could be finished. Heck I bet @jonrobinson would be glad to include some of his tables and trees, or Brutus' playfaq. All that would be needed would be new links in the game. The best part is that this would be good for all three Shalunverse games.
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Post by fallen on Jun 13, 2014 15:14:29 GMT -5
dayan - in terms of priority, getting the game play / tutorial is more important at the moment, vs. typing in the rest of the story about the Star Traders universe. We will get there 
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Post by tenbsmith on Jun 13, 2014 15:48:20 GMT -5
Cory Trese Until reading your post, I was unaware that my turn ended when I colonized. I was confused about when turns ended during my initial attempt at playing. Knowing it was a turn-based game this concerned me. Maybe explicitly telling the player turns end after you colonize... I can't recall if I got further instruction immediately after colonization. Maybe so, maybe told to upgrade. It's all to murky now... I'll try again, probably some time this weekend, and report back.
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Post by fallen on Jun 13, 2014 15:55:16 GMT -5
tenbsmith - the screen that allows you to colonize tells you the turn ends. The Advisor comes up and gives you immediate advice after the colonization event. I can see that we need to make the change of turns more clear. Perhaps printing the date in big letters in the screen center (1.10 AE (Turn 21)) would be helpful.
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Post by Cory Trese on Jun 13, 2014 16:05:46 GMT -5
Just being referenced against Civilization II and MechWarrior2 is really flattering. Thanks!
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Post by Brutus Aurelius on Jun 13, 2014 19:51:53 GMT -5
Cory Trese Dude, ST 4X is better than Civ Rev any day of the week, twice on Sundays!
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Post by lazarus on Jun 17, 2014 1:20:47 GMT -5
Cory, have you ever played the tutorial for Civilisation II? (I am showing my age now!) It tells you things like "now move this unit north to the mountain" (when that unit first becomes active) and "the first thing we will do is build a warrior to protect the city" (when you have just built the first city) and "build a temple in this city to keep the people happy" and "build a marketplace next to keep the economy going" etc. After 40 turns, everyone following the tutorial in Civ II has an IDENTICAL empire, and they have a basic idea of how to start out in the first few turns. It is extremely step-by-step, and therefore needs to be an optional game/mission, but it provides crucial help for people who have not played similar games before. It gives people an idea of what they should build, and in what sequence, for a typical new colony. My first game in 4X fell apart because I did not know that you have to build lots of Mines as they are a source of income (for example). I am learning the hard way, but I am still enjoying it, which bodes very well for the game. I look forward to clearing the sector of Xeno at some point in the future! Sent from my GT-I9300 using proboards +1 to this tutorial idea. Instead of a general guidance that pops in every few turns with advice, the tutorial should be X number of structured turns (however many it takes to cover all important topics) where the game pretty much holds your hand. Move this ship here and colonize, then next turn begin building *blank* upgrade, then move this guy here. Have the first few turns played for the user except the user is pressing the buttons. I had the same experience as above. Started my first tutorial game, thought I was doing well, and went bankrupt a few years in from overspending. |
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Post by algesan on Jun 17, 2014 8:07:22 GMT -5
Heh, I probably wrote some of the first 4x software support for the earliest 4x game...Starfire Empires. Of course, that was a warp point building program so we could have larger games...and the rest of the stuff we tracked on accounting tablets at one page per system.
Ok, now that my chest has been beaten adequately (or my age shown more likely (and who would love to play Colonization again?)).
Civ2 level isn't necessary, but:
1. It would be nice if girly-girl told you to move ALL the colony ships first so you don't blow several turns by doing the move-colonize routine at the beginning.
2. A brief explanation of WTH all the CP / RP / MP / EP / QP / XP / AP / BP / PP / TP (in rolls?) stands for and what it buys. I like a learning curve but when the start turn screen that comes with girly-girl's advice keeps "advising" that you blow the $ cost for a hab unit a colony desperately needs because you aren't trying a 25% for a trade treaty every turn.....
3. A bit more on ship design, so it isn't so annoying to find out you cannot have three skills on your first cruisers so if you train both gun skills, all your torps are worthless since apparently have torpedoes alone doesn't allow shooting them. (That might be more appropriate as a ship design check, because this isn't a program to randomly fill an array and give answers based on the kind of system survey you just did.) So, maybe something like 2 above that gives the basics of what each system does.
Fun game though, looks like it might end up my favorite after TA.
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eskimoform
Initiate
And for some reason, I got blue hair. You gotta have blue hair.
Posts: 23 
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Post by eskimoform on Jun 17, 2014 8:09:24 GMT -5
Maybe put "This will end the turn" in bold, and also include it in the first tutorial message. I think most people just aren't realizing it or are skimming over it on the colonize menu. Also might help people if there was some message on screen while the enemy was taking its turn.
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Post by fallen on Jun 17, 2014 8:49:11 GMT -5
Thanks to everyone for the feedback! Great suggestions all around. You know we are working on it  |
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