The only other criticism I can even THINK of, and it's VERY minor, is maybe add some more flavor text/style elements. I really like the red and blue font text, where the BE and NF add their little opinion. Perhaps you could do that elsewhere in the text, too. Like, for the VF, "Vehicle Factory. This is where vehicles are produced. Use these war machines to rain destruction upon your enemies." I know, the line is corny and stupid. That's just off the top of my head; you can add your own style that's more in-line with Empires. Again, very minor, other then that, it's great.
for NF: create your machines of war here to reduce those Brenodi scum to rubble. for BE: the Jekotians must fall, create your vehicle of war and advance to victory!
Yes, I agree. I am trying to get a balance of this joviality and a conciseness that doesn't take too much to read through. I'll add some more faction-specific lines once I have a more complete framework. And don't worry about it being minor, this is exactly the kind of feedback I'm looking for.
Instead of NF saying: Our stuff is crap (that's the concise version ) have them saying: Our equipment may be old but it is strong and reliable. Or something...
I'm having some problems re-publishing this in google documents, it's backed up, but I can't seem to get the URL working any more. I'll see what I can do when I get around to it. EDIT: Scratch that, it was a browser problem.
I took a look at Doobie's tutorial map, and I was a little disappointed. I'm thinking of doing my own with some basic bot support. I'd reuse an existing map's landscape, and add custom programming to do all the required stuff. I read through the script, and I like it. It needs some stuff about squads, and the rest to be finished about vehicles and commanding.
I know everyone loves the idea of a tutorial map, but I'm going to be the blunt side of the edge as usual: I still think a tutorial map would be a waste of time and not as effective as tips during playing. Sure you can force new players to do the tutorial, doesnt mean they want to do it. Besides tooltips will reach every single player. Im guessing only a small number of mod players are really interested in playing a tutorial, vs getting straight into where the battles at, online. Most likely they will try online first, check it out, then if they are interested do the tutorial. Im just speculating and this isn't my main point. Another arguement I have stored is that a (forced) tutorial is too much information all at once, don't expect players to get all that information in one go (isnt it just annoying if you missed something in a tutorial and can't go back?). Instead of letting them absorb all the information there is at once (let alone teaching them unnesecary things like aiming or manouvring, nobody needs to learn that, unless its complicated like sniping in Joint Operations) and have to somehow be able to apply it all when going online, tips during online play will give them the information they need, when they need it, and they will be able to reread a certain tooltip on something over and over until they decide to turn off the tips (for example like NS). Tips can also be more detailed and require less work from the main developer, aka you Krenzo, as its just text and everyone can write that in this community. (and letting others than yourself does in this case not mean the quality of the tips are bad, its just text afterall, unless the person writing them has been chatting on aol too much) I know from other games, long tutorials are hated and half of it ignored, loading times are not the best part of a game, so why load some silly tutorial, all tutorials on all commercial games are boring as hell (press wasd to move around, do this now, omg lol WIC). Tips during playing are the way to go, besides theres so much that needs to be done, im not making a schedule or deciding what you should do, but I bet there is a bigger chance people will actually read the manual if they dont get 10 bugs in the first 5 minutes and other wacky stuff to complain about. (comparison, not saying you can actually get 10 bugs in 5 minutes ) I'm sure I have more arguements to prove why tips are the easier and better way to educate players of all the game features. From my own experience, when I was playing ET:QW, the tips were very usefull, I just needed to equip the gun, or get in the vehicle to get it, and i found myself rereading some to get more information, all this while I was already playing online, they werent obstructive, I didn't need to do any tutorials, I could get in the game straight away, and if I needed to know about something, I would just use it and read the tip that popped up.
I agree with you dizzy, in-game tips would be the best way to educate new players, but it's hardly a dichotomy. Why couldn't both be included? Personally I really enjoyed playing through the hazard course in HL1, and the training section in Opposing Force. You have to strike a balance between education and fun, which is why this will take a while to get right; but once it is done it should feel like a natural extension to the game. Again I can't speak for other people, but I would feel like I was missing out on something if I didn't try it out. What does it matter if people try it after playing a round or two? The environment alone should be enough to reward even the most experienced players with something they haven't seen before.
I'd forgotten all about tips. People like to jump into the game without reading the manual or trying the tutorial level. I planned to put in BF2 style tips but forgot about it. Now, who's going to write up all the hints to be put in?
What should the style of the hints be? Like "Press your change Team key (<changeteamkey>) and select from Brenodi Empire, Northern Faction, or Spectator"
No, it'd be BF2 style. You bring up a weapon for the first time, and it will give a voice message telling you about the weapon. "The engineer kit can be used to repair buildings, heal players, revive dead players with the revive skill, and can also place turrets and walls by right-clicking." When you spawn as a scout for the first time, it will say "the scout is designed for enemy infiltration; enemy buildings can be sabotaged by using them, and the scout can use the Hide skill to remain virtually invisible to enemy players."
You could make it a community thing in the secret forum rather than assigning it to one person and keep the thread heavily moderated until the majority is happy with the full list of hints/tips (can be shown in first post or something). (Also I could've sworn I posted a joke about ammoz, I guess it was moderated/ammoz joke got old and someone didn't like it.) This is a serious thread. Take your jokes to the blackhole. - Krenzo
A way it could be done is have a wikipedia page on it, where all the things that could need a tooltip popup in it, then everyone can suggest a sentence. Main rules for suggesting on it would be a char limit, proper grammar and whatever. Or if you have even less time, put the article up for under construction, put just 1 or 2 examples of parts that need tootlips (for example divide it into secions, -weapons here- -skills here- -vehicle weapons- etc. Then people can go through the current list and add more features that need a tooltip. If that sounds confusing, what I basicly ment is not only the tooltips text itself can be suggested on such a wikipage, but also the features that could need a tooltip can be suggested. its worth a try and someone should moderate it to keep it clean once in a while. Then let everyone that has some time, like during his work or school, suggest some lines :D
Well, you'd need one on every building and vehicle. Squads need a good explanation, each class, basic menu workings (cvbnm,.). Most of the details are stored within the menus already, just need the player to know how to access it.
You could always do a quick tutorial which enables the 'join server' button, and you have to play through it to be able to play. No idea if you can actually implement it though. And then when you patch the game, you just go to a file in a specific folder and change the tutorial value to 1 - voila, no need to do it again. Of course noobs don't know this, but I bet that a few still get through. Tool-tips would be easier though. :p
