Gripes

[jnewl]

Ok, first off: S:FPTP is a fun game and I'm glad I bought it. However, nothing's perfect, and I've got a few gripes I'd like to communicate to the devs:

1) There's no Start Game button on the main screen where you choose your commander and map until you actually choose a commander for Player 2. However, you can still start a game without choosing a #2 commander by clicking anywhere on the screen. Well, if you can start a game without choosing a #2 commander, what's the point in not having the Start Game button there all along?

2) There ought to be a Transfer All button for transporting troops, particularly when offloading to a planet. The transfer interface is way too fussy, requiring you to laboriously transfer each individual unit one by one. Even if you're going to leave some units behind, it would often be easier to Transfer All and then move the few that are staying behind back to their original spots manually. An Organize button, like some RPG's have to organize inventory, would be nice as well.

3) There needs to be some easy way to see the potential attack squares of units like the artilleryman without going into Siege Mode. Maybe a press of the Ctl key or something.

4) How can such a simple game require so many resources? It's incredibly unresponsive during the ground batttles. I have to click numerous times in order to select a unit or give an order. My machine's no speed demon (P4 1.7Ghz), but I do have a Radeon 9800 Pro, and the ground portion of the game (particularly) brings it to its knees. This is in fullscreen, with AA and VSync turned off. (Incidentally, I just tried to change the resolution and bit depth I'm playing at, and discovered that only 32-bit is available in the list. Shouldn't there by an option for 16-bit?)

5) I've had several CTD's so far, but that may just be my machine. I'll report back if I can find any rhyme or reason to them. I'll also check and see if any new ATI drivers have been released that escaped my attention (but I don't think so).

6) How come my vessels start out with multi-word names--i.e. names made of words separated by spaces--yet when I rename them I can't use spaces? I don't want to name my ship Fred. I want to name it CSS Whatever, but I can't do that unless I use an underscore (which I don't like).

7) It's been brought to my attention that there is a tutorial if you start the game in Windowed mode. What's up with that? I started in Fullscreen mode and had no clue. Do you suppose you could at least put a blurb in the game that mentions the tutorial and how to run it, instead of banking on people reading the readme file?

I'll post more gripes if and when I have them. Let me reiterate, though: I like the game and am having a lot of fun with it so far.

[praetorblue]

Hi jnewl,

Glad to hear you're generally enjoying the game, I'll see what I can do to address some of the issues you mentioned. First, what do you mean by:

However, you can still start a game without choosing a #2 commander by clicking anywhere on the screen.

You should not be able to start a game without a CO (or at least the "?"/random CO) being chosen. How are you bypassing this by "clicking anywhere on the screen"?

The transfer interface is way too fussy, requiring you to laboriously transfer each individual unit one by one.

You can right-click on units to instantly move them from one location to another (without having to pick them up and place them). You can use this to move all the units you want to move very quickly. If you need to finesse their placement, to fit them all in a ship, you can do it by hand.

There needs to be some easy way to see the potential attack squares of units like the artilleryman without going into Siege Mode

This is a good idea for a patch, thanks for suggesting it. I can see how this would be useful.

How can such a simple game require so many resources?

Strategy games have the unfortunate plague of seeming simple (as compared to an FPS or RPG). I can assure there are all kinds of things going on that require processor/graphics time that are hard to appreciate. You could try playing in a window (or fullscreen if you're already in a window), as well as trying various resolutions. 16-bit should be listed on the display modes, perhaps you need to scroll further up or down (the list is often very long). If you can't get things to run smoother, please let us know which maps have issues, and we can try to address it in a patch.

I've had several CTD's so far

Yes, new drivers are always the best place to start. If you continue to have problems, and can reproduce the situation, let us know so we can include the fix in the first patch.

How come my vessels start out with multi-word names

Hm, I'll have to look into this one. I'm not sure if there is some inherent reason, or if this limitation should not be in place. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

there is a tutorial if you start the game in Windowed mode

There is a button that says "Tutorial" (or similar) on the settings that come up when you first launch the game. We could also include it in the game itself, but if the user started in full-screen mode they would have to restart to use the tutorial, which is somewhat awkward. If many other new users have great difficulty in finding the tutorial, we can look into a more conspicuous way of showing how to get into it.

Thanks for the constructive feedback, we appreciate it when users take the time to let us know what we can improve. Hope you enjoy our game!

- Vance

[Erik Rutins]

jnewl,

ORIGINAL: jnewl
4) How can such a simple game require so many resources? It's incredibly unresponsive during the ground batttles. I have to click numerous times in order to select a unit or give an order. My machine's no speed demon (P4 1.7Ghz), but I do have a Radeon 9800 Pro, and the ground portion of the game (particularly) brings it to its knees. This is in fullscreen, with AA and VSync turned off. (Incidentally, I just tried to change the resolution and bit depth I'm playing at, and discovered that only 32-bit is available in the list. Shouldn't there by an option for 16-bit?)

With similar specs, I have excellent performance in the ground battles, so I would really advise checking drivers and DirectX versions as well as chipset drivers to make sure you are up to date.

Regards,

- Erik

[jnewl]

Glad to hear you're generally enjoying the game, I'll see what I can do to address some of the issues you mentioned. First, what do you mean by:

However, you can still start a game without choosing a #2 commander by clicking anywhere on the screen.

You should not be able to start a game without a CO (or at least the "?"/random CO) being chosen. How are you bypassing this by "clicking anywhere on the screen"?

Ok, forget the "anywhere on the screen" part. I thought that was the case, but I can't reproduce it now. What does work, though, because I just checked it, is if you click where the Start Game button is supposed to be, but isn't yet. In other words, as long as the #2 commander circle still shows a hand icon there's no Start Game button, but if you click on the area where the button would show if you had picked a #2 commander, the game will start.

EDIT: I just discovered that this actually works without having either commander chosen. When I do it, the game assigns the blue commander to me and the red one to the computer. In fact, the game always assigns the computer the red CO in this situation. Thus, if I choose the red one for myself, both sides end up using the same CO.

You can right-click on units to instantly move them from one location to another (without having to pick them up and place them). You can use this to move all the units you want to move very quickly. If you need to finesse their placement, to fit them all in a ship, you can do it by hand.

Thanks. That ought to work just fine.

16-bit should be listed on the display modes, perhaps you need to scroll further up or down (the list is often very long).

No, when I said 16-bit is not in the list, I meant it's not in the list. I have scrolled from top to bottom and there are numerous display resolutions listed at 32-bit, but none whatsoever at 16-bit. I considered setting my desktop res to 16-bit to see if they'd show up then, but I haven't tried that yet. Obviously, I shouldn't have to do that.

There is a button that says "Tutorial" (or similar) on the settings that come up when you first launch the game.

Ah, indeed there is. I guess I was in such a rush to play the game I didn't even see that button. Sorry. Still, if that's the only indication the player is going to have that there's a tutorial, it ought to be much more prominent and hard to miss. Maybe you should put the button text in boldface type to make it stand out.

[jnewl]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

With similar specs, I have excellent performance in the ground battles, so I would really advise checking drivers and DirectX versions as well as chipset drivers to make sure you are up to date.

Thanks for the response. I updated my driver and nothing has changed. Everything is still sluggish. This is really noticeable when it comes to mouse clicks. I have to click slowly (by which I mean click and hold a second before releasing) in order for the mouse click to register.

Don't get me wrong. It's playable. When I said the game "brings my machine to its knees," that was an unhelpful exaggeration. But everything is just...well, sluggish and a bit frustrating, as I'm used to snappy responses.

[Jonny_B]

Mr. jnewl:

Campaign

Does this game have a campaign mode (do what you want when you want) or are there connecting scenarios, all connected, thereby calling it a campaign.

Please explain, thanks

[Serian]

ORIGINAL: jnewl
Ok, forget the "anywhere on the screen" part. I thought that was the case, but I can't reproduce it now. What does work, though, because I just checked it, is if you click where the Start Game button is supposed to be, but isn't yet. In other words, as long as the #2 commander circle still shows a hand icon there's no Start Game button, but if you click on the area where the button would show if you had picked a #2 commander, the game will start.

EDIT: I just discovered that this actually works without having either commander chosen. When I do it, the game assigns the blue commander to me and the red one to the computer. In fact, the game always assigns the computer the red CO in this situation. Thus, if I choose the red one for myself, both sides end up using the same CO.

Yes, I have confirmed this as well. I have a slightly different outcome when there are no commanders chosen though. I am assigned the red commander and the computer is assigned the blue one. This might change depending on the map that is selected for play, but I haven't looked into that. For reference I was brought to the tutorial map.

[jnewl]

Serian, I only checked it using the Tiny map, so you may be right that which CO's get assigned depends on the map.

Jonny_B, there is no campaign mode. All games are self-contained, head-to-head encounters.

[jnewl]

A question, leading to a potential gripe:

Don't CO's get a penalty when leading troops of their enemy race? If so, then starting a CO out on a planet of enemy type could seriously affect play balance, could it not? For instance, the opponent sees that you're starting out on an enemy planet and immediately rushes you, knowing you cannot compete.

If this is so, then it becomes crucial to know which planet type you will be starting out on when choosing your commander. Yet there's no way of finding this out without actually starting the game or having memorized the starting planets for each map. That's just not right. [;)]

[praetorblue]

Hi jnewl,

Should you find yourself cornered in the unpleasant situation of owning only planets of your enemy race, you need not fear! Strategy is here. *cue cheesy music*

First off, the bonus/penalty for your CO is nominal. While it will help in a neck-to-neck fight where every bit of advantage counts, it may make a difference. However, if I were stuck with only a planet of my CO's enemy race, I would make all (or mostly) common units -- snipers, infantry, tanks, etc. These do not receive bonuses or penalties, and a force of these is quite formidable.

But even if you go ahead and build a few of the special units of your enemy race, they will still be quite effective.

Great job on realizing such an interesting situation.

- Vance

[jnewl]

Thanks for the info, praetorblue. I was thinking the bonuses/penalties applied to all units, but obviously not. Sorry about that.

On the color-depth thing: I run my desktop at 1280x1024, 32-bit color depth. I just went into the game and reverified, for the umpteenth time, that 16-bit depth choices were not showing up in the list. They were not. Then I went and changed my desktop to 16-bit and checked again. Voila! They were there. I changed my desktop back to 32-bit and checked again. Still there. So no problem now, except that I have no idea how I lost those choices in the first place.

I'm pretty sure I remember them being in the list the first time I played the game, so the only thing I can think of is that one of the other choices I made (AA, VSync, etc.) caused them to subsequently disappear. I know that's not very helpful, but I just wanted to report what I'm seeing.

(It appears now that this should probably go in the tech support forum, but since I first mentioned it here, I thought it would be better to follow up here as well.)

[mllange]

Ditto w/the 32 bit only selections. I'm not too worried, I'm not having performance issues. However I can verify there are no 16 bit selections in my options list, so it's not something with your system only.

[jnewl]

A couple more gripes:

1) Why force the player to manually get rid of those "Insufficient Funds" messages? They just clutter up the screen, and for no good reason. It can hardly escape the notice of someone attempting to buy something that they're not able to. Just flash the message on the screen for ten seconds or so and let it go at that.

2) Turn-based strategy games are ideal candidates for autosaves, or at the very least quick saves. I get really tired of having to go through the menu system every turn in order to save my game.

3) This isn't really fair, but: why isn't the game 3D? You've got this great 3D engine, with the ability to zoom, rotate, pan, etc., yet everything takes place in a 2D plane. My vote is for Supremacy 2 to allow movement and combat along all three axes. [:)]

Gripes aside, I've played all the game modes now except Body Count, and the more I play the more I like the game. That's a hefty compliment coming from me, because I own hundreds of titles and am very jaded. Most games I end up putting aside after a day or two and moving on to something else, but Supremacy seems to have staying power. Good job.