Matrix Games Forums

Hello everyone
Please note this original welcome was written in June when the game was still very much in development.
We are now in late October and Strategic Command is now complete other than PBEM (which will be with us soon)

At this point if something is missing its a bug!

regards
Ben Wilkins


Now that the beta is almost ready we just wanted to bring everyone up to speed on just where we are at and on what to expect from the initial package.

3D Units
These are still a work in progress and many are not yet complete. The Germans have a full set and for some countries they use the Germans as placeholders, for others there are some completed and some that are missing. Feel free to try out the 3D unit mode option to get an idea of just how they will look and work in game, but for now it is recommended to still use the NATO counters as those are fully completed.

Interface
This too is a work in progress and it should be pretty evident which screens are placeholders from our previous game. This is also being updated as we go along and the updated screens should give you an idea of what direction we are heading with the new interface and UI in general.

For the placeholder screens, there are some display errors, these are known to us already, and will be corrected once those screens are updated.

UI
The in game UI is mostly complete but also a work in progress. Soon we will have all unit actions selectable just to the left of the 'Previous/Next' unit buttons, but for now all unit actions are still only accessible via a right click on the unit. Eventually we'll have this as an option for those that still prefer the right click menus for units

I believe we have most of the in game UI options functional but just in case we've missed something here are the hotkeys that are also available:

Here they are for reference and they can also be found in the SC3 Essential Playing Guide in the Manuals folder:

G ¨C Turn the map hex grid on or off.
H ¨C Temporarily hide all units on the map.
L ¨C Display the last turn's summaries for reference.
P ¨C Show the location of potential enemy partisan activity.
R ¨C Show reinforceable units, as these will show a blue unit strength number.
S ¨C Show the level of supply your forces currently receive, along with a prediction of how much
they will receive if venturing into enemy territory if you press S again.
U ¨C Show upgradeable units and resources, displayed by a green research level number.
Page Up/Down ¨C Select the previous or next active unit that has not yet moved.
¡û ¡ü ¡ú ¡ý ¨C Scroll map left, right, up or down.

Ctrl-D ¨C Diplomacy
Ctrl-E ¨C End Turn
Ctrl-I ¨C Reports
Ctrl-M ¨C Maps
Ctrl-N ¨C New Units
Ctrl-O ¨C Options
Ctrl-P ¨C Purchase Units
Ctrl-Q ¨C Quit
Ctrl-R ¨C Research
Ctrl-S ¨C Save
Ctrl-Z - Undo Move

User Manual
This too is a work in progress so what you'll be seeing is the current manual draft. Despite this, information wise it is nearly complete so it will be quite informative.

Developer Mode
Currently the game EXE is in a developer mode, and all this means is that once an error crops up it should pop out a pretty detailed analysis of the crash and this will help me track down the source of the error. I'll have more notes on this in another post, but for now it just means that the game will be running marginally slower than it should. On most systems it probably won't be noticeable.

Developement
What you'll be looking at in terms of a package is a pretty well tested main campaign, we've been testing this internally for a few months now with a dedicated team of development testers and so the campaign should play out quite well in terms of balance and especially for the AI.

This is not to say that there is no work left to be done, there will always be improvements, but it should be a pretty solid experience right out of the box. That being said, definitely highlight any issues you might find as we'll want to correct those prior to release.

I can't think of anything else at the moment but hopefully the package will be ready soon enough, the delay is on me and I apologize for that, and once it is out we hope you really enjoy it. Happy gaming! [:)]

Hubert

3D Units These are still a work in progress and many are not yet complete. The Germans have a full set and for some countries they use the Germans as placeholders, for others there are some completed and some that are missing. Feel free to try out the 3D unit mode option to get an idea of just how they will look and work in game, but for now it is recommended to still use the NATO counters as those are fully completed.

Just a little hint from me. Zoom out 1x and units without a 3D model will have one. I'm playing in 1x zoomout mode most of the time.
Enjoy the game.

Yes, at zoom out level 2 there might be some missing 3D units as well for now, thanks n0kn0k.

is there a shortcut for zoom in and out?

ORIGINAL: kingstuart

is there a shortcut for zoom in and out?

Yes, the mouse scrollwheel.

Hi everyone

Thanks for all the great feedback so far! [:)]

It's very encouraging and useful, and although I haven't commented in every thread, rest assured that I have made some notes of things to look into and consider for change.

Please keep it coming! [:)]

Bill

I was taking a first look into the Editor to get a feel for it. Is this a fully functional version of the Editor ?

Yes, the Editor is fully functional.

Have a play to familiarise yourself with some of it, and then use the second section of the Manual if you want to do any serious design work.

That is an excellent feature, thanks so much for letting us have it. I am sure it takes time to learn it, but currently I am only interested in making a few unit changes without changing the scenario, like I have done with some of the graphics [for personal reasons].

This one is a little unclear as to what the benefit is. I've captured France so St. Nazaire is mine so I can use it for subs if I want, so what is the benefit for spending 50 MPP's ?

You will be able to launch new units from que in the port.

For those that want to play with 3d unit icons I finished them enough so you won't have blank disks, blank entries in the purchase screen, and you'll still have special units for those that were in the game (Soviet/French level 1 tank, Soviet/French level 1 fighters, Soviet/French infantry). I also made garrison icons for Soviet/French since I could pull a soldier out from the Corps units. Most of the units now have national emblems to give them a touch of variety.

You can grab them here:
tm.asp?m=4123906