My two cents on PA: Meh...

So... Just started playing the game last week - stay out of alpha and beta and whatnot, because I was waiting for the 'full' experience, even though I bought in plenty early.

Now, here's what I was hoping for:

That SupCom1 feel with enourmous (internplanetary) maps, critical radar intelligence, sneaking stuff around under the cover of radar jammers, turltling up under shield domes, anti-nuke stations and just using artillery...

basically I wanted SupCom1, only bigger and better. Heck, where's the submarines?


What do I feel that I've gotten:

That SupCom2 kinda tiny-map feel (aircraft can circle a planet/map fairly quickly) with no shields, and no single-player campaign - heck, looking at the confirmed feature list there is a LOT of things that the previous games had that this one wont have, at least not in any official capacity.

There's no subletly to the game. Its all tank-rushing, or SXX-rushing, or nuke-rushing. RTS gameplay-wise this game has more in common with Red Alert than SupCom I'm almost tempted to say.


Oh sure, the game has some nice and unique features. Quite lovely - but without a single player campaign, and only a rather dull 'galactic war' feature that honestly feels like a really lackluster copy of C&C 3's Global Conquest mode, then I seriously feel like this game is missing quite a lot...

I mean, in the galactic war mode you don't ever get attacked. It's always you attacking. That's not a 'war', that's just a "now pick your next random AI skirmish battle and hope for some nice random tech loot" mode


Oh well. I hope in time that mods and whatnot will add at least some of these things.

Sorry for the rant, but I really feel that we - the buyers - were promised more.

Even if I feel I might disagree with some of your opinions.

Thanks for sharing.

Hard to disagree with this point.

Really....Considering all of the features he listed were confirmed as not being in the game during kickstarter and the rest were ruled out during development. Sounds to me like someone didn't look into the product they were buying.

I agree with you on the Single player- it's pretty rudimentary compared to SupCom.

As for the other aspects, the game is more intended to follow on from Total Annihilation rather than Supreme Commander which is why certain things (e.g. shields) aren't in the game. Many people were rather 'let down' by SupCom due to it changing the focus away from combat and more towards bases. I personally like both games so I'm on the fence about the whole thing. I certainly think there is a place for radar jamming in PA (that was something that was always in TA as well) for more stealthy manoeuvres though

PA is at it's best when played multi player, I would really recommend you try out some of the multi player before writing the game off! If you have a few people you know you can get together with the 'shared army' mode is by far the best way to play (requires good co-ordination so TeamSpeak is a good idea, there are a few PA servers available on TS, I can get you details if your interested?). If you haven't tried it, this allows you to share control of a single army between multiple people, and provided you co-operate allows you to be so much more efficient than one person.

Tis a tad comical about people trusting businesses, but that's just my cynical side.

Oh I know not all things were shown to be there from the get-go...

Though, the "and the rest were ruled out during development" bit wasn't exactly an easy thing to keep track of.

I said I didn't pay that much attention to the game during development: I waited for a gold version. I specifically chose not to go over every alpha update and whatnot because... quite frankly, I'm currently keeping tabs on five or six other early-access games.

So I don't really consider your argument valid.


As for the game being more TA than SupCom - yes, I can see that. And I've yet to try multiplayer simply because I don't feel that I've mastered the game well enough to do that competently yet. But hey, I haven't given up on the game yet... I'm just saying that so far I'm not that impressed.

+1 for being reasonable with your feedback. I maintain that you should find the multi-player a pleasant surprise after playing through Galactic war. I don't think the concept behind Galactic war is bad, but I dunno, it's definitely lacking something. I wonder if making it turn based (and having the AI take systems back again) would play better, I think it would be more engaging?

I'll grant that not looking into the game beyond its initial kick starter could have left you out of the loop on some matters but there's plenty just reading the kick-starter page could have told you.

For example, it was a confirmed no right from the very beginning (before it was backed) that this game wouldn't have a single-player campaign.

There was nothing to suggest there would be shield domes, radar jammers, crazy artillery, experimentals of any kind in the game from the kickstarter trailer, and they had since been discussed and dismissed. And are still being discussed and constantly suggested, so its clear some people still want them.

But I digress, basing your expectations on the game on your hopes for the game is amazingly naive. Sorry. But i do agree with some of your opinions.

I don't think making this turn-based would be much of an improvement...

IMO very games have ever pulled off turn-based strategy very well, though the Heroes of Might and Magic series comes to mind (especially the third game)

EDIT: and ya - a lot of people seem to be calling for at least some of these features


From a pure game-design perspective, then most games - even the fairly multiplayer-centric ones - tend to use a single-player element to teach the game to their players.

I would love a small campaign that properly introduced the orbital and interplanetary mechanics - making a game purely for those in the know greatly limits your playability for new RTS players. From a purely "what features should we ensure to include if we want to sell more" then a basic single player/tutorial is critical!

He means galactic war itself, think of Galactic Conquest from Star Wars BF2.

Oh yes - in taht sense. Like the World Conquest mode from C&C 3. That would be quite nice.

Of course, that would also require that you could somehow pre-fortify and develop the places you conquer - just like in those games.

Oh SW BF2 - such an overlooked game.

I see where you're coming from, PA feels kinda limited when it comes to unit variety and complexity, especially compared to SupCom. But that's probably just how kickstarter goes. PA got a fraction of the time and budget SupCom had, not to mention the lack of publisher-support.

That's also pretty much the reason why i'm personally ok with the 'continual develeopment after release to reach the full scale'. If it's viable for the devs, the game might look very different in one or two years. Ofc it's not perfect and there is a risk, but that's probably the only way to get a full RTS.

>implying supcom had variety in its units.
>Supcom units were almost always direct upgrades.
>mfw

And SupCom still had more unit variety, despite the direct upgrades. Says a lot, doesn't it?

Aesthetic variety =/= Role variety.

Shields again. What if uber implemented shields that do nothing, but look good? I bet that'd stop many complaints.

You know, like, expensive shields that serve the only purpose - 'look dude, I have such a huge ego eco, I can afford building stuff that does nothing'. You know, demoralizing enemy, but but giving no other advantage.

Lolz.

That said, if you are looking at making a wonder victory game mode.

*sigh* I guess you could have the shield wonder.

Lol, I think that a more specialised shield could be implemented without being totally OP. TA:Spring did this, the 'Balanced Annihilation' mod has 'plasma deflectors' that deflect (note doesn't completely stop) plasma based weapons like the Big Bertha. Lasers or bombs pass through the shield though so you have a way to counter it. The fact that shots are 'deflected' (and I mean literally) and not detonated on the surface has resulted in some *epic fails* by the defending team, who positioned their shield badly (bouncing the shots away from the front line defences and directly into their reactors.... which in BA *chain react*). I would *love* for something like that in PA....

True, its the price you pay for the game not being a massive bloated AAA production

That said, then ya: With the continued development I sorely hope to see a lot of the things I'm missing added - like how the game Warframe (a free-to-play space ninja thing on steam) has grown so much since I started playing it. They even added in a proper intro/tutorial section to the game recently... hint hint

Squishy: I get what you mean - but I'm going to side with Temeter: Supcom had loads more variety in how units worked and how they could be used, even if they all quite honestly looked fairly bland and similar (relative to each faction's unit aesthetics) - they might as well have just made all units a single-pixel blob with a nametag. I would still have prefered that to the very small selection we have here

I mean, there's no T2 anti-air fighter. Am I the only one who thinks that that's really silly?

never mind that in Supcom each of the three factions had similar units that behaved vastly different. Those tech-head destroyer ships that could go up on land and faceroll people were a great example of that.


EF32: In Supcom you could costumize a game quite a lot before a game started - both single player skirmishes and multiplayer, enabling or disabling certain bits of tech and unit options. Why not just introduce the same here with shields... and everything else?

A game played out on a single massive world with all orbital nosh disabled, but with shields, would be a very different game experience than one where all T2/advanced units were disabled but where there was full access to all orbital tech on a multi-planet map. This was the kind of variety I was hoping to see in PA.