Gamma v.62037 First Impressions thread

Hello, (in construction)

Just want to say that this build does feel like a completely different phase and I understand why changing it from beta to gamma was neccessary.

Who ever did the intro User interface as well as Lobby/ ingame/ everything basically deserves kudos.

BUG?: I was trying to join 3 or 5 games and for some reason I would join and it was automatically start generating planets, skipping the game lobby. Not sure if its due to server stress or a game that is started once joined. Will comment later if this changes.


I like the new commanders, They all seem to have a distinct silhouette. Will comment later if they seem weird or fight funny. But currently they seem just about awesome.


Notifications
The notification sounds are interesting. Sometimes I'm not sure if i'm hearing a notification for a building complete or a unit has died. regardless, it is new and i'm sure it will improve.

The notification I can differentiate:

• Commander getting attacked(Clear as day seeing and hearing this notification)
• Building getting built?? (disappears late game )
• Getting attacked. ( I could use a map ping on the attack notification)

ooooooohhh hovering your mouse curser over a notification shows a Picture in Picture of the location being attacked.... this is awesome!!!!

In-game changes

I only played a land based two planet system with lots of metal Extractors.

Bots are fun to play with, squishy like infantry still, but pack a punch in numbers.

Engineers: Simple and still straight forward. I Like how weak they are as well as expensive. Very good changes. Pathing Issue:Sometimes a T2 or T1 engineer cannot get to the structure to build due to other engineers blocking it. This happens not very often, but when there is a swarm of T1 engineers helping a T2 engineer, the T1's can block that T2 from starting the structure.

Tanks are nice and tankey still. I usually storm bases with a good swath of them. (I wish the infernos would take the lead in the formation if that comes down the line eventually)

Anti-air units: In numbers can easily hold off bomber attacks if in good numbers. Makes me think that bombers might have become weaker. However, more testing will truely tell this difference.

Bug: Inferno tanks when selected stop in their tracks when ordered to attack a building. Every other unit will move towards that building except the infernos.

I like How Pelters and holkins operate and create suppression fire when utilizing a fire base. Radar range improvements have made attacking much easier and better for artillery creeping.

T2 Sniper bots are by far the best bots to build from a T2 advanced factory. They honestly seem a little Too strong in their attack. Slammers are only slightly more useful but t1 spam is much cheaper and effective for guarding the snipers.

Building walls and fortresses is super easy and great when anyone can attack in all directions. I'm glad for the cheaper wall cost and the damage soak they make with their construction. I do feel bots or tanks should have a t1 or t2 unit that can bypass walls by hopping over them or jumping the wall. Like old medieval times.

Pathing Issue: This happens with some of my units when ordered to attack a base or ralleyed outside the wall. Just somthing I noticed

T2 flak cannons: These flak cannons easily clear the air of any units. They feel just a little to strong and probably a sheer upgrade to the T1 anti air. Its similar to the 3 laser towers, however air needs at least some time to react when entering a flak field. compared to when a land army enters a T3/T2 laser field. I would prefer if flak was the artillery Anti Air that attacked a long distance while missile towers did the work. IMO.

Formations: I like how all units get into a box shape and clear any clutter they create. I saw one formation was a giant Bar shape and I'm not sure if formation drawing has been put in or maybe I set up the units in that fashion.

Nukes: Automatic nuke construction is awesome. Thanks for the add. Hopefully more missiles will be added to the structure.

being able to see icons in the fog of war : Great improvement! Or maybe I'm seeing things, I'll double check to see if this is an added feature.

In-Game UI:
Super improved!!!

I like the new planet circular movement lines instead of the constant focus lines. Super cool

The player and planet drop downs are a great improvement. Font changes are also nice and clear to read. However, for energy and mass negative drain, it can be hard to see if you are approaching max drain or minimum. Since the red blends in with the black.

I like the color change on selected units, much easier to see whats in my unit selected.

The Construction Bar UI Is great, It only gets bad when I have 3-4 Rows of buildings I can construct and it blocks my Field of View of the battle field. I think the 2 Rows Setup should have a arrow button to move down the rows.

A cool suggestion: It would be cool if the power symbol for energy would Change with the varying economy as well as the metal one. So at super max power. The symbol would pulse with blue energy up and down. and then drain until gone when the energy is low. The mass one can show a solid aluminum color pulsing white when full and then drained when mass is gone. I think it would be cool to add.

New sounds are good , I like the new interface. I noticed that pa stats is gone ( the 1v1 aspect). Will there be a new way to record stats? Commanders are awesome.

Coming home from school. Was able to listen to the music and it sound sooo awesome! Kudos Howard. The pip notifications sound cool along with all the new commanders this build is so cool.

this might be my favorite addition in quite a while. very slick. can't wait to get home and check it out!!

I found one bug in a team armies match with 2 cpu players.
The CPU Enemys move there commander without a reason to our Base and dont retreat and because of this there are destroyed and we win the game. The Commander never gone back to there own bases.

that might be a feature, afaik sorian (the AI guy) implented some sort of "i-cant-win-this trigger" which makes the AI com rush into your base to go down in a glourious fiery death ... hopefully taking out a chunk of your base.

Um....
Maximum Armour!



That's so good. I really wanted armor in this game!

the servers are geting a baet up becouse rush im steam

BTW the pathing issues are kind of vexing. When we added formations we went backwards in some areas.

This sounds like game development, I thought you guys were wizards, now I'm disappointed.

This new update is simply awesome.

There is one thing though that left me a bit confused. And that is the Unit Cannon defined as not a priority, due to the fact that if an opponent holds a planet, instead of landing an army and invading it, you should simply smash it.

Fair enough, Uber has the direction of the game. But I thought that the Unit Cannon represented a big share of the initial concept, as well as massive armies clashing against each other.

If the ultimate solution to planet invasion is to smash an asteroid on it, I feel like we are missing a bit chunk of fun.

Otherwise, great improvements in this new update. Awesome work, as usual by the Uber folks. Thanks guys!

He said the same thing about the unit cannon in the last live stream.

Can't see the size of planets, in game lobby anymore.

When backwards, like literally

Well its not the worst, it is kinda funny seeing 500 robots just stand there walking into a wall. Skynet having problems with the connection to its minions.

Its nice with the walls, althought i still wish that walls would look more like walls, and not blocks put together. not to mention i wish there was the current wall height, and then tall walls.

First off, Gamma is freaking awesome. The new music adds a whole new atmosphere to the game. Second, I've had no major bugs yet.... This build seems pretty good on my system.

A note on the AI - So far every time I've had a match with the AI it's been kicking my butt up until a certain point where it just decides to do something really stupid with it's commander. Like just standing in front of an army, or walking into a swarm of battleships (they come in swarms now). Basically I usually beat the AI because it does something very stupid with it's commander, not because of its strategy. Thought I'd throw that out there to see what Sorian thinks.

I would like planet size to be imparted onto the planets in that are listed in lobby for easy viewing.

formations are #notapriority.
couldn't we have a UI option or a settings option to turn formations off? (or maybe it could be broken down to certain situations)
This is not only usefull for playability but also ups gameplay value and depth as it is a valid strategy to either choose to use formations or not.

Do you want the doxes and scampers to go running into the front lines or not.

Some cases you do some cases you don't. For those who micro units sufficiently formations aren't helping.

You probably should post that on this thread: https://forums.uberent.com/threads/for-backers-only-ai-building-stuff.49742/page-24
But I think he knows about it already and lots of players have been commenting on it too.

I thought the new launcher was going to be added into the gamma update. I did see screen shots of it somewhere.
http://brianpurkiss.wpengine.netdna...een-Shot-2014-02-18-at-1.11.59-PM-760x464.png

It's coming really soon.