My idea is that before the beginning of a game (after the lobby), a cutscene occurs that previews the system. It would do an overview of the system (showing which planets are where, and labeling them) and then do a brief overview of each planet, showing the player where their spawns are, and where some nice points to expand to would be. Thoughts?
It would be kinda handy, kinda like you see the map while loading like in most RTS games. Also it would show the size radius and the amount of halleys to move it.
I'd like this, but at the moment it wouldn't be all that useful (at least for me) since my loading screens consist of a frozen lobby screen until the map shows up. And then I have to hurry and find a proper spawn before other players click "start annihilation" and the game starts by major vote. Sometimes the loading takes so long that I don't get to pick a spawn, and end up on some random spot miles from any large metal deposits. I hope they optimize the game more so that this becomes possible.
+1, I also think GW would be much more playable if you could do some form of "scouting" before committing to a battle as it would allow you to go "hey that's a water planet and I don't have naval or air tech, maybe leave that one for a bit" rather than getting thrown in blind. Perhaps Uber could make a 'radar satellite' card that you could use in the GW map to scout 1 system (and then the card gets spent)?
Why not also have a cinematic intro for when the commander lands? That would be really cool, I'm thinking of something similar than the first few seconds of the KS concept video. After all, Uber is working on commander landing animation, so I have hope for something awesome.
My thought would be for it to be after the system has loaded but before you choose spawns. Sort of just a cutscene before the game, that is adaptable to randomly generated systems.
Yes, I like your idea, I was talking about having both. Or is two cinematics before the game starts overkill?
Ok, I was just clarifying. I'd be fine with two cinematics. Maybe we could make the intel report cinematic interactive, so the player can choose their spawn as it's playing, and manipulate the camera as it is playing...
As long as there's a way to disable it. Before I spawn in, I always look at all of the different planets on my own. I don't really need a cut scene.
I dunno about a cut scene, maybe just start the game in system view with tooltips pinned to each planet detailing stats like size, amount of Halleys required (if any), metal spots available, etc. I feel like having to sit through a cut scene every time would get irritating pretty quickly.
It wouldn't necessarily need to be a cutscene, even just a voice that says "commander, we have detected (1, 2, 3, or 4) suitable landing zones" or "this planet requires 2 halleys" or "this area has a high metal density, it would be a good location to expand to" as you look around the system before the game starts.
