2 months to release and the game feels like pre-alpha and is a letdown. Please delay the release.

You don't need the entire planet to be translucent. The unit icons just need to show through the planet, modified in some way to make it apparent that they're on the backface (e.g. smaller, dimmer, translucent).

As for this '2d projection' argument... I'm fairly certain that the enthusiasm for map-like projections will die shortly after their proponents have had a chance to use it. So by all means, let it be implemented. Just not at the expense of any other feature.

Had this idea a long time ago too, I also thought high grounds and water areas on the other side could be shown by lines in different colors (this should be a toggable function), and there could be a hotkey that allow your cursor interactive with things on the other side without rotating the planet.
Never know why Uber never adopt it, perhaps it is too messy visually.

Maybe simple to create, but hard to handle.

I strongly disagree, a "see everything view" is what tons of people are hoping for.

If you haven't noticed, the first thing newbies do on the forums is create a "1st Impressions" thread.
And in their top 3 things is inevitably "this game is great, but where is the minimap?" comment.
Zooming in and out of the battlefield alone does not make it strategic.
Strategy comes from the grand overview of everything.




Right now, we have this...




And people want this...







People want to feel powerful.
People want to feel in-control.
People want to know everything that is going on in the battlefield at once, how they process that info is player skill.

And most importantly,
People feel like the Commander-in-Chief, in charge of the most fearsome army in history.
We want to see everything at once, and for us to decide on how to act on that info.

loooooooooooooooooooooooool
EXCELLENT !!!!!

I feel like this game would really benefit from being designed for multiple monitors, but since few people even have two monitors that is probably not realistic.

edit: as in, you are forced to have multiple monitors to fully utilize the UI

THE MOST AWESOME PART IN THIS TOPIC XDDD

I just want to clarify, it's not an insult to Uber,
but rather a comment on how the player feels with the current state of the game right now without "see everything" views.

For example:
5 planetoid system, you will ever only see 1/2 of 1 planet.
When you add in the orbit paths and units in interplanetary-travel,
That's LESS than 10% of the game.

Not what I call "Strategic".
You get a better overview of the game in StarCraft 2.

That was not taken as an insult as far as i'm concerned. I actually found very interesting this funny way to express a serious concern and taking it easy

Now I think map topology is actually one of the worse areas for innovotions when it comes to the RTS genre.

For example:
Looping rectangle means the units/projectiles could disappear in one side of minimap/strategic view then reappear in another side, and the weapon ranges could extend across sides too, calculating with this kind of discontinuity could be a challenge for some people, and it is not really a fun challenge.
You can make the camera always centered in minimap, but then locating the positions of things become more difficult.

A direct view of sphere might be more intuitive than a looping rectangle, since your intuition would tell you the units would circle around if they move.
But to display a full sphere you need a projection or two hemispheres.
Projection, like someone said has too much distortion.
Two hemispheres has visual discontinuity, and the displays of things become too dense near the edge of a hemisphere, make them hard to be distinguished.

As for multiple battlefields, if the interactions between battlefields rarely happen, it could feel similar to playing multiple games simultaneously, which is not fun. If the interactions happen frequently, the strong discontinuity between battlefields would hinders calculations a lot, which is not fun too. Uber may care the latter more, and that's why we don't got T1 orbitals. Also display all battlefields at the same time is difficult if the count of battlefields is large.

Extraordinary map topology are more fit for TBS games, even so we rarely see TBS games with more than one battlefield, say nothing of more than two battlefields.

Unfortunately, gameplay wise, the only major innovotions of PA are about map topology.

Since this thread had discoursed so much... The minimap ideas probably need to be transferred to a proper thread that has been discussing it.

I would say lock this thread since it seems to be weird now...

Once Uber announce the release date, it could still function like a lightning rod or just sink, either ways no need to lock it.

I may be a little late in this discussion, but it seems to me that everyone here is discussing changes to some basic features, and the game seems too unfinished, considering we're a month from release.

The available selection of units is rather limited, we need more, like double of what we have now.
I can see several outcomes:
- This is it, nothing new will come out before release => people will lose interest really fast
- More units are still in the works, and will be added just before release, providing too little time to actually test them, resulting in serious balance issues in game => bad reviews
- I'm just too damned impatient, and they're on their way WITH enough time for re balancing.
Right now, planetary annihilation just feels like a really fun but limited minigame.

Uber always release features one by one, so stockpiling half of the unit roster then release them together makes no sense to me.

The mid-november is almost over and we don't get the schedule details yet.
So there is one more reason to suspect we won't get a significant delay after all:
From a business perspective, it make sense to announce the schedule date as late as possible if the final product will be disappointing. It can keep the testers saying "it's still in Beta" and the potential negativity won't start spreading out too early before the release to damage the sales.

A close-to-December release is some of the worse things to happen.

But releasing anything close to current state for sure will generate a huge lot of negativity. Of course that way generates more sales but its still just selling unfinished software to people who didnt know any better, something I associate more with bigger publishers/studios and different mentalities than with Uber.

The point for a proper December release, IMHO, is over.
Adding more units to the game than there are already in it, fixing loads of bugs, optimizations and last but not least BALANCE isnt done in 6 weeks. It just isnt, whatever results may come from a rushed release, they arent pretty.

Something tells me you aren't intimately familiar enough with the guys at Uber to be making such claims about their capability.

Mike

Uber could have the best team in the world,but out side its like it is.
Iff the review dont like the game,they not care who is the developer team behind,i saw so many games with great publicity and with great team behing geting so bad reviews.

you havent?

And iff PA got bad review ,you think if we say ( but its Uber team) you think ppl will forgot the critics and buy the game, even with bad review?

I think Uber is quite capable of producing results since every build has been a step towards improving the game and never a step back... Sure they are not addressing hard standing issues but those long standing issues deserve an equal amount of hard work to make them perfect.

#IbelieveinUberEnt

I think it is pretty unrealistic to think that much will/can happen in less than one month. Sure they can add stuff / refine things in this time, but there is no way it will get significantly better in that timespan.
If they have to release it with that deadline, i think we will get a pretty unfinished game (that is maybe still fun) and overall the reviews would be pretty lowish because of that "unfinished" feeling.