Weapon Aesthetics -------------------- Having the ability to change the looks/sounds of weapons like the particle effects would be cool. ex: energy plasma ball, laser, cannon projectile, etc. Body Armor Aesthetics ---------------------- Modifying the look of a unit slightly, like a body kit for a car to alter the look slightly, but not to the extent where it doesn't resemble anything like the original unit would be awesome too. Changing out the look of the legs, arm, head, torso to another body kit, or mix and match body kit styles. Achievement/Feat based Aesthetics ---------------------------------- Keep in mind none of this stat changing so it doesn't change the principle of the unit but more of less a cosmetic/sound change. Maybe award special ones through achievements or after obtaining certain feats of strength, to keep players enticed to work towards a goal while mashing out RTS games. Balancing issues if you make modular pieces to units affect stats/function of the unit ----------------------------------------------- Now you can if you want to go the route of making major adjustments where the units are modular and you can equip artillery cannons instead of plasma canons; changing out legs to change movement speed or other armor pieces to add health/armor and stuff might be cool, but then you work into balancing issues and that part of it involving stats might cause more problems than its worth, so lets start off with just cosmetics Custom vector logos players can create to add a personal look to their units ------------------------ In addition to all this this maybe allow players to create their own vector logos much like the game APB allows their players to customize their character. Have this cool metallic pearlescent paint job and then slap an awesome decal/logo on half the unit or wherever the player wants. Part of this goes in line with the suggestion of a "Painter Armory" for players that has already been suggested like in dawn of war, but go the extra mile with allowing dynamic customization to allow player creativity.
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme This should be in the General Discussion Sub Forum. But I don't want any of this, it ruins the entire point of the Aesthetics already put forth by Uber and only adds confusions and readability issues. Mike
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme Yeah, yeah, general discussion and what not. xeno, all non-dev topics shouldn't be here, fyi. Not until the alpha starts at least. 1) Wait... Mike, you DON'T want the option to modify sounds for units? Personally, I'd love to hear trololol whenever I obliterate a planet :lol: 2) As for adjusting visuals. Sure there's the issue with readability, but couldn't these changes be purely client side? I'm sure there are people that would like a realistic visuals overhaul, or replace the M.A.V.O.R with a giant slingshot. If you can point out a means by which adjusting the visuals could actually help someone, I'm 100% willing to concede this point. Just because Uber is going a certain direction with the visuals doesn't mean it's the only right direction. Just look at skyrim. Most mods only adjust visuals. Was Bethesda wrong? No. Are the modders wrong? No. I don't mod, so perhaps this would cause issues. From my experience playing and using mods though, it really shouldn't. 3) Related to achievements: Veterency, in or out? If in, will there be some indication of its level? I do believe there was a large discussion about this earlier, but I don't recall the response. Too early, sure, but knowing the options is important. 4) It would be nice to give your units a little insignia showing their allegiance to their glorious leader. It's the little touches that leave an impression. Some way to distinguish my presence in any game is appreciated, regardless of how insignificant it is. 5) Already covered modular units. Not going to happen. Sure, it'd be nice, but ultimately useless. People would determine the best configurations for every purpose, defeating the point of using modular units. Better to just have the 'perfect' units premade and avoid the whole customization system. It would be more difficult to use for hardcore RTS players than a simple unit list, which is why most people here dislike it. Personally, I'd love to be able to build useless units that looked cool Then again, I only play RTSs to turtle and spend 20 hours fighting the AI with AKs and crawling bombs. I like to think I represent to ultra-casual players here.
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme The problem is that he isn't talking about Mods, he basically wants custom units. Mike
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme xeno mentioned that things should only be cosmetic changes for now, so don't harp on them for suggesting custom units. Xeno, I don't really have anything against custom units, but it's a fairly unpopular idea. TBH, I don't really understand the hate, so someone else is going to have to explain it to you. There are a few topics about it, but all you're going to see is a negative response. People here really hate a lot of things.
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme I think that small cosmetic changes would be a good idea. Like mentioned above an insignia for your team. Or maybe something like changing the color of your teams lasers. I think things like that would make players more open to the idea of the big pool of units rather then the different races.
Re: Suggestion - Cosmetic changes / Aesthetics and Achieveme I am not much a fan of the idea of customisable appearance in the core game. As OrangeKnight and others in threads before this have mentioned it interferes with the readability of the game and the Devs have stated on more than one occasion a desire to make things easy to read and keep to a simplified aesthetic, something that visual customisation works against. In saying this the other thing they have stated is that they are building the game from the ground up to be very moddable. Custom things like this are going to pop up regardless of whether Uber put time into making customisable appearance and sound. Personally I would rather they spent the time working the aesthetic they have decided on to a mirror shine, the core gameplay mechanics and work on a decent set of tools for modders to work with. Sounds like the job for a mod, not something that is worth spending time on in development over working on core gameplay and a unified aesthetic. OrangeKnight didn’t say anything about modders being wrong. They are responsible for a lot of modding in the past and have expressed a desire to do it for PA. What they are saying is that this kind of customisation works against the aesthetic goals of the core game and would be better left to a mod than have the dev team work on it. As I recall Neutrino was heavily against the concept of veterancy. In his opinion it would make the game less readable and also put an undue focus on micromanaging veteran units. What he did say he was happy to work on was having the stats on individual units, like how many kills it had and so on for interests sake.
