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Wanted to leave a few suggestions for the missions and challenge maps. I think the work you guys is great so far, but these are some ideas I feel are inspired by your previous titles.
During combat I feel as if the space I play in gets constricted rather quickly when presented with enemies or obstacles. The architecture is neat to look at, but i don’t think it should come at a cost for the movement mechanics. Not to make this comparison too often, but one of the selling points for Descent 3 were how big and spacious a lot of the areas were. I felt it was a lot funner for Dogfighting and Maneuverability when I’m not constantly running into stuff or being pressed up against walls. I feel that it would really bring out the smooth and quick flow of movement system you guys have created if there were more space to work with, enough room to circle and roll around foes dodging lasers and missiles, while watching all the beautiful explosions and particle effects spread out in all directions, in a huge corridor/hallway or large center areas, like syrinx and pipline, only maybe twice as big? Maybe something that holds a better scale for the player ship not being large enough to take up a a third of the hallway, but more presents how much larger a threat/oppostion can be when able to see them from any direction. For me I believe that would REALLY sell the six degrees of freedom, because for me right now I feel a lot of it gets missed behind the other bunch of stuff that can be in the way at any given time.
One thing i really do like about these maps are the elemental qualities each one can attribute to the environment, the the ice in pipeline, or lava in others. one thing i think i’d really like to see would be a level like the inside of an asteroid or something with an old running water cave system leading to larger areas from the mouth of a waterfall leading into an installation or something. (research team studying water beneath mars kind of stuff)
i know there are also graphical and CPU limitations that a large area can bring which is maybe why it feels so small now? whichever is best for the project though! thanks.
Something to remember is that when Descent 3 came out a lot of the fans of the series disliked it because it lost the cramped and claustrophobic feel of the first two games. I was one of them. Descent 3 did a lot that I really liked, especially in terms of storytelling during the missions and more varied objectives, but the larger areas led to a different style of gameplay and a lot of balancing issues.
Overload so far seems to be much more in the Descent 1/2 direction which makes me really happy, on the other hand, everyone has different tastes. Long story short, I don’t think you’re wrong LegoJake, but I disagree with you. 😉
On a happier note, remember that we will be getting a level editor so even if big maps aren’t in the base game, people can always make them!
Variety is nice though – while I am fine with the current scale as the meat and potatoes, the occasional big room (like Vertigo level 5, perhaps) helps make things memorable and gives you a chance to fight in a different way. Hopefully Overload will handle them better – in Descent 2 the robots wouldn’t fire until you got quite a lot closer, which had a tendency to turn those rooms into Gauss target practice.
I also loved D3 for this. Bigger areas, outdoor areas. I found I enjoyed D3 multi much better than I did D2.
Hopefully the user made levels will be similar in size.
Revival Productions has said many times that they are only going to have the claustrophobia-inducing tight spaces like they had in Descent 1 and 2. They will have the occasional larger room here and there when and where it makes sense, but they won’t have us go outside at all. Instead, they will have skyboxes in Overload to show us where we are.
So, like it or not, Overload will always be focused on the claustrophobia-inducing level design of D1 and D2. After all, Overload is a spiritual successor of D1 and D2.
Prepare for Overload…
Instead, they will have skyboxes in Overload to show us where we are.
I don’t think I got a confirmation on that, past that someone was thinking about it, but would really like to see it. (Was it in an interview or Q&A somewhere?) Skyboxes don’t fit everywhere, but when used appropriately they can do great things. Metroid Prime was a good example of that – it was mostly rooms-and-tunnels with only occasional open space, like Descent, but had a few really cool vistas that usually used inaccessible skyboxes to pull it off.
Provided the skyboxes are in fact inaccessible, the same technique should be possible for Overload. In D2X-XL it let me wring quite a lot out of a much more basic engine… am looking forward to digging into what’s possible with this one. 😀 (Tetrahedron/pyramid/triangular prism segments would also open up quite a bit of creative freedom, but I understand that’s not on the agenda at this time.)
A Space station level would be pretty badass too. being in more of the structured areas and seeing out through viewports into space?
Yeah, that’d definitely fit. Descent 3 had a level like that – 14 I think? It was kind of eerie thanks to the soundtrack, but memorable.
Instead, they will have skyboxes in Overload to show us where we are.
I don’t think I got a confirmation on that, past that someone was thinking about it, but would really like to see it. (Was it in an interview or Q&A somewhere?) Skyboxes don’t fit everywhere, but when used appropriately they can do great things. Metroid Prime was a good example of that – it was mostly rooms-and-tunnels with only occasional open space, like Descent, but had a few really cool vistas that usually used inaccessible skyboxes to pull it off.
Provided the skyboxes are in fact inaccessible, the same technique should be possible for Overload. In D2X-XL it let me wring quite a lot out of a much more basic engine… am looking forward to digging into what’s possible with this one. 😀 (Tetrahedron/pyramid/triangular prism segments would also open up quite a bit of creative freedom, but I understand that’s not on the agenda at this time.)
They have said it in Q&A videos, interviews, forum posts, and even one night in chat if I recall correctly. All I’m doing is passing along what they have said. I’m just a messenger. The question of whether they will give us D3-style open-area maps has been asked quite a few times, and each time they say that they are keeping Overload focused on the claustrophobic tight spaces that they did in D1 and D2 with maybe a very small handful of larger rooms (just like they did in D1 and D2), but never anything outside of the mines. They said the only outside we will have while we’re piloting the ship is what we can see through skyboxes.
Prepare for Overload…
The large areas and outdoor areas in Descent games have their disadvantages, due to a few design decisions of these games:
1-The ship you are piloting is actually quite slow, compared to some other space fighters in different games. Since you cannot travel long distances quickly, the large areas become quite tedious to travel, especially if there is nothing much to do… Simply hold the forward button/key/axis/whatever for the duration of the flight. Heck, I always thought they should’ve kept the “cruise” function in Descent 3 🙂 .
2-The “engagement” range of bots, for Descent 2, also mentioned by Sirius. You essentially snipe the bots from afar, without giving them any chance to return fire (I actually like this. My favorite prey is the Thiefbot 🙂 ). While it is kind of interesting change of pace, it may become boring after a while… at least for some players.
I also remember some of the bots in Descent 3 has RIDICULOUS engagement distance and accuracy instead… You getting hit with vauss/MD before you know what hit you.
According to Luke:
We haven’t ruled out being able to see a skybox, but we will definitely not have outdoor areas you can fly in, especially in the D3 sense. That’s not to say you couldn’t fake it with a custom level (have a large see-thru side that still has collision). Having huge open areas is nice for a change of pace, but it’s not something we want to overdo. Making them look nice (not overly-tiled/repetitious) is a challenge as well.
Luke
See this thread for source: https://playoverload.com/forums/topic/what-kind-of-maps-to-expect/
There are other times the dev team have talked about this, but I think this is one of the oldest examples.
Instead, they will have skyboxes in Overload to show us where we are.
I don’t think I got a confirmation on that…
They have said it in Q&A videos, interviews, forum posts, and even one night in chat if I recall correctly. All I’m doing is passing along what they have said. I’m just a messenger. The question of whether they will give us D3-style open-area maps has been asked quite a few times, and each time they say that they are keeping Overload focused on the claustrophobic tight spaces that they did in D1 and D2 with maybe a very small handful of larger rooms (just like they did in D1 and D2), but never anything outside of the mines. They said the only outside we will have while we’re piloting the ship is what we can see through skyboxes.
They already did one (albeit very rudimentary) skybox in the August demo mission from last year.
Ship’s cat, MPSV Iberia
Check out his original music @ http://vertigofox.bandcamp.com/Thank you, DW!
Instead, they will have skyboxes in Overload to show us where we are.
I don’t think I got a confirmation on that…
They have said it in Q&A videos, interviews, forum posts, and even one night in chat if I recall correctly. All I’m doing is passing along what they have said. I’m just a messenger. The question of whether they will give us D3-style open-area maps has been asked quite a few times, and each time they say that they are keeping Overload focused on the claustrophobic tight spaces that they did in D1 and D2 with maybe a very small handful of larger rooms (just like they did in D1 and D2), but never anything outside of the mines. They said the only outside we will have while we’re piloting the ship is what we can see through skyboxes.
They already did one (albeit very rudimentary) skybox in the August demo mission from last year.
The only skyboxes Overload has right now just show bright light. I would bet that these will eventually show what’s out in space.
Prepare for Overload…
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