SE5 combat is much better than SE4. It is fallacious to call it "real time combat" because of all the Starcraft/Command and Conquer baggage that label brings along. It is absolutely nothing like those games. I'd certainly not be testing the game still if the combat was anything like those games.
SE4 combat sucks, terribly. There is not even an inkling of a basic initiative system as in games like MOO2 (1.31 patch). Both sides just line up and shoot, one at a time, everything on one side, in some gross Napoleonic system of warfare. Sure you can play with maximum ranges and such, but those just drag forth the other glaring issues of a basic turn based system. There is actually very little strategy involved in the SE4 combat model (other than exploiting AI weaknesses in single player).
Especially in the stock game, SE4 combat tends to be winner take all (past the pointless early game battles of 3 ships against 3 ships), because the more powerful side can deal out tremendous damage before the enemy has a chance to fire back, each round. This is totally imbalancing and nonsensical. Some mods try to get around the horrid limitiations of the combat engine by overpowering defenses so that ships survive multiple rounds of fire, but this can only go so far. With a good initiative system, you can get situations where ships on each side move and fire at each other back and forth, avoiding the one side moves entirely crap that so weakens SE4. SE5 does exactly this, but smooths out the initiative system infinitely. It is not a matter of just trying to make the combat glitzy, it is a concerted effort to make it better, to make it balanced and sensical. Playing with it in tactical mode is certainly not a click-fest/button-mash like Starcraft/C&C type games.
The auto-pause feature is the real clincher... It turns the combat into a simultaneous execution system with perfect initiative. There is no silliness with ships moving in, firing, and moving out before the enemy can react as in a primitive model like SE4; it all happens in a better, more fluid environment. No more missile dancing! There have been games that seek to put into place complex initiative systems to approximate realistic action, where ships do part of their actions for a turn in phases. While this does generally make the combat engine more balanced and sensical, it does create horribly complex, anti-fun rulesets that get in the way of playing the game. A continuous time model achieves the same goal, though to an even greater degree, without the madness.
It is still a deep TBS game, just with a better engine for combat execution. The ships are just as complex as SE4; their interactions in combat are governed by similar horribly (beautifully?) complex rules. There is no RTS style oversimplification of unit stats into attack, defense and hitpoints, no horribly frantic pacing (though you could probably create it if you ramp up weapon damage...). I can't really go into detail due to the NDA, however.
"If I want to play a game where the number of mouseclicks per second"
Number of mouse clicks is not even a relevant complaint when you can pause the combat and issue whatever orders you like... Click-festing can only be an issue if you refuse to use the pause hotkey and the auto-pause feature.
And it is absolutely nothing like MOO3, in any regard. Why do you think Aaron Hall would be so inept as to follow in MOO3's footsteps?
Remember, "real time" does NOT mean click fest. It does NOT mean "like a RTS game." RTSes are only click fests because the game engine is made to be click festing. SE5 is not made to be click festing.
(I wonder how many more times I will need to make this argument... at least the 6th time in the last few years.
)
=0=
Quote:
Roanon said:
I do hope the testers do their job properly... I would recommend a second beta phase with more testers, especially players being totally new to SE if possible.
|
I'm fairly offended by this whole paragraph, as I imagine most of the other beta testers are as well. I don't know what rabid fanbois you think are running around merely gawking at new features, but I assure you there are none in the beta tester group.