SE5 AI is pathetic

Devnullicus · #1 October 15th, 2006, 05:26 PM

The sad thing is that the game itself has SO MUCH potential! This game can be so much better than SE IV - the engine is pretty damn cool overall.

But it's the lack of polish and the lack of time spent on the AI that might kill this game in the market.

Sure, mods will be created to fix a lot of these problems (I plan on beginning work on one as soon as I can get ahold of a freakin' copy of the !##$&@# game). Sure, Aaron will fix a lot of the UI and engine annoyances over the next few months.

But probably 75% of the customers will never see any of that. They'll buy the game off the shelf, play it a couple times and get bored with the pathetic AI or get annoyed with the klunky UI annoyances..and they'll toss the game on their shelf, never to be played again.

That's the part I find sad.

AAshbery76 · #2 October 15th, 2006, 05:30 PM

Blame the publishers SF,who yet again released a game unfinished.3+ months more development time was needed.

Yimboli · #3 October 15th, 2006, 05:38 PM

who's surprised?

*doesn't raise hand*

pardon the cynicism, it just seems like the general trend for space empires is to leave AI programming to the modders, who aren't even on the payroll.

as an aside, based on the demo I've also decided not to buy, and instead lay off computer games entirely for a while. I'll still be lurking though =P

jowe01 · #4 October 15th, 2006, 06:09 PM

Quote:

Yimboli said:
who's surprised?

*doesn't raise hand*

pardon the cynicism, it just seems like the general trend for space empires is to leave AI programming to the modders, who aren't even on the payroll.

I am afraid, I have to second that. As much as I hail Aaron for tweaking the mechanics of SE4 until they were really good and essentially bug-free, as much it was painfully clear that he had also deliberately accepted releasing SE4 at a point in time where it was little more than a bug-riddled, early beta version. In terms of AI, it was even worse: not even today are the SE4 AIs capable of following through on their attacks or "remembering" even the most basic pitfalls (like odds in which they have already lost a dozen times before, etc.)

Elsemeravin · #5 October 15th, 2006, 06:16 PM

On the other side, the sooner the game is publicly released, the sooner I can work on my mod, which should then be completed by the time Aaron fix most issues.

If released in 3 months, I can only start in 3 months, and not proposed the mod when the game is finally "finished" (bug-free).

The marketing should however start big advertising not now but in 3 months, and then only fans of the series might buy the game now, however still buggy, and the newcomers will only hear about it in 3 months and buy a game "bug-free" and with several interesting mods tweaking it.

Baron Munchausen · #6 October 15th, 2006, 09:20 PM

The patch will help quite a bit. The AI is not 'comatose' anymore in the latest patch. It'll never be real competition for an experienced human, of course. But at least it will be doing something after the patch.

Phoenix-D · #7 October 15th, 2006, 09:51 PM

Quote:

Baron Munchausen said:
The patch will help quite a bit. The AI is not 'comatose' anymore in the latest patch. It'll never be real competition for an experienced human, of course. But at least it will be doing something after the patch.

What in the patch helped the AI? I didn't see anything in the notes.

Fyron · #8 October 15th, 2006, 10:08 PM

AAshbery76 said:
Blame the publishers SF,who yet again released a game unfinished.3+ months more development time was needed.

If Aaron hadn't done the exact same thing with Starfury and SE4 before this, I might be inclined to agree...

AstralWanderer · #9 October 15th, 2006, 11:40 PM

I'd agree that the AI in SEIV was dire as well to start with. The problem is that AI can only really be worked on when the game engine/rules are essentially set in stone - if the game balance isn't there yet (necessitating further changes) then clearly the AI is going to be some way behind.

On the other hand, how many posters here would be happy to see the release delayed for a few more months to allow for better tuning of the AI, given that modders (*salutes*) likely have more time to do a better job?

LordAxel · #10 October 16th, 2006, 12:37 AM

The game will be slightly hurt as well bc its not in the big super stores(best buy ,cc). The game is far more buggy than i expected. My feel on alot of the broken components is dont include them until they work. The worst thing is they should have NEVER EVER released this game with the state the multiplayer is in. Either that or the AI has to be good at release or what are you releasing