501

(3 replies, posted in General discussion)

So in case no ones noticed that steam has caused the games starting area and help channel to become alive with activity again.  And a lot of these trials become players when they hear how *** good the kickstart pack is.

Other that fixing the nooby titan spawns from occurring on top of mobs an arkhe couldnt defend with one autocannon fitting...even two...

Whats the game plan here to keep these guys in game after that first month?


Ive noticed corps dont seem to be actively recruiting...at all...to anyone

Im seeing this as the possible new problem for players who choose to stay...

There any other big plans in the works here to impress the new steady stream of people who are wandering into game from steam?  Also i think you guys need to make these new players really aware of the kickstart package and what it offers...i was shocked myself when i realized how good it was...possibly make it available for not just Americans too?




Oh also regarding the greenlight program, ive searched around and read about what they are trying to do... basically they dont know how to really determine what games stay and which go...seemed to mention that games can stay on greenlight for as long as the poster wants...but they mention and to quote the site "So the specific number of votes doesn't matter as much as relative interest in a game compared with other games in Steam Greenlight."  And im looking at the comment section for perp and it has at least double the comments and activity compared to most of the other games i click on...not clicking on the games made by some guy in a basement fit for an apple2... seems to be drawing a lot of interest.

502

(18 replies, posted in General discussion)

Aye Pod wrote:

http://i1261.photobucket.com/albums/ii5 … ea282f.png


If this doesnt illustrate a problem with lag then I dont know what will. At this point the game is unplayable for me. It started when this last patch dropped. This wasnt a spike in lag for a brief second. This client had this lag for about 10m. Oddly enough it did not disconnect. My lag is pretty constant accross Alpha2 (Hersh), Beta (Norhoop), and Gamma (Davis Barrier). I have ping plotter results.


Hmm i wonder what was said in chat that was so top secret....

503

(6 replies, posted in Feature discussion and requests)

Im suggesting very small base construction requiring materials that one player no matter his/her chosen role in game can obtain. A slightly improved one that 3-5 peoples worth of mats can obtain for small corps.  Im suggesting this island have all the benefits of gamma minus pvp materials and pvp.

Perhaps allow a mutual mini-war between bases.

Keep the resources to a minimum, no pvp mats, keep the mobs to just barely more difficult than the first starting island.

There needs to be motive to move out and into the pvp areas, but allow players to enjoy the full scope of what this game offers early on in sample size.


Oh and my idea for how to allow this easy to make base in a nooby gamma:  Mobile home bot.  You buy it(mission reward for extended tutorial?), you drive it to spot, you deploy it and it transforms into a...i dunno construction yard with a small bank.  Now you can farm mats store them and then work to making walls or whatever. Make a small weekly tax on it or something so if people quit for a while it can decay and someone else can move in with their own mobile home bot.


Just something simple and not all that rewarding, and not overly complicated and complex... to bridge the gap between "grinding rep" and joining a mega-corp-alliance to enjoy the same activities but with pvp and on a grand scale.

504

(6 replies, posted in Feature discussion and requests)

Alright, what drew me back into the game was the awesome sounding terraforming and base building.

Ok so now that im back and fully re-addicted i realize that this aspect of the game is reserved for mega-corp-alliances, given you need to be able to defend your base.

Here the issue im seeing.  First i forgot how corps seem to not want to take new players or returning players, and as much as i want to beg some corp to take me in which could potentially restrict me from ever joining numerous other corps down the road...well i just dont want it.  So anyway...all this gamma base building and terraforming that sounds great seems to be out of reach for me until i can amass an insane amount of goods, get those structure cores...well its not gonna happens since if i ever do get all that stuff ill probably get my base stomped when im at work ect.

So seeing how the game currently seems to be completely focused on mega corp pvp and is lacking for new players and casuals.. Why not cut off one or two of those 20 pvp islands and make them some type of optional pvp small group and solo player base building islands.

Im not sure how much programming work this would take, maybe have a separate section of things that could be built or just make the current items in game cheaper and accessible for newer and small group players.  Dont need to make these islands really good, maybe a slight step up from alpha in difficulty and value ect.

Allow mutual mini wars between the players who build bases in case they want it, otherwise non destructible no pvp.  Allow the bases to degrade fairly quick.

This will give new players something to shoot for before they get to a place where they want to go full on pvp and base destruction and will give something for players who just might not want to join a mega-corp-alliance.


Just a thought...cheap easy to access terraforming and small-base building that anyone alone or in a very small corp could do without the risk of losing it all, while retaining the option to war another base if they want a small scale mini-war.  Content barely more difficult than alpha island, possibly worse resources, no pvp only resources or whatever.

505

(15 replies, posted in General discussion)

Celebro wrote:

Cynicism or not its not only a sandbox , its also a business with customers. What do you say to your customers?'Sorry its a sandbox ,you should create your own content 99% of the time, here are the limited set of tools'


Yes.  That is what a sandbox is. That 1% where you dont create your own content should be tutorials to showcase what you can possibly do in game and provide a taste of all the paths in game you could take.

The problem that i see is that 90% of the sand in this sandbox is only accessible to large corporations who are pvp capable.  New players and "medium" players who are not part of a mega corp alliance have access to getting stomped in pvp and farming alpha/beta.  Mega corps get to own outposts build bases terraform ect.

506

(56 replies, posted in Feature discussion and requests)

In my humble opinion, basic items shouldn't be out of reach for your average joe who wants to basically craft.

It seems that most industry is reserved for corporations, who obviously dont need any more or new player taking up the art of industry.  This is bad.  It reserves a major aspect of the game for the few who are "in" enough with a corp who will feed them kernals and mats.

I dont see an issue with the best extensions and bots requiring a corp's farming efforts and having those items reserved for serious industry accounts.

Its the basics.  I want to be able to be self sufficient with making basic extensions, ammo for my combat character...hell it would even be nice to be able to pump out some bots so that i can pvp more.

As far as i remember, getting into a corp, your basically told to not spec into industry its already covered be a miner. Thats all fine and good to need a lot of mining character, however theres got to be a system that makes a large number of people interested in industry advantageous to a corp, while at the same time allowing casual people to be able to contribute something to the market.

Something does need to change with the insane amount of kernals needed to unlock stuff.  If anything research should be a time based function not a quantity of kernals munched type of mechanic.

Also i would LOVE to see some type of communal industry functions for corps.  So adding some noob with lv3 industry into the corp will benefit the corp rather than being ignored or rejected due to not being needed.

My idea is somewhat long winded.  I would like to see more corp based structures, not just on gamma.  Perhaps a corp factory where anyone with any type of industry could park and work on work orders of things needed by the corp, while mining characters could mine the materials and have transports dump those mats into a corp storage faclility that would be connected to the factory that was pumping out goods.  Basically a corp structure for every aspect of the games grouped extensions. I realize that would take far too much programming to even be realistic but its nice to dream.

507

(26 replies, posted in General discussion)

So people avoid the public chats fearing that people will know they are on ect.  New players see the general chat with 35 people and get the wrong idea or whatever...

So why not add an anon tag for players who want to avoid public chats for these reasons? Cant be hard to do on the programming side and might help the game at least feel more populated.

Make a little box in options for it, then people could safely join general chat and help chat and rejoin the community who doesnt afraid of being in chat.

I really think its a big factor in a lot of new players backing out of a game they might enjoy if only they knew that in fact more than 30 players were on and even maybe got to converse with some people in larger corps even if they were anon in chat.


Just a thought.

508

(9 replies, posted in General discussion)

Yeah its good to be back.

Oddly im most excited about the dynamic ore spawns, despite seeing a lot of negative feedback.  Its going to add exploring to my game plan as well as giving me further reason to keep my combat account near by.

A little disappointing to see the starter terminal, at least the green one being void of life though, was hoping all the new stuff added would bring more new players.  Still plenty of new stuff for me to work towards which is good.

509

(9 replies, posted in General discussion)

Yeah i think it was NEX since i remember you being a corp manager or whatever.

Ive only had time to quickly hop in and see my EP stash ect so i havent looked to see whats going on and if theres any activity ect.

I remember corps being rather difficult to get into though...that still the case?

Im hoping the game isnt too void of life im stuck here for like 90 days on each account lol...

510

(9 replies, posted in General discussion)

About 50 days since i last played.  Looks like whatever corp i was in is gone. Im clueless as to all the minute changes that have occurred but aware of the major ones (terraforming and hovercrafts right?)

I seem to have made shinjala as my main base...i hate that place, looking for a good non-pvp area to make my new base...whats good these days?

What are the good corps to try to join?  I hate commies if that helps.

Anything i should be aware about?

PVE = Farming stuff....the end.

Fix that and carebears will be able to enjoy building up an account thats able to take pvp losses.

You could make farming more complex.  Last i played the only thing that really changed was what kernal type dropped and some possible wrecked extensions that i would usually leave since they werent worth the weight to take back.

I would take missions out if i was in an area that offered quests for the mob spawn i wanted to farm, but other than that they weren't really worth doing just to do.



I would suggest a new farming mechanic and items.  While my miner account which serves as something to afk mine in near where im combat farming or in a known safe location (im fine with that) its the combat character that needs love.

Many people ive talked to whove quit this game fell into 2 categories. They either didnt want to have to have two accounts, one to afk mine and the other for pvp combat...or they simply found pve combat to be boring and not really worth the while...

Personally i think the combat in this game is fun.  I just think there needs to be a better mechanic than farming kernals and trying to break even with ammo drops. My disclaimer on this is that im an on and off player and im just returning from about a 50 day break and not up to date fully on whats different.


I do think that there needs to be a vital combat mechanic, stuff to farm that are not bulky worthless junk i cant sell without repairing (perhaps a deconstruct extension so i can recycle stuff on the spot or a recycle bot my miner could use?) 

Its a pain to get the good extension which it should be, but the act of farming npc mobs needs some "oomph" and some addicting mechanic that makes me want to log on and start blowing up mob robots. 

Make this fun and worthwhile and people wont need to have multiple accounts to support a pvp combat account...since that account could be more than viable to support itself and pvp bots on its own.

512

(18 replies, posted in News and information)

Annihilator wrote:

shadows at night... omg, i dont know how long i have been waiting for that (ok, since i started almost exactly 2 years ago...)

Honestly, shadows dont matter.  No offense but they look goofy and mechanical in this game and get annoying to watch them pixilate or whatever blocky movement effect they go through.  Also shadows is often the most turned off graphical effect in any game.  I turn them off in almost any game, even games where the look fantastic.

If we were going to develop fluff game effects, getting that new shader, animations, and more easy listining hungarian techno beats would be appreciated by all.  Not sure why i like the music in this game but i do and the second thing ill turn off after shadows in most games, but not this game, love the music.

I will say, that for as small of a game as this is, and for as small of a company as this one is (still remember the photos of the team and its launch party)...for a bunch of scrubby lookin dudes you all are putting some very large and cash heavy companies to shame with this little game, even if the games activity is small right now.  This is comming from someone whos been though a lot of beyond *** mmorpg attempts and a whole bunch of fail sandbox attempts.  Lot of the sandbox competition out there is years ahead of this game but isnt anywhere close to as playable as this game was even at launch.  Think that makes up for the *** shadows comment.

513

(75 replies, posted in General discussion)

Personally i would like to see the developers add more dimensions to the pve &pvp combat/mining&production and possibly economics/diplomacy aspects of the game.

Adding various theme-park-y additions and calling it content is a never ending void that must be filled since those activites lose their luster quickly. 

Adding more dimensions to what we are already doing is how you add to sandboxes.  I would like to see more reasons to do what we do in game, other than aquiring NIC and padding e-peen.  I think that is the biggest drawback in the game, im either feeding my NIC desires or im aiming to wreak havoc in pvp.  It seems those are the two ends to the means in the game.  Develop this aspect, providing more "sand" for the existing sandbox is what people typically ask for in sandboxes as far as development.  Only problem is, doing so requires unique thinking and its why the route of adding themepark type activites and polishing existing systems is the only route taken when developing sandboxes.

found this to be the most exciting part " it’s the first member of a new robot class we call gliders"

New class of robots is good and means more choices are on the way.

factional mission tokens is good too...id rather have nic and rep gain and be able to select what i need as a reward later on in bulk.

On a side note on missions, i would like more mission type control.  Personally i like missions to compliment what im doing rather than driving what i do, but request that the option to talior what my missions require rather than take away the new more interesting missions.  Basically id like an option to select what im killing/resourcing/scanning ect, dont care if it comes in reduced reward form.  Keep the new multi step missions however, just give me an option to get a bit of rep and nic bonus for what just feels right at the moment.

515

(9 replies, posted in Q & A)

Well advertising is an epic money sink.

Would you prefer more resources to making the game better or more resources to getting the word out?

At some point they are going to need to get a whole boatload of player in game.


Also i would like to point out how utterly worthless advertising money sinks are compared to solid word of mouth.  Ive seen terrible games grow simply because people who played did the free type of advertising. 

With that said perhaps an incentive should be created for players who bring new players into the game.

516

(15 replies, posted in Guides and Resources)

this is a game with a few hundred players...cant hide from what you do

517

(20 replies, posted in Balancing)

I like this all however the way i would do it, is create factional "attributes".

Some form of bonus added to whatever was being made, perhaps per type of item created (such as weapons/ammo, armor/shield, industry mods and other secondary mods.

Keep all the resources as is, but add factional "rares" only found on the related island.  Except ill call them catalysts to reduce confusion.

When creating items one of these catalysts could be added to imbue the item with its effect.


So, for example, anyone wanting to make industrial mods with a faster cycle time mod would need to go to the factional island where that catalyst would drop and farm for it, while farming on another island would produce catylsts that increased output.

Either way i like the idea of giving me a reason to go to another factions island, but i dont like the idea of limiting the most vital materials, especially since you cant do missions when in a diffrent faction without penalty.

This needs to be done to facilitate newer players not in a corp, as those are the people in the game hurting the most and the most needed imo.


Not to get off topic but those not in a corp are treated to a market void of variety and prone to overpricing due to the lack of "need" for the most active individuals in big corps to buy and sell through the market.  Seems they are more or less self sufficiant and that leads to a very inactive market with little variety and even the most simplest items out of price range for anyone remotely new.  Thats the biggest issue i see with the market.

Reducing the location of standard resources is only going to further hurt these players.