Some Stuff To Look At

[Maiss-Thro]

Good day, DE.

I'm quite pleased with the game so far. The design is beautiful, the tile system is well put and no level repeats the exact same, all frames are very different indeed and require a different style to approach. I even loved what you did with the way to defeat Lieutenant Lech Kril. All is very good for a f2p game, and even much better than some commercial games. Kudos to you all.

Nevertheless, I'd like to expose some stuff that simply bothered me enough to write them down for you to take a look and -possibly- correct in future updates. I didn't know where to put this, so here it is. Let's get started.

First: I'm quite dissapointed with the Informer Special Event. This is a Co-Op game and almost everyone that paid attention to it ended up soloing missions (specially Merrow) to get as many kills as possible. I noticed that there is not a system in-game that kept track of a limit on stages for the quantity of Informers it could have, so going back and forth the stage could give you enough to kill (if sanity of such dull method allowed you) to "be made of WIN". What's done it's done, but maybe you could invite team playing by registering teams instead of solo gamers for next event of this kind, that way special reward can be earned by all members of the team (despite being 2 or 4 players team). the fact of the clan was all good.

Second: Melee combat seems just not so loyal to reality, and that said from a martial artist perspective (okinawan karatedo and kobudo). I know you could do a better job on that. Probably give more enphasys on taking real martial arts references instead of movies (that's what it looks like). Specially noticed this on Orthos where in some attacks the blades are facing oposite directions than reality needed, and in Kogake where it seems to me that all the moves are taken from Final Fight istead a real martial art. You can probably find a martial artist that can performs some moves for you to motion capture it. Perhaps you even can give some frames different fighting styles depending on weapon, but this maybe asking too much (same Tenno school, same Tenno style). You could even add some classic combat tonfa to give variety (please research them well, since it's easy to make them look false).

Third: There is a bug with Kestrel and Glaive that's quite annoying. If you throw it to a group of enemies, it will randomly get one that may possibly dissappear from sight and get stuck on the floor (you can still hear it) and only a heavy AOE attack or a Dethcube's vaporize can get rid of it. The stucked enemy won't even show on minimap.

Fourth: Ignis... oh! Ignis... I wanted this weapon to be in the game, and when it finally did I just wanted it. It's a very fun weapon! Why not? Who wouldn't love to throw some flames at a potential threat? Just for the sake of plain innocent fun... But no! this is probably the weakest weapon in Tenno's weaponry. Low damage, single targeted, no piercing, shortest range. This 4 points almost take out the fun of it. It even have a shorter range than a shotgun, so why give it so low damage (even with a maxed multishot? Don't know if you've seen a flamethrower burn, but please research it. It's no kidding. That's one of the worst thing that man could invent, and in no way it is single targeted (short cone damage like Hek). Besides, the flames get all around you, so piercing might be a nice add-on. Cone damage and piercing can make it a great short ranged low damage weapon for crowd control. It has to be balanced to an equilibrium.

Fifth: Melee combat just feels unnecessary. The damage is low and there's so few animations that it's like an 80's beat'em up. It's better going charge or get into guns for gaming, which makes melee weapons almost non existing in most gameplay.

Sixth: This is my main concern: NINJAS play free. That's the slogan the game is known. NINJAS play free. Ninja were something so stealth that most of what we know of them is pure assumption. Fast killing shadows that rarely were seen in the place they were making a job (if anyone that saw them was left alive. Strangely, stealth is almost no part of the game, unless you are a skilled Loki or have a Shade. There isn't even a reward for a completely stealth accomplished mission.

Only one more thing: you made something great on The Call trailer for PS4. That was a badass Ash with his Bladestorm ability. If you have those animations, why not give them to the game? They look so well made that is a shame you don't use them to the character outside the trailer.

Hope you take note of this observations to make a better game and a better experience for us all.

Greets.

[Namacyst]

[tsubasakuroi]

1. Nothing to really comment about one, though I just wish it was better handled and not a solofest...

 

2. Any chance you've seen this?

I apologize for the lengthy video but it'll probably answer plenty of things about the Kogake along with animations... I think they did get someone to motion cap it but I don't recall well. Most of the time they keyframe(?) things or that seems to be their preference

3. Bug will probably be fixed soon. I'm not sure if that has been mentioned already or not in bug forum

4. Many Ignis owners are unhappy on how it works. Might be buffed in update 9. I don't have it myself, but from what I've seen I wish it was an area denial weapon like how the Torid is.

5. Update 9 might be the one to bring normal melee attacks up to par.

6. Stealth is something they're slowly working on.

Ash's Bladestorm will get more animations

Edited July 8, 2013 by tsubasakuroi

[Maiss-Thro]

I haven't got the chance to watch last Livestream as it should be: in calm. Thanks for the link, I'll watch it tomorrow for good.

 

Thanks for replying this "long essay" as it is said above.