Mouse aiming (turn ship towards cursor)

[Sire]

Hi guys!

I feel the current movement method is a bit too difficult to master, especially for beginners. You need to work too many movements together. Ship turning, ship strafing, ship acceleration/braking and also a separate weapon aiming. And I'm a drummer so I should be pretty good at stuff like this

I'm sure you'll get better with a few hours of training, but right now the difficult movement makes me much less interested in an otherwise EXTREMELY interesting game (that I bought immediately).

My suggestion is to change, or add an option for another, movement method where you aim and turn with the mouse cursor. This feels so obvious I'm guessing you've actively decided against this method? If so, I hope you're willing to reconsider.

If you think it's "dumbing down" your game, just lower the experience reward to 75% (or something similar) when using "beginner controls".

I think you guys deserve that this game turn into a huge success, and I hope you're not letting a petty thing like this stand in the way.

Thanks and keep up the good work!

Sire

[Lurler]

We received a few suggestions to implement direct mouse control and it is something we will certainly look into.

But it seems the main problem with controls that people have is because they are not aware they can use SPACE to stop their ship. It makes it much easier when you use it.

[Sire]

Thanks for considering this! I'm sure it will improve the game

[catmorbid]

It's very simple to implement it. But just remember to also implement a hold-toggle button that will switch the control mode, because bigger and slower ships can actually utilize the mobile turrets vs static movement better.

The major problem with the current layout is that it's very difficult to do strafing and turning, because we're not used to doing it with the same hand. 20 years of first-person-shooters has wired gamer reflexes to use one hand for forward-backward + starfe movement, while the other does the turning, so trying to get familiar with completely different type method of movement does not come easily. It probably also has something to do with how many things you're doing at the same time. So now your left hand is doing 2-3 things (strafe, turn, reverse/accelerate), while right hand is doing basically just one thing (shoot). Or I don't really know, just throwing thoughts here without any basis ^.^

[Lurler]

atmorbid, I agree with you. Using strafe and moving at the same time is somewhat difficult even for us, even though we created the game. So yeah, we will certainly investigate alternative control modes. Although it is not a top priority for us at the moment since there are tons of bugs we need to fix first and add more content.

[B.M/F]

It's very simple to implement it. But just remember to also implement a hold-toggle button that will switch the control mode, because bigger and slower ships can actually utilize the mobile turrets vs static movement better.

The major problem with the current layout is that it's very difficult to do strafing and turning, because we're not used to doing it with the same hand. 20 years of first-person-shooters has wired gamer reflexes to use one hand for forward-backward + starfe movement, while the other does the turning, so trying to get familiar with completely different type method of movement does not come easily. It probably also has something to do with how many things you're doing at the same time. So now your left hand is doing 2-3 things (strafe, turn, reverse/accelerate), while right hand is doing basically just one thing (shoot). Or I don't really know, just throwing thoughts here without any basis ^.^

I vote fore the hold modifier key (ex. shift to turn heading towards mouse cursor).
each mode has it own use, if youre flying with a fast frigate/fighter with forward firing gun, you'll do alot of strafing and that's when you'll need the mouse  flight.
but when you're flying a slow freighter/carrier with lots of turrets or a destroyer with broadside cannon  you'll appriciate the normal control.

[Lurler]

I vote fore the hold modifier key (ex. shift to turn heading towards mouse cursor).
each mode has it own use, if youre flying with a fast frigate/fighter with forward firing gun, you'll do alot of strafing and that's when you'll need the mouse  flight.
but when you're flying a slow freighter/carrier with lots of turrets or a destroyer with broadside cannon  you'll appriciate the normal control.

Totally agree with you.
We will certainly investigate this feature and I am sure we will add it eventually.

[wormywyrm]

You can still have astroid-like physics while also having the ship automatically rotate towards the cursor.  Have the ship increase rotational accel towards the cursor- Just make sure the ship decelerates as it gets closer to aiming at the cursor so that it doesnt overshoot it.  I did this in my small multiplayer game, starsky lysle.net/ss Which is a sort of asteroid multiplayer shooter, no RPG elements like your amazing game.

I found this game while looking for a spiritual successor to Armada for Dreamcast.  I am really impressed by it

I did find the spacebar to be helpful, but I think the controls could be even easier to use if you rotate towards the mouse.  I also am not sure if there is any game controller support- I would love to use my X1 controller in the game so it would play more like Armada did.

I noticed that ships don't maintain their momentum very well- so for instance, if you begin rotating or flying one direction and you let go of the keys, your ship doesnt continue flying in that direction.  I think you did this so we can control our ships with more ease.  I think you will find though that if you have the ship rotate towards the mouse cursor AND have the spacebar slow the ship, players will be able to control their ships with ease without making the momentum any less realistic.

I haven't played a lot of the game yet but the only other thing I can really say is, it would be fun to have more enemies or to fight multiple weaker enemies at a time.  I might just not be at that part of the game yet though, so I will hold off on commenting   Amazing job.

[Lurler]

You can still have astroid-like physics while also having the ship automatically rotate towards the cursor.

That's what we will probably end up with as an alternative control scheme. Not now though

I found this game while looking for a spiritual successor to Armada for Dreamcast.  I am really impressed by it

Ah, another Dreamcast fan! These were a good times indeed. I still play some RE:CV and Soul calibur from time to time

I noticed that ships don't maintain their momentum very well

This was done on purpose as there are several reasons why it shouldn't be infinite.

I haven't played a lot of the game yet but the only other thing I can really say is, it would be fun to have more enemies or to fight multiple weaker enemies at a time.  I might just not be at that part of the game yet though, so I will hold off on commenting   Amazing job.

Thank you
And yes, we will definitely introduce more variety to the game and combat as we progress in development.

[Expanding Man]

I'd just like to second this suggestion.  Not having the mouse be able to control rotation in some manner feels rather awkward.  I think I can get used to it, but if I were you guys I'd make this a priority before you hit Steam, I have a bad feeling the current control scheme might really piss some people off.  I do think the ship combat itself is really nice though!

[Lurler]

That's the problem. If we simply change controls to make your ship just follow the mouse it will really turn all the work we've put in combat system so far into a mindless shooter like countless other casual space games... I really wish we can think of something better than just that.
I think we will have to do it at some point anyway though, if we want to implement controller support, but... I really think it is just a matter of practice and if you spend couple of hours playing you will have a feel for the control scheme that we implemented and you will understand why we like it so much.
But again, as I mentioned above we will definitely implement it to see how it plays and then decide if it is worth putting in the game and in what way exactly.

[Hammish]

Having both in game in some form does seem to make a lot of sense.  I kinda wish I had a mouseaim option when I'm flying something faster and more maneuverable, as keyboard turning after you've leveled up a bit, in something like a Banshee II... well, you start to turn so fast with a good RCS that it's actually hard to control with the keyboard.  It also makes lining up fixed weapons a pain.

By the same token, in the slower ships I can see having keyboard turning actually being a plus instead of a minus.  I'm still working on a ship designed for broadside fire, I think including something like that would be a big step toward selling people on the advantages of keyboard control, where you might not want to face something to shoot it.  The same goes for mine weapons, of course, and possibly even missile weapons when you want to arc in a tracking shot without having incoming laser/ballistic fire constantly wrecking your missiles.

[Expanding Man]

That's the problem. If we simply change controls to make your ship just follow the mouse it will really turn all the work we've put in combat system so far into a mindless shooter like countless other casual space games...

I think you underestimate your own combat system.  There is still inertia and tracking speeds, plus special modules, or whatever you are calling the modules that fit in the numbered slots (I'm not sure what sorts of things you still were thinking of adding, perhaps webifiers, ECM, tracking disrupters?).  Additionally, unless I'm wrong, some weapons have damage which falls off with range.  Consider that your game already has much more sophisticated combat than say, Diablo (of course that is contingent on there being more special ability modules).  A good example of a game that pulls this off with mouse controlling rotation quite successfully is http://ringrunner.net/ .  (A related question, are there damage types?  It's always good to have damage types.)

So, I'm getting used to it, definitely won't stop me from playing and enjoying the game, but making things more difficult by muddling your control scheme seems like the wrong way to go.  If you let the combat stand on it's own I have no doubt it'll hold up.

[x-tream]

In my opinion current aiming system is quite hard to get used to.  Because of strafes.  It would be much better if there was second control-mode which uses pressed SHIFT to aim nose of ship towards cursor and change A and D to strafe buttons (Just like in Starsector). ╨í╨┐╨░╤ü╨╕╨▒╨╛.

[Lurler]

x-tream, we plan to implement that system as an alternative control scheme. Hopefully it will be included in the next big update.