Closed Beta Thoughts
Clonesa
Join Date: 2012-02-05 Member: 143691Members
Join Date: 2012-02-05 Member: 143691Members
These are my thoughts on what I've experienced with the beta so far. I've only had a few hours as Commander so I'll focus mainly on the FPS player experience. Also, I know since this will be critical that people will get upset and lambast with me, "Its only a beta!" Since I cannot see into the future my comments are entirely focused on the closed beta as I experienced it and not the past or future. I hope that the developers might get some use out of this (I can dream).
Technical Issues:
I'm sure the development team is a lot more aware of these than me so I'll keep it brief. However one thing that worried me was people's comments on the perceived "lag" they experienced, including server administrators. I have been in servers where people will pings lower than me have complained of lag and I felt very little. Likewise I have felt insane "lag" at ping 50 in some servers. Sometimes the exact same server on another map.
During these moments I don't believe this is lag at all. Reaction to firing my gun is fast and stable and my ping is stable at a low 50-60. However, it appears client side prediction fails entirely or has a very badly done heavily server dependent system. Animations even fail to interpolate causing constant jittering while the animations play at actual key frame rates O_O Movement becomes difficult as not even my own movement is predicted much less that of other entities.
Graphics are fairly well done, but unfortunately not utilized well by the artists. There are a lot of effects in the game that have under played or confusing graphics. I'll assume many of these are due to the usage of placeholders. Alien vision is a neat effect (love the Predator homage), but unfortunately counter-productive art wise and can be very confusing during gameplay (is that flamethrower shooting right now? whats the range on it?)
It crashes every now and then, but then so does TF2 and BF3.
The physics simulation is annoying. Rag dolls just do bizarre things and seem very silly. I often kind myself ending up inside walls or objects and getting stuck, especially as an Onos. Suggestions: Beef up the simulation here. :P Adjust those rag doll weights and properties. Add some detection for stuck players and bump them out (not a solution I know, but a nice fallback).
The menu is poorly done. Pressing escape brings up the menu, but does not remove it. You can't double click on a server to join it. The ingame buy menus don't seem to share a standard. You can't even press escape to close the Prototype menu, but you CAN use it to close the Armory menu. Little things like this are brutal on player experience. There is poor feedback as well. Quite a few times I could not purchase a new weapon, but there was no indication of why or even that it was unavailable. Loading screens show no progress, etc.
Gameplay:
Screw balance
Wait, hear me out :P Balance is subjective and something that can never truly be accomplished. Its like justice. One must always pursue justice, but not be so naive to think it can be achieved. So in the Alpha and early Beta stages development should be focused on making the game engaging and fun, FUN and even more FUN. This is a video game. Fun is everything. As such where there is a lack of depth, add it. Where there is a lack of content, add it. Where there are frustrating mechanics, remove or alter them. Balance can be worked on later. Examples:
The Fade is overpowered, yet fun. More so to play as than against, but good, we can work from there.
Early game skulks and marines lack depth and are boring to play, but fairly well balanced. This is a problem. You need to tweak or add dynamics to make this game stage fun. Where there is some fun is the stalking effect for aliens and the creepy intensity of roaming through a dark quiet hallway with your squad right before they pounce. However, in term of actual combat, it needs work.
Aliens (Khaara if you like...):
Skulk
The skulk is just too simplistic right now and very awkward
Yes, I know there are evolution upgrades and commander level upgrades. Even so depth needs to be added here. The skulk is extremely important as the default form for alien players. Most new player will like to try aliens first as its new and exciting (even though they should be playing marines first to ease into the game... they simply will not, its human nature). Any balance adjustment to the Skulk can have an extreme impact on balance. Parasite is out of place and not the depth that feels right for Skulks.
They are too awkard
The skulk model is extremely long. As I'm guessing you are aware this makes it a pain in the ass to work with in a FPS game. Rework the model. Shorten him a bit. This is a problem when the model pokes out around corners or looks bizarre and thus is hard to aim at for marines when its running around and quickly turning. FPS games do not handle long character models well, don't try :P
Wall climbing is a problem
I'm guessing you've given this a lot of thought and iterated over it a bunch of times, but here goes anyway. Wall climbing is always a problem for any game that adds it. Its disorienting and difficult to get feeling right. NS2's model is less disorienting when rapidly changing axis as the view doesn't change axis, but this in and of itself can be very confusing. I find myself constantly falling off of ceilings as I look down when running and seem to drop off. I often get the error message that I can't evolve because im wall climbing but have no idea because I'm only 1mm off the ground. Suggestions: Experiment with view axis changing (perhaps as a menu option). I would suggest not having it the same axis as the world model, but rather smoothed out and kind of averaged between nearby surfaces to be less disorienting. Add a small HUD indicator that shows that was are currently wall climbing and on which axis. And a keybinding or menu option to allow the Skulk to look down while running on the ceiling and not drop off.
Parasite, what?
I actually had to ask on the forums as to what this thing even does. The effect is far too subtle. There appears to be no visible indication anything has even happened other than a +1 if you land a hit with it and quiet audio queue on fire. The entire ability seems misplaced and more fitting, gameplay wise, on the Lurker, who actually often surveys the battle from above and fires ranged attacks. Perhaps this an attempt to add depth to the Skulk? Also the actual parasite victim fx is too underplayed and confusing. Suggestions: Give the ability to the Lurker instead and add a better visual effect on both the victim (I'm thinking Infected vision in l4d) and on fire.
Lurker
Not very effective
Part of this is player perception. The primary fire is very fast, but does very low damage and has a faint audio queue and a barely visible, near instant projectile. For the player this means like he ->feels<- as if his primary contributes nothing. Secondary fire is the same thing, but slower... I think? Suggestions: Remove the secondary, replace it with the 2nd weapon slot parasite cloud ability. Add a louder, more powerful sound to primary fire, slow the firing speed down, increase the damage, slow the projectile way down and add drop. This will make it less spammy, more skill based and more importantly, feel better to use. Also, as a cool effect and reward for the player make the spikes physically stick into objects and enemy players :)
Cloud parasites thing is cool, but forces alien vision by obscuring vision. its a neat ability to use to swoop in and obscure the marines vision. But I think for aliens it should have a low alpha so they are not forced to use alien vision. Using it is also pretty awkward. I think it should replace the seemingly useless primary weapon slot secondary fire and the lurker should be able to shoot spikes while he spreads the gas cloud (take auto attack off of energy).
Fade
Fun and interesting, but too strong
The fade can teleport far too often and stay invisible for too long, moving at incredible speed. A Fade with carapace, frenzy and regen is nearly impossible to kill by a single marine and even a group of 3+ with a similar tech level. I went 33:9 in a game with this and I'm not even very good O_O This makes it fun to play AS, but not against. Suggestions: Take auto attack off of energy usage as its confusing and annoying. Increase teleport energy usage slightly and slightly reduce movement speed while invisible. Remove some of the power from an un-upgraded Fade (lower base health) and lower cost and then move the power to evolving player upgrades. Remove Frenzy as a choice for Fade. Its good for Skulks, but way too strong for Fades that already have amazing sustain. Each form should have unique upgrades anyway. Make cloak a default ability for the Fade. Teleporting in to marines should be a gamble. Either you try to sneak up let them them move into your ambush, open up and kill one and then teleport away or you teleport in and try to kill them before they can kill you. You should not be able to go in and out as you please. Also, allow to use the slow charge up claw weapon while invisible, only revealing the Skulk when it finally swings, allowing a skilled Skulk to get ambush hits.
Onos
Too big
I know thats the point of the Onos, but it just does not work in this game. He should remain a scary big tank, but tone it down a little. Its too hard to navigate around the map. It doesn't play nice with the physics simulation and I get stuck as Onos constantly.
The l4d style impact attack is a good idea, but it feels off. It doesn't feel like a powerful hit like the l4d tank. Increase the horizontal knockback effect and exaggerate the animation and audio queue (again, too subtle).
Technical Issues:
I'm sure the development team is a lot more aware of these than me so I'll keep it brief. However one thing that worried me was people's comments on the perceived "lag" they experienced, including server administrators. I have been in servers where people will pings lower than me have complained of lag and I felt very little. Likewise I have felt insane "lag" at ping 50 in some servers. Sometimes the exact same server on another map.
During these moments I don't believe this is lag at all. Reaction to firing my gun is fast and stable and my ping is stable at a low 50-60. However, it appears client side prediction fails entirely or has a very badly done heavily server dependent system. Animations even fail to interpolate causing constant jittering while the animations play at actual key frame rates O_O Movement becomes difficult as not even my own movement is predicted much less that of other entities.
Graphics are fairly well done, but unfortunately not utilized well by the artists. There are a lot of effects in the game that have under played or confusing graphics. I'll assume many of these are due to the usage of placeholders. Alien vision is a neat effect (love the Predator homage), but unfortunately counter-productive art wise and can be very confusing during gameplay (is that flamethrower shooting right now? whats the range on it?)
It crashes every now and then, but then so does TF2 and BF3.
The physics simulation is annoying. Rag dolls just do bizarre things and seem very silly. I often kind myself ending up inside walls or objects and getting stuck, especially as an Onos. Suggestions: Beef up the simulation here. :P Adjust those rag doll weights and properties. Add some detection for stuck players and bump them out (not a solution I know, but a nice fallback).
The menu is poorly done. Pressing escape brings up the menu, but does not remove it. You can't double click on a server to join it. The ingame buy menus don't seem to share a standard. You can't even press escape to close the Prototype menu, but you CAN use it to close the Armory menu. Little things like this are brutal on player experience. There is poor feedback as well. Quite a few times I could not purchase a new weapon, but there was no indication of why or even that it was unavailable. Loading screens show no progress, etc.
Gameplay:
Screw balance
Wait, hear me out :P Balance is subjective and something that can never truly be accomplished. Its like justice. One must always pursue justice, but not be so naive to think it can be achieved. So in the Alpha and early Beta stages development should be focused on making the game engaging and fun, FUN and even more FUN. This is a video game. Fun is everything. As such where there is a lack of depth, add it. Where there is a lack of content, add it. Where there are frustrating mechanics, remove or alter them. Balance can be worked on later. Examples:
The Fade is overpowered, yet fun. More so to play as than against, but good, we can work from there.
Early game skulks and marines lack depth and are boring to play, but fairly well balanced. This is a problem. You need to tweak or add dynamics to make this game stage fun. Where there is some fun is the stalking effect for aliens and the creepy intensity of roaming through a dark quiet hallway with your squad right before they pounce. However, in term of actual combat, it needs work.
Aliens (Khaara if you like...):
Skulk
The skulk is just too simplistic right now and very awkward
Yes, I know there are evolution upgrades and commander level upgrades. Even so depth needs to be added here. The skulk is extremely important as the default form for alien players. Most new player will like to try aliens first as its new and exciting (even though they should be playing marines first to ease into the game... they simply will not, its human nature). Any balance adjustment to the Skulk can have an extreme impact on balance. Parasite is out of place and not the depth that feels right for Skulks.
They are too awkard
The skulk model is extremely long. As I'm guessing you are aware this makes it a pain in the ass to work with in a FPS game. Rework the model. Shorten him a bit. This is a problem when the model pokes out around corners or looks bizarre and thus is hard to aim at for marines when its running around and quickly turning. FPS games do not handle long character models well, don't try :P
Wall climbing is a problem
I'm guessing you've given this a lot of thought and iterated over it a bunch of times, but here goes anyway. Wall climbing is always a problem for any game that adds it. Its disorienting and difficult to get feeling right. NS2's model is less disorienting when rapidly changing axis as the view doesn't change axis, but this in and of itself can be very confusing. I find myself constantly falling off of ceilings as I look down when running and seem to drop off. I often get the error message that I can't evolve because im wall climbing but have no idea because I'm only 1mm off the ground. Suggestions: Experiment with view axis changing (perhaps as a menu option). I would suggest not having it the same axis as the world model, but rather smoothed out and kind of averaged between nearby surfaces to be less disorienting. Add a small HUD indicator that shows that was are currently wall climbing and on which axis. And a keybinding or menu option to allow the Skulk to look down while running on the ceiling and not drop off.
Parasite, what?
I actually had to ask on the forums as to what this thing even does. The effect is far too subtle. There appears to be no visible indication anything has even happened other than a +1 if you land a hit with it and quiet audio queue on fire. The entire ability seems misplaced and more fitting, gameplay wise, on the Lurker, who actually often surveys the battle from above and fires ranged attacks. Perhaps this an attempt to add depth to the Skulk? Also the actual parasite victim fx is too underplayed and confusing. Suggestions: Give the ability to the Lurker instead and add a better visual effect on both the victim (I'm thinking Infected vision in l4d) and on fire.
Lurker
Not very effective
Part of this is player perception. The primary fire is very fast, but does very low damage and has a faint audio queue and a barely visible, near instant projectile. For the player this means like he ->feels<- as if his primary contributes nothing. Secondary fire is the same thing, but slower... I think? Suggestions: Remove the secondary, replace it with the 2nd weapon slot parasite cloud ability. Add a louder, more powerful sound to primary fire, slow the firing speed down, increase the damage, slow the projectile way down and add drop. This will make it less spammy, more skill based and more importantly, feel better to use. Also, as a cool effect and reward for the player make the spikes physically stick into objects and enemy players :)
Cloud parasites thing is cool, but forces alien vision by obscuring vision. its a neat ability to use to swoop in and obscure the marines vision. But I think for aliens it should have a low alpha so they are not forced to use alien vision. Using it is also pretty awkward. I think it should replace the seemingly useless primary weapon slot secondary fire and the lurker should be able to shoot spikes while he spreads the gas cloud (take auto attack off of energy).
Fade
Fun and interesting, but too strong
The fade can teleport far too often and stay invisible for too long, moving at incredible speed. A Fade with carapace, frenzy and regen is nearly impossible to kill by a single marine and even a group of 3+ with a similar tech level. I went 33:9 in a game with this and I'm not even very good O_O This makes it fun to play AS, but not against. Suggestions: Take auto attack off of energy usage as its confusing and annoying. Increase teleport energy usage slightly and slightly reduce movement speed while invisible. Remove some of the power from an un-upgraded Fade (lower base health) and lower cost and then move the power to evolving player upgrades. Remove Frenzy as a choice for Fade. Its good for Skulks, but way too strong for Fades that already have amazing sustain. Each form should have unique upgrades anyway. Make cloak a default ability for the Fade. Teleporting in to marines should be a gamble. Either you try to sneak up let them them move into your ambush, open up and kill one and then teleport away or you teleport in and try to kill them before they can kill you. You should not be able to go in and out as you please. Also, allow to use the slow charge up claw weapon while invisible, only revealing the Skulk when it finally swings, allowing a skilled Skulk to get ambush hits.
Onos
Too big
I know thats the point of the Onos, but it just does not work in this game. He should remain a scary big tank, but tone it down a little. Its too hard to navigate around the map. It doesn't play nice with the physics simulation and I get stuck as Onos constantly.
The l4d style impact attack is a good idea, but it feels off. It doesn't feel like a powerful hit like the l4d tank. Increase the horizontal knockback effect and exaggerate the animation and audio queue (again, too subtle).
Comments
Reserved
Where is the like button!?
Except I did and, perhaps more importantly, played Gloom, AvP 2000 and Starcraft, which NS is heavily derivative of (not saying this as a bad thing, loved those titles).
NS1 is irrelevant and I certainly hope the dev team agrees. It was a mod, a fantastic mod, but a mod. This is an entirely new game and most gamers have never even heard of it much less played it. The dev team has a great opportunity to build from scratch. It would be absurd to suggest they build an entire engine from scratch and then clone a mod for HL. Certainly hope they don't pull a Dota2.
Diablo 3 is a sequel to one of the most popular and beloved titles of all time and even then they have re-designed virtually every game mechanic. Please do not add X ability or weapon because it was in NS1.
And they build the game engine from scratch so they could expand on the NS gameplay trough dynamic infestation, and other new features that would have otherwise been way to complicated to build in the Source engine.
I also don't understand what Diablo 3 has to do with all of this, they didn't re-design everything, the pure basics of what allways made diablo fun are still in there, it's still a dungeon crawler that profits heavily from it's randomized loot by giving players tons of different risk-reward gambles. You are also missing many things Diablo 3 simply took from Diablo 2 without much redesign, because they work.
By your logic Blizzard should have made Diablo 3 an cart racing game because they shouldn't copy mechanics and gameplay of previous diablo titles?
You also fail to realize that UWE is an small team with only limited resources, so i'm not really sure how serious you are about them having to reinvent the wheel just because you want some "unique fun". The game is not even feature complete yet, many assets are ripped from the original mod, the original mod has years usefull rebalancing behind it, why not use these balancing lessons instead of having to rediscover them all the time?
It would be stupid to throw all these lessons out of the windows and just start from scratch, don't change what's allready working if you have to look out for your workload.
That beeing said: I know what you are talking about and as far as i remember charlie allways said "Natural Selection 2 won't be a NS HD, NS1 had been the first contact NS2 will be the all out war!" and i liked the sound of that.
But having seen the latest build i have to say the marines side of the game currently plays and feels like "Natural Selection! Now in HD!" and it's fun and feels actually pretty well, performance issues aside. Playing alien right now feels like a whole mess compared to that because they tried something new they didn't have in NS1 with the alien commander and the dynamic infestation.
That is why NS1 lessons are important for NS2 design, NS1 had basicly been allready a giant beta test for many different features and gameplay mechanics in the NS universe.
So alien play is rough because they tried something new so they shouldn't try anything new? Good lord... thats scary logic.
I know it's a minor, minor thing but I can't imagine this would take more than 5 minutes to fix and it would remove a ton of annoyance, at least for me ^^
<!--quoteo(post=1900074:date=Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM:name=Clonesa)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clonesa @ Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900074"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Experiment with view axis changing (perhaps as a menu option). I would suggest not having it the same axis as the world model, but rather smoothed out and kind of averaged between nearby surfaces to be less disorienting.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This has indeed been through many iterations and although there's probably no perfect way to do it, the current implementation is the best I've seen so far (if maybe a little too sticky around vents with the latest build.) I think making the skulk slightly smaller and sleeker would improve things a lot too. In the end it's an unusual mechanic that takes some getting used to.
A toggle to force sticking sounds good but may be even less intuitive for new players.
<!--quoteo(post=1900074:date=Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM:name=Clonesa)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clonesa @ Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900074"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Suggestions: Give the ability to the Lurker instead and add a better visual effect on both the victim (I'm thinking Infected vision in l4d) and on fire.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I can understand the confusion but I think the idea is that the skulk (apart from being the basic ground combat unit) is the scout of the alien team. It's fast, agile, and it's the alien most suited to fast travel via vents (also it's expendable.) Lerks are needed in active combat as harassment and disorientation.
Having 'tooltips' like in NS1 that explain weapons to new players would do a world of good too, but those details I'm sure will be filled in before launch.
<!--quoteo(post=1900074:date=Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM:name=Clonesa)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clonesa @ Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900074"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Suggestions: Remove the secondary, replace it with the 2nd weapon slot parasite cloud ability. Add a louder, more powerful sound to primary fire, slow the firing speed down, increase the damage, slow the projectile way down and add drop.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Not a big fan of spikes as they are either. +1 for putting spore cloud on 2ndary fire, I think a lot of people agree with this one.
<!--quoteo(post=1900074:date=Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM:name=Clonesa)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clonesa @ Feb 6 2012, 07:09 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900074"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Fade Fun and interesting, but too strong<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I've never seen fade health or power as the problem but rather that he can go completely invisible and <u>invincible</u> at will with one ability. You can't hit him and there's no way to chase him down if he knows what he's doing. I wouldn't even mind seeing a buff to his health if he became a little easier to hit. Perhaps reduce the blink effect to invisibility only so you could still hit him if you're paying attention and force fades to attack from unpredictable angles. Maybe that would make him too weak though.
Not only is balance not very relevant at this stage of design, but the game honestly *feels* balanced when a server full of experienced regulars plays it. It's sorta like how the metagame has developed in Starcraft 2 - everyone knows what the cheesy imbalanced strategies are, and they put effort into not losing to them so that they can play out a normal game. So much of the feedback from players (myself included) is balance whining that I think it eats up too much of the developers' time.
Little things like opening/closing buy menus with esc go a LONG way to making sure a game sells a lot of copies and doesn't die after 1 year. It's really important to notice things like this in player feedback because it means the person mentioning it has a 'big picture' view of this game, and doesn't just want their favourite class/weapon to be better so they can pwn more n00bz or whatever.
Also, I went 70-1 as a fade last week while eating my dinner. I was taking down 2+ shotgunners at a time. Guess what, though? This was before the armor change in 194. Having played a lot since then, I think the fade is very killable. Now the problem with it is that the mechanics are extremely shallow and it's boring to play if you've ever touched the NS1 fade (or the spy/scout in TF games).
@ie
Agreed on the Fade's HP not being the problem, but still i think it should be lowered a bit and his cost lowered along with nerfs to blink. My logic here is that more interesting upgrades should be added to evolve into more specifics types of Fades. Beefier Fade, sneakier Fade, faster Fade, stuff like that, but hopefully more creative :P
In it's current implementation, yes.
NS1 parasite was dead useful and used extremely often. It wasn't overpowered, so I don't know why they nerfed it so much.
And as for what you said about NS1 being irrelevant, that's your opinion, maybe the opinion of a few others. But the vast majority (I would wager that majority to include the devs) do not beleive this to be true at all. NS1 stayed around and was as successful as it was for a reason. They aren't just going to throw that aside.
I disagree that LMG vs. skulk isn't fun. It's my favorite part of the game, the only thing that competes with it is possibly an evenly-matched mid-game with shotguns vs. fades.
<!--quoteo(post=1900451:date=Feb 6 2012, 09:09 PM:name=paella)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (paella @ Feb 6 2012, 09:09 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Site needs to be on the skulk because it is the only thing that keeps good marines from dominating the early game. This may be hard to believe on an un-optimized game played on public servers, but it's absolutely true. The small, wall-walking, melee-only alien early game needs REALLY GOOD scouting and really good ambushes. Site enables both of those. If you have it on the lerk you may as well not have it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The scouting granted by the Skulk does not have to be in the form of an awkward ranged attack. There are plenty of ways to slay this beast.
<!--quoteo(post=1900451:date=Feb 6 2012, 09:09 PM:name=paella)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (paella @ Feb 6 2012, 09:09 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1900451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I disagree that LMG vs. skulk isn't fun. It's my favorite part of the game, the only thing that competes with it is possibly an evenly-matched mid-game with shotguns vs. fades.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thats the problem though. Its always LMG vs Skulk, Shotgun vs Fade, Jetpacks vs Onos. The game needs variety. Instead, early game should be a combination of shotguns, lmgs and rifles vs skulks, gorges and lurkers. Etc, etc. Players should choose roles that complement each other not because its just the next best thing. Progressions is cool, but not ONLY progress.
except parasite is one of the most classic NS mechanics, and it perfectly exemplifies the aliens' hive mind (which the rest of the UI is lacking in if you compare to NS1)
outside of parasite, you get to do the same scouting as every other player except you can also sit on ceilings/in vents....you just need to communicate your scouting information to your team to see it become useful
It really is amazing the progress that has been made since I posted the OP. Kudos to the dev team. Most of the concerns have been addressed in eerily similar ways to some of the suggestions.
The menu, UI and ingame effects have seen the most major and important improvement IMOs. Much less subtlety and ambiguity in the weapons and player actions. A lot easier to tell what is happening and why, which the new tooltips and new HUD elements helped a lot with. Still some work to do be done here though.
I think the ergonomics of the Lurker needs some serious work. It is extremely awkward trying to dive in, attack and spread spores at the same time. I definitely think some kind of nerfed basic form of spores should be a standard Lurker attack and a secondary on the first weapon. If necessary add a tertiary weapon fire keybind.
Onos is much better to use. Much more clear what the attacks are doing and far less awkward to use. The context sensitive primary attack is a great solution. Doesn't get stuck nearly as much and seems easier to move. My only concern really is that it has a lack of depth and is a bit UP in the current balance.
In an effort to be less verbose I'll cut my major concern with the game.
Player choice, strategic and tactical options seem extremely limited and poorly designed. A rethink of the some design principles are in order. What I would very much like to see is the individual FPS players empowered to make their own choices on a tactical level AND the commander empowered to make choices on a strategical level. An example:
Marines start with basic rifles. Thats it. Zero options. Skulks vs marines. "Starcraft is like that!" This isn't an RTS. Its a hybrid and an 80/20 (at least) hybrid in favor of FPS. Add some choice here to open up tactical choices for players and perhaps even more importantly, add some more flavor and fun to the game. Modern, more successful design imo is moving away from a rock, paper, scissors approach imo, even Starcraft a bit.
Shotties should be an option for the player. I could choose to be a pointman for my squad and go shotties while others go rifles for example. Or if combat moves to enclosed spaces I could go shotties. Unfortunately as it is now shotties is just a brain dead upgrade. This limits the commanders choice as well. Upgrade logic could almost entirely be scripted :/ There is some choice later on with GL and flamethrower, but even this isn't much.
Aliens have this problem in spades. I find myself going Lurker just to entertain myself or if my team can't make it to Fades, but for the most part it seems to be Skulks->Fades + 1 Gorge->Ones + 1 or 2 Gorge, with most upgrade choices being obvious as well (adrenaline, feign death, regen... the same on every "class"). Maybe its a bit different in the competitive community, I don't know.
What I would love to see is different types of Skulks, Lurkers, etc. and a mix of all different types (except Onos) in ALL stages of the game. Commander level upgrades focusing on over arching team strategy and player level upgrades focusing on tactics or play style. Ie: Alpha Skulk: alt-fire a battle roar and non-self stacking aura that boosts damage and/or speed or something of nearby aliens, but cannot Charge. These types of choices would be much more fun, add new interesting content and open up new tactics and strategies.
The choice of more armor, vs more hp regen is in most cases a non-choice in reality. Blizzard is really discovering this with Diablo 3, where this is a much worse problem. Because both of these focus on a very boring method of by-the-numbers survival, where one is almost always going to be better overall than the other. Its just not fun. It becomes a chore, something you just have to do to remain viable at the next tier. But these choices can continue to exist just in more fun and interesting forms. For example a type of skulk could have an ability to regen by feasting on the corpses of marines.
So it shouldn't be NS1 with better graphics and several wanted fixes and better implementation of key features like matchmaking and site ranking, and instead should share similar success with a title that also changed a lot of core gameplay elements and still kept if not expanded with the original fanbase? I can't find many if any at all games that are like that. You did mention Diablo 3, that's probably the best comparison minus the fact that D2 had different (and superior) developers with a different mindset to making their game. I can tell you a lot of people are hoping that NS2 will "Re-invent the wheel" just like CS:GO did with 1.6 (forget source) or Dota2 did with dota, specifically because to a lot of people NS:2 was the best HL mod of all time. Whether it's better for marketing purposes though, we will find out soon enough.
Also, I prefer regen to cara on almost every lifeform, works well imo.
Also Also, Dota 2's engine is ballers and no match on the WC engine. At least for the purposes of dota.
I like the idea of different skulks to change up the late game, but that would open an incredible amount of variables in terms of balance.