Things I Have Learned From The Free Weekend
Poochi41
Join Date: 2013-03-22 Member: 184172Members
Join Date: 2013-03-22 Member: 184172Members
I wanted to post a thread and contribute to the community as I am avid player of Natural Selection 2. Ever since I played NS1 I have loved this game and playing NS2 I feel that there is a lot of potential for this epic game to grow. Since I have been playing this game I have noticed that there are a lot of subtle details and tactics that you have to learn in this game in order to be successful.
From what I have observed in the free weekend from many new players is a huge sense of being overwhelmed about what is going on whether they are playing in FPS mode or in the RTS mode (commander). Many of these individuals have not gone into the tutorial mode and watched the various amounts of videos that explain basics mechanics. Or they have not gone into the explore mode to see the various objects, tech trees, and units in the game. Therefore, when they enter the game as rookies they get overwhelmed by how rapid paced and intense the game is when their teammates are communicating various tactics. Although, I always help new players in my pub games and give them tips on how to play in order to encourage them to keep trying despite the outcome!
The other interesting thing I have noticed is that most new people are having trouble grasping things like how to beacon using an observatory in an emergency situation. Or understanding how each room strategically has power nodes that need to be used to build power in order for buildings to work. They even have trouble understanding the functions of the ARC and how it is a siege tank for buildings (offensively) and not units (defensively).
All of these things to us veterans are already common knowledge since we have played the game so much and I understand that these people are new. But, what really hit me is that even if they don’t do the tutorial or they did. I see that people cannot INTUITIVELY learn just by first glance and that is a HUGE problem to growing the community of this game. More people seem to be interested in the FPS shooter aspect of the game as that is the straight forward approach and the most basic way of playing the game. From there they gain a sense of “mob mentality” where they stick together and work as a team.
I think where I am going with this is that UWE has to somehow make the game mechanics more obvious to new players and user friendly. An example would be like TF2 where the solider only has a rocket launcher and he has two functions. One being to attack other players and the second to rocket jump to higher places. It’s something that players use and just instinctively learn very quickly how to use.
I understand the complexity of the game and the genius behind the concept of what UWE has done. Nor do I want to interfere with their artistic vision as it is the best I have ever seen in a game by far. What I am trying to say is that they need to find a creative way of making the learning process of the game feel more gradual than just being thrown in the fray.
Let me know what all of you think as I would like to have a discussion about it as I am trying to find a better way to explain this, but I wanted to share my opinion nonetheless.
From what I have observed in the free weekend from many new players is a huge sense of being overwhelmed about what is going on whether they are playing in FPS mode or in the RTS mode (commander). Many of these individuals have not gone into the tutorial mode and watched the various amounts of videos that explain basics mechanics. Or they have not gone into the explore mode to see the various objects, tech trees, and units in the game. Therefore, when they enter the game as rookies they get overwhelmed by how rapid paced and intense the game is when their teammates are communicating various tactics. Although, I always help new players in my pub games and give them tips on how to play in order to encourage them to keep trying despite the outcome!
The other interesting thing I have noticed is that most new people are having trouble grasping things like how to beacon using an observatory in an emergency situation. Or understanding how each room strategically has power nodes that need to be used to build power in order for buildings to work. They even have trouble understanding the functions of the ARC and how it is a siege tank for buildings (offensively) and not units (defensively).
All of these things to us veterans are already common knowledge since we have played the game so much and I understand that these people are new. But, what really hit me is that even if they don’t do the tutorial or they did. I see that people cannot INTUITIVELY learn just by first glance and that is a HUGE problem to growing the community of this game. More people seem to be interested in the FPS shooter aspect of the game as that is the straight forward approach and the most basic way of playing the game. From there they gain a sense of “mob mentality” where they stick together and work as a team.
I think where I am going with this is that UWE has to somehow make the game mechanics more obvious to new players and user friendly. An example would be like TF2 where the solider only has a rocket launcher and he has two functions. One being to attack other players and the second to rocket jump to higher places. It’s something that players use and just instinctively learn very quickly how to use.
I understand the complexity of the game and the genius behind the concept of what UWE has done. Nor do I want to interfere with their artistic vision as it is the best I have ever seen in a game by far. What I am trying to say is that they need to find a creative way of making the learning process of the game feel more gradual than just being thrown in the fray.
Let me know what all of you think as I would like to have a discussion about it as I am trying to find a better way to explain this, but I wanted to share my opinion nonetheless.
Comments
A singleplayer map that's something similar to that could be really fun and helpful. I don't know if it's being worked on by anyone though.
That said, remember that there are PIP tutorial video clips that play on every death. Those should do just fine, along with the beginning message "KILL THE ENEMY BASE." The rest of it is up to the player and the other players on the team telling them what to do.
Being "thrown into the fray" is the best way to learn any game in my opinion.
The problem is that there's no singleplayer. People want to jump right into the action. However, other players might not take this into account; in a 16-slot server, there's 15 other people trying to enjoy their game and most of them won't take time or make an effort to 'help' the new player understand things. They want to just enjoy playing the game.
The rookie servers are a step in the right direction, naturally, but there's no real way of making it easier to learn in multiplayer mode.
I absolutely agree with the rookie servers in order to prevent the skill gap issue, but I feel there needs to be some more "fine-tuning" that needs to be done in order to make that transition better.
The only thing I'd advise is making something like a short singleplayer walkthrough of all the concepts and controls, mixed up with some NPC target practice to keep it interesting. It's your best shot of having them learn fast and efficiently. If they still decide to skip that, well, there's nothing more you can do.
The Observatory, with it's big radio dish, is quite obvious. The arms lab, with it's little spinning armor icon, a little less. But the others: not at all.
Imagine seeing an Armory, Extractor and a Proto Lab side by side, having never seen them before? You'd have NO idea what any of them did, or even which was which.
Maybe, whilst Rookie mode is enabled, they get some of the tooltips from Explore Mode show up in an actual game? When they get near an Armory, say, it not only brings up the [E] icon but brings up the description as well. The videos are a reasonably helpful feature, but as new people die a lot, I can see them getting turned off before they're properly paid attention to.
I would like to see a little holographic icon above all of the buildings showing what it does. Again, maybe in Rookie mode. A little floating gun above the armory. A little spanner above the Arms Lab. A little $ sign above the Extractors. Etc.
You can instantly see what they do, and once you know, you can turn it off.
This is actually a grand idea. Floating holographic symbols. The armory already has a red plus icon (for "health"), so that could probably be expanded if UWE wants to.
I realize this is a lot like explore mode, but I feel like explore is a little to unguided, and it would be nice if the tutorials triggered rendered events so you could see visually what you were trying to teach.
I feel like this wouldn't have to be a UWE thing either, it could be a MOD just as easily. I am not skilled enough to do the actual MOD-ing but if someone wants to collaborate I would be willing to help build content for it.
It's both of these.
For most, when a game is too difficult to learn it is not as fun. At the same time, when a game is too easy to learn it is not as fun. The proper balance is struck when upon need or failure the player can intuitively recognize the solution. This applies to basic mechanics and not to higher level learning ex. advanced movement skills and tactics.
The armory example is in the right direction; upon receiving damage, when a player is near an armory a health symbol is displayed above. But, let's expand on that. A player that has received enough damage that their vision and audio is distorted has received the intuitive cue that they are injured and instinctually know they need health... but do they know if that is possible? Do they know where to get it if they aren't near an armory.
Now this is only an non-thought-out solution, but should help drive the point. What if when the player was dangerously low on health (and has tool-tips / noob-system enabled) the player receives a new set of situation specific waypoints (arrows with health cross) indicating the nearest route to a health. Upon entering the room where the armory is located, not just a little cross above it, but either a visual pinging or glow would emanate from the armory.
Here's another example. The player is in base with 10 res to spare. The system recognizes that their is a protolab with jetpants researched. "The System" (as I shall now call it), suggests to the player to don the jetpants by displaying a message, waypoints (situation specific; jet pants pics), and/or flash/glow the building.
What overwhelms anybody to a new game, job, environment, etc. is having to filter out all the unneeded information. By overemphasizing the mechanics of interest to the player at any given time they will be more readily able to understand the game.
What increases the intuitiveness of the game is a system that can interpret your needs.
Every time you leave the ready room, every time you spawn. Be the tutorial.
Every game.
I don't think anyone should Com until they have maybe 5 to 10 hours on the ground to know what their teammates need and when they need it. Also, having that experience tells you when to readjust your strategy, when to pick crag hive over shift or shade, where to place forward crag bases, when to rush exos rather than focus on upgrades. The game is dynamic and it helps to know what the conditions on the ground are like before getting into that chair.
A bad com can really hamper a decent team where a good com can make a mediocre team good.
Veterans this weekend should really be taking the Chair even if you normally don't. A bad experience with a bad com can turn off many players. Remember, we want as many people (who are interested) to join the game as regular players as possible. A F2P weekender in the chair is likely going to go bad unless they're facing ANOTHER F2P weekender in the hive.
Anyways, I'm with Poochi that the game is pretty overwhelming and as the Devs aren't likely to do anything to make that simpler for new players, us Vets have to step up.
One particularly good thing we could recommend is telling them to bind the map key to their mouse. The better they know the maps, the better their game experience will be.
I am only a really fresh player as well, I play since about 1-2 weeks but what I recognized was that the ingame tutorial section is really really bad.
I mean, tutorial videos are nice and all, but they give you no real feeling for the game and are still just an abstract way to teach you things. Many things you simply forget too fast, don't really listen or just can't grasp in these videos, instead with a real tutorial players are learning by doing, which is the right approach.
Also the commander UI and view is really horrible and it is very hard to make any sense out of it when you play for the first time as commander. People probably get into it and expect it to have all the functionalities and features like an rts, and then they are confused when a lot of things work completely differently (like planting cysts manually, if no one tells you that, you might need ages to find that out).
Ingame Tutorials for Marine Basics, Kharaa Basics and Commander Basics for both sides are desperately needed if you want to attract new players. Something that holds you by the hand and walks slowly with you through the different section. The tutorial videos and guide section of steam are definitely neat, but they just can't be a real substitute for a proper ingame tutorial.
Maybe they could give players an option after the mandatory basic tutorial to watch a game before starting?
I watched about an hour of game play as spec before I played my first game. Helps.
It certainly does, but a potential buyer that plays this game during free weekend doesn't want to first read some books before starting, he wants to jump straight into the action, he needs something interactive where he can try the mechanics of the game while learning the basics, an ingame tutorial or playing against bots is just perfect for this, especially if it is divided into basics and advanced things.
I've been trying to help the rookies a little bit. Suggesting that they follow me, remind them to crawl on ceilings and walls, and various little pointers can help. IMO the best way to help rookies is for a vet to go commander and really take charge and educate.
I wish Alien commander had better tools to direct his or her minions. The alien rookies really seem to have a tough time.
This.
30 seconds are more than enough to explain in short, brief sentences what this game is about and what you, the player, are supposed to do when you play as alien or marine. This combined with in-game popups and holographic symbols which indicate the function and purpose of in-game entitites such as powernodes and buildings are mandatory. You cannot expect any customer to study videos before they can get into the thick of it, no one wants that. Learning the game by doing though, is a tough job as most games have a variety of in-game mechanics that acutually help you to learn the game. Various kinds of feedbacks, symbols, popups and tooltips - NS2 has none of that. If you start the game without knowing what to do you are lost and it you will loose most likely several games before you start getting an idea what's going on.
This cannot be compared to a game such as TF2 where you, if you're familiar with shooters, know what to do. Aside, the game always tells you what you have to achive on a map or in a certain situation in order to win. NS2 does not. It doesn't even tell you what the buildings are good for, unless you command, which again, you're not supposed to do as a rookie. Only option for a new player is to quit the game and either go in the explore mode, watch videos or read wiki-articles. None of that is fun.
A 30 second video that tells you the most basic prinicples of the game can be done, one for aliens and marines. That might do some good. More in-game information - symbols, tooltips, popups, etc. - would be a great addition NS2 really needs, especially for the free weekends. I've seen server full of rookies and nobody had a clue what was going on; very few have the endurance to keep playing a game that is for the first hour a mixture of confusion, frustration and helplesness.
I still remember me playing NS1 for the first time. Well, I started with several friends but in the end, only I remained as most gave up. A game that needs to be explained before you can start playing it is usually not much fun; it's more fun to learn a game while you play it. If you try to do that in NS2 though, that won't do much good as it is practically impossible to find out certain things in-game unless you command, e.g. the use of buildings and such. Commanding as a rookie then again is the most certain way to get flamed and noone wants that.
I have no problem with rookies in themselves, but if they aren't clever enough to figure stuff out AND don't listen to any help either, it's getting frustrating to play. And aliens on the other hand don't know how to finish the game when it's actually over. Marines on 1 RT, not even really turtling, plenty of Onos, Fades and Gorges available, forward base right in front of the marine one and still nobody actually attacking.
True in a way. But especially on this free weekend, i ran into several rookies who didn't speak english or german. And sharing at least one language is from my pov kinda mandatory for explaining. Plus there are these guys i'm sure most of you know, who don't do anything usefull and don't responde to any advice, order, or even chat at all. And those are the ones stressing me out the most when i'm in the chair. I don't have a problem with rookies themselves. But rookies who won't listen and take no advice and keep doing nonsense... thats kind of a game loser. Especially when there's several of them in one team.
So all in all, i try to be the tutorial, but it's frustrating if your efforts go unheard.
I like the idea of a tutorial map more
At least it's even.
Veteran Com against new free weekender is going to end badly for the free weekender's team.
Played this one game where the Marine com had on AVERAGE 160 res and we still didn't have upgrades or protolabs. One of the veterans ninjaed a base and we finally got a phase gate.
I've been Com a few times this free weekend and I rarely see teams that get that kind of res. In 20 minutes I had my team everything, in addition to sentry-ing up every base, building multiple robotics labs (and then arc factory), upgrading every armory to advanced, and scanning the crap out of everything. I can't even spend money that fast. Littered the battlefield with medipacks and ammo drops. A com should never go above 50 res. At the end, was down to 30 res after repeatedly scanning server room to ensure that every enemy and structure had the target on it. Between ARC push and lots of exo it wasn't really fair.
I took at least a month of learning NS1 and what each piece of equipment does before I jumped in the chair, and not before i jumped in a comm chair on a bot server.