Build 283 Released on Steam! - Natural Selection 2

System · February 2016

Build 283 Released on Steam! - Natural Selection 2

Natural Selection's Build 283 is now avaible at Steam. It includes various performance and stability improvements preparing for upcoming features.

Read the full story here

GhoulofGSG9 · February 2016

First :P

ZEROibis · February 2016

Great so see all these fixes but not great to see local talk bind removed from the options. Now there is more hidden features for rookies to learn.

Looking forward to seeing how these server improvements pan out!

Kouji_San · February 2016

GhoulofGSG9 wrote: »

First :P

This guy

IeptBarakat · February 2016

Whaaat, I used local talk all the time! It was very useful for talking to and teaching new players without interrupting the commander.

Calego · February 2016

I've seen more Rookies using local talk than all talk. There was probably some confusion as to what each did. Does the option still exist at all via console? Or is it "possible but not implemented" atm?

Also I didn't really hear much about the sneaky-skulk problems, was it messing with how the model collided or something? (Vids?)

Vindaloo · February 2016

Wouldn't it be better if the instruction thingies that are globally pushed to all servers run over HTTPS? But I guess workshop doesn't use it either, does it?

navazka · February 2016

The local chat option was a very useful feature. If its usage needs to be better designed and demonstrated, ok, but I don't think it's a good idea to remove it.

Also, you have removed it from GUI but didn't remove the current binding, so everyone who wants to bind some action to V (or a different button, if they rebinded local chat to something else before) can, but local chat is triggered with it as well. Now talk about confusing behavior. If you remove something from GUI options, you also need to remove the currently active binding from options.xml.

Nordic · February 2016

I was probably local voices biggest advocate but even I admit that removing it is probably for the best. That is because:

1. Rookies, and sometimes veterans, used it without knowing and could not figure out why no one could hear them.
2. If I used it people would think I was using it by mistake every time. If I kept using it players would complain about me using it.
3. It went unused. Since it was added I have only seen 2 other players besides myself actually use it purposefully and not by mistake.
4. Local talk was not all talk by default, but some servers made it all talk which led to confusion of its use even among veterans.

IronHorse · February 2016

navazka wrote: »

if they rebinded local chat to something else before) can, but local chat is triggered with it as well[/b]. .

Thanks for the report

RedSword · February 2016

Reverted the “Sneaky Skulk” (introduced with build 276) by popular request. (Skulks could become exposed without noticing, or even partly glitch into walls)

Either way you'll never always-notice how expose you are... b276 skulk made more sense to me. Seeing only the head vs a noticeable part of the body...

/sigh

Care to link the "popular request" ? Doesn't seem to be that link : http://unknownworlds.com/ns2/faster-speeding-bullet-ok-not-fast/ .

p.s. "http://unknownworlds.com/ns2/page/2/" under "http://unknownworlds.com/ns2/" redirect to first page. Yay.

Racer1 · February 2016

Will the Amazon extension backup service possibly become a regular mod backup service in the future? With most mods ranging from <1MB to 25MB in size, perhaps 100 of the most popular mods could be cached on a 1GB RAM ECC instance.

WasabiOne · February 2016

Racer1 wrote: »

Will the Amazon extension backup service possibly become a regular mod backup service in the future? With most mods ranging from <1MB to 25MB in size, perhaps 100 of the most popular mods could be cached on a 1GB RAM ECC instance.

No, this service is strictly for making sure our extensions are always available when being deployed.

WasabiOne · February 2016

Nordic wrote: »

I was probably local voices biggest advocate but even I admit that removing it is probably for the best. That is because:

1. Rookies, and sometimes veterans, used it without knowing and could not figure out why no one could hear them.
2. If I used it people would think I was using it by mistake every time. If I kept using players would complain.
3. It went unused. Since it was added I have only seen 2 other players besides myself actually use purposefully and not by mistake.
4. Local talk was not all talk by default, but some servers made it all talk which led to confusion of its use even among veterans.

It has been disabled for now, although this is still a feature that many liked and want. Our plan is to come back to it, but for now we have other primary objectives and it continues to create issues, so better to disable for the time being.

IeptBarakat · February 2016

Instead of calling it local talk it would probably be more self explanatory to call it proximity talk. Minor detail of course.

It suffered the usual fate of being half implemented and barely spoken about, there should have been more indication of when a player is using it and more coverage overall of the feature.

Nordic · February 2016

IeptBarakat wrote: »

Instead of calling it local talk it would probably be more self explanatory to call it proximity talk. Minor detail of course.

It suffered the usual fate of being half implemented and barely spoken about, there should have been more indication of when a player is using it and more coverage overall of the feature.

As I said, I was probably its biggest advocate.

HEllrunner2k · February 2016

how do i bind my local talk again?

Nordic · February 2016

HEllrunner2k wrote: »

how do i bind my local talk again?

You can't anymore, it was removed entirely.

Farewelltoarms · February 2016

All these patches get released for this game, but I honestly notice absolutely zero differences from patch-to-patch. Maybe some people have had hit-registration issues, or experienced server issues, but I've never came across that.

Will there ever be a "substantive" patch released? By substantive I mean something like balance updates or front-end gameplay changes. Maybe make flamethrowers and whips more useful, make shade's ink ability used for something besides delaying arcs, change fade's stab timing so that people actually use it, lower biomass for webs so there is an incentive to use them, make railgun exo's on par with miniguns, give babblers more offensive capabilities, fix the rifle jam bug and getting stuck on infantry portal bug, let other players pick up a dead player's unused grenades, give lerk/fade hallucinations better A.I., and much more.

The above is just a sampling of ideas, but if all that "Tundra" is supposed to bring is cosmetics and maybe a new map, that's disappointing. It's already obvious the community doesn't like new maps, evidenced by the newest official maps (eclipse, kodiak, and derelict) being extremely underplayed. And wasn't there a huge topic on Derelict and how to improve it to make it more balanced? I haven't seen a single one of those suggestions implemented.

Calego · February 2016

Farewelltoarms wrote: »

All these patches get released for this game, but I honestly notice absolutely zero differences from patch-to-patch. Maybe some people have had hit-registration issues, or experienced server issues, but I've never came across that.

Will there ever be a "substantive" patch released? By substantive I mean something like balance updates or front-end gameplay changes. Maybe make flamethrowers and whips more useful, make shade's ink ability used for something besides delaying arcs, change fade's stab timing so that people actually use it, lower biomass for webs so there is an incentive to use them, make railgun exo's on par with miniguns, give babblers more offensive capabilities, fix the rifle jam bug and getting stuck on infantry portal bug, let other players pick up a dead player's unused grenades, give lerk/fade hallucinations better A.I., and much more.

The above is just a sampling of ideas, but if all that "Tundra" is supposed to bring is cosmetics and maybe a new map, that's disappointing. It's already obvious the community doesn't like new maps, evidenced by the newest official maps (eclipse, kodiak, and derelict) being extremely underplayed. And wasn't there a huge topic on Derelict and how to improve it to make it more balanced? I haven't seen a single one of those suggestions implemented.

https://trello.com/b/uFv64kH6/ns2-development-team

At the moment the main focuses are on retention of newbies and probably making ns2 financially profitable again. I'm sure balance changes are on the radar, but there's also a lot of upkeep and maintenance upgrade stuff that is taking priority. We see these patches but they don't affect us much (not really a bad thing). Lately the biggest changes have been target at new players.

Farewelltoarms · February 2016

Calego wrote: »

At the moment the main focuses are on retention of newbies and probably making ns2 financially profitable again. I'm sure balance changes are on the radar, but there's also a lot of upkeep and maintenance upgrade stuff that is taking priority. We see these patches but they don't affect us much (not really a bad thing). Lately the biggest changes have been target at new players.

The newbies will leave like they always do once the weather gets nice again. NS2's playerbase always goes up during the winter and then goes back down come spring. It makes more sense to focus on the people that have stuck with the game and might be willing to buy DLC for it vs fair-weather newbies who will leave when spring comes.

Nordic · February 2016

Farewelltoarms wrote: »

Will there ever be a "substantive" patch released? By substantive I mean something like balance updates or front-end gameplay changes. Maybe make flamethrowers and whips more useful, make shade's ink ability used for something besides delaying arcs, change fade's stab timing so that people actually use it, lower biomass for webs so there is an incentive to use them, make railgun exo's on par with miniguns, give babblers more offensive capabilities, fix the rifle jam bug and getting stuck on infantry portal bug, let other players pick up a dead player's unused grenades, give lerk/fade hallucinations better A.I., and much more.

Although I like most of those ideas, you need to think of the bigger picture. The biggest problem with ns2 is player retention. The PDT has mostly been working on back end changes that are aimed to retain new players. Retaining new players and increasing player counts takes priority. I hope that when they get the back end where it needs to be, they can then focus on some good ideas like you mentioned.

You may have missed it, but this thread might be what you are looking for.
http://unknownworlds.com/ns2/simplifying-ns2-thoughts-on-gameplay-feedback-wanted/

Farewelltoarms wrote: »

And wasn't there a huge topic on Derelict and how to improve it to make it more balanced? I haven't seen a single one of those suggestions implemented.

I am a little confused as to why it has not been released, but many of those suggestions were implemented. They are included in a workshop version of derelict called "Derelict_b277".

_INTER_ · February 2016

At the moment the main focuses are on retention of newbies

What a futile undertaking. NS2 was trimmed towards competitive play from the very start, you'd need to change that. Impossible at this stage.

Obraxis · February 2016

_INTER_ wrote: »

At the moment the main focuses are on retention of newbies

Impossible at this stage.

UncleCrunch · February 2016

Was fuuny. But in the mean time @_INTER_ raise a good topic. Every time someone brought the suggestion; a meteor shower felt on the heretic.

If the game ends up as it is today (not so many players) by favouring the so called competitive aspect. Maybe in the perspective of change to encourage a larger audience to play the game, NS2 will have to rip off the competitive sticker. It's not gonna happen without extensive publicity. And will look like amputation for some and cry rivers to try to stop that. Even though it wouldn't benefit the game and community. What are the odds...

Nordic · February 2016

It is kind of comical when you see public players saying the game is too competitive focused, and you also see competitive players saying it never had enough competitive focus. So which one is it?

I think these guys had some good comments on the subject. I say this as someone who only plays public ns2 and dislikes playing competitive ns2.

bonage wrote: »

NS2 was never an e-sport. I despise the notion that a game can't appeal to a pub/casual audience and a competitive one at the same time. This idea that NS2 turned out the way it did because it was catering towards competitive players is a complete fallacy.

Look at any of the top FPS games and you will see that the core gameplay mechanics appeal both to casual and competitive players (eg - csgo ).

SantaClaws wrote: »

In extension to @bonage point. NS2 has always lacked a LOT of tools for the competitive scene. If you believe that UWE focused on the competitive side too much, then you must explain why in the world there are so many 3rd party modifications with competitive games in mind.

Why was CompMOD and NS2+ ever necessary?

Moreover, we still lack a lot of tools for the comp scene. The demorecording system is as good as broken. For the longest time we didn't have 1st person spec.

I think everyone can agree, that NS2 suffers from low player retention. And a focus on the casual player might be a good strategy for that. But to blame it on the comp scene like this, when it has struggled every bit as much, is crazy in the light of these things imo.

In regards to player retention, I think matso described the concept well. To me it looks like the PDT is trying to fix the "bounce."

matso wrote: »

I find it useful to split player retention in two parts; The Bounce is how many new players "bounce off" after trying. The Leak is players that stops playing the game after a long time.

Some game have a low Bounce but a high Leak. You play it for a few weeks and then you get bored and stop.

NS2 have a brutal Bounce, but a fairly low Leak; those people who stays around long enough tends to stay for while.

Or at least I think so.

Maybe because I started playing back in NS1 days.

Build 283 Released on Steam! - Natural Selection 2

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