[gemeaux333]

There are many excellent arguments in favor of french translations for sure !

[Zaxx]

HulkNukem, on 15 March 2018 - 02:50 PM, said:

I wouldn't say better, just handled differently.

Yes... from a certain point of view. Personally I don't like Wolf TNO's system at all because the game has a tendency to just simply close doors behind you after you pass through and that's just not very good for an FPS that has secrets (and TNO was pretty great in the secret department). There is no reason why I shouldn't be able to just go back, there is no scripted event that destroyed the entrance, I did not blow up the room behind me etc. so in those cases I wouldn't say that easy replayability solves the problem. Doom 2016 was okay in this regard because there the maps stay quite open and you get a very good idea of when you're going to cross a point of no return (if you have to jump down a huge chasm you know you won't be able to go back and you can sniff out when you're approaching the end of a map) but I prefer to be absolutely sure and that's what you get from Ion Maiden.

And here's the thing about easy replayability: I don't think it improves things that much if the gameplay is not that replayable. In Wolf TNO you can replay the game one time if you're that curious about how events unfold if you choose to save a different character but if I remember correctly you have to start a new save to do that so it's not good for collecting missing secrets. Apart from that the gameplay is the same and everything plays out the same way. Doom 2016 is a bit better because the arenas are designed for variety and the enemy AI is good enough to change things up but even in that case you're against the same enemies you fought before.

Wolf TNC is the only game from the new id FPS titles that does replayability in a great way. There once you finish a large chunk of the campaign you get a new game mode where you can revisit areas to hunt down nazi commanders. It's the secret hunter's dream: they changed the maps a bit where they had to so you can freely explore every single level, you face new enemy configurations and the commanders themselves are a new enemy type (armored nazi officers with explosive weapons), you even get new soldier chatter and once you kill every commander and solve every enigma code you get a secret level in a nazi bunker that's full of robots and it all ends with a nice little bossfight. That mode is the best part of the game honestly, you blast through all the content the game has to offer again without those lengthy cutscenes, it's all about killing nazis, exploring and navigating levels. MachineGames was like "so you've played through the story campaign, watched all of our cutscenes, now here's that classic shooter from the 90s you wanted".

So TNC is what I'd call "not better, only different". Hope they continue that trend with Doom 5 and the next Wolf game.

[NightFright]

The golden design rule is that you should be able to get back to any place of the map you had previously visited. And if you can't, the game should tell you somehow that you reached a point of no return. Ion Maiden does this admirably.

[NNC]

One thing I hope for the final version are some truly memorable and charismatic locations. Maybe even emphasizing the city you are in (Washington?). You know, Build engine games are all about memorable places you visit, it can be a haunted mansion, a theme park, a hospital, a ship, a space station, a farm or a shinto shrine, let alone real places like Egypt pyramids or Golden Gate, but the memorable place you visit should be there.

[necroslut]

Nancsi, on 16 March 2018 - 11:43 AM, said:

One thing I hope for the final version are some truly memorable and charismatic locations. Maybe even emphasizing the city you are in (Washington?). You know, Build engine games are all about memorable places you visit, it can be a haunted mansion, a theme park, a hospital, a ship, a space station, a farm or a shinto shrine, let alone real places like Egypt pyramids or Golden Gate, but the memorable place you visit should be there.

The old Build games have distinctly themed levels, but Ion Maiden from what we've seen doesn't really have self-contained levels in that sense but more of a continuous world à la Half-Life.

[Danukem]

necroslut, on 16 March 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

The old Build games have distinctly themed levels, but Ion Maiden from what we've seen doesn't really have self-contained levels in that sense but more of a continuous world à la Half-Life.

I wouldn't jump to conclusions. The preview campaign is one big connected area, but the full game might contain entirely different big connected areas in other locations.

[NNC]

necroslut, on 16 March 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

The old Build games have distinctly themed levels, but Ion Maiden from what we've seen doesn't really have self-contained levels in that sense but more of a continuous world à la Half-Life.

You can have distinct locations even in a continuous world.

[MusicallyInspired]

Let's reserve our judgment until the full game comes out.

[necroslut]

Trooper Dan, on 16 March 2018 - 12:40 PM, said:

I wouldn't jump to conclusions. The preview campaign is one big connected area, but the full game might contain entirely different big connected areas in other locations.

Which is why I said "from what we've seen". But the level transition mechanics, as well as what developers have said, do point in that direction.

Nancsi, on 16 March 2018 - 01:13 PM, said:

You can have distinct locations even in a continuous world.

You can, but distinct locations and self-contained levels aren't the same thing. Half-Life also has distinct locations, but they aren't self-contained and separated from each other in the way that a Duke 3D level is, which makes the exploration and such a bit different.

[Micky C]

By the looks of it, they’re going to have 7 zones, where each zone has a distinct overall theme. Judging by the preview, each zone will have levels, such as how the elevator transitioned to the basement area, and each level could be split into multiple maps for the purpose of getting around the wall limit.

However, even within the first level there was some variety in terms of a GDF base, an outdoor area and an office.

[OpenMaw]

Duke 3D and i'd say to a slightly lesser extent the other BUILD games all have theme-park style design, with each level being it's own "ride." Something like Half-Life models the whole theme park, including paying for your ticket and walking between each ride.

[Danukem]

I'm having a lot of fun playing through the preview levels again with the improvements. However, I have two issues to report.

One: Where the heck are my screenshots going? I press F12 and a screenshot is saved somewhere, but they are not appearing in the game folder like they did in the previous version.

Two: This is a minor issue that existed in the previous version as well. Concrete sprites spawned on extreme slopes will enter a glitched state where they bounce up and down in the air forever. You can see them doing this just to the right of the crosshair in the screenshot (taken with a different program because I could not find the F12 ones!) below. EDIT: Still can't find those screenies taken with F12 -- I'm starting to think they didn't get saved at all.

EDIT2: Found the problem.

Built Mar 11 2018 21:41:58, GCC 7.3.0, 64-bit
Using C:/3DRealms/IonMaiden/ for game data
Using C:/Users/Daniel/AppData/Roaming/Ion Maiden Preview Campaign/ for game data

Definitely not where I would expect to find my screenshots, since EDuke32 has never done that before.

[NNC]

Micky C, on 16 March 2018 - 11:32 PM, said:

By the looks of it, they’re going to have 7 zones, where each zone has a distinct overall theme. Judging by the preview, each zone will have levels, such as how the elevator transitioned to the basement area, and each level could be split into multiple maps for the purpose of getting around the wall limit.

However, even within the first level there was some variety in terms of a GDF base, an outdoor area and an office.

I hope for a snowy type of level with some artcic base to visit there. This kind of game works well with snow.

[TerminX]

Trooper Dan, on 17 March 2018 - 02:44 AM, said:

EDIT2: Found the problem.

Built Mar 11 2018 21:41:58, GCC 7.3.0, 64-bit
Using C:/3DRealms/IonMaiden/ for game data
Using C:/Users/Daniel/AppData/Roaming/Ion Maiden Preview Campaign/ for game data

Definitely not where I would expect to find my screenshots, since EDuke32 has never done that before.

Yes, the behavior is flipped from EDuke32 default. EDuke32 requires a special file be created in order to use %APPDATA% and IM requires a special file be created if you need to disable it. The expectation these days is generally that stuff doesn't write everything out to the install dir.

[Phredreeke]

wouldn't it be more appropriate to write screenshots to a subfolder in the documents folder? generally more accessible for non-technical people than the appdata folder

[Danukem]

Phredreeke, on 17 March 2018 - 08:51 AM, said:

wouldn't it be more appropriate to write screenshots to a subfolder in the documents folder? generally more accessible for non-technical people than the appdata folder

The idea is that the folder is connected to your user account, which you could theoretically access from a different machine if you are "roaming" -- which sounds like a good idea.

I would suggest that a shortcut automatically be created inside the install directory which goes to the directory where the screenshots etc are being stored. Then dinosaurs like me could still find the stuff easily. I have just created the shortcut manually.

[Mark]

MusicallyInspired, on 16 March 2018 - 06:24 PM, said:

Let's reserve our judgment until the full game comes out.

You know that's not how it works around here.

[Fox]

[Mblackwell]

Trooper Dan, on 17 March 2018 - 02:44 AM, said:

I'm having a lot of fun playing through the preview levels again with the improvements. However, I have two issues to report.

One: Where the heck are my screenshots going? I press F12 and a screenshot is saved somewhere, but they are not appearing in the game folder like they did in the previous version.

Two: This is a minor issue that existed in the previous version as well. Concrete sprites spawned on extreme slopes will enter a glitched state where they bounce up and down in the air forever. You can see them doing this just to the right of the crosshair in the screenshot (taken with a different program because I could not find the F12 ones!) below. EDIT: Still can't find those screenies taken with F12 -- I'm starting to think they didn't get saved at all.

EDIT2: Found the problem.

Built Mar 11 2018 21:41:58, GCC 7.3.0, 64-bit
Using C:/3DRealms/IonMaiden/ for game data
Using C:/Users/Daniel/AppData/Roaming/Ion Maiden Preview Campaign/ for game data

Definitely not where I would expect to find my screenshots, since EDuke32 has never done that before.

Thanks for reporting this.

RE: Screenshots and data dir
It is different than EDuke32, but it is the expected "good" behavior for an application (similarly on Linux the files go under ~/.config/maiden), and in many cases applications might not have access to the folder where Steam installs the files.

[VGA]

Yeah, trying to save to the user's "Program Files" folder is a no-no for professional applications. Maybe there should be a message to say "Screenshot saved to blah/blah/blah.png" so there is no confusion.

[Zaxx]

VGA, on 17 March 2018 - 08:58 PM, said:

Yeah, trying to save to the user's "Program Files" folder is a no-no for professional applications. Maybe there should be a message to say "Screenshot saved to blah/blah/blah.png" so there is no confusion.

I'm sure this stuff will be worked out better by the time the full version drops because really the way screenshots work is not exactly ideal now. For example the Steam version should have ED32's screenshot feature turned off by default because people will use the Steam overlay anyway.

[SonicB00M]

[Zaxx]

SonicB00M, on 18 March 2018 - 04:19 AM, said:

snip

It was cool to hear some of the plans in terms of improving performance, frame pacing and the like though it was a bit shocking to hear that good old Polymost is still chugging along on OpenGL 1.1. I hope that eventually switching to a newer version will be an option for Voidpoint, especially if 3DR is planning on doing more stuff with Build.

[cosmonautcowboy]

SyFy Wire posted a piece on Ion Maiden yesterday. Nice to see the game get more publicity, even if SyFy Wire has become another trash website of faux-geek writers who do little more than push their politics.

[Sanek]

Listened the whole DF interview and really enjoyed it.
I actually felt the excitement that these guys have while developing a Build Engine game in 2018. They also talked about the improvements of the EDuke32 that we didn't covered here for the most part. I also like the idea of using the old tech of old unreleased version of games and releasing these games today. Especially if it's a Build Engine-related. And making the new games, of course.

[Zaxx]

Sanek, on 18 March 2018 - 06:53 AM, said:

Listened the whole DF interview and really enjoyed it.
I actually felt the excitement that these guys have while developing a Build Engine game in 2018.

Yeah, it feels fresh to hear an actual developer who is working on a video game instead of some random dude from the marketing team with the rehearsed speeches.

[Danukem]

Sanek, on 18 March 2018 - 06:53 AM, said:

Listened the whole DF interview and really enjoyed it.
I actually felt the excitement that these guys have while developing a Build Engine game in 2018. They also talked about the improvements of the EDuke32 that we didn't covered here for the most part.

+1

It's especially interesting to hear about future polymost optimizations. But who is working on that besides Evan?

[Malgon]

Really enjoyed the video and found it quite interesting. Everything Evan spoke about was really well explained and you can tell a lot of effort is being put in to resolve performance issues and such. As mentioned, you don't seem to get many interviews these days with actual developers. Good stuff.

[HulkNukem]

I might be remembering this wrong, but when you fall a great distance, the game slows down and lets you press a button to scream before you die.
It seems weird to have a slow down mechanic for something so small, and though I haven't tested to see if absolutely everything in the game slows down, could this be a hint that there might be some time manipulation at some point in the game?

[NightFright]

The sad info I extracted from the (interesting) video was that we won't see a release of the Prey prototype because Bethesda does not want. Reminds me of the situation with Blood. Sigh...

What I really like are the plans for a boxed version of the game. A floppy disk with integrated USB. Really nice! Hope even us poor Germans will have a chance to get their hands on that.