You're playing on hard and complaining it's hard?
You know, there are two easier levels, it might reduce your frustration.
It's Time for Another Spore Thread. Again.
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Broomstick
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Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
Sam Vimes Theory of Economic Injustice
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
Sam Vimes Theory of Economic Injustice
I think he's saying the basic premise of the space stage with constant random events nobody can fix except you and nobody can offset except you and the absurdly long quest to finish the game are incompatible. If 'hard' just makes 'random encounters happen more', that's pathetic.Broomstick wrote:You're playing on hard and complaining it's hard?
You know, there are two easier levels, it might reduce your frustration.
Frankly even in my short space experience, the constant nursemaiding of colonies has already pissed me off - it's even worse when you consider that in civ mode, city defences RAPE the AI over and over and over. Why can't we build defence fleets, orbital guns, or system-wide presence like the AI can?
My complaint is that the end-game is difficult without any element of challenge. It's not like the game is asking you "Hey, these guys are ultra-hard now, you gotta dodge real fast and shoot them in the blinking weak spot" the way Hard Mode works in most games. In SPORE, hard mode just means you have a flat reduction on hitpoints for your spaceship (1200 or so, which translates into around 6 seconds less durability) and an increased rate of uninterceptable planetary raids. I'm going to hurl some nasty invective, but it's solely at SPORE's designers, not at anyone here. If you know how to make this easier on me, feel free to tell, so I can go back to have a human blood pressure. But honestly, it's just bad. And hell, it's not even the Pirates--who you can stop with an Uber Turret--or the Eco Collapses--which you can kind stop with one of those other devices--it's the whole End Of Game experience and the fucking GROX.
The thing is, the Grox aren't hard to eliminate even so, it's just tedious. Want to waste a Grox planet? Fire your heat-ray or cloud-maker gun for 10 seconds and watch them die as the planet takes on an atmosphere. Or simply strafe their undefended microcity for two seconds. Dead. It's not even the combat versus Grox fighters that makes me angry, even if pixel-hunting quests with the laser or the photon missile are stupid, clumsy, and hamstrung by the short range of my weapons and the long range and durability of my enemy. No, the issue is the mind-numbing stupidity of needing to do this through hundreds of planets all the while being destroyed without any chance to avoid it due to the fuckawful way SPORE handles deep-space warfare:
Because my ship has 1200 less hitpoints or so than usual due to Hard Mode I can only survive an extremely limited amount of time under bombardment. This includes space bombardment, which happens anytime you're within an enemy planet's sphere of influence. Because the Grox build so densely, you can't avoid running into two or three or four ships at a time, so if you ever stop moving and they all catch up, you're often dead before you can even breach atmosphere. Furthermore, you can't even use repair items outside of atmosphere, from what I can see, so you can't fly and heal at the same time, which forces you to do everything on the run while constantly dodging down into planets to restore health. It's possible to do in one run but it is extremely difficult because of the low health you have versus the DPS of the Grox. I have a maximum health plus the goddamn 1.5x bonus from my Conseqeunce ability and the 160DPS Grox weapons sure eat through 2,250 hitpoints real fast, especially when there's 2 or 3 of them firing at once. So I shudder to think of how stupidly difficult this would be if I didn't have that benefit.
This forces you to leapfrog from the most local planet to the next most local planet, slowly destroying the Grox so that you can carve a hole to fly through. Just so we're clear, the Grox generally occupy a space between 600 and 1000 planets, so this is no small number. Because you can usually only kill one planet before you get wasted going to the next one (unless you're buying a LOT of health items) you're going to be respawning a lot. Sometimes you get killed even before you can reach the first world. But because this action takes place at the galactic core and your Empire is naturally located out on a galactic arm you're stuck spending a lot of your time running back and forth between spinward and coreward.
The only way to reduce this unnecessary tedium is to create an outpost to repair, recharge, restock on weapons and respawn at closer to the action--which requires you either to find an empty system or successfully carve out a wide area and then colonize one. But if you do that, you'll no longer be able to respond quickly at all to crisis situations at your home base, which can even include Grox attacks--which won't just pirate spice, but will actually clean off an entire planetary surface. There's no solution to this, it's simply the fucking way it is.
If you're especially unlucky, one of the random bullshit civs you run into along the way will be a xenophobic shithead and continually demand tribute or threaten to go to War, forcing you to spend time back home selling spice or doing missions in Grox territory. Ignoring them can lead to War, which means more "instant fucking anywhere" fleets hitting your bases. If the game let me do cosmological engineering so I could create a wormhole from a distant colony to my homeworld, okay, or if I got the Intersteller Drive X that let me plot a course to any of my colonies at infinite range, okay, but no--no such thing.
Even worse is that in the Core your effective range is reduced significantly, and seems to drop several more steps as you penetrate deeper. This makes it extremely troublesome to even attempt to rush through, because the Grox happily intercept you before your ship can accelerate, and pour death down your throat while you're trying to overcome inertia. You can't use your shields while in galactic mode, so this is usually a death sentence.
The only solution I can see is to eliminate the Grox in a long enough corridor that you can rush the rest of the way, while ignoring all your colonies back home, regardless of what happens. This takes an extremely long time, so I'm not sure how feasible it is. Not even uberturrets and fully turreted cities can withstand a concerted Grox assault.
Is that more clear? I understand your tone, but I really do feel this is a fairly legitimate complaint. It's not like the Grox require intelligence or skill, it's just a matter of mindless repetition of the same task over 100 or so planets as I march down to the Core, wasting hours and hours of time doing something which is not hard--it's just stupid. That's why the Grox are the worst idea ever, they're a threat that is completely irrelevent to the rest of the game, and totally out of step with the sandbox appeal of the Space stage. You're shoehorned into conflict with them, and there's no peaceful option, or clever solution, or anything.
If the Grox had a limited assault range, so they couldn't threaten my worlds from quite literally halfway across the fucking galaxy, then it'd be different. Then all I would need to do is defend my outposts. Or if they sent a few giant fleet waves at me and I, space invaders style, had to knock them all down in a climatic battle with me and my allies against the evil Core-dwellers, okay. That'd be at least a challenge. This is just bullshit. I get killed in automated, uninteractive combat sequences that occur in deep space, like a health tax on anyone attempting to just dash through Grox territory. Since I can only take a small amount of punishment, I can't penetrate far. Because the Grox have colonized EVERYTHING between half of the way in to the Core, there's no way for me to just tough it out and zip through. And because there's no way for me to safely leave home to do this final bullshit mission, I'm either going to have to ignore the pleas of my allies and my own colonies just to complete some kind of idiotic quest to find out what--if anything--is at the center of the galaxy. As the famous saying goes, No Reward Is Worth This.
The thing is, the Grox aren't hard to eliminate even so, it's just tedious. Want to waste a Grox planet? Fire your heat-ray or cloud-maker gun for 10 seconds and watch them die as the planet takes on an atmosphere. Or simply strafe their undefended microcity for two seconds. Dead. It's not even the combat versus Grox fighters that makes me angry, even if pixel-hunting quests with the laser or the photon missile are stupid, clumsy, and hamstrung by the short range of my weapons and the long range and durability of my enemy. No, the issue is the mind-numbing stupidity of needing to do this through hundreds of planets all the while being destroyed without any chance to avoid it due to the fuckawful way SPORE handles deep-space warfare:
Because my ship has 1200 less hitpoints or so than usual due to Hard Mode I can only survive an extremely limited amount of time under bombardment. This includes space bombardment, which happens anytime you're within an enemy planet's sphere of influence. Because the Grox build so densely, you can't avoid running into two or three or four ships at a time, so if you ever stop moving and they all catch up, you're often dead before you can even breach atmosphere. Furthermore, you can't even use repair items outside of atmosphere, from what I can see, so you can't fly and heal at the same time, which forces you to do everything on the run while constantly dodging down into planets to restore health. It's possible to do in one run but it is extremely difficult because of the low health you have versus the DPS of the Grox. I have a maximum health plus the goddamn 1.5x bonus from my Conseqeunce ability and the 160DPS Grox weapons sure eat through 2,250 hitpoints real fast, especially when there's 2 or 3 of them firing at once. So I shudder to think of how stupidly difficult this would be if I didn't have that benefit.
This forces you to leapfrog from the most local planet to the next most local planet, slowly destroying the Grox so that you can carve a hole to fly through. Just so we're clear, the Grox generally occupy a space between 600 and 1000 planets, so this is no small number. Because you can usually only kill one planet before you get wasted going to the next one (unless you're buying a LOT of health items) you're going to be respawning a lot. Sometimes you get killed even before you can reach the first world. But because this action takes place at the galactic core and your Empire is naturally located out on a galactic arm you're stuck spending a lot of your time running back and forth between spinward and coreward.
The only way to reduce this unnecessary tedium is to create an outpost to repair, recharge, restock on weapons and respawn at closer to the action--which requires you either to find an empty system or successfully carve out a wide area and then colonize one. But if you do that, you'll no longer be able to respond quickly at all to crisis situations at your home base, which can even include Grox attacks--which won't just pirate spice, but will actually clean off an entire planetary surface. There's no solution to this, it's simply the fucking way it is.
If you're especially unlucky, one of the random bullshit civs you run into along the way will be a xenophobic shithead and continually demand tribute or threaten to go to War, forcing you to spend time back home selling spice or doing missions in Grox territory. Ignoring them can lead to War, which means more "instant fucking anywhere" fleets hitting your bases. If the game let me do cosmological engineering so I could create a wormhole from a distant colony to my homeworld, okay, or if I got the Intersteller Drive X that let me plot a course to any of my colonies at infinite range, okay, but no--no such thing.
Even worse is that in the Core your effective range is reduced significantly, and seems to drop several more steps as you penetrate deeper. This makes it extremely troublesome to even attempt to rush through, because the Grox happily intercept you before your ship can accelerate, and pour death down your throat while you're trying to overcome inertia. You can't use your shields while in galactic mode, so this is usually a death sentence.
The only solution I can see is to eliminate the Grox in a long enough corridor that you can rush the rest of the way, while ignoring all your colonies back home, regardless of what happens. This takes an extremely long time, so I'm not sure how feasible it is. Not even uberturrets and fully turreted cities can withstand a concerted Grox assault.
Is that more clear? I understand your tone, but I really do feel this is a fairly legitimate complaint. It's not like the Grox require intelligence or skill, it's just a matter of mindless repetition of the same task over 100 or so planets as I march down to the Core, wasting hours and hours of time doing something which is not hard--it's just stupid. That's why the Grox are the worst idea ever, they're a threat that is completely irrelevent to the rest of the game, and totally out of step with the sandbox appeal of the Space stage. You're shoehorned into conflict with them, and there's no peaceful option, or clever solution, or anything.
If the Grox had a limited assault range, so they couldn't threaten my worlds from quite literally halfway across the fucking galaxy, then it'd be different. Then all I would need to do is defend my outposts. Or if they sent a few giant fleet waves at me and I, space invaders style, had to knock them all down in a climatic battle with me and my allies against the evil Core-dwellers, okay. That'd be at least a challenge. This is just bullshit. I get killed in automated, uninteractive combat sequences that occur in deep space, like a health tax on anyone attempting to just dash through Grox territory. Since I can only take a small amount of punishment, I can't penetrate far. Because the Grox have colonized EVERYTHING between half of the way in to the Core, there's no way for me to just tough it out and zip through. And because there's no way for me to safely leave home to do this final bullshit mission, I'm either going to have to ignore the pleas of my allies and my own colonies just to complete some kind of idiotic quest to find out what--if anything--is at the center of the galaxy. As the famous saying goes, No Reward Is Worth This.
I did. I just loaded up on super-repair packs and super-batteries (had 20 or so of each), had my UFO maxed out with health and just bum-rushed through. Also, get a level-5 stardrive, I wouldn't have made it without it because the stars near the center are set just right to barely allow you to reach the center with a level 5 stardrive, and then only through a very concretely defined narrow passage.
It's not worth it, though. You get a genesis device which makes any planet an instant T3 world and a kinda funny video: just go an watch the video on youtube. Just getting a level 5 stardrive is an incredibly horrible achievement. You have to make IIRC 2500 random trips between starsystems to get it.
It's not worth it, though. You get a genesis device which makes any planet an instant T3 world and a kinda funny video: just go an watch the video on youtube. Just getting a level 5 stardrive is an incredibly horrible achievement. You have to make IIRC 2500 random trips between starsystems to get it.
It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.
- NEIL ARMSTRONG, MISSION COMMANDER, APOLLO 11
Signature dedicated to the greatest achievement of mankind.
MILDLY DERANGED PHYSICIST does not mind BREAKING the SOUND BARRIER, because it is INSURED. - Simon_Jester considering the problems of hypersonic flight for Team L.A.M.E.
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Singular Intellect
- Jedi Council Member
- Posts: 2392
- Joined: 2006-09-19 03:12pm
- Location: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Currently I'm having quite a bit of fun. I did a shitload of missions and made several allies. Once I got powerful and upgraded enough, I declared war on everyone and have begun dominating my little star cluster.
The planet buster weapon is fun (if expensive), but with the planet modifying technology, taking out enemy home bases isn't too hard. Just boil their planet until all their cities fall but one, and then wipe it out or force a surrender. You can terraform it back later.
So far my only real complaints are:
1) Too much micro management required.
2) Having to constantly be bugged about ecosystems collapsing or some shit.
3) My game has a bug where it will occasionally lock up when leaving my home world atmosphere. It doesn't lock solid, but I do have to exit to the main menu while losing all my progress unless I've saved close to that point.
All in all, so far I'm finding the game quite enjoyable.
The planet buster weapon is fun (if expensive), but with the planet modifying technology, taking out enemy home bases isn't too hard. Just boil their planet until all their cities fall but one, and then wipe it out or force a surrender. You can terraform it back later.
So far my only real complaints are:
1) Too much micro management required.
2) Having to constantly be bugged about ecosystems collapsing or some shit.
3) My game has a bug where it will occasionally lock up when leaving my home world atmosphere. It doesn't lock solid, but I do have to exit to the main menu while losing all my progress unless I've saved close to that point.
All in all, so far I'm finding the game quite enjoyable.
One of my technical issues would be the unnecessarily huge lag when entering/leaving a planet. The transfer from 'textured ball' to 'planet level' takes several seconds, and considering the pretty lame graphics I'm not sure why this is so (it's likely due to all the crazy animals and trees, I imagine). This is a serious contributor to the 'getting killed by the unfightable space-defences everyone in the universe has except you' factor.
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Singular Intellect
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Weird...when I upgraded with my auto defense turret system and keep it toggled 'on', space defenses get raped by my ship. I'll even sit there and let the ships attack me so they're blown to pieces, and I don't have to lift a finger (other than having turned it on in the first place).Stark wrote:This is a serious contributor to the 'getting killed by the unfightable space-defences everyone in the universe has except you' factor.
It's probably loading the planetary model and anything on it to procedurally render.Stark wrote:One of my technical issues would be the unnecessarily huge lag when entering/leaving a planet. The transfer from 'textured ball' to 'planet level' takes several seconds, and considering the pretty lame graphics I'm not sure why this is so (it's likely due to all the crazy animals and trees, I imagine). This is a serious contributor to the 'getting killed by the unfightable space-defences everyone in the universe has except you' factor.
It doesn't even start until you actually try to 'enter' a planet; the pause is long enough to be noticeable, but if they spread it out over the whole 'zoom to system' time I imagine they could lessen the impact. Are the planets fully procedural? I figured since the locations of trees/animals/etc appear fixed, it'd need to load those locations, rather than generate a planet anew. Frankly, preloading the inhabited planets (ie the planets you spend the vast majority of your time shuttling between in tiresome micromanagement) would kill most of it, and the pause transitioning OUT of a planet is tactically dangerous. Clearly they're moving around a lot of data, but you'd think they'd have put more thought into mitigating it, since you'll be entering and leaving literally thousands of planets PER GAME. That's like a shooter that pauses for a few seconds to load PER BULLET.phongn wrote: It's probably loading the planetary model and anything on it to procedurally render.
I guess that's why everyone in the universe has a functioning space defence system except the player, lol?Bubble Boy wrote:Weird...when I upgraded with my auto defense turret system and keep it toggled 'on', space defenses get raped by my ship. I'll even sit there and let the ships attack me so they're blown to pieces, and I don't have to lift a finger (other than having turned it on in the first place).
Actually what he's talking about is the weapon tool that fires back at local enemies, which also works even in space. You can buy it early on, but the upgraded ones take a bit longer to get, and they're amazingly effective. Overall though, it's a bad idea to let it handle things for you against the Grox, who have such a large amount of shit to throw at you that there's no way of being able to just 'ride it out' unless you do what PeZook did. I'm planning on doing that in just a moment, and then going to watch the movie 88 minutes--which I hope does not suck--and then I'll report my experiences. I imagine it'll be somewhat underwhelming, especially from the description of the Genesis device so far--it would have been nice if you could use it to make a planet--or if it was a star-maker device--or something. Maybe it could have been some kind of tool to seed cellular life... eh, I dunno. I would have liked a sort of "comes back to the beginning" sense to it, like you find the universe is barren or something happens, and your final act is to insure that life endures. Anyway we'll see. Actually... no we won't, shit. I still need the iDrive 5. Goddammit. Time to fly back and forth a thousand more times.Stark wrote: guess that's why everyone in the universe has a functioning space defence system except the player, lol?
But what he's talking about does happen--it's too bad that a similar system isn't in place to stop the enemy from harassing your worlds, but against anyone but the Grox you can essentially just let them attack and shrug off the aggressors. You can even do it to the Grox, as their ships are a lot weaker in space than in atmosphere, there's just no benefit to it.
Oh I know, but I've only used the first (ie, nigh useless) version. I was referring to everyone else having actual other ships that actually defend their space from invaders, while your species is so fucking stupid they can't even build two ships at the same time, let alone build a varied fleet of different classes/sizes to defend your space.
It doesn't matter, man. Nothing matters. I just got to the Core--and goddamn, srsly. That's it? The Grox don't even go away! 
Ah well, what can you expect. But I find it particularly abhorrent to goodness and life that the Ultimate Cosmic Power you recieve has only a few charges before it ceases function. I'm not sure if you can recharge it anywhere--I can't go back into the Core once I've been there... so eh.
Ah well, what can you expect. But I find it particularly abhorrent to goodness and life that the Ultimate Cosmic Power you recieve has only a few charges before it ceases function. I'm not sure if you can recharge it anywhere--I can't go back into the Core once I've been there... so eh.
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Singular Intellect
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- Location: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
You are able to install a defensive satellite around your colonies if you can afford to and bother to do so. Furthermore, if you take the time (and money) you can also make sure every one of your colony cities is fully armed with turrets as well.
That's what I've done, and generally speaking, I just ignore colony distress calls since I've equipped them to defend themselves quite well. If I bother to respond, I usually show up just in time for them to 'thank' me for my 'help'.
That's what I've done, and generally speaking, I just ignore colony distress calls since I've equipped them to defend themselves quite well. If I bother to respond, I usually show up just in time for them to 'thank' me for my 'help'.
So you're saying it's okay because you only have to put up with it for hours? lol! I've seen a single squad of raiders take down a whole city full of turrets, they appear to be far less effective than the were in civ mode (probably due to the shocking poor engagement range). I can only imagine how terrible it is once the AI starts using bombs.
It's not actually a defensive Satellite. The Uberturret is actually just a close air patrol for your colonies, and doesn't do space intercepts, just low-orbital defense. Plus, there's only one of them, so while they're pretty good offense, they can be erased and they're not able to intercept fleets before they get to your base. This is important because the AI will drop several squads, and the Uberturret can only handle one unit at a time--it's not firing Antimatter Torpedoes or anything. I'd prefer a ground-based cannon that did. That'd sure make stuff easier. But the fact is that it's not the durability of an individual world that's the biggest issue, just the fact that I'm bothered by these things at all.
There's no reason this should ever happen. Why should I be harassed by the Grox? Why should they launch raids against me? They could be just as dangerous if they were actual unfeeling machines who simply attacked anyone within X radius and no further--or if any civilization who reaches the Core was so terrifying to them that they would sue for peace, or something else--anything else! Once you reach the Core, the Grox don't stop being a threat--even the use of your new Uberdevice has limited uses. And upon leaving the Core I was swarmed by like 8 Grox craft and destroyed. Fuck this! The fun of space is the exploration and sandbox elements, and the Grox add an unnecessary element of nagging bullshit to it. Hell, SPORE overall appeals to people who want to make custom stuff and then play around with it--and SPORE's vast endgame in space basically destroys any hope of doing that once you reach it. It would be different if I could get out of my spaceship and walk around on my world, doing stuff with my space people, like a huge version of the Sims or SimCity or something. It just turns into a deranged minigame where I lose all contact with my original species and am stuck doing one of three things: a poor version of the StarControl or Starflight spice-trading game, an extremely minimalistic planet editor which offers a great deal if disincentive for it's use, and the worst space combat game ever. Worse than Sword of the Stars or Sins of a Solar Empire or any of the other shitty games I've ranted on.
Honestly, what's the point of the space warfare aspect? Is it because everyone wanted intersteller warfare? I can understand that, but couldn't we have developed a better system than "raiders have magically appeared at a colony, go and defend it?" Why not let me set up fleet patrols? Why not give me units, like the AI does, that intercept incoming forces? The idea of task-based unit behavior is not foreign to Spore--why do I lose the ability to give commands to several units when I go to Space? If they wanted to give people a fun space war aspect, there's tons of ways to do it that do not include 'hunt the pixel' or 'respond to magical appearing fleets'. It's so clear they should have just followed the trend they were starting, and made space war something similar to a large version of Civ phase. And here, I'll do it for them:
In Tribal I command about 9 dudes, and assign them behaviors like harvest or hunt or play fish or heal people. In Civ I can command like 25 planes at once, and set up trade routes that are run by actual, physical units.
In space I get one unit--my single flagship? Why not let me build spaceships? Instead of the allied fleet thing, why not let me slowly expand the fleet maintenance capacity of my nation, from like a mothership and 2 support units to 3 to 6 to 10 and so forth, and then let me build units of that sort. On the planet menu let me choose the Unit Builder and instead of deciding what to use for my irrelevent ground, sea and air units, let me choose to design Transports (for troops, colonies, biosphere components, spice), Attackships (for intercepts, patrols, additions to your mothership's fleet) and Survey Craft (for researching sightseer objects, mapping black holes, automatically handling eco-disasters, improving relation, additions to your mothership's fleet to expand diplomatic potency)
In space I get one unit--my single flagship? Why not let me build spaceships? Instead of the allied fleet thing, why not let me slowly expand the fleet maintenance capacity of my nation, from like a mothership and 2 support units to 3 to 6 to 10 and so forth, and then let me build units of that sort. On the planet menu let me choose the Unit Builder and instead of deciding what to use for my irrelevent ground, sea and air units, let me choose to design Transports, Attackships, and Survey Craft.
Transports: moves troops for land invasions instead of surrenders, are called in to colony markers to deploy a colony or biosphere components if you don't have the stuff yourself, and can be ordered to go on Spice Missions to increase your cash. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your hauling capacity and your fleet's buying power.
Attackships: patrols your spacelanes and intercept enemy forces that are heading your way, and can be ordered to go on Raiding Missions to get you some spice, soften enemy defenses, and make them open to bullying and possible surrender. Are called in to rally markers to join your force and defend you. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your combat capacity and your fleet's bullying power.
Survey Craft: patrols outside your space looking for objects of interest, emerging empires, and handles eco-disasters. Are called in to survey markers to map wormhole paths and research sightseer spatial anomolies for new Spaceforming technologies. Can be ordered to go on cultural missions like the Enterprise that cost a little over time but will increase your relations with another Empire. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your diplomatic power and aid in mapping space.
There's no reason this should ever happen. Why should I be harassed by the Grox? Why should they launch raids against me? They could be just as dangerous if they were actual unfeeling machines who simply attacked anyone within X radius and no further--or if any civilization who reaches the Core was so terrifying to them that they would sue for peace, or something else--anything else! Once you reach the Core, the Grox don't stop being a threat--even the use of your new Uberdevice has limited uses. And upon leaving the Core I was swarmed by like 8 Grox craft and destroyed. Fuck this! The fun of space is the exploration and sandbox elements, and the Grox add an unnecessary element of nagging bullshit to it. Hell, SPORE overall appeals to people who want to make custom stuff and then play around with it--and SPORE's vast endgame in space basically destroys any hope of doing that once you reach it. It would be different if I could get out of my spaceship and walk around on my world, doing stuff with my space people, like a huge version of the Sims or SimCity or something. It just turns into a deranged minigame where I lose all contact with my original species and am stuck doing one of three things: a poor version of the StarControl or Starflight spice-trading game, an extremely minimalistic planet editor which offers a great deal if disincentive for it's use, and the worst space combat game ever. Worse than Sword of the Stars or Sins of a Solar Empire or any of the other shitty games I've ranted on.
Honestly, what's the point of the space warfare aspect? Is it because everyone wanted intersteller warfare? I can understand that, but couldn't we have developed a better system than "raiders have magically appeared at a colony, go and defend it?" Why not let me set up fleet patrols? Why not give me units, like the AI does, that intercept incoming forces? The idea of task-based unit behavior is not foreign to Spore--why do I lose the ability to give commands to several units when I go to Space? If they wanted to give people a fun space war aspect, there's tons of ways to do it that do not include 'hunt the pixel' or 'respond to magical appearing fleets'. It's so clear they should have just followed the trend they were starting, and made space war something similar to a large version of Civ phase. And here, I'll do it for them:
In Tribal I command about 9 dudes, and assign them behaviors like harvest or hunt or play fish or heal people. In Civ I can command like 25 planes at once, and set up trade routes that are run by actual, physical units.
In space I get one unit--my single flagship? Why not let me build spaceships? Instead of the allied fleet thing, why not let me slowly expand the fleet maintenance capacity of my nation, from like a mothership and 2 support units to 3 to 6 to 10 and so forth, and then let me build units of that sort. On the planet menu let me choose the Unit Builder and instead of deciding what to use for my irrelevent ground, sea and air units, let me choose to design Transports (for troops, colonies, biosphere components, spice), Attackships (for intercepts, patrols, additions to your mothership's fleet) and Survey Craft (for researching sightseer objects, mapping black holes, automatically handling eco-disasters, improving relation, additions to your mothership's fleet to expand diplomatic potency)
In space I get one unit--my single flagship? Why not let me build spaceships? Instead of the allied fleet thing, why not let me slowly expand the fleet maintenance capacity of my nation, from like a mothership and 2 support units to 3 to 6 to 10 and so forth, and then let me build units of that sort. On the planet menu let me choose the Unit Builder and instead of deciding what to use for my irrelevent ground, sea and air units, let me choose to design Transports, Attackships, and Survey Craft.
Transports: moves troops for land invasions instead of surrenders, are called in to colony markers to deploy a colony or biosphere components if you don't have the stuff yourself, and can be ordered to go on Spice Missions to increase your cash. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your hauling capacity and your fleet's buying power.
Attackships: patrols your spacelanes and intercept enemy forces that are heading your way, and can be ordered to go on Raiding Missions to get you some spice, soften enemy defenses, and make them open to bullying and possible surrender. Are called in to rally markers to join your force and defend you. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your combat capacity and your fleet's bullying power.
Survey Craft: patrols outside your space looking for objects of interest, emerging empires, and handles eco-disasters. Are called in to survey markers to map wormhole paths and research sightseer spatial anomolies for new Spaceforming technologies. Can be ordered to go on cultural missions like the Enterprise that cost a little over time but will increase your relations with another Empire. Can also be added to your mothership's escort to increase your diplomatic power and aid in mapping space.
So...Fixing of the game begins
Sometimes, I think developers today make flawed or downright broken games, thinking "ah, the fans will fix it all".
Predictably, the first thing they fixed are the bullshit attacks and pirate raids (one every two hours instead of one every 15 minutes).
BTW, the Staff Of Life supposedly recharges every time you load the game. Supposedly.
Personally, I think they will keep releasing horribly bloated expansion packs which will try and add the content which should've been included with the first goddamned game...like, you know, an actual free on-board gene lab.
Of course, the basic flaws will probably remain unfixed forever.
Sometimes, I think developers today make flawed or downright broken games, thinking "ah, the fans will fix it all".
Predictably, the first thing they fixed are the bullshit attacks and pirate raids (one every two hours instead of one every 15 minutes).
BTW, the Staff Of Life supposedly recharges every time you load the game. Supposedly.
Personally, I think they will keep releasing horribly bloated expansion packs which will try and add the content which should've been included with the first goddamned game...like, you know, an actual free on-board gene lab.
Of course, the basic flaws will probably remain unfixed forever.
It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.
- NEIL ARMSTRONG, MISSION COMMANDER, APOLLO 11
Signature dedicated to the greatest achievement of mankind.
MILDLY DERANGED PHYSICIST does not mind BREAKING the SOUND BARRIER, because it is INSURED. - Simon_Jester considering the problems of hypersonic flight for Team L.A.M.E.
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Admiral Valdemar
- Outside Context Problem
- Posts: 31572
- Joined: 2002-07-04 07:17pm
- Location: UK
Don't take my criticism as advice to avoid it. SPORE is overall an interesting game, and it's worth a play, or at least it would have been before the DRM made it hard to lend a buddy a disc to play. It's just not what it could be, and it makes the mistake of adding too much 'gameplay' in the wrong places. The real problem is that the most fun aspect of the game is, frankly, the creature creator--which is now a standalone product--and that in-game your creature creations move from limited (by the DNA point and 'must find before buying' gameplay mechanic) to irrelevent. You get to enjoy them in the creature phase, but once you finally have all the DNA you want and all the parts you were looking for you've already finished creature phase. And then that's it.
It's not that Tribal doesn't let you enjoy your dudes, just that it's so amazingly short. And then in Civ and Space you barely ever see a Creature of your design and you lose all touch with anything but economics and combat.
So the strength of the game, which everyone liked and wanted to get their hands on, was the thing we all got for free (in limited form) already, or could buy for like 15 bucks. Sure, you can't see your creations dance around and stuff, but they never do that in-game anyway. The creature creator's personality animations are far more detailed than anything the game actually uses, so there's nothing in the game that adds to the creature creator. The game is just a structured way of slowing your access to the editors/creators, and hiding some entirely (like the flora creator which can be activated via a cheat/workaround) rather than actually letting you explore those options.
Ideally, the game's phases would be 'soft' and merely as the next steps YOU choose. There's no reason you couldn't put the 'brain' back in, and when you evolve more brains, you open up a new creature editor tab for clothes and a new village editor for advanced city buildings. You do not NEED to ever REMOVE old editor options, or introduce them after discrete changes in venue. You don't get forced from creature to tribal--it's just that you want to make buildings now, and to do that, you need a tribe. Or you want to make a spaceship, and to do that you need a civilization. Or you want to make a new planet to start a new game on, with a less retarded assortment of animals and your favorite style of plants and purple skies with red seas. And to do this, you need a space empire and a terraformer mothership. And so on. So you're not being forced from one stage to the next--just always marching forwards, like powers of ten, from cell to space, in search of the ability to make your vision come true. SPORE skirts this by allowing you to 'wait', but it still feels the need to add concrete divisions between phases where there is no need for it. The same world you walk on in Creature Phase is the world you see in Space. All the levels of detail are there. All the powers of ten are in place. Just remove the artifical divisions between one and the next and you'd have a game that really makes you feel like you're part of something.
It's not that Tribal doesn't let you enjoy your dudes, just that it's so amazingly short. And then in Civ and Space you barely ever see a Creature of your design and you lose all touch with anything but economics and combat.
So the strength of the game, which everyone liked and wanted to get their hands on, was the thing we all got for free (in limited form) already, or could buy for like 15 bucks. Sure, you can't see your creations dance around and stuff, but they never do that in-game anyway. The creature creator's personality animations are far more detailed than anything the game actually uses, so there's nothing in the game that adds to the creature creator. The game is just a structured way of slowing your access to the editors/creators, and hiding some entirely (like the flora creator which can be activated via a cheat/workaround) rather than actually letting you explore those options.
Ideally, the game's phases would be 'soft' and merely as the next steps YOU choose. There's no reason you couldn't put the 'brain' back in, and when you evolve more brains, you open up a new creature editor tab for clothes and a new village editor for advanced city buildings. You do not NEED to ever REMOVE old editor options, or introduce them after discrete changes in venue. You don't get forced from creature to tribal--it's just that you want to make buildings now, and to do that, you need a tribe. Or you want to make a spaceship, and to do that you need a civilization. Or you want to make a new planet to start a new game on, with a less retarded assortment of animals and your favorite style of plants and purple skies with red seas. And to do this, you need a space empire and a terraformer mothership. And so on. So you're not being forced from one stage to the next--just always marching forwards, like powers of ten, from cell to space, in search of the ability to make your vision come true. SPORE skirts this by allowing you to 'wait', but it still feels the need to add concrete divisions between phases where there is no need for it. The same world you walk on in Creature Phase is the world you see in Space. All the levels of detail are there. All the powers of ten are in place. Just remove the artifical divisions between one and the next and you'd have a game that really makes you feel like you're part of something.
I agree, and outside of the first level, the idea of 'adapting' your creature to 'the environment' is totally absent. After the first stage, your creature is almost entirely cosmetic, only the highest tier of 'spikes' and 'feet' having any ingame effect. A few more stages on and your creature is reduced to DIALOG BOX ANIMATIONS and that's it.
I actually dig on the first stage. It's what I expected from the whole game; adapting geometry and parts to 'solve' 'environmental' problems, since placement, size, shape etc were all important to play. It might be a flash game, but at least it knows what the 'game' is supposed to be (keeping up with changing enemies and environments, feeding efficiency etc) whereas the other levels devolve into a primitive beat-em-up and a broken civ game.
The fact that decisions in stages have no subtle consequences or structural choices have no knock-on effects is really lame. You have 'alignment bonuses' and that's it. The whole idea of 'playing' with designs is moot, because outside the first two stages your creature is TOTALLY IRRELEVANT. Best part? Attitude of spacefaring civs seems to be random and not biologically-influenced, so you can't even terraform or bio-sphere customise to influence the rise of certain types of sentients.
I actually dig on the first stage. It's what I expected from the whole game; adapting geometry and parts to 'solve' 'environmental' problems, since placement, size, shape etc were all important to play. It might be a flash game, but at least it knows what the 'game' is supposed to be (keeping up with changing enemies and environments, feeding efficiency etc) whereas the other levels devolve into a primitive beat-em-up and a broken civ game.
The fact that decisions in stages have no subtle consequences or structural choices have no knock-on effects is really lame. You have 'alignment bonuses' and that's it. The whole idea of 'playing' with designs is moot, because outside the first two stages your creature is TOTALLY IRRELEVANT. Best part? Attitude of spacefaring civs seems to be random and not biologically-influenced, so you can't even terraform or bio-sphere customise to influence the rise of certain types of sentients.
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Admiral Valdemar
- Outside Context Problem
- Posts: 31572
- Joined: 2002-07-04 07:17pm
- Location: UK
It's a pity. If the unique creature biology had led to unique ways of going about the later stages, rather than one template fits all, then I'd be more than happy even with the micro-managing and other fiddly bits. As it is, it sounds like the one concept that I've always wanted in a game is playing second fiddle to something that is a half-hearted MoO or Gal. Civ. clone with some Sims aspect thrown in for good measure.
One of the Something Awful goons put out an assymetry mod. Completely safe, as far as I can tell, and it works well.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
What's the fascination with asymmetry? I like the automatic symmetry, it keeps my creatures from looking like frankenstein abominations. The only place I can see a need for it is for clothing, like the Grox outfit.loomer wrote:One of the Something Awful goons put out an assymetry mod. Completely safe, as far as I can tell, and it works well.
Asymmetry does allow for more interesting beasts if you do it right, like fiddler crabs.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
Thanks for the heads-up! I'll be checking it out, I think. I had actually just been wishing I could make a Giant Enemy Fiddler Crab in Spore yesterday, in an odd coincidence.loomer wrote:One of the Something Awful goons put out an assymetry mod. Completely safe, as far as I can tell, and it works well.
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