blackthorn9
Larva
Hello all,
I have some praise, constructive criticism and finally some suggestions for this excellent game in development. Firstly, this game is awesome, and the potential is plain to see. Thanks, and major props to the developers for this masterpiece in the making. Please take my criticism as constructive as I mean no disrespect.
My biggest pet peeve as a videophile gamer is watching the excessive clumping that occurs in most battles in EotU. Now I realize that ants were no Roman soldiers, but it would be nice if you guys could make some changes to space out combat somewhat. I am no developer or programmer, so I lack the knowledge to make a more concrete suggestion and perhaps it's not worth the effort, but I think it would be more visually pleasing to make some kind of change to the targeting algorithms or collision detection/avoidance to make combat a more spaced out affair. (Mainly applies to underground combat)
My other criticism is related. When I have a lot of idle ants in the nest, most of them will congregate around the queen making for another clumping problem (IMHO of course) and I think, again, it will be more visually pleasing to find a way to have the ants distribute themselves better within the nest when idle.
Now on to my suggestions, some of which are related to my criticisms above.
1. More rooms / tiles for diversity and more choices for nest building
• Guard chamber – Soldier ants will man these chambers and fight as a group within the nest responding to any threats automatically and gaining an attack speed bonus as a concrete representation of the greater coordination they share in a fight. (Would be useful placed along the main corridor into the nest / queens room where you anticipate a lot of enemies will enter)
• Compost Chamber – Enables to harvesting of dead ants (whether own ants or enemy) to grow fungus that serves as an additional food source once the fungus grows and cultivates (Should be balanced as a slow, constant, but small influx of food with an expensive tile cost – long-term investment)
2. More ambient activity (would help solve the idle ants crowding the queens chamber)
• Ants assigned or left in the “home / nest” group or possibly any idle ants in the nest engaging in various ambient activity to spread them around the nest that is mainly aesthetic such as communicating with one another via their antennae, “eating” food (without actually consuming the food – representative only), redistributing food to other chambers to balance out the amount in each food area, patrolling / manning guard chamber (possibly only soldier ants engage in these activities and not in the nest maintenance activities), reinforcing walls (see below under new mechanics), tending to the brood, exploring tunnels and foraging for food, etc…
3. New mechanics
• Fortifying walls (like in Dungeon Keeper) – When a room is fully tiled ants will fortify walls (takes a long time = gives reason to have more workers AND to assign them to home group or keep them idle) which makes it take a lot longer for enemy ants to dig through your walls or possibly take so long as to make them lose interest and look for another way to break in. (Giving you time to respond and eliminate the threat) Can also increase productivity in some way for room. (Improve stats = more food stored, more food harvested, more attack speed and more ants allowed in guard chamber, stronger ants spawned from broods etc)
• Forage / Escort Group = Similar to the “Home / Nest” group, would be another pre-available group that you can assign ants to that will begin foraging outside the nest for food/insects to turn into food. Can have workers assigned forage while soldiers assigned would act as escorts and follow the workers / guard the food source found etc.
• More / random ambient life that moves on and off the map randomly or random food sources that appear like seeds etc for foragers to find/kill/harvest and bring back to nest. (Would create another mechanic to balance – assign too few ants and risk them dying excessively to dangers outside – assign too many and the nest is undefended and less efficient.
4. Quality of life changes
• Reduce the size or allow an option to resize the roman numeral group marker and pheromone smoke to make the action/ants/game more visible if one so wishes.
Now I realize that some of my suggestions might be considered slightly gamey and its obvious that the developers have made great efforts to simulate real ant behavior as much as possible, but I think many will agree that entertainment comes before realism in a game so it’s something to consider. (Tried to make my suggestions as little “gamey” as possible). I also realize that the game is still very much a work in progress so I am not discounting that some of my suggestions might already be thought about and in the works but since I have not seen them in the game yet, it is worth mentioning!
Thanks again for such an awesome experience. I am looking forward to freeplay mode and all the future content that is sure to come. I wish you all much $$$$ and success so the game grows and receives expansions and DLC that will allow you to continue with the development.
I have some praise, constructive criticism and finally some suggestions for this excellent game in development. Firstly, this game is awesome, and the potential is plain to see. Thanks, and major props to the developers for this masterpiece in the making. Please take my criticism as constructive as I mean no disrespect.
My biggest pet peeve as a videophile gamer is watching the excessive clumping that occurs in most battles in EotU. Now I realize that ants were no Roman soldiers, but it would be nice if you guys could make some changes to space out combat somewhat. I am no developer or programmer, so I lack the knowledge to make a more concrete suggestion and perhaps it's not worth the effort, but I think it would be more visually pleasing to make some kind of change to the targeting algorithms or collision detection/avoidance to make combat a more spaced out affair. (Mainly applies to underground combat)
My other criticism is related. When I have a lot of idle ants in the nest, most of them will congregate around the queen making for another clumping problem (IMHO of course) and I think, again, it will be more visually pleasing to find a way to have the ants distribute themselves better within the nest when idle.
Now on to my suggestions, some of which are related to my criticisms above.
1. More rooms / tiles for diversity and more choices for nest building
• Guard chamber – Soldier ants will man these chambers and fight as a group within the nest responding to any threats automatically and gaining an attack speed bonus as a concrete representation of the greater coordination they share in a fight. (Would be useful placed along the main corridor into the nest / queens room where you anticipate a lot of enemies will enter)
• Compost Chamber – Enables to harvesting of dead ants (whether own ants or enemy) to grow fungus that serves as an additional food source once the fungus grows and cultivates (Should be balanced as a slow, constant, but small influx of food with an expensive tile cost – long-term investment)
2. More ambient activity (would help solve the idle ants crowding the queens chamber)
• Ants assigned or left in the “home / nest” group or possibly any idle ants in the nest engaging in various ambient activity to spread them around the nest that is mainly aesthetic such as communicating with one another via their antennae, “eating” food (without actually consuming the food – representative only), redistributing food to other chambers to balance out the amount in each food area, patrolling / manning guard chamber (possibly only soldier ants engage in these activities and not in the nest maintenance activities), reinforcing walls (see below under new mechanics), tending to the brood, exploring tunnels and foraging for food, etc…
3. New mechanics
• Fortifying walls (like in Dungeon Keeper) – When a room is fully tiled ants will fortify walls (takes a long time = gives reason to have more workers AND to assign them to home group or keep them idle) which makes it take a lot longer for enemy ants to dig through your walls or possibly take so long as to make them lose interest and look for another way to break in. (Giving you time to respond and eliminate the threat) Can also increase productivity in some way for room. (Improve stats = more food stored, more food harvested, more attack speed and more ants allowed in guard chamber, stronger ants spawned from broods etc)
• Forage / Escort Group = Similar to the “Home / Nest” group, would be another pre-available group that you can assign ants to that will begin foraging outside the nest for food/insects to turn into food. Can have workers assigned forage while soldiers assigned would act as escorts and follow the workers / guard the food source found etc.
• More / random ambient life that moves on and off the map randomly or random food sources that appear like seeds etc for foragers to find/kill/harvest and bring back to nest. (Would create another mechanic to balance – assign too few ants and risk them dying excessively to dangers outside – assign too many and the nest is undefended and less efficient.
4. Quality of life changes
• Reduce the size or allow an option to resize the roman numeral group marker and pheromone smoke to make the action/ants/game more visible if one so wishes.
Now I realize that some of my suggestions might be considered slightly gamey and its obvious that the developers have made great efforts to simulate real ant behavior as much as possible, but I think many will agree that entertainment comes before realism in a game so it’s something to consider. (Tried to make my suggestions as little “gamey” as possible). I also realize that the game is still very much a work in progress so I am not discounting that some of my suggestions might already be thought about and in the works but since I have not seen them in the game yet, it is worth mentioning!
Thanks again for such an awesome experience. I am looking forward to freeplay mode and all the future content that is sure to come. I wish you all much $$$$ and success so the game grows and receives expansions and DLC that will allow you to continue with the development.