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[BishopX]

Sort of, the issue of course is that that makes ship ranges kinda arbitrary after a certain point (say 10k credits in the bank).

More bugs:
The ammo counter for missiles and ship guns decrements the wrong side, i.e. it's Total/Remaining instead of Remaining/Total

Landing on a building means you need to bypass building door locks to get to your ship (this is annoying when there are 3 giant frickin' robots of death massacring your red shirts)

Sometimes there is no hit resolution in space combat, I'm guessing these are misses.

There are numerous charter artifacts on the @ screen, mostly notably lots of lowercase blue r's on the lower right side. You really just need a re-draw command.

not doing something takes time...

[Ampersand]

Btw, Magellan, I wouldn't mind helping with the testing effort. My email is in my profile, just send a link or something. Unless you need to attach it to an email. In which case PM me.

[slMagnvox]

Gonna register a few of my comments since I've been playing quite a bit.

I play primarily exploration, haven't traded or pirated much.  My first few missions can be badly hampered if Station 1 doesn't sell binoculars or a cheap set of weapons.  Maybe each starting ship class could correspond to an appropriate starting inventory, plus the typical bonus items.  Binoculars and some combat blades for Scout.  Perhaps a ship detection sensor for the Fighter.  A pair of laser rifles or similar and some protection suits for the Transport.  And so on.

Or maybe remove the binocular item altogether, it gives such a large boost in LOS and for so cheap it seems any survey team worth their salt would sleep with a pair under their pillow at night.  Give base LOS a little bump and let the personal sensorset be the sweet LOS upgrade I spend the early game hunting for.  I've lost a couple early crews just going blind from Station 1 to St2 to find some binoculars.

LOS could further be modified by atmospheric conditions.  In which case a sensorset could help overcome the disadvantage on a densely atmosphered world, while on an airless world in proximity to a star LOS could be much larger.

At any rate, I've found that many of my games are dictated by what types of equipment is available at the stations.  Availability of key items should play a part in how you'd like to balance the game.  In contrast to ship hulls and equipments which are all completely available at every station.  Its frustrating when neither station will stock Comm Sats, but anti-climatic when I can buy a Battleship on either.

I have visited a few pyramids.  It was a fun explore but the loot wasn't so great, some gold or (exotic) gems might be thematic.  Can't remember if I got much of the jewelries etc to the antiques dealer on the Colony  (He never seems to offer to buy many of the items I've found)  Liked the monsters (a few more variations would be great), traps and hidden walls.  Even a L5 Sci Officer gets jammed on a locked door more often than I'd like.

Have a look at the hiring dynamic.  Perhaps a list of who is available for hire, for example select Gunner and a L2 and a L4 are available.  The L4 might not join your crew if they are too green or else ask for a big signing bonus (3x money up front or something)  Oftentimes when I am replacing crew, I'll hire a couple level 1s, then maybe a 3 in one position and go back to the level 1, hire a 2 and then "no more avail for this position"  Seems counterintuitive to just treat it like the roulette wheel.

Only one crash bug so far <knocks on wood>

Seen a few screen artifacts (you may have noticed the 5 on the far left of the screen in that save I sent you)

If you <q> to quit on a station it still asks you if you want to leave with out fuel/pilot/etc

On certain planets out of LOS creatures appear to leave ~~~~ that overwrite map data.

Picked up a few blank items, mostly from dead awayteams.  .  You pick up the  .  Also an asteroid had high concentrations of <blank> .  Also high concentrations of Alien Holokeycard.

After a certain point find Alien Holokeys on every other planet.  (still haven't found what they unlock, Robot City?  No wait don't tell me, hah)



Cheers!

[Granite26]

Still on the prev version, but I've found that LOS is either one square (even with lights and binocs and sensors) or it's far enough that an extra square or two doesn't really matter.

So I'll agree with slMagnvox...  Maybe a default of 3, 1 at night, with items increasing to unlimited and 2(3 for upgrade).  Unlimited isn't as powerful as it seems, planets with stuff to see usually have a lot of LoS breakers as well.

If you haven't, consider the random space scanners reveal.  Maybe do a 50% chance of revealing a mountain tile and a lower (1-4%) for everything else.  (just brainstorming)

[Ampersand]

Any word on Development?

[magellan]

I made a new unique planet yesterday (Love it how enough is in place to punch one out in a good half to 3/4 hour)
And actually got to catch most of the bugs pointed out to me today & yesterday. The day of release is nigh.
(and if you give me a e-mail adress ampersand, I'd send it to you)

[Ampersand]

Email'd

[Ampersand]

Not necessarily a bug, but a star occupies the same position as the space station occasionally. Not sure if it's intentional.

Edit: Second thing, more likely a bug. Landed on a special planet. Don't want to spoil it for anyone though. I landed on the far right edge of the map in a pool of liquid ammonia, and the lander disappeared, at which point the landing party was forced to run around on the surface as death from above was laid upon them.

Edit2: Another minor bug. Encountered a huge, vicious pirate elite tro. I'm sure it should be trooper.

Edit3: Another possible bug. It doesn't seem like the stock of recruits for the three main positions ever replenish.

Edit4: Crash

Code: [Select]

Aborting due to runtime error 6 (out of bounds array access) at line 1803 of C:/sources/prospector.bas::EXPLOREPLANET()

[magellan]

If the lander dissapeared

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

on apollos planet (strange sensor readings) then, no it wasn't a bug. He is mean. He does that

The others i shall look into. thanks!

[Ampersand]

I seem to be running into that last crash frequently. It happens when I attempt to land on planets. Seems to happen mostly if, after scanning from orbit, no features are detected; that is the map remains completely blank, but those times may have just been flukes.

Edit: I also found a nameless item on a dead away team.

[Shoku]

I really love the game so far!

One thing I'd love to see is the ability to check up on the data you've collected, and perhaps name your discoveries.
Things like looking up the planet maps, the list of known species on those planets, details of each species,...  The game is mostly about exploring after all!

Another thing I'd like to see is a more consistent biodiversity on each planet.  Aliens from the same planet should share a common ancestor or two, to make them similar enough to be widely different from aliens from another planet.
Example:  Planet X has 3 main groups of creatures:  Avians, mammals and insects.
The mammals come in two big groups: tripedal and tentacled.
The tripedal mammals come in the scaled and feathered varieties, each with their own subdivisions for predators, prey and perhaps a sentient species or two.
The tentacled mammals happen to be all furry, but there is a subgroup with a flotation bladder.
The other groups also have their own subdivisions.  The more cosmetic traits can be added more loosely, like eye shape and neck length. (but not eye type or number of eyes)

This mimics earth in that almost all land-dwelling vertebrates have 4 limbs, divided in avians, reptiles and mammals.  Each group can then be split in other groups and so on.
I think that this way each planet would get it's own signature biodiversity, which could become very noticeable and interesting if you are able to name and catalogue these creatures.

You could really change the scanning mechanism with this- instead of just scanning each creature around you'd get most of your money from filling out the details on a tree of life for the planet that you work down the branches from to try and figure out what the trunk was. If you do this for the trees too you could get a bit more normal amount of money from scanning a planet with an average amount of life on it but without having to scan every tree once you had pretty much figured out what was on the planet.

[Jetman123]

I've got a suggestion or six, actually:

1. Up pirate generation. At the moment it's kind of hard to be a pirate hunter. I know that sensors do help, but it's hard to afford them right away for those who want a space combat route.

2. Separate out buying of weapons and items. Give me one per purchase, so I can get a specific number instead of buying them in increments of five.

3. It should be possible to get heavy weapons of some sort for a large credit cost that your Gunner can use in conjunction with a Security member (As they're large multicrewed weapons)

4. Make it so that examining things doesn't cost a turn. Trying to separate out hostile creatures from nonhostile creatures is a MASSIVE headache when you know whenever you stop observing the environment the creature will attack again.

5. Grenades. Should take a moment to explode. Should have you able to set a timer on them. Should allow you to target a specific spot on the ground instead of specifying a direction. At the moment they're entirely worthless as chances are you're going to end up killing YOURSELF more often than not, especially with the fusion grenades. Too-short throws happen ALL THE TIME. Seven times out of ten I end up killing every team member I have because the grenade throw was too short.

6. Fix the armed reptillian planet so you can sell guns to them if you wish. At the moment you can't, apparently, seeing as giving them any sort of weapon fails to work.


As for the game itself - I absolutely love it, and am now addicted to it. I'm glad I stumbled across this topic.

I really want to see how this game grows. It has a LOT of potential, and even in it's alpha state is highly fun to play. (Gee, doesn't that sound like something we all know and love. )

[Granite26]

I've got a suggestion or six, actually:

1. Up pirate generation. At the moment it's kind of hard to be a pirate hunter. I know that sensors do help, but it's hard to afford them right away for those who want a space combat route.

2. Separate out buying of weapons and items. Give me one per purchase, so I can get a specific number instead of buying them in increments of five.

3. It should be possible to get heavy weapons of some sort for a large credit cost that your Gunner can use in conjunction with a Security member (As they're large multicrewed weapons)

4. Make it so that examining things doesn't cost a turn. Trying to separate out hostile creatures from nonhostile creatures is a MASSIVE headache when you know whenever you stop observing the environment the creature will attack again.

5. Grenades. Should take a moment to explode. Should have you able to set a timer on them. Should allow you to target a specific spot on the ground instead of specifying a direction. At the moment they're entirely worthless as chances are you're going to end up killing YOURSELF more often than not, especially with the fusion grenades. Too-short throws happen ALL THE TIME. Seven times out of ten I end up killing every team member I have because the grenade throw was too short.

6. Fix the armed reptillian planet so you can sell guns to them if you wish. At the moment you can't, apparently, seeing as giving them any sort of weapon fails to work.


As for the game itself - I absolutely love it, and am now addicted to it. I'm glad I stumbled across this topic.

I really want to see how this game grows. It has a LOT of potential, and even in it's alpha state is highly fun to play. (Gee, doesn't that sound like something we all know and love. )

1:  Try scanning planets (without landing)...  It doesn't give you a lot of money, but it's free, and can bump your cash flow nicely. 

2:  I'd guess the 'buying five' is a balance issue.

4:  Are you using the examine command?  I've not had this issue

[a1s]

4:  Are you using the examine command?  I've not had this issue

I think I know what the problem is: the key that gets you out of examine mode is also [one of] the key the skips a turn. I routinely press it one time too many.

[magellan]

the "they come packed in 5s" thing was actually something i considered to be a convenience thing. Actually thinking about it now (I should do that more often but it's kinda hard and stuff ) One just might as well ask for a number after each purchase...

...
Make reptiles buy stuff: 5 lines
Add # question to buying: 3 lines less
Add delay to grenades: modify one line

Ok: consider your suggestions accepted