0.7 feedback

[sardaukar]

First of all, congrats on 0.7 - it feels much more like Dune II than 0.6, more solid, and easier to play! My favorite improvement is the separate move/build cursor, it totally makes the game way more playable and less awkward.

Here are my points of feedback:

• [ ] It can get loud sometimes - maybe the number of sound channels can be restricted or something, but there are volume spikes
• [ ] on volume, I think the original would only output sound from what was in the current viewport, not the whole map - so you wouldn't hear the enemies shooting at sandworms, for example, when you're starting out your base
• [ ] the AI seems very eager to attac, but not to protec :D enemy bases are very lightly guarded once you destroy the waves they send out
• [ ] the game is very easy now, at least up to mission 4 - not sure if spice yield needs to be reduced, or building times tweaked (or both) but you need silos really quickly, which I don't remember from the original
• [ ] when Sardaukar troops are dropped in and you destroy them, there's a "Player 4 (Sardaukar) has been destroyed" message which is kinda weird
• [ ] money drain stops a second or so before buildings are built, a delay that I don't think the original had
• [x] the Repair cursor also shows over units, but it doesn't do anything - it would be super cool for it be a call for a Carry-all to pick it up and take it to the Repair Facility (once you have one)
• [ ] sandworms are still hard to see
• [ ] sending a unit somewhere by clicking on the minimap doesnt' work (#291)
• [ ] the "move" cursor remains even when the mouse cursor is outside of the map - pretty sure in the original, the cursor would change to a normal pointer when it was outside of the map. Right now, you see the move cursor when the mouse is outside of the map, and you can give an order to move but the unit will just stop
• [ ] units shoot through buildings to attack, which damages the building - if there's no clear line of fire, a unit should move to somewhere where there is (almost lost a Heavy Factory because 3 of my tanks were shooting at an enemy quad through the building, damaging it and not reaching the enemy quad)
• [ ] when you select a unit, sometimes you see "Quad at 87.63597 health" which is nice, but would be better without the decimal places
• [ ] it's possible to have a unit selected, then click a building and they're both selected (which is weird) I know the cursor for building and movement is supposed to be separate, but as soon as I click "Place" on something, the unit should be deselected (like the original)
• [ ] enemy units seem to be slow at targetting mine - having a line of tanks defending my base means the AI sends a unit or two at a time and by the time they stop to shoot, they're already half dead
• [ ] would be cool to have the "primary building" selection mechanic of Command and Conquer when you build more than one factory of the same type :D (not priority)
• [ ] does building more than one factory of the same type make building faster?
• [ ] mission 3 or 4 has don't on the Mentat text and the apostrophe ' looks like an encoding error
• [x] A few times I've seen "Player 1 (Ordos) has been defeated" right as the mission starts (#547)
• [ ] harvesters seem to get confused when hit by enemies and just stop sometimes
• [ ] on Harkonnen mission 2, there's an isolated 1x1 slab southeast of the base, far away (not built by me)
• [ ] the path finding is a bit off when units are blocked by other units or building (they just stop) (#221 )
• [ ] it's too easy to get tons of money in every mission

Moved from prev 0.6.0 feedback list

• [ ] units overlap on the field. If I have a unit going south and another going north, and they meet, the north one will turn left and the south one will turn right, which makes them overlap. maybe both turning the same direction would fix it (Stefan: rendering issue z-index related?) #100 ?
• [ ] the attack cursor should make the target unit blink if you target an enemy unit, instead of always pointing at a point on the floor #292 I hope the list isn't too daunting :D it's a much better release than 0.6, and the issues are way less game-breaking (except maybe the money one).
• [ ] would be cool to be able to save/load and set options, like the scroll speed and resolution #94 #50
• [ ] also cool to have a scoring screen and high-score table :D (#102 )

I'll keep playing, and looking forward to 0.8 with save/load (pretty please) 🚀

[stefanhendriks]

the Repair cursor also shows over units, but it doesn't do anything - it would be super cool for it be a call for a Carry-all to pick > it up and take it to the Repair Facility (once you have one)

that actually works ;-) if you have a Repair Facility you can click repair on units. Either the unit will move to the closest repair facility OR a carry-all will pick it up for you

[stefanhendriks]

units shoot through buildings to attack, which damages the building - if there's no clear line of fire, a unit should move to somewhere where there is (almost lost a Heavy Factory because 3 of my tanks were shooting at an enemy quad through the building, damaging it and not reaching the enemy quad)

Wasn't this in OG Dune 2 as well? Where you would always damage structures in the way? (you could not shoot over structures, only with troopers and launchers?)

[stefanhendriks]

would be cool to have the "primary building" selection mechanic of Command and Conquer when you build more than one factory of the same type :D (not priority)

Interesting. This worked in the past, but it is broken. So I'll create a ticket for that. (https://github.com/stefanhendriks/Dune-II---The-Maker/issues/546)

[stefanhendriks]

On a whole, thanks @sardaukar for your feedback. Always appreciated. The list is not daunting at all. I love it. There is so much to improve, and there are (still) so many new things to add. I'll go through the list later again and (re)assign issues. Some will make it in 0.8.0 and others would have to wait.

[stefanhendriks]

it's too easy to get tons of money in every mission

@sardaukar - can you elaborate on this? why is it too easy? harvesting speed to fast? any other reason?

[sardaukar]

units shoot through buildings to attack, which damages the building - if there's no clear line of fire, a unit should move to somewhere where there is (almost lost a Heavy Factory because 3 of my tanks were shooting at an enemy quad through the building, damaging it and not reaching the enemy quad)

Wasn't this in OG Dune 2 as well? Where you would always damage structures in the way? (you could not shoot over structures, only with troopers and launchers?)

If it was, I forgot - would still be cool for units to not do it.

[sardaukar]

it's too easy to get tons of money in every mission

@sardaukar - can you elaborate on this? why is it too easy? harvesting speed to fast? any other reason?

It just feels like you never need to stop and lay back for a while, like you did in the original at the beginning. Maybe harvesting is both too fast, and yielding too much money.

[sardaukar]

Just did some totally unscientific measurements on a short Dune II play of the first mission:

• 1xSlab construction: 7 seconds
• Windtrap construction: 20 seconds
• Refinery construction: 30 seconds
• Harvester 0 to 100% right next to the Refinery: 108 seconds (due to turns and so on)
• Harvester yield: 700 credits (and took ~15 seconds to fully unload)

These times feel longer than the current D2TM build. And it feels like, if harvesting and building is faster but units are not, that the overall pace is a bit different from the original.

The original has extra "time padding" built-in because of how cumbersome the move/attack orders for units are and so on, and I think this slow pace is to reflect and help with that.

I think there should be a "Dune II" or "D2TM" pace option, so players can opt-in to it. To note, the original game also has "Slowest/Slow/Normal/Fast/Fastest" speed controls. The measurements I took were on "Normal".

[sardaukar]

Combat also feels slower on the original, something that I like personally

[BarabasGitHub]

Harvesting is definitely way faster than the original. Not necessarily bad, but can make it a bit awkward at times with the original missions.

[stefanhendriks]

would be cool to have the "primary building" selection mechanic of Command and Conquer when you build more than one factory of the same type :D (not priority)

I believe this is already built in. If you place more than 1 factory, if you click the factory and press D, it will make it the primary building.