SupCom2 Demo

[Gota]

Chili seems to look nice although with the default framing it looks more in the style of the sims games than something related to robots or war in general.
If it gets some nice skins and it if isn't a resource hog or crippled in some major way we will have nice looking UIs soon.

[Google_Frog]

I was being partially sarcastic, and was talking from an almost purely visual standpoint. You can't argue that Spring looks or runs better than SupCom. It looks amazing and it runs fantastic, and it has very nice features like the new pathfinding (I would LOVE to see that in Spring).

Interface and features in Spring are equal or superior. Although, it would be nice if spring could get a more pretty interface, while the one we have now is perfectly functional, it's kinda ugly and does contribute to the whole 'this is an unpolished open source project' feel. Or maybe there is one and I just don't know about it?

When you say Spring what do you mean?

Visually it looks worse than CA. I set the supcomm settings to high and it still looked worse than my middle-low CA settings. There's always the possibility that I had a graphics bug.

When I was comparing the interface I compared my Spring interface to the supcomm one, not the default spring one. Supcomm's interface and gameplay have a very strict feature set compared to what could be written in lua for spring.

[Hobo Joe]

So to you, this > this?

Also (I may only be speaking for myself here), it runs WAY better than Spring, at semi-equal settings.


And yeah, as to the flexibility of the Spring interface, I know it's basically unlimited. I was just taking that chance to say it might be nice to have a new default, if only for the sake of pulling in new players.

[Google_Frog]

That's a poor and old CA screenshot but I defiantly think they're comparable. Neither seems far ahead of the other.

[Gota]

IMO there is no comparing them at all.
Supcom2 looks very well.
Very nice models imo and nice texturing.
Not even the best units in spring can match supcom unit quality.
I want Spring to look amazing but it doesn't.
And it does seem supcom 2 runs much better than the first.Need to see huge battles though.

[knorke]

one thing that looks good in supcom2 are how on some maps the background works really good with the actual map.
spring can not compare to this (yet?)
but then i wonder what playermade maps will look like or if its even possible?

[SanadaUjiosan]

Just like to say that I hate RTS campaigns very much. Starcraft and Warcraft 3 are the only RTS campaigns I've completed, and those are driven more by story than gameplay. With that intro, I actually enjoyed the 2 demo levels of SupCom 2 quite a bit, which is odd. I'm actually kind of interested in what happens with this.

I kind of liked the first SupCom, but my computer could just barely handle it on lowest settings. The SupCom2 demo ran fine. Started on bare minimum graphics, then upped the model and texture quality (left everything low.) I noticed a small decrease in performance, but still very playable.

I know it's easy to compare games and decree that one is better than the other, but I think a good approach to judging games (as several other things in life) is to take it for what it is and like it for that reason. I agree with Gota that SupCom2 looks pretty good when compared to Spring. But I also think they're different enough that you can't truely compare them and hope to get an objective result. Kind of like how Soul Calibur 4 and Street Fighter 4 are both pretty games, but in totally different ways.

[Tribulex]

I have been explaining for years that spring's default interface insnt an actual interface, its just a placeholder. Ill show you some day...

[1v0ry_k1ng]

one thing that looks good in supcom2 are how on some maps the background works really good with the actual map.
spring can not compare to this (yet?)
but then i wonder what playermade maps will look like or if its even possible?

actually, amorphis looks as good as anything commercial I have seen

[LordMuffe]

don┬┤t know if it fits the discussion, but i found this on an interview by Bestbuy with ChrisT:

ChrisT-Square: I'm not quite as rich as you think. I did however try to buy the TA IP (Intellectual Property) a couple of years ago, but sadly it was out of my price range. I'll keep trying!

the whole thing:

http://forums.bestbuy.com/t5/Gaming-Gad ... 2FE18DFFB7

[imbaczek]

played the demo. the biggest thing this has on spring is the map format. gameplay is... meh. not bad, but i've seen better.

[Caydr]

Just skimmed some reviews... oh lawd, is it true you have to pay for things at purchase time rather than "only feature that separates SupCom/TA from everything else" allowing you to pay for things gradually as they're built?

Here's hoping they at least fixed the bug where the game thinks you're under attack if you abandon construction of something, then change the music into "epic battle" because some random structure is losing 1 HP a second. Or, say, when you reclaim one. Oh man did that ever irritate me. The game was generally solid but how could they miss something like that? With no minimap, audio cues are the biggest thing you have to go by to tell if there's anything exciting happening offscreen. COME ON PEOPLE, let's put a little polish on this thing before we release it, yeah? Or, say, in the expansion? Or in a patch at some point? Srsly...

Being able to order construction before you were actually capable of supporting said construction is one of the biggest advances in RTS since unlimited unit selection. Sins of a Solar Empire does something similar and immediately allows you to order construction of something as soon as you've begun researching its prerequisite technologies.

That's called interface streamlining, and it's the kind of thing that actually makes RTS games have a broader appeal. It is not to be confused with dumbing down, which doesn't broaden the target audience, it simply changes it. Less hardcore players, more casual players. Note that Battlefield 2, Counter-Strike, Starcraft, and tons of other games are still hugely popular despite being pretty old. Dumbed-down games don't have this sort of staying power and just serve to frustrate people looking for the next great [genre] game.

I dunno, maybe Chris Taylor & Co have just decided they can't touch the popularity of a thirteen year old game (Starcraft) so they're going for the low-hanging fruit instead.

[knorke]

one thing that looks good in supcom2 are how on some maps the background works really good with the actual map.
spring can not compare to this (yet?)
but then i wonder what playermade maps will look like or if its even possible?

actually, amorphis looks as good as anything commercial I have seen

apart from the dreadlocks of the singer they look like any other band.
WAT?

[AF]

You can queue up orders in advance, even on factories that have been ordered but construction has yet to start, the only thing that has changed is it take the entire cost of the order when it's clicked, which I to find somewhat frustrating.

There is a minimap too, I should know, I've turned it on myself =p

[knorke]

the only thing that has changed is it take the entire cost of the order when it's clicked

Doesnt this break looping buildorders as only the cheapest stuff gets build and there might never be enough ressources stored for the more expensive units to start construction?

[AF]

No because this would assume that the unit is paid for when construction is about to start. This is not the case.

If you queue 100 fighters, you pay for 100 fighters. They are then guaranteed to be built and at full buildspeed. Assisting to speed it up is free, as is repairing. Everything queued up has already been paid for in advance, in full.

You can also push out units half built, or at least mini experimental. They do not have full health and require a lot of repairs when you do this but it can be done. You cannot use this to cheat the game out of resources because you've already paid for the whole unit upfront.

[knorke]

so there is no looping?

[Das Bruce]

You can queue, however you can't select more than one builder at a time and order them to build. This is terrible, aircraft also sit airborne and motionless while not doing anything, this is so shit it hurts.

[AF]

There is a repeat button yes

I was aghast at the lack of multiple builder selection myself

[JohannesH]

So how is it strategically, then...