Things I dont like in Sins...

from Sins Forums
Heard about Sins a long time ago. I dont like beta. First time I have played waas yesterday.

Ill keep it short. I can go into the great stuff about the game, but seems everyone already knows what they like about Sins so no point in going into those.

First off I am an "older" gamer and have seen pretty much everything in a game, so it takes quite a bit to impress me...so dont get me wrong, I am liking the game for the same reasons other folks are. After playing for about 5 hours, these where the things bugging me personaly.

If these are things that I am over-looking or just plain incorrect on, please let me know.

1. I was really under-impressed with the graphics. While they are not bad, they are far from "pretty". The ships models look neat, but there is no eye candy at all. With a space game it seems you can crank up ship models/details since the background of "Space" is pretty barren. Think X-3 Reunion. Pretty game great shadows...even just looking at space stations or plants was a treat. Even in a system that had 1k+ asteriods, planets, ships, factories in it etc.

2. I know this had been said...but combat animations...ugh. Turrets dont "aim". When a ship gets hit, it doesnt matter if its in the front back or side, you get the same damage model (although the model of the flames and smoke is REAL neat). I just wish there was a bit more oomph to the combat since its such a huge part. Think Sword of the Stars. Turrets would move to aim. Hit a ship from behind and they lose thier engines...and couldnt move. Hit a ship from the front and bam...their main gun couldnt fire. Annnndd...hit a ship with a laser and it would leave a singe-like mark...hit a ship with a mass driver and you could actually knock it off course.

3. Diplomacy. Seems there is NO real reason for it. Eventually the faction you gave credits, metal, etc to will break all the deals because they asked you to kill ships with a faction that you cant even see yet. Its odd. Seems you cant get a reliable ally. Think Total War (modded mind you), where allies and trades make sense. A faction is about to wiped out...you make them give you money for protection...and YOUR allies ease up aggression twords them.

I have to say I am impressed with Ironclad and Stardock. Never played one their games much (bought GalCiv2 but only played for a few hours), but I really like the way they listen to customers. Thats the ONLY reason I am posting what I consider areas that could use improvments.



34,250 views 20 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
I've decided I'm going to wait for reviews to appear before I run out and purchase this.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
If you can manage without trade in Total War I'm impressed. The game is built around trade. And updates to Medieval 2 have much-improved AI that actually wants to stay allied with you.
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
If you can manage without trade in Total War I'm impressed. The game is built around trade. And updates to Medieval 2 have much-improved AI that actually wants to stay allied with you.
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Right. Thats what I miss about other strat games. Seems no rhyme or reason for someone to break alliances.

Also, I forgot to add, I play single player...and dont plan on playing online anytime soon if at all. So of course the diplo stuff doesnt apply to online.
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
I was really under-impressed with the graphics. While they are not bad, they are far from "pretty". The ships models look neat, but there is no eye candy at all. With a space game it seems you can crank up ship models/details since the background of "Space" is pretty barren. Think X-3 Reunion. Pretty game great shadows...even just looking at space stations or plants was a treat. Even in a system that had 1k+ asteriods, planets, ships, factories in it etc.
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I think its unfair to compare this game with x3 Reunion , in the same way is unfair to compare a soldier in Unreal to a single soldier in command and conquer. FPS > RTS in candy eveytime, simply because RTS have other complexities.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top



I think its unfair to compare this game with x3 Reunion , in the same way is unfair to compare a soldier in Unreal to a single soldier in command and conquer. FPS > RTS in candy eveytime, simply because RTS have other complexities. [/quote]

Not neccessarily, I can think of several RTS's that have superior graphics to what we are seeing in Sins, namely Homeworld 2 (much older game, superior graphics, especially the way fighters move around, and the look and feel of the ion cannons), Company of Heroes (different Genre but amazing graphics and detailed damage models on units and terrain), Supreme Commander, and several others. The Graphics in SINS are decent, but I defnitely expected better after setting the many, many options in the menu and then turning them all the way up...

I think what I was slightly dissappointed by in the gameplay was a lack of tactical options in fleet combat that give you a sense of commanding a vast fleet and applying some skill to help you gain an advantage. It seems that ships left to their own devices seem to just move into range and then sit still and shoot at eachother until they or the target blows up. It seems like ships do not really fire while manuevering unless specifically ordered to, which kind of takes away some of the drama of a space combat. I have not read the pdf manual yet, so maybe I am missing out on some command options, but my first few battles seemed to consist of making a big group of ships and ordering them all to attack single targets. Hopefully there are more detailed tactical options buried in the interface that are not immediately obbvious (like formations for instance), rather than just roping a herd of ships and sending them all in with an unimaginitive AI in control.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
I was really under-impressed with the graphics. While they are not bad, they are far from "pretty". The ships models look neat, but there is no eye candy at all. With a space game it seems you can crank up ship models/details since the background of "Space" is pretty barren. Think X-3 Reunion. Pretty game great shadows...even just looking at space stations or plants was a treat. Even in a system that had 1k+ asteriods, planets, ships, factories in it etc.



I think its unfair to compare this game with x3 Reunion , in the same way is unfair to compare a soldier in Unreal to a single soldier in command and conquer. FPS > RTS in candy eveytime, simply because RTS have other complexities.
End of quote


Why is it unfair? X3 is a 4x game as well...set in space. With much, much more going on than in Sins. Much older game as well. Even Sword of the Stars had more details in the models. So...I dont think its unfair to compare...especialy when I am bringing these up as some things devs can get some feedback from. Not saying Sins should LOOK like another game, just some ideas...
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top




I think its unfair to compare this game with x3 Reunion , in the same way is unfair to compare a soldier in Unreal to a single soldier in command and conquer. FPS > RTS in candy eveytime, simply because RTS have other complexities. [/quote]

Not neccessarily, I can think of several RTS's that have superior graphics to what we are seeing in Sins, namely Homeworld 2 (much older game, superior graphics, especially the way fighters move around, and the look and feel of the ion cannons), Company of Heroes (different Genre but amazing graphics and detailed damage models on units and terrain), Supreme Commander, and several others. The Graphics in SINS are decent, but I defnitely expected better after setting the many, many options in the menu and then turning them all the way up...

I think what I was slightly dissappointed by in the gameplay was a lack of tactical options in fleet combat that give you a sense of commanding a vast fleet and applying some skill to help you gain an advantage. It seems that ships left to their own devices seem to just move into range and then sit still and shoot at eachother until they or the target blows up. It seems like ships do not really fire while manuevering unless specifically ordered to, which kind of takes away some of the drama of a space combat. I have not read the pdf manual yet, so maybe I am missing out on some command options, but my first few battles seemed to consist of making a big group of ships and ordering them all to attack single targets. Hopefully there are more detailed tactical options buried in the interface that are not immediately obbvious (like formations for instance), rather than just roping a herd of ships and sending them all in with an unimaginitive AI in control.
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Someone posted it before, but technology has gotten to the point where weapons are 99.9% accurate so no matter how much maneuvering you do, the weapons will still hit.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top




Why is it unfair? X3 is a 4x game as well...set in space. With much, much more going on than in Sins. Much older game as well. Even Sword of the Stars had more details in the models. So...I dont think its unfair to compare...especialy when I am bringing these up as some things devs can get some feedback from. Not saying Sins should LOOK like another game, just some ideas...
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Interesting, everywhere I go, x3 reunion is labeled as a space simulator/ trade simulation. Sword of Stars, in itself, is a turnbased game, which is given leeway since numerous battles aren't usually taking place at the same, nor can you zoom all the way out during battle (unless I missed something). I also don't feel that SotS looked better, but meh...





Not neccessarily, I can think of several RTS's that have superior graphics to what we are seeing in Sins, namely Homeworld 2 (much older game, superior graphics, especially the way fighters move around, and the look and feel of the ion cannons), Company of Heroes (different Genre but amazing graphics and detailed damage models on units and terrain), Supreme Commander, and several others. The Graphics in SINS are decent, but I defnitely expected better after setting the many, many options in the menu and then turning them all the way up...

I think what I was slightly dissappointed by in the gameplay was a lack of tactical options in fleet combat that give you a sense of commanding a vast fleet and applying some skill to help you gain an advantage. It seems that ships left to their own devices seem to just move into range and then sit still and shoot at eachother until they or the target blows up. It seems like ships do not really fire while manuevering unless specifically ordered to, which kind of takes away some of the drama of a space combat. I have not read the pdf manual yet, so maybe I am missing out on some command options, but my first few battles seemed to consist of making a big group of ships and ordering them all to attack single targets. Hopefully there are more detailed tactical options buried in the interface that are not immediately obbvious (like formations for instance), rather than just roping a herd of ships and sending them all in with an unimaginitive AI in control.
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Both HW2 and CoH take place on a much smaller scale, and the only comparable game would be supreme commander, which looks slightly similar in terms of details. Fighters, in Sins, also maneuver in a manner similar to HW2. Also, people keep referencing to homeworld's capital ships moving on their own.....They didn't. Ships also, in that game, sat and shot each other until they blew up.

Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
X3 is a 4x game as wel
End of quote


No, no it's not. It's a trading sim that focuses on one area at a time. Asking for anything like x3's level of detail in a game of this scale is silly.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top




Why is it unfair? X3 is a 4x game as well...set in space. With much, much more going on than in Sins. Much older game as well. Even Sword of the Stars had more details in the models. So...I dont think its unfair to compare...especialy when I am bringing these up as some things devs can get some feedback from. Not saying Sins should LOOK like another game, just some ideas...


Interesting, everywhere I go, x3 reunion is labeled as a space simulator/ trade simulation. Sword of Stars, in itself, is a turnbased game, which is given leeway since numerous battles aren't usually taking place at the same, nor can you zoom all the way out during battle (unless I missed something). I also don't feel that SotS looked better, but meh...






Not neccessarily, I can think of several RTS's that have superior graphics to what we are seeing in Sins, namely Homeworld 2 (much older game, superior graphics, especially the way fighters move around, and the look and feel of the ion cannons), Company of Heroes (different Genre but amazing graphics and detailed damage models on units and terrain), Supreme Commander, and several others. The Graphics in SINS are decent, but I defnitely expected better after setting the many, many options in the menu and then turning them all the way up...

I think what I was slightly dissappointed by in the gameplay was a lack of tactical options in fleet combat that give you a sense of commanding a vast fleet and applying some skill to help you gain an advantage. It seems that ships left to their own devices seem to just move into range and then sit still and shoot at eachother until they or the target blows up. It seems like ships do not really fire while manuevering unless specifically ordered to, which kind of takes away some of the drama of a space combat. I have not read the pdf manual yet, so maybe I am missing out on some command options, but my first few battles seemed to consist of making a big group of ships and ordering them all to attack single targets. Hopefully there are more detailed tactical options buried in the interface that are not immediately obbvious (like formations for instance), rather than just roping a herd of ships and sending them all in with an unimaginitive AI in control.


Both HW2 and CoH take place on a much smaller scale, and the only comparable game would be supreme commander, which looks slightly similar in terms of details. Fighters, in Sins, also maneuver in a manner similar to HW2. Also, people keep referencing to homeworld's capital ships moving on their own.....They didn't. Ships also, in that game, sat and shot each other until they blew up.

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HW2 has an attack move command, and tactically this was very useful when playing vs. skilled opponents. I am hoping that Sins has a similar option (I looked at the key bindings and the length of the list made my eyes roll back in to my skull... hopefully reading the manual will be less intimidating).

You are right about HomeWorld 2 and COH being smaller scale games in terms of total numbers of units, although HW 2's graphics (and HW1 for that matter) had a certain unique style that made them a lot of fun to watch (like fighter contrails twisting around eachother, the big red ray from the Battle Cruisers, the Ion cannons sustained fire). I see some of that that from Sins (some of the special weapons on the cap ships have nice effects, but I was really hoping for more.

I also think that Supreme Commander and Forged Alliance is a LOT more detailed and pleasing graphically at most levels of zoom (it is also easier for me to control what is on the screen, although that could just be because I have only been playing SINS for one evening so far). Also, I do not believe that SINS has a dual screen mode that SUPCOM has(which would be really, really handy in this game).

Graphics isn't really what matters in the long run, however, I am more concerned about the relative lack of tactical options that I am seeing in my first session. I am hoping that the manual, forums, and multiplayer experience proves this first impression wrong, however.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
I am sure if they wanted to they could jack up the graphics fairly high, problem is then it'll run into Supreme Commander's problem when the unit count goes into the hundreds/thousands.

Also, I fail to remember Homeworld 2's ships moving around they maybe jittered but that was pointless since their guns are 100% accurate. Microing scouts/fighters/etc generally took away my attention rather than watching a big beam hit a ship which I've seen a thousand times.

Supreme Commander's graphics were also superfluous since a player spent most of the time zoomed out watching squares, triangles, and circles collide into each other.

And wait, you're talking about formations? I don't see the point really when even in Homeworld the first sign of resistance you're immediately moving your capital ships individually around to flank or something else. Your smaller ships had formations but mainly it was just a difference of clicking option one or two (and in the case of Homeworld 1 rapidly switching). So are you looking for a twitch fest? There are still plenty of advantages in forcing an enemy capital ship to turn around since ships have firing arcs and are pretty slow in general.

In essence, go play against a human perhaps rather than AI which eventually becomes easy (and predictable), perhaps then you'll see plenty of 'tactical options'.
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
Add Pirates to the list of things that need some ironing out and I agree with your post 100%.
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
I agree with the pirates addition. Too many times have I paid off the priates an exhorbitant amount of money just to have, right before the deadline, one of the ai's add just a wee bit.
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
I personally think that this game has fairly good graphics, it bloom effects and textures are excelent. Sure it lacks some excessive shadowing, but in my opinion, shadows like whatyou see in most space RTS wouldn't happen in space, there just isn't enough light to create such contrasts.

If you look at the ships, and even the planets, the amount of detail is pretty high. You do have to remember that there are is a lot of other stuff going on around the map. Thats also a reason why tactical add ons, like different effects based on where a ship was hit, are not included. They would just add unnecessary complexity to the game and cause more frustration, in my opinion, then good.

I do agree with the Diplomatic system, its a little bit ridiculous. Though the AI does keep profitable deals(ie trade pacts and alliances), but only if they are beneficial and the AI doesn't feel threatened but your actions. Things are bit radical with their missions. First off I think they should not start at 0% on the scale, but around 50%. They just met you, they shouldn't hold much of a bias. And I want to see the missions like giving credits and metals worth less then 25%, more like 5%, and they should give no penalty or very little penalty. Because if you think of the principle, here you are giving your enemy money, that essentially makes them stronger then you, and you get punished for not doing so. Then, make the harder missions like killing structures/ships worth more, with the 'kill planets' mission wort near 50% precent.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
I can see this is going to be good and I am looking forward to it and the improvements you know will follow (I just bought the game in the last couple of hours but after galciv I have faith).

That being said, the tutorials are really poorly designed, disjointed and frustrating. I won't get turned off by them but I'll bet there will be a lot of people that will get this game by whatever means necessary to test it and become frustrated before they are hooked and subsequently buy it. I think stardock will have a real winner on their hands again but is going to miss a sizeable market without good reason.......

Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
wee, people playing the beta when the FINAL RELEASE is out, then complaining about it!

hum dee hum...
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
How do you know hes talking beta?
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
X3 is a 4x game as wel


No, no it's not. It's a trading sim that focuses on one area at a time. Asking for anything like x3's level of detail in a game of this scale is silly.
End of quote


Dont think anyone saying X3 isnt a 4x game has played it. Its not a trading game...IF you dont want it to be. I barely did trade in that game. Factions, fighting, pirates, etc...

And, all of it WAS going on in different areas at the same time. Large battles etc.

Please...if your going to make a comment like that...at least TRY to know what you are talking about. And if you read my post again...I specificly said ""Not saying Sins should LOOK like another game, just some ideas...""

Love the lack of depth in some of these posts...
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
wee, people playing the beta when the FINAL RELEASE is out, then complaining about it!

hum dee hum...
End of quote


Didnt play beta. If you read the OT its in the first paragraph...fanboy.
Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
Hello,

Im a new player, just started the account today.
This is my first game of this sort, i DID play HW2 a long time ago and i have to say that this is much more engrossing than homeworld ever could be. I've been playing my first single player for about 5 hours, and i really didnt think that the tutorials were bad at all. I'm an avid Company of Heores fan and even a FPS constant player, so this level of detail in the fundamentals of gameplay are sometimes smothering. But, I didn't have that much difficulty figuring out with the help from the tutorial and learning along the way, i'm actually winning my first game! Anyway, the pirates aren't that bad if you can constantly bribe em up. So far, i'm having a great time!