The good and bad of T2
Ok, I'm not gonna cover the obvious stuff like the reverse patch or the 25 point flag caps. I'm thinking of what they did to turn T1 into the slightly inferior T2...steps where they regressed. Anyhow here's what I think:
Bioderms having seperate weapons: This was originally something they where going to do. What it fucks up is the symmetry of the tribes and how if players have access to all the same weapons it makes the game skill based versus item based (i.e. the better player wins, not the guy who chose the better team...bloodlust in war2 anyone?).
Stronger Turrets: The automatic stuff in tribes is one of the most frustrating. Getting killed by a turret is NO fun at all. Things are mostly fun in tribes when you're up against another human. I'd get rid of the turrets myself (well rocket turrets at any rate), except for deployables and vastly weaken those. Deploying stuff is fun, but it's outweighed by the lack of fun being killed by them.
Missle Launcher: Same thing. Why would you want a weapon that does the work for you? Where's the fun in that?
Slower Gameplay: Tribes was the kung foo of the video games. High paced action with strategic depth. T2 turned it into the tai chi of games. Same strategy at a much more lethargic pace.
Not using all the cool grenades: The nades were a great step forward, in that they became actually useful. The flashbang nade sounded really cool, and it would really add to the fight while in the air (currently it's pretty much CG and the odd MA that lends itself to fights in the sky). It's just that the flare took precedence.
Taking out mine-disking: It's fun and is hard to do. Maybe make it so the disk has to hit the mine, not just the blast (so that it's more skilled based).
Keeping medium somewhat useless: Medium armour was never very useful. I always thought that perhaps making the laser rifle a medium armour weapon could help change that. I'm pretty excited to see what you do to make the medium more versatile without just nerfing the light and replacing its role with that of the medium. Personally I'd love to see the breakdown of roles be: light for capping & chasing, medium for defending base and heavy for attacking base.
Complicating the bindings: Plus taking out the popular ones.
closing dynamix: damn tribes2.
Good things:
Vehicles: It's a really big selling point...most games don't have great first person gameplay plus vehicles. Nerfing skiing to force people to use the vehicles was bad but having them in game was still pretty cool. TOUGH to balance though..similar to the ingame browser in that why spend time working on vehicles if skiing makes them obsolete/impotent.
Making packs more useful: In T1 there really was only the choice of using the energy pack, or shield pack (MAYBE). Almost all the other packs were useless asides from the odd strategy. T2 tried to make them more useful, though it didn't nessecarily succeed. This is the way I see packs being currently used: Basically the whole point of the game is to stay in the air longer than your enemy because you are less vulnerable while in the air than on the ground. SO, to survive the person with the most energy will generally win fights (read the guy with the energy pack). This was what made the energy pack more useful than the others. This was also what made base rape effective...the team without access to the energy packs couldn't chase the cappers, run routes, win fights etc (not to mention lack of weapons...but the disc launcher is still a pretty effective weapon). Anyhow, I would propose prototyping a change where EVERY pack gives you the energy boost of the old energy pack so you keep the base rape stuff, while not creating an all-singing all-dancing pack. You could then make the other packs more useful (for example a possibility would be to make cloak pack cloak all units within a certain distance of the guy ala starcraft...adds teamplay to the mix...plus could counter with sensor jammers). I'd make the energy pack be what's required for the laser rifle and possibly the mortar, in other words a weapons upgrade pack. Anyhow that's just one idea but however you do it, making the different packs more useful will add more depth to the game and hopefully make it more fun.
Anyhow thats my rant....sorry it was all a bit long.
edit: This was originally a 'list the fuckups of t2' but that's kinda harsh...it'd probably be useful to see what went right with T2 as well..Just so you know T2 is still a really fun game, it's just there were certain design decisions that had me going
vs. :bananasex.
Ok, I'm not gonna cover the obvious stuff like the reverse patch or the 25 point flag caps. I'm thinking of what they did to turn T1 into the slightly inferior T2...steps where they regressed. Anyhow here's what I think:
Bioderms having seperate weapons: This was originally something they where going to do. What it fucks up is the symmetry of the tribes and how if players have access to all the same weapons it makes the game skill based versus item based (i.e. the better player wins, not the guy who chose the better team...bloodlust in war2 anyone?).
Stronger Turrets: The automatic stuff in tribes is one of the most frustrating. Getting killed by a turret is NO fun at all. Things are mostly fun in tribes when you're up against another human. I'd get rid of the turrets myself (well rocket turrets at any rate), except for deployables and vastly weaken those. Deploying stuff is fun, but it's outweighed by the lack of fun being killed by them.
Missle Launcher: Same thing. Why would you want a weapon that does the work for you? Where's the fun in that?
Slower Gameplay: Tribes was the kung foo of the video games. High paced action with strategic depth. T2 turned it into the tai chi of games. Same strategy at a much more lethargic pace.
Not using all the cool grenades: The nades were a great step forward, in that they became actually useful. The flashbang nade sounded really cool, and it would really add to the fight while in the air (currently it's pretty much CG and the odd MA that lends itself to fights in the sky). It's just that the flare took precedence.
Taking out mine-disking: It's fun and is hard to do. Maybe make it so the disk has to hit the mine, not just the blast (so that it's more skilled based).
Keeping medium somewhat useless: Medium armour was never very useful. I always thought that perhaps making the laser rifle a medium armour weapon could help change that. I'm pretty excited to see what you do to make the medium more versatile without just nerfing the light and replacing its role with that of the medium. Personally I'd love to see the breakdown of roles be: light for capping & chasing, medium for defending base and heavy for attacking base.
Complicating the bindings: Plus taking out the popular ones.
closing dynamix: damn tribes2.
Good things:
Vehicles: It's a really big selling point...most games don't have great first person gameplay plus vehicles. Nerfing skiing to force people to use the vehicles was bad but having them in game was still pretty cool. TOUGH to balance though..similar to the ingame browser in that why spend time working on vehicles if skiing makes them obsolete/impotent.
Making packs more useful: In T1 there really was only the choice of using the energy pack, or shield pack (MAYBE). Almost all the other packs were useless asides from the odd strategy. T2 tried to make them more useful, though it didn't nessecarily succeed. This is the way I see packs being currently used: Basically the whole point of the game is to stay in the air longer than your enemy because you are less vulnerable while in the air than on the ground. SO, to survive the person with the most energy will generally win fights (read the guy with the energy pack). This was what made the energy pack more useful than the others. This was also what made base rape effective...the team without access to the energy packs couldn't chase the cappers, run routes, win fights etc (not to mention lack of weapons...but the disc launcher is still a pretty effective weapon). Anyhow, I would propose prototyping a change where EVERY pack gives you the energy boost of the old energy pack so you keep the base rape stuff, while not creating an all-singing all-dancing pack. You could then make the other packs more useful (for example a possibility would be to make cloak pack cloak all units within a certain distance of the guy ala starcraft...adds teamplay to the mix...plus could counter with sensor jammers). I'd make the energy pack be what's required for the laser rifle and possibly the mortar, in other words a weapons upgrade pack. Anyhow that's just one idea but however you do it, making the different packs more useful will add more depth to the game and hopefully make it more fun.
Anyhow thats my rant....sorry it was all a bit long.
edit: This was originally a 'list the fuckups of t2' but that's kinda harsh...it'd probably be useful to see what went right with T2 as well..Just so you know T2 is still a really fun game, it's just there were certain design decisions that had me going
vs. :bananasex.
Last edited: