Slitherine

After getting past the problem with the first splash screen, things were much better. The menu is easy to read, well presented and layed out. The user interface is easy, and appears to be similar to the old PG ui.

Ater playing for five minutes, I felt right at home, and I suspect even the greenest newbie would also have no trouble with the game. It might help, in the tutorial, to give a bit more tactical information in the introduction, telling a newbie how best to coordinate artillery, infantry and armour. While it is "old hat" to all of us, people who are knew to the genre might like the help.

After fifteen minutes, I was still enjoying the experience overall, but found myself wishing for two things:

1. An easily accessed unit information button while in the middle of a scenario. Perhaps I missed it, but I could not find an easy way to learn what the range of my artillery was, for example.

2. A toggle for the hex grid on or off. If it's there, again I missed it. EDIT---I found this in the settings menu. Would be nice to be able to toggle it off in game however, maybe hot key of "h" or "g" ?3. Higher contrast and a bit more colour. The map is boring to look at, and it would be nice if the forests were a bit greener, the mountains a bit greyer, and so on. And especially, it would be nice if the units stood out much better from the background.

Some great observations here, thx!

Happycat wrote:Ater playing for five minutes, I felt right at home, and I suspect even the greenest newbie would also have no trouble with the game. It might help, in the tutorial, to give a bit more tactical information in the introduction, telling a newbie how best to coordinate artillery, infantry and armour. While it is "old hat" to all of us, people who are knew to the genre might like the help.

Yes, probably we should explain something about "close terrain" etc., without going into much detail.

Happycat wrote: After fifteen minutes, I was still enjoying the experience overall, but found myself wishing for two things:
1. An easily accessed unit information button while in the middle of a scenario. Perhaps I missed it, but I could not find an easy way to learn what the range of my artillery was, for example.

As I said in a different thread, there is an option to toggle unit stats panel on and off ("i" button in the sidebar), but we shall of course add a full-blown unit dialog too. Primary purpose of this dialog is to show unit's awards, battle history etc., so it is more of an eye candy, and I consider it low priority. That is the reason why it is not in yet - but it will be.

Perhaps we should have some more indication on the map, e. g. range shown as a circle? What do you guys think?

Happycat wrote: 2. A toggle for the hex grid on or off. If it's there, again I missed it. EDIT---I found this in the settings menu. Would be nice to be able to toggle it off in game however, maybe hot key of "h" or "g" ?

It is easy to add, but I wonder: is there a real need to toggle the grid on and off dynamically? I thought that each user will choose the option he likes best - one time - and then leave it as it is.

Happycat wrote: 3. Higher contrast and a bit more colour. The map is boring to look at, and it would be nice if the forests were a bit greener, the mountains a bit greyer, and so on. And especially, it would be nice if the units stood out much better from the background.

This is something for our graphics guys to think about, but I wanted to ask already now: can you give us a link to a screenshot from a game where the colors are done right in your opinion? This would help us a lot.

Perhaps we should have some more indication on the map, e. g. range shown as a circle? What do you guys think?

As long as there's a unit information screen listing the same details as are listed in the purchase screen, together with the awards and the like you mention, I don't think the system should be too dumbed down. I mean, with a hex overlay, you don't have to be a genius to figure out where you need to place your artillery in order to hit a certain unit that's a certain distance away.

Maybe instead of a white background for targets that are in range, a red background could be used similar to that in PG III or, I believe, PG Forever too, but I might be mistaken (it's been a few months since I played it).

3. Higher contrast and a bit more colour. The map is boring to look at, and it would be nice if the forests were a bit greener, the mountains a bit greyer, and so on. And especially, it would be nice if the units stood out much better from the background.

>>> Aye we still have to polish the map tiles and some are a first pass eg. mountains... it will help if you could get some examples of contrast and colour for the map tiles, you really like.

Sample 1, from Battlefront's Global Conflict

From the game Blitzkrieg 2

lordzimoa wrote:

3. Higher contrast and a bit more colour. The map is boring to look at, and it would be nice if the forests were a bit greener, the mountains a bit greyer, and so on. And especially, it would be nice if the units stood out much better from the background.

>>> Aye we still have to polish the map tiles and some are a first pass eg. mountains... it will help if you could get some examples of contrast and colour for the map tiles, you really like.

I will post a couple that I like.

Hi Rudankort---in reference to the grid, the only reason I like it is because I am so used to it from other games. But you're right, it's not a big deal.

Happycat wrote:Hi Rudankort---in reference to the grid, the only reason I like it is because I am so used to it from other games. But you're right, it's not a big deal.

Actually, I think that by default hex grid should be on, and I thought it worked this way. But I tried now, and it did not. Fixed now, the game will display the grid by default when installed on a new machine, and then the grid can be turned off via settings is needed.