Dev Diary 3 - Demo Feedback and Improvements
Hi everyone!
It's been a super busy time here on the Orbiting Disco space station, so let me fill you in on what's been happening.
DEMO FEEDBACK
Those of you following Dust Fleet on Twitter will have seen plenty of Tweets about the game making the journey to PAX East. The demo was available to play there and was also released on Steam for anyone to try out. Feedback has been really good, and I learned a few interesting things about how people play the game.
As many of you correctly spotted, the demo can be tough, but it also doesn't put any real pressure on you - enemies don't attack you between turns meaning you can take your time building up your fleet and attack when you're ready. This was a conscious choice for the demo, as I didn't want players getting into too much difficulty. In the full game, depending on game mode and settings, there will be reasons to force you to expand, and enemy attacks you'll have to deal with.
Another point raised was that, while you can see enemy ships on the starmap, if there's a mission at a location, there's no way to tell what you'll be facing. This happens because enemies that roam the starmap are different to the ones you get in scripted missions. Enemies in missions are only spawned for that mission, and disappear again afterwards which of course means that until you start the mission, the starmap has nothing to show you. I'm going to see if I can rectify this by getting the starmap to reach into the mission data and pull out some of the ships that will be used in the mission. I still want to keep it a bit vague, as missions have a lot more going on and I wouldn't necessarily want the player to know eveything that's going to make an appearance.
Another question was about why squadron fighters are automatically rebuilt as long as a single ship makes it back to it's carrier. Some have pointed out that it's not realistic or doesn't make sense. And yes, this is one of those choices that makes more sense as a gameplay element than for realism. As fighters are destroyed, the value of the remaining fighters goes up, since they carry the value and veterancy of the squadron. It gives the player a mini-objective to keep those remaining fighters alive and get them home safely. This also helps the player not feel discouraged about using them, because they have every chance to get them back as long as they're careful.
And finally, yes, I'll be fixing that bug with the unit audio being very loud. Sorry.
MINING AND RESOURCES
Something else that came out of the demo was some uncertainty about when to use drilling barques.
During battles, drilling barques can mine asteroids in the battle area. If there are stations nearby, you can then use the resources you've mined to build ships. If not, you get to keep those resources for later.
In the starmap view, drilling barques currently don't do anything, but I've been working on some changes here.
As you progress in the game, you'll have more and more stations, and as you fit them with refineries the amount of resources you gain will increase - a lot! In longer games resources are no longer an issue. While the enemy will attack your stations, it's easy to get to a point where this is nothing more than a minor annoyance. So, I've made 4 key changes here to give players more to do in managing their stations and spreading their territory.
If you like the look of the game or enjoyed the demo, make sure to wishlist us! If you want to be kept up to date with progress on the game's development and connect with our community, you can check out our Twitter, Discord, or YouTube!
That's it for this update - I'll see you on the next one
https://store.steampowered.com/app/406160/Dust_Fleet/
It's been a super busy time here on the Orbiting Disco space station, so let me fill you in on what's been happening.
DEMO FEEDBACK
Those of you following Dust Fleet on Twitter will have seen plenty of Tweets about the game making the journey to PAX East. The demo was available to play there and was also released on Steam for anyone to try out. Feedback has been really good, and I learned a few interesting things about how people play the game.
As many of you correctly spotted, the demo can be tough, but it also doesn't put any real pressure on you - enemies don't attack you between turns meaning you can take your time building up your fleet and attack when you're ready. This was a conscious choice for the demo, as I didn't want players getting into too much difficulty. In the full game, depending on game mode and settings, there will be reasons to force you to expand, and enemy attacks you'll have to deal with.
Another point raised was that, while you can see enemy ships on the starmap, if there's a mission at a location, there's no way to tell what you'll be facing. This happens because enemies that roam the starmap are different to the ones you get in scripted missions. Enemies in missions are only spawned for that mission, and disappear again afterwards which of course means that until you start the mission, the starmap has nothing to show you. I'm going to see if I can rectify this by getting the starmap to reach into the mission data and pull out some of the ships that will be used in the mission. I still want to keep it a bit vague, as missions have a lot more going on and I wouldn't necessarily want the player to know eveything that's going to make an appearance.
Another question was about why squadron fighters are automatically rebuilt as long as a single ship makes it back to it's carrier. Some have pointed out that it's not realistic or doesn't make sense. And yes, this is one of those choices that makes more sense as a gameplay element than for realism. As fighters are destroyed, the value of the remaining fighters goes up, since they carry the value and veterancy of the squadron. It gives the player a mini-objective to keep those remaining fighters alive and get them home safely. This also helps the player not feel discouraged about using them, because they have every chance to get them back as long as they're careful.
And finally, yes, I'll be fixing that bug with the unit audio being very loud. Sorry.
MINING AND RESOURCES
Something else that came out of the demo was some uncertainty about when to use drilling barques.
During battles, drilling barques can mine asteroids in the battle area. If there are stations nearby, you can then use the resources you've mined to build ships. If not, you get to keep those resources for later.
In the starmap view, drilling barques currently don't do anything, but I've been working on some changes here.
As you progress in the game, you'll have more and more stations, and as you fit them with refineries the amount of resources you gain will increase - a lot! In longer games resources are no longer an issue. While the enemy will attack your stations, it's easy to get to a point where this is nothing more than a minor annoyance. So, I've made 4 key changes here to give players more to do in managing their stations and spreading their territory.
- LIMITED RESOURCES: Resources per location are now limited. They'll run out, and when they do things like refineries will drop to 5% of their normal output.
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- MINING DURING TURNS: Drilling barques will now also mine some resources each turn on the starmap. If the location they are at has none left, they too will produce resources at 5% of their usual rate.
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- RESOURCE GENERATORS: There's a new technology on the tech tree - a resource generator. As you progress up the tech tree, you'll unlock these modules, and be able to fit them to industrial stations. They can generate a steady stream of resources at locations where there's nothing left to mine, BUT... they need something else to work, which brings me to point 4...
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- POWER: In addition to resource generators, power generators have also been added to the tech tree. These can be fitted to science stations, and provide power to neighbouring stations. Resource generators, shipyards and station sensor arrays now require power to function. The good news is that even though only science stations can generate power, you don't have to keep everything close together. Any station that is receiving power can retransmit any power it doesn't need to its neighbouring stations. So you can build a network of stations that use power, and distribute your power generation however you like. As you progress down the tech tree, you'll unlock bigger and better power generators, which is good because resource generators will use a lot of it!
If you like the look of the game or enjoyed the demo, make sure to wishlist us! If you want to be kept up to date with progress on the game's development and connect with our community, you can check out our Twitter, Discord, or YouTube!
That's it for this update - I'll see you on the next one
https://store.steampowered.com/app/406160/Dust_Fleet/