sharaleo

Seriously? How hard did you even look? On both the Developer and Publisher AP pages (Graviteam and Paradox) there are links to Impulse, Gamersgate and Direct2Drive. Don't like Digital? Mail order from Amazon. I assume you had no issues doing that with CMBN. No MP? Fair enough, but it's also a third the cost of CMBN. No forum activity? There is activity on the Graviteam and Paradox forum, admittedly not much lately, but the game came out 18 months ago. A comparative alternative to CMBN was asked for and it was provided. Rather than off-handedly dismiss it without even looking properly, how about you go grab the demo from one of the multitude of places it is available and then comment. Caveat - Much like CMBN, don't expect to get too far into AP without thoroughly reading the manual. Edit - Apologies to BFC if this appears as an advertisement for AP, not my intention, but I'll understand if you feel the need to delete.

A thread about camera controls, you say? Search and you shall find... http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=97499

So as time is available for these changes to be developed, will the final result be patched into CB:BN? I assume the engine is good to go for a few years yet, especially with talk of further modules based on it. If UI design changes are present in upcoming modules, I assume they will be patched into CM:BN?

I think sometimes it my be part of the intelligence you receive for the battle in question. ie I know I am facing roughly these forces and intelligence suggests they may be roughly in these positions.

Why is it widely accepted? That's half the problem. If it's a widely acknowledged problem that WASD camera movement is clunky, why don't the Dev's do something about it?

Hmmm, I don't recall any indication from the Development team that the current camera controls as they stand are are a result of engine limitations, nor that it was even acknowledged as something that could use improvement. Yes, perhaps I was a little harsh. But sometimes it seems improvements to interface usability is compromised in favour of, say, making tanks bounce more... I mean seriously, who was it that decided tanks bouncing more when they fired rated higher than movable waypoints? If it was BF, then they have their priorities wrong, or if it was the Beta Testers, then the wrong feedback was given. I know BF has a small but devoted programming team. I know they cannot action every little thing that every other person thinks is wrong with the game. I would not expect them to. I very much appreciate their hard work and applaud their efforts. There are too few games like this around these days. But having a small Development team is no excuse for ignoring issues that have been the subject of criticism for years. Just to re-iterate. I don't at all see camera control issues as game-breaking, just a massive barrier of entry to new players. From your comments above, I am confident that BF do pay attention to player feedback, I would just ask them to take valid criticism of such usability issues seriously and invest some time in improvements. Otherwise new players will just turn to alternatives with cleaner, more intuitive controls. If you can't make it easy for people to play your game, then they probably won't.

Begging your pardon shredder, but that attitude is severely flawed for a couple of reasons: Firstly, CMBN is most likely not designed with anywhere the necessary level of mod-ability that would facilitate this. Secondly, how about we petition the actual Developer - you know, the ones taking our money, to recognise areas where improvements can be made and action them. I can accept the camera controls the way they are now and can accept that they are unlikely to change in the current iteration. But if you sit back on your laurels and expect modders to fix issues that Developers should have considered during the development cycle, then things will never get better. Similarly, if BF Developers don't listen to the views of NEW players and also play a wide range of competing games then they are doing their community a serious disservice in that they are not exposing themselves to their own game's weaknesses or just improved ways to do things. I say NEW players because too often on this forum I have seen senior members and Beta Testers respond to issues with 'that's the way it is, get used to it'. If that was their attitude during Beta, then they should simply not be Beta Testers. Their job is to push the game to new heights, not accept the status quo. If any one of the Beta Testers wants to tell me the mouse camera controls are the best they have ever used, they are delusional, or just not exposed to current games. Conversely, If BF Developers want to tell me the mouse camera controls are the best they can be within the limitations of the engine, I can accept that take some solace that it is likely on the radar for CMx3. There is a great game here, I know that and I never even played CMBO. I would love nothing more than to see it succeed, as it means more development money for BF. Sadly the way it stands, when reviews of CMBN begin to arrive in coming months, I predict they will be quite mixed and obtuse camera controls will be a prominent recurring theme. Poor reviews = poor sales. Now maybe BF don't care and survive on existing customer loyalty, but that would be a shame. This would be a marvelous idea. It would give community members a much greater sense of the workload BF endure and the potential progress the game will be making over coming patches/modules.

Thanks WineCape, I did quote you, but admittedly did not elaborate further on what you meant.

Good advice. Hotkeys, binded to mouse buttons or otherwise, are an essential way to get around in CMBN. From a thread i posted elsewhere: Tips to get around for those that have not played (or in a while). 1 - After selecting a unit, press TAB. it will zoom to just behind the unit at the current camera height. 2 - After you have TABbed to a unit, right click will now pivot around the unit, rather than pivot the camera itself. 3 - Press 'v' to reverse the camera view. 4 - Camera height hot keys (1 - 5) are useful for quick adjustments. Bind some of these keys to a mouse and you will be rocking, but it does not excuse the cumbersome mouse camera controls.

Seriously? From the manual, bottom of page 19 in the Tutorial section: "To move the camera forward, backward, left, or right, press and hold the left mouse button and drag the mouse. The camera will pan and follow your motion. To change the direction that the camera is facing while staying in place, press and hold the right mouse button and drag the mouse. This is analogous to swiveling your head. The camera facing will move with the motion of the mouse. It is important to know where your cursor is on the screen, because the sensitiv- ity of these changes decreases as the cursor approaches the edge of the screen. To move quickly, click your cursor in the center of the screen; to make small adjustments to the camera, click the camera click the cursor nearer to the edge of the screen." The last sentence of the above is not well written, however. And I directly quoted WineCape - " left click drag = lateral movement (slow = in middle screen view, fast = edges) and right click drag (left/right = swivel on axis, up/down = change height angle)"

When you click to pan or rotate, the speed at which the camera moves increases the further you move it from the starting position.

Why, oh why implement such an ridiculously antiquated system? Honestly, most people's issues with the camera would just go away with system of 1:1 mouse mapping. ie right or left click for pan or rotate and the camera moves with your mouse at a constant speed regardless of where the cursor is. This is the camera system found in, oh, I don't know, just about EVERY modern 3D game engine.