First Impressions

[Battlefront.com]

Metalbrew,

The thing about the abandoned bunker or killed crew makes a bit of sense. The reason I didn't think this was going on was the red 'MG Crew' icon was still hovering over the bunker. I don't know what enables or disables this icon, but that's why I thought the thing was still alive.

Our bad on that one. You will see that icon as long as the bunker is alive, it doesn't matter if it is occupied by a weapon or not. We never got around to making a dedicated bunker icon because usually there is a MG in it. I made a note about that so hopefully we can get that patched.

In short, if you see that icon it simply means the bunker is functional, it doesn't specify that it is occupied.

Steve

[Runyan99]

After rolling through the first two scenarios without much of a problem, although there were some losses and a few tough firefights, I'm not sure if I'm digging the asymetrical nature of the forces. The designers are really going to have to work hard to make good 2-player scenarios.

[David Chapuis]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

4. Trees can't be turned off because there is no ground texture, like CMx1, to show you where the trees are. Plus, individual trees matter in CM:SF, so turning them off has a lot of implications that did not exist in CMx1. Having said that, we know that if we could find a way of turning them off many of you would be happy about that.

I hope that eventually you will revist this. I can understand why it wasnt a priority since most of the syrians maps (I assume) are not tree heavy. But the first game I played was an inf battle in trees, and I had a really had time seeing my units. I have no ideas how to fix it (maybe something like how you did the buildings in CMx1), but I hope you can think of something.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Runyan99:

The designers are really going to have to work hard to make good 2-player scenarios.

Aren't you one of us, Cory? :confused:

[Ryan Crierie]

First impressions; using the ATGM ambush scenario; with graphics detail set to HIGHEST on both my GeForce 6800, and the game itself:

Not that great.

Foreground detail's good, but far away detail is worse than CMBB/AK/BO.

[JohnCalvin]

Great game and it runs on my old rig... 2.6 ghz, geforce 6600 gt, 1 gig ram..

Well done!

[MikoyanPT]

My mouth is watering.

I am reduced to spectator batles, game runs smothly even with maximum settings, but crashes to desktop as soon has i left click a unit.

Some guys at the suport forum report the same problem.

Has soon has it is solved i am launched.

THe game looks great !

[Battlefront.com]

David Chapuis ,

I hope that eventually you will revist this. I can understand why it wasnt a priority since most of the syrians maps (I assume) are not tree heavy. But the first game I played was an inf battle in trees, and I had a really had time seeing my units. I have no ideas how to fix it (maybe something like how you did the buildings in CMx1), but I hope you can think of something.

You're right about WWII ETO. It is a must. However, I think one of our bright little testers (Elmar) is right. When in the game click on the Menu Button at the bottom right and then on Hotkeys. Do you see a toggle for trees? Something is telling me we added it near the last minute simply to keep people from bugging us for it (I'm on my Mac now so I can't double check). It still isn't very useful from a gameplay standpoint EXCEPT to look at units in more detail. But unlike CMx1, you have the floating icons that keep your guys from getting lost like they did in CMx1.

Ryan Crierie,

Something looks wrong there! Go into OPTIONS off of the main screen and tell me what your CM graphics settings are. That screenshot of yours looks like something is turned down a bit.

Steve

[Runyan99]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Aren't you one of us, Cory? :confused:

Perhaps not. I did WW2 scenarios to explore history, but I'm not sure the subject matter here is up my alley. I'm sure I'll do some more once the series goes back to the '40s.

I don't know about the trees, but I know in the second scenario, Al Amarah, I had a hard time seeing what the hell was going on inside or between the buidlings sometimes. Does this game have a translucent wall hotkey?

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Runyan99:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Aren't you one of us, Cory? :confused:

Perhaps not. I did WW2 scenarios to explore history, but I'm not sure the subject matter here is up my alley. I'm sure I'll do some more once the series goes back to the '40s. </font>

[konstantine]

My questions always get overlooked in these threads (easily printable hotkey reference sheet, anyone?), but here is another one:

Why can't we choose our forces in a QB?

I can't believe I overlooked this very salient point as I followed this game quite closely for the past couple of years. I really want to be able to browse through and choose my own units.

However, I am enjoying the gameplay and learning curve so far.

edit: forgot to mention the music isn't bad!

[ July 27, 2007, 07:35 PM: Message edited by: konstantine ]

[Runyan99]

Actually I thought of you a bit when I read the Al Amarah briefing. It says it is a two hour long scenario! (Actually, it is 90 minutes, but whatever) And I was hated and ridiculed for arguing that small unit WW2 battles should be two hours! I was told 90 minutes couldn't work for CM!

I only needed about 70 minutes to secure my objectives at Al Amarah, and then to an exfil. But having the time available allowed me to spend 15 minutes I needed for one tough firefight at the edge of town, so that I could cross a street safely.

Are the devs are quickly coming around to my viewpoint, that combat operations are typically a little bit slower than we imagined in CMx1?

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Runyan99:

Actually I thought of you a bit when I read the Al Amarah briefing. It says it is a two hour long scenario! (Actually, it is 90 minutes, but whatever) And I was hated and ridiculed for arguing that small unit WW2 battles should be two hours! I was told 90 minutes couldn't work for CM!

I only needed about 70 minutes to secure my objectives at Al Amarah, and then to an exfil. But having the time available allowed me to spend 15 minutes I needed for one tough firefight at the edge of town, so that I could cross a street safely.

Are the devs are quickly coming around to my viewpoint, that combat operations are typically a little bit slower than we imagined in CMx1?

It certainly worked out that way here; but in modern combat, if its visible, it's dead, I think. So you move a lot more carefully than you would if you were in a King Tiger. I'll be very interested to see if the trend continues in Normandy. I agree with you that it seems realistic. The impact on sales is yet to be determined - will this give CM the rep of "not for the casual gamer?" I think it will get that based on a lot of other stuff - quite deliberately - outside the time factor.

RTS gameplay may also have pushed up the time allowed also. In fact, I wonder how scenario designers in the community will reconcile WEGO vs. RTS - if they will have different game lengths for the different styles, the way some designers in CMX1 had different force allocations for vs-AI play and FtF play.

[ July 27, 2007, 07:25 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Runyan99]

Well, as far as the time goes, I think the change to individual men makes the game speed more accurate. I suppose now that each soldier is visible on screen, and you can see exactly what each guy is doing, be that shooting, or walking, or reloading or whatever, it's a lot easier to judge if things are happening too fast or too slow to be realistic.

[Ryan Crierie]

Something looks wrong there! Go into OPTIONS off of the main screen and tell me what your CM graphics settings are. That screenshot of yours looks like something is turned down a bit.

All of them are at bestest.

I'm using a Ge Force 6800 with the latest drivers.

[Kwazydog]

Ryan, what are you referring too in CMBB that looks better out of itnerest? I think that part of what you are seeing here is the texture smoothing we are applying to remove the sparkles you used to see in CMx1. Also, you might want to take a look in your control panel of your graphics card and try turning up you AF settings. That might give you the visuals you are looking for.

[Rik81]

Originally posted by mgk:

For me it is good old CM but with new fast and beautiful graphics and new tactical possibilities

Great work !

Fast and beautiful graphics? I am obviously doing something wrong. I am not getting those beautiful pictures we saw in the video's they released. I get the blue and red icons to click on and give orders, but I don't know how to focus the replays to see the action. Some one give me a clue please.

[adultery]

awesome

wimpy javelin sounds...can hear them launched on youtube and they have a lot more "ommph" on launch

as does the automatic grenade launcher on the striker...sounds like its firing high speed bags of flour...no "crack" of high explosive going off.

the ability to see all pathline and targets? cant seem to find the comand for that

im sure the sounds will have a mod soon

overall, just finished the tut and loving it

[Ryan Crierie]

Originally posted by KwazyDog:

[QB] Ryan, what are you referring too in CMBB that looks better out of itnerest?

The fact that I can see textures from a distance, instead of a blurry mass.

CMAK - nice and crisp long distance graphics from a height.

CMSF - Blurry mass from a height.

Also, you might want to take a look in your control panel of your graphics card and try turning up you AF settings. That might give you the visuals you are looking for.

Set my NVIDIA driver to 16x AF. No change.

[David Chapuis]

I am pleasently surprised that I like real time better than We go. We go was very cumbersome. Realtime (on the small and not too hectic battles) was better.

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Ryan Crierie:

First impressions; using the ATGM ambush scenario; with graphics detail set to HIGHEST on both my GeForce 6800, and the game itself:

Not that great.

Foreground detail's good, but far away detail is worse than CMBB/AK/BO.

I have to say, this is true.

The LOD (level of detail based on distance) that you have chosen for CM:SF is very disturbing. A lot of them in the foreground and then very sharply go to zero at what is not very far away. As a result, moving forward looks extremely wired.

Also, as the screenshot above shows, terrain in the distance looks bad.

Would it be possible to give us a user controllable parameters to control density and distance of doodads?

[Kwazydog]

Originally posted by Ryan Crierie:

The fact that I can see textures from a distance, instead of a blurry mass.

Ryan, its not something we have had mentioned to us before but Ill speak to Chalres about it. Its hard to tell from a screen shot, but if you have textures turned up in game, and manually set your video card drivers that should be all you can do on your end.

To an extent this is a trade off between the sparkles of old or the smoothed textures. The reason the sparkles existed in CMx1 is that the textures werent smoothing as happens in most game, and were retaining full detail even what a great distance from the camera.

Originally posted by Redwolf:

Would it be possible to give us a user controllable parameters to control density and distance of doodads?

Redwolf, possibly. Ill chat to Charles about this too.

[PAEZ]

Great job BTF.

I played for a few hours, no crashes.

The game looks and plays very well.

It is good too know that there are people that can make a game like this one.

It will take me a bit to get use to the new interface.but it is a new engine and game.

Calling artillery at night its just well... WOW.

note to self ..keep this on drive for the next few years.

thanks again.

Ps.What the hell were those guys from Tomhardware taking about.

Using a dual core 2 6600.

8800 gts 320mg. 2mg of ram

all the new drivers.

[ July 27, 2007, 09:07 PM: Message edited by: PAEZ ]

[Rik81]

My earlier post referenced the "tutorial battle". I now have looked at the first battle of the Training Campaign, and voila! I can see. However, I can't drive worth a bean flip, lol. Back to the manual I guess. There has to be a way to CANCEL an order and re-issue it. (I play WEGO, no RT stuff for this old man.)

BTW a little gripe: A "tutorial" or a "training" battle ought to have some "on-screen, in the game prompts." I know they warned us to have the manual handy, but at the moment I only have the pdf. When my snail mail copy arrives I am hoping they have a nice printed manual.

[MrSpkr]

A few more thoughts after playing some more:

(e) The ability to show all paths, or all covered arcs, or all paths and covered arcs, particularly in turn based play.

(f) The ability to resize units for easier visibility.

(g) the ability to zoom in and behind a selected unit instantly from any angle (right now, I often double click on a unit, then hit tab, and the camera moves to a position 40 meters or so above the selected unit, looking towards the horizon -- and the selected unit is completely out of sight!)

(h) The ability to turn off roofs and make buildings transparent or opaque (particularly critical if you are trying to keep track of a large number of troops in an urban environment).

(i) A keyboard interface which does not use the same keys over and over (yes, I know I can reprogram, but that is a pain). It is annoying to hit "U" and expect a move arrow, but get a targeting line instead.

Steve