http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/7643

as commissioned by Lyth here

So it has long boring thing at start?

Going to be frank here:

You know how people these days seem positively addicted to make video tutorials that take 3 minutes to explain what a simple text page with pictures can do in 60 seconds, require 10 times as long to load, and make it eleventy-billion times harder to go back and review previous material?

This is exactly like that (worse, in fact, on account of being unskippable and unrewindable). Not to mention the it's thrown at the player in such a way that your average newbie will probably forget almost all of it after half a minute.

I think the point is that your methodology might be wrong. Noobs will be noobs, knowledge can't be forced onto you unless you're willing to learn it. With that in mind, a rude and harsh atmosphere to teach these things is certainly not the way to make people understand and adhere to that stuff.

The intro is quite long.. without any flashy text or voice acting a wall of text wont do much. I personally lost interest after the first minute. If I were you I'd ıntroduce these things one by one over a span of a mission instead of all at the beginning. Start with the first thing: plop a factory. Then go into mex making. Then into raiding. And so on. The best tutorial in my oppinion would be a ''ride-along'' type. If the hıgh elmo players are willing to spend some time training rookies then we might get somewhere. Its honestly too much to teach someone in game while playing at the same time. Perhaps voice chat teaching would suffice. A thought on the matter.

Regards.

I quite understand that it is WIP. However, as I stated in my feedback you should do a ''ride-along'' type tutorial. Do not introduce every concept at the game start. This makes the intro way too long to effectively hold attention. If you do not hold the rookie's attention they learn effectively nothing, which defeats your purpose. Introduce the complaints one by one. For example start the mission off explaining you need to plop factory immediately and get mexes asap! Watch this guy here. Show sped up version of a standard start. Give control to player with objectives plop factory and make 3 mexes.

Praise player for job done. Yay you made a factory and some mexes. Good. Youll want do defend your base a little now. Make a LLT or defender. Dont make a lot of them tho. While this llt or defender is being made, lets make some raiders.

Objectives:
= make llt/defender near base.
= Make 5-6 raiders.

Praise player again for jobs done. You now have a decent start. Lets scout the enemy force. Give objective of move raiders to enemy start position.

Enemy is undefended and has only a few glaives sitting around. (One complaint you have!)

On factory spotted, give objective of kill the mex. Tip them that units cannot shot things behind larger units (eg the factory).

Praise player for job done. Youve crippled your enemy. Now lets expand here. (Ping nearby expansion) [yet another of your complaints.] Make a mex here and put an llt to defend it. Also make a few more raiders.

On raiders completed:
Good. Lets go raid the enemy again. (Have the ai have a slightly larger base)
Objectives received:
- Kill enemy base.
- Continue expansion.

On completion of kill enemy base:
Scanners detect another enemy base! This one's heavily defended by turrets. Lets make some artillery. [This shows them that porc = bad. Yet another of your complaints]

And so on. Just an example. Also try to keep them in control while this is explaining things to them so they can continue to build and what not instead of taking them away from the game.

Other tips:
- Do not repeat things over and over until its done. This annoyed the FUCK out of me (excuse my language) during the supcom campaign. HOLY FUCK was that annoying.
- Try to make explanations as short as possible.
- Do not take control away from the player unless its neccessary. Theyll likely go

quote: Yawn.. what do I do now while this idiot is explaining things. Ye gods he goes on forever! Ugh. I just want to play around with robots!

- Try to do explanations in 20 seconds or less and explain one thing at a time and allow the rookie to try it out before moving onto the next common complaint.

what @ForlornShaman suggested is very similar to another Lyth commissioned mission which is being made. Lyth himself think that we should try it this way first though.


in defense of the wall of text, though I have no great love for text, it is no longer than the [unskipable iirc] dialogue of starcraft 1.

newer version will have less text and shorter intro.

mid game "event" like congrats on complete task is being implement.

allies CAI will have different color

mission updated.

I think for the time being we don't need any further feedback until we've had a chance to look at it ourselves a bit more.

Brilliant. Nice one I think its not too bad now. If someone thinks they can do better they can put their money where their mouth is :)

standard CAI, but may be harder for new player. Thanks for the feedback though. could increase difficulty as more feedback from new players are available.