List of 44 gameplay/ui gripes (Copied from discord)

Started by matjojo, May 03, 2021, 03:34:52 PM

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matjojo

This list was made after a couple of post in the creeper world 4 channel in the discord about some gripes I had with the design of the campaign and its use as tutorial.


When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units)
No hotkey for increasing size or depth of TERP. (And none in the settings to create a custom one)
The TERP size number is wrong compared to the actual size of the cursor.
Starting a level requires too many actions. (One to select, move mouse, click play) Fun for the first couple levels, just a double click would be fine for later.
Options menu, when unsaved, will close and stay the same until after you restart the game(? just one time I did this, so not sure)
I cannot look straight ahead, weird artificial(?) limit on what I can see.
No way to turn off "smooth scrolling" (?)
Death sound is same for ghosts and buildings.
Sound mixing is all over the place.
Sometimes an explosion is super loud out of the blue.
No kill log, so if you miss the ghost there is no way of knowing what has just died.
Keybinds appear to be a hit and miss combination of expecting the user to use a mouse and them having both hands on the keyboard.
Keybind menu will tell you that a key is set on another option but gives no easy way to remove that other binding, causing annoying searching.
No way of searching keybinds.(?)
Inconsistent use of mouseovers for units, some have them, some do not.
No easy way of knowing where a Spore launcher Sound is coming from.
No "event log" to see deaths and spore launcher one-minute-events (and blobs and more)
Artwork of that stuff that transmits creeper and multiplies creeper is similar enough to be confusing.
Mission text like "I should mine this" get's in the way of viewing said thing quite often, and can't be removed (?)
Totems don't tell you what they need all the time. (only when you've unpaused the map once(?))
The shields in some of the campaign maps don't really seem to use energy (?)
TERP locks you into top down view.
Total creeper graph is very hard to impossible to interpret for small changes
Delta creeper graph is hard to read.
Unclear how to mine greenar.
What is "Ultrac"?
Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?
No way to get the view to rotate around a thing(?)
Even on 64 zoom speed zoom is weirdly slow. (Another artificial limit?)
No way to change the sound level per thing(?)
Game ignores scroll input when not in focus even if windows is instructed to pass it through (and windows does pass it through to other programs)
In the controls menu you select "Mouse Wheel: " Zooms, but then the speed selection is "Bump scroll rate" Why the difference?
UI uses checkboxes even when only one option is possible. Radio buttons are generally meant for that, and are styled as circles instead of squares.
Controls menu has a "Save Keys to File" button but no "save" button, unclear when options are saved.
Inline options exist as well as an out-of-line options menu, unclear what is where.
Saving system appears to be opposite for the two.

Inline "Info" icon is very pixelated.
Style things that are somewhat opinion based:
Style of "Info" button is different from any other.
Style of "Total, Deta, Cover" Buttons is weirdly different from all other buttons.
Mouseover style of the spawn button is different from all others (that I've found)
Background style of "Factory, ERN PORT, RECORDER, and A.D.A[0]" is different from all others.
Style of "Paused, Sound:on" buttons are different from all others.
Style of "Options" button is different from all others.

Bob

Organized version:

A) Keybind Requests

  • No hotkey for increasing size or depth of TERP. (And none in the settings to create a custom one)
  • No way of searching keybinds.(?)
  • Keybinds appear to be a hit and miss combination of expecting the user to use a mouse and them having both hands on the keyboard.
  • Keybind menu will tell you that a key is set on another option but gives no easy way to remove that other binding, causing annoying searching.
B) Sound Requests

  • Death sound is same for ghosts and buildings.
  • Sound mixing is all over the place.
  • Sometimes an explosion is super loud out of the blue.
  • No way to change the sound level per thing(?)
C) Gameplay details

  • What is "Ultrac"?
  • Unclear how to mine greenar.
  • Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?
  • The shields in some of the campaign maps don't really seem to use energy (?)
  • No kill log, so if you miss the ghost there is no way of knowing what has just died.
  • No "event log" to see deaths and spore launcher one-minute-events (and blobs and more)
  • No easy way of knowing where a Spore launcher Sound is coming from.
D) Zoom and Camera Controls

  • No way to get the view to rotate around a thing(?)
  • Even on 64 zoom speed zoom is weirdly slow. (Another artificial limit?)
  • Game ignores scroll input when not in focus even if windows is instructed to pass it through (and windows does pass it through to other programs)
  • In the controls menu you select "Mouse Wheel: " Zooms, but then the speed selection is "Bump scroll rate" Why the difference?
  • I cannot look straight ahead, weird artificial (?) limit on what I can see.
  • No way to turn off "smooth scrolling" (?)
E) Menus

  • Starting a level requires too many actions. (One to select, move mouse, click play) Fun for the first couple levels, just a double click would be fine for later.
  • UI uses checkboxes even when only one option is possible. Radio buttons are generally meant for that, and are styled as circles instead of squares.
  • Controls menu has a "Save Keys to File" button but no "save" button, unclear when options are saved.
  • Inline options exist as well as an out-of-line options menu, unclear what is where.
  • Saving system appears to be opposite for the two.
  • Options menu, when unsaved, will close and stay the same until after you restart the game(? just one time I did this, so not sure)
F) MISC

  • When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units)
  • The TERP size number is wrong compared to the actual size of the cursor.
  • Inconsistent use of mouseovers for units, some have them, some do not.
  • Artwork of that stuff that transmits creeper and multiplies creeper is similar enough to be confusing.
  • Mission text like "I should mine this" get's in the way of viewing said thing quite often, and can't be removed (?)
  • Totems don't tell you what they need all the time. (only when you've unpaused the map once(?))
  • TERP locks you into top down view.
  • Total creeper graph is very hard to impossible to interpret for small changes
  • Delta creeper graph is hard to read.
G) Styles

  • Inline "Info" icon is very pixelated.
  • Style of "Info" button is different from any other.
  • Style of "Total, Deta, Cover" Buttons is weirdly different from all other buttons.
  • Mouseover style of the spawn button is different from all others (that I've found)
  • Background style of "Factory, ERN PORT, RECORDER, and A.D.A[0]" is different from all others.
  • Style of "Paused, Sound:on" buttons are different from all others.
  • Style of "Options" button is different from all others.

Bob

Going to address section C first, as it is the easiest to understand.

  • What is "Ultrac"?   

    https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=cw4:info:ultracap
  • Unclear how to mine greenar.

    This is covered in the 'We Know Nothing' mission. https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=cw4:info:refinery
  • Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?

    I assume you are talking about walls, if so, you can adjust them to allow AC through  https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=cw4:info:wall

    If you are instead talking about mesh, then only when it is active can the fluids go over it. https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=cw4:info:mesh
  • The shields in some of the campaign maps don't really seem to use energy (?)

    That's right, many campaign shields are special units that only require a connection. Example is in Ruins Repurposed campaign mission
  • No kill log, so if you miss the ghost there is no way of knowing what has just died.

    There is a type of kill log in the creeper graph on bottom left - it will display a symbol that you can hover over to see location and type of structure destroyed
  • No "event log" to see deaths and spore launcher one-minute-events (and blobs and more)

    In addition to the bottom left 'kill log', the map will have timers and flashing icons for spores and blobs
  • No easy way of knowing where a Spore launcher Sound is coming from.

    Easiest method here is to pause the game immediately after the spores launch to see their trajectory

michaelb958

Responses to those that I can respond to:

  • "Death sound is same for ghosts and buildings." Hasn't that always been the case?
  • "Unclear how to mine greenar." Build a Refinery whose radius covers the Greenar Mother's radius. The campaign covers this.
  • "Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?" I think you're referring to campaign force barriers. If you select them, there's a checkbox (button? that mission was a while ago for me) to let AC through.
  • "The shields in some of the campaign maps don't really seem to use energy (?)" Campaign force barriers don't use the network at all. Totems are usually charged with liftic, although some beta maps use arg. Buildable shields consume arg.
  • "No kill log, so if you miss the ghost there is no way of knowing what has just died." Check the creeper graph for a blue (incomplete construction) or red (complete) explosion icon. Mouse over it to see what it was and show a pointer on the map. Click it to move the camera there.
  • "Controls menu has a "Save Keys to File" button but no "save" button, unclear when options are saved." Save Keys to File really means 'Export keys'. Options in the options dialog, including controls, are saved instantly.
  • "Inline options exist as well as an out-of-line options menu, unclear what is where." The inline menu contains level display options; the dialog contains everything else. The dialog used to have level display options as well, but it's been patched out because inline options became saveable.
  • "Options menu, when unsaved, will close and stay the same until after you restart the game(? just one time I did this, so not sure)" The inline menu applies to the current level only, unless you click its Save button which saves the current options for all future levels. The dialog options are saved instantly.
  • "When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units)" Not sure what you mean. There is a problem when selecting an incomplete movable unit that it won't show a move preview or any hint of being a movable unit, but won't deselect on left-click like immovable units do.
  • "Delta creeper graph is hard to read." Could you be more specific? The center of the graph is 0, and the numbers should help interpret the scale.

Bob

I want to be clear that I'm trying to give you solutions / answers that help you 'now'. Some of these features may be available in a later update or in a later game. I am not attempting to minimize your feedback.
Regarding
A) Keybinds:

  • No hotkey for increasing size or depth of TERP. (And none in the settings to create a custom one)

    Correct
  • No way of searching keybinds.(?)

    You can search in the ../..creeperworld4/settings/controls.xml file
  • Keybinds appear to be a hit and miss combination of expecting the user to use a mouse and them having both hands on the keyboard.

    Most 'routine' use keybinds (unit selection, movement) seem to be in the left portion of a QWERTY keyboard.
  • Keybind menu will tell you that a key is set on another option but gives no easy way to remove that other binding, causing annoying searching.

    As I mentioned, if you are wanting that level of control, perhaps the controls.xml file is for you

Bob

Regarding B) SOUND.

I'm sure you've already noticed the Sound , Game and Menu volume sliders.

Outside of this, there's no sound adjustments - certainly not on a per unit or per sound basis

Bob

Regarding
D) Zoom and Camera Controls

  • No way to get the view to rotate around a thing(?)

    Turning autocam off and using middle click (rotate map) seems to do this pretty well for me
  • Even on 64 zoom speed zoom is weirdly slow. (Another artificial limit?)

    I think you are confused by the SCROLL rate sliders - these are not ZOOM rate sliders
  • Game ignores scroll input when not in focus even if windows is instructed to pass it through (and windows does pass it through to other programs)

    This is by design because many people were complaining about their map zooming as they were in discord or on another application
  • In the controls menu you select "Mouse Wheel: " Zooms, but then the speed selection is "Bump scroll rate" Why the difference?

    'Bump' is bumping against the edge of the screen to scroll - it has nothing to do with zoom
  • I cannot look straight ahead, weird artificial (?) limit on what I can see.

    Use Free View Camera (SHIFT + F) to be able to get more 'cinematic' views
  • No way to turn off "smooth scrolling" (?)

    I don't know what this is

Bob

Regarding E menus - I think michaelb958 has covered most of it.

It would be nice to have double click auto start a level  - this might make a good github suggestion

Check boxes versus radio buttons: Radio buttons are typically used for mutually exclusive groups of options. I think checkboxes are the appropriate choice here.

Bob

Regarding:
F) MISC

  • When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units)

    This is because you have a unit 'selected'. 'Space' will deselect the unit. The alternative implementation here would be that clicking would select the new unit - personally I would accidently click too often for this to be a solution I'd recommend
  • The TERP size number is wrong compared to the actual size of the cursor.

    There are various brushes that aren't consistent - this has already been entered in github https://github.com/KnuckleCracker/CW4-bug-tracker/issues/477
  • Inconsistent use of mouseovers for units, some have them, some do not.

    I think all/most custom units have the mouseovers - not sure why Nullifier has a mouseover though - this seems like a github issue to me
  • Artwork of that stuff that transmits creeper and multiplies creeper is similar enough to be confusing.

    I think this is also worthy of a github issue - but it may be too late to adjust - - one thing to be aware of is in the bottom left the 'terrain' area will tell you what type of terrain it is
  • Mission text like "I should mine this" get's in the way of viewing said thing quite often, and can't be removed (?)

    Hmm - maybe you can point me to a specific mission here - most will allow you to either advance a bit or rotate them out of the way
  • Totems don't tell you what they need all the time. (only when you've unpaused the map once(?))

    This is another example where I think I need to know what map - in every case I've tried, hovering over the totem says their required resource
  • TERP locks you into top down view.

    This is by design (I think) to allow easier manipulation of the terrain. Based on what you were saying in discord, I think you'd rather have the option on how to view it - - maybe there were some technical limitations (as some users had suggested), but I think this was more likely a deliberate design choice - sorry.
  • Total creeper graph is very hard to impossible to interpret for small changes

    The graph auto scales based on the amount of creeper, perhaps it could be better if it 'zoomed in' on plateaus to see smaller changes
  • Delta creeper graph is hard to read.

    Same as above, but also I think it would be better if the zero line was a bit more transparent in some way

Bob

Regarding
G) Styles

  • Inline "Info" icon is very pixelated.

    I maximized the UI scale and I don't notice this, it looks no more or less pixelated than other text
  • Style of "Info" button is different from any other.

    See below
  • Style of "Total, Deta, Cover" Buttons is weirdly different from all other buttons.

    Style seems consistent with the 'Struct'/'Weapon'/etc buttons
  • Mouseover style of the spawn button is different from all others (that I've found)

    This is true - but also this is an important button
  • Background style of "Factory, ERN PORT, RECORDER, and A.D.A[0]" is different from all others.

    Seems consistent with the unit buttons
  • Style of "Paused, Sound:on" buttons are different from all others.

    See below
  • Style of "Options" button is different from all others.

    See below

Info / Paused / Options styles do seem different. Maybe they should've been different in a consistent way. But I do agree that this is certainly a matter of opinion

matjojo

My reply was too long to post at once, so here we go in pieces:

  • Unclear how to mine greenar. (And every other minable thing.)
Every time I have to mine something I have to try out the different mining buildings and hold them near it whilst hoping for some UI to pop up. Some more info in either a mouseover or in the unit selection UI would be nice. (I'm sure this will clear up with time, but I'm also sure I'm not the only one that experiences this.)

  • Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?
I was indeed talking about Mesh. The wiki says that it should flow over void terrain, but this is not my experience. (https://i.imgur.com/f0XhBmE.png)

  • No "event log" to see deaths and spore launcher one-minute-events (and blobs and more)
    In addition to the bottom left 'kill log', the map will have timers and flashing icons for spores and blobs.
Good to know. I had not seen this before.

  • No easy way of knowing where a Spore launcher Sound is coming from.
    Easiest method here is to pause the game immediately after the spores launch to see their trajectory
Having to pause the game every time I hear that sound is indeed what I'm doing now, but I just learned from this thread that there is more info on the map.

  • "Death sound is same for ghosts and buildings." Hasn't that always been the case?"
(Indeed, but this is confusing so I noted it.)

  • "Controls menu has a "Save Keys to File" button but no "save" button, unclear when options are saved." Save Keys to File really means 'Export keys'. Options in the options dialog, including controls, are saved instantly.
(Indeed, but this is confusing so I noted it.)

  • "Inline options exist as well as an out-of-line options menu, unclear what is where." The inline menu contains level display options; the dialog contains everything else. The dialog used to have level display options as well, but it's been patched out because inline options became saveable."
(Indeed, but this is confusing so I noted it.) (Thanks, this categorization isn't apparent and I don't get why, but at least I know now.)

  • "Options menu, when unsaved, will close and stay the same until after you restart the game(? just one time I did this, so not sure)" The inline menu applies to the current level only, unless you click its Save button which saves the current options for all future levels. The dialog options are saved instantly."
(Indeed, but this is super confusing so I noted it.) (Especially the fact that with no save button it saves just for that one level, what kinda UI is that? Super inconsistent and hard to understand for users.)

  • "When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units)" Not sure what you mean. There is a problem when selecting an incomplete movable unit that it won't show a move preview or any hint of being a movable unit, but won't deselect on left-click like immovable units do."
(I see, I hope this'll be fixed in a newer version then)

matjojo

The forum thinks I already posted this I don't know how much I need to type to make it think that this is a new post I think the forum interprets posts that fail to post due to too quick timing as already posted, that is certainly not meant to happen right? I hope that this is enough to fool the dupe filter otherwise I don't really know what to do.
  • "Delta creeper graph is hard to read." Could you be more specific? The center of the graph is 0, and the numbers should help interpret the scale."
(This graph can be very unclear. Graph lines may help.)


  • I want to be clear that I'm trying to give you solutions / answers that help you 'now'. Some of these features may be available in a later update or in a later game. I am not attempting to minimize your feedback.
I understand, thanks.

  • No hotkey for increasing size or depth of TERP. (And none in the settings to create a custom one) Correct
I wish there where.

  • No way of searching keybinds.(?) You can search in the ../..creeperworld4/settings/controls.xml file
Good call, thanks.

  • Keybinds appear to be a hit and miss combination of expecting the user to use a mouse and them having both hands on the keyboard. Most 'routine' use keybinds (unit selection, movement) seem to be in the left portion of a QWERTY keyboard.
This is not my experience:

  • O To rotate
  • Y To disarm
  • U To stop resupply
  • I to ERN
  • Terraform (I don't remember but I moved it so it is far away default).
And these are just the ones I know and use.
(I know that choices have to be made and that there is limited keyboard real estate.)


  • Keybind menu will tell you that a key is set on another option but gives no easy way to remove that other binding, causing annoying searching. As I mentioned, if you are wanting that level of control, perhaps the controls.xml file is for you
Thanks for that, but this is a very normal thing to want if you ask me.

Talking about the Controls menu, why is it so small? It is six whole screens long on my 1080p monitor. Why doesn't it grow?


  • I'm sure you've already noticed the Sound , Game and Menu volume sliders. Outside of this, there's no sound adjustments - certainly not on a per unit or per sound basis
I see, I hope that we will get at least some more categories, like "warnings", "Positives", "weapon sounds", "Explosions".
Please Please Please for explosions, they are so much louder than the rest of the game for me.

  • No way to get the view to rotate around a thing(?) Turning autocam off and using middle click (rotate map) seems to do this pretty well for me
Actually it turns you around the middle of the screen, not the place you're clicking. (The best way to emulate what I mean is to hold the move cam and move map keys both and then move the mouse.)

  • Even on 64 zoom speed zoom is weirdly slow. (Another artificial limit?) I think you are confused by the SCROLL rate sliders - these are not ZOOM rate sliders
I see, is there a way to edit zoom speed? It requires 7 whole scrolls of the wheel to go from zoomed out to zoomed in for me, and from zoomed in to out it takes 16(!)

Also this whole input seems weird. The game appears to ignore scroll speed and just zooms at roughly the same speed regardless of how fast I'm zooming.

matjojo


  • Game ignores scroll input when not in focus even if windows is instructed to pass it through (and windows does pass it through to other programs) This is by design because many people were complaining about their map zooming as they were in discord or on another application
This is actually a different case than I mean. When you have multiple windows open there is an option in most window managers (windows 10 has this, and I think I also remember PLASMA, XFCE, MATE, and LXQT having this option in the past.) to pass through scroll input to the window you are hovering over even when it is not in focus. I don't know if it's on the application or the OS to figure out when this hover is happening, but I know that QT does this, as well as chromium browsers (and with that electron) windows mail, factorio, Foobar2000, Notepad, Visual Studio, the Jetbrains Editors, and I assume many more as well.

I'm not asking the game to scroll whenever I scroll the wheel, just when I have it selected or when I'm hovering over it.


  • In the controls menu you select "Mouse Wheel: " Zooms, but then the speed selection is "Bump scroll rate" Why the difference? 'Bump' is bumping against the edge of the screen to scroll - it has nothing to do with zoom
I see, my mistake. Is there then no way to change the zoom speed?

  • I cannot look straight ahead, weird artificial (?) limit on what I can see. Use Free View Camera (SHIFT + F) to be able to get more 'cinematic' views
Actually the free camera view is still limited. See the video attached. I am moving my mouse further up than the camera appears to allow.

  • No way to turn off "smooth scrolling" (?) I don't know what this is
Both in the UI and for the camera the game forces you to scroll "smoothly" between steps I turn this off in applications since it makes me nauseous.

  • Check boxes versus radio buttons: Radio buttons are typically used for mutually exclusive groups of options. I think checkboxes are the appropriate choice here.
Actually for a lot of options that I meant they are mutually exclusive, like game speed, Windowed or Full-screen mode, and Right Click and Left Click option selection.
Weirdly the game does have radio buttons for the Antialiasing setting.


  • When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units) This is because you have a unit 'selected'. 'Space' will deselect the unit. The alternative implementation here would be that clicking would select the new unit - personally I would accidently click too often for this to be a solution I'd recommend
Clicking is only used for UI and selection right? So I'd say that a click on anything that cannot be selected is a good way of un-selecting. But I get your angle.


Good to hear.


  • Inconsistent use of mouseovers for units, some have them, some do not. I think all/most custom units have the mouseovers - not sure why Nullifier has a mouseover though - this seems like a github issue to me
Should I make an issue in this case? (And for some of the others?)

  • Artwork of that stuff that transmits creeper and multiplies creeper is similar enough to be confusing.  I think this is also worthy of a github issue - but it may be too late to adjust - - one thing to be aware of is in the bottom left the 'terrain' area will tell you what type of terrain it is
This is good to know. Thanks.

matjojo


  • Mission text like "I should mine this" get's in the way of viewing said thing quite often, and can't be removed (?) Hmm - maybe you can point me to a specific mission here - most will allow you to either advance a bit or rotate them out of the way
The TERP mission springs to mind, but really any mission. The text is big, doesn't (appear to) scale with zoom. That kinda stuff. For the users I think the easier and least invasive as well as least subject to forgetting would be to fade when the camera is closer. And have it fade 100% when parts of the text fall from the edge of the screen.


  • Totems don't tell you what they need all the time. (only when you've unpaused the map once(?)) This is another example where I think I need to know what map - in every case I've tried, hovering over the totem says their required resource
I think this is just my confusion, I must have looked in the wrong place once or twice since even going back to the map I meant (where you get the TERP) I cannot get this to appear again.

  • TERP locks you into top down view. This is by design (I think) to allow easier manipulation of the terrain. Based on what you were saying in discord, I think you'd rather have the option on how to view it - - maybe there were some technical limitations (as some users had suggested), but I think this was more likely a deliberate design choice - sorry.
I get that this is a design choice. I may wish for more control, but sometimes it's technically infeasible. Thanks for clarifying.

  • Total creeper graph is very hard to impossible to interpret for small changes The graph auto scales based on the amount of creeper, perhaps it could be better if it 'zoomed in' on plateaus to see smaller changes
  • Delta creeper graph is hard to read. Same as above, but also I think it would be better if the zero line was a bit more transparent in some way
I said this before, but I really think all three graphs would be helped by having some graph lines. Esp horizontal ones. They don't even have to have a scale attached, just a way to tell if a line is going net up or net down over larger widths.

  • Inline "Info" icon is very pixelated. I maximized the UI scale and I don't notice this, it looks no more or less pixelated than other text
See image: https://i.imgur.com/c8ObaqP.png I have a 1080P monitor and as far as I know, I have no changes to any scaling. I think it's clear that the circle around the I is pixelated a lot more than the Totem or Pylon.

  • Style of "Total, Deta, Cover" Buttons is weirdly different from all other buttons. Style seems consistent with the 'Struct'/'Weapon'/etc buttons
"Total, Deta, Cover" Have different outlines, different background, different edges, and different selection colours.

  • Background style of "Factory, ERN PORT, RECORDER, and A.D.A[0]" is different from all others. Seems consistent with the unit buttons
Good point, I did not notice this.

  • Info / Paused / Options styles do seem different. Maybe they should've been different in a consistent way. But I do agree that this is certainly a matter of opinion
I certainly agree that these are mainly a matter of opinion.

Bob

  • Unclear how to mine greenar. (And every other minable thing.)
    Every time I have to mine something I have to try out the different mining buildings and hold them near it whilst hoping for some UI to pop up. Some more info in either a mouseover or in the unit selection UI would be nice. (I'm sure this will clear up with time, but I'm also sure I'm not the only one that experiences this.)
My only remaining suggestion is to visit the wiki - some portions of this game a kinda meant to be found by trial and error but the wiki should help.

  • Why can creeper go over those white lines but not AC?
    I was indeed talking about Mesh. The wiki says that it should flow over void terrain, but this is not my experience.

As I mentioned, Mesh can only conduct fluids if it is Active. This is certainly not an easy to obtain situation - you need it to be active (blue) but also not carrying creeper.

  • Even on 64 zoom speed zoom is weirdly slow. (Another artificial limit?) I think you are confused by the SCROLL rate sliders - these are not ZOOM rate sliders
    I see, is there a way to edit zoom speed? It requires 7 whole scrolls of the wheel to go from zoomed out to zoomed in for me, and from zoomed in to out it takes 16(!)
  • In the controls menu you select "Mouse Wheel: " Zooms, but then the speed selection is "Bump scroll rate" Why the difference? 'Bump' is bumping against the edge of the screen to scroll - it has nothing to do with zoom
    I see, my mistake. Is there then no way to change the zoom speed?
No way to edit zoom speed


  • No way to turn off "smooth scrolling" (?) I don't know what this is
    Both in the UI and for the camera the game forces you to scroll "smoothly" between steps I turn this off in applications since it makes me nauseous.

Ah, no way to adjust this that I am aware of.


  • Check boxes versus radio buttons: Radio buttons are typically used for mutually exclusive groups of options. I think checkboxes are the appropriate choice here.
    Actually for a lot of options that I meant they are mutually exclusive, like game speed, Windowed or Full-screen mode, and Right Click and Left Click option selection.
    Weirdly the game does have radio buttons for the Antialiasing setting.

I also took a look at this more after I replied, and I agree it is not consistent, but certainly servicable.


  • When I have a unit open I cannot move anything. (Not sure if counts for all units) This is because you have a unit 'selected'. 'Space' will deselect the unit. The alternative implementation here would be that clicking would select the new unit - personally I would accidently click too often for this to be a solution I'd recommend
    Clicking is only used for UI and selection right? So I'd say that a click on anything that cannot be selected is a good way of un-selecting. But I get your angle.

Clicking is for 'choosing a unit' (from the field or from unit pane) or 'moving/placing' selected unit. My perspective is that if I am currently 'moving/placing' I don't want to accidentally 'choose' if I click at/near an existing unit.


  • this seems like a github issue to me
    Should I make an issue in this case? (And for some of the others?)

I will create github issues for the 2-4 things that I mentioned - I will link them in a reply after I create them. If you want to create additional issues for other items - that is your prerogative. Be aware that I believe it is likely that updates to this game may end soon - so they may not be implemented.


  • The TERP mission springs to mind, but really any mission. The text is big, doesn't (appear to) scale with zoom. That kinda stuff. For the users I think the easier and least invasive as well as least subject to forgetting would be to fade when the camera is closer. And have it fade 100% when parts of the text fall from the edge of the screen.

I see, no amount of scrolling or rotating gets that text out of the way; but once you build a terp it does remove itself.


  • Inline "Info" icon is very pixelated. I maximized the UI scale and I don't notice this, it looks no more or less pixelated than other text.
    I have a 1080P monitor and as far as I know, I have no changes to any scaling. I think it's clear that the circle around the I is pixelated a lot more than the Totem or Pylon.

I think can almost see what you're talking about here, but when ever I zoom in using windows magnifier or by changing the game's UI scale, it is clearly not present. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that one