I was thinking that it would be cool to have a form of currency in the game that you could use to buy special towers and upgrades, like range and fire speed. Heres my ideas for it:
1. You would gain it from completing Missions (Story or otherwise)
2. You could use it to purchase special towers and upgrades for towers you already have.
3. You could get more from special missions (Conquest, Special Ops, Custom, etc)
What do you think?
Its much too far along in the game to be adding in something that complex. It would also mean that you would have to figure out how much each map would be worth and with custom maps that would be very difficult to do.
Could you use the CW3 suggestions redux instead of using a new thread each time ;) . Great suggestions :D , it's easier if they're all hubbed in one location. Currency would get a bit complicated, especially since the value of a currency can change relatively , if it stayed constant I think number 2 could be one but 3 sound a bit hindersome.
As much as I wish for CW3 to be released already, I doubt that there is such a thing as a game being "too far along". (Two words: major updates)
About the currency: I'd like to wait and see how the whole upgrading system will work in the new game. Will it be similar to CW1, CW2 or something new?
A currency somehow add's a step where none is required. You simply unlock and gain new units by completing missions. No need to go to a shop first.
If at all, I'd opt for an achievement system ("story completed", "1k cusom levels won", "1 million billion ammo packets delivered", etc.) that would unlock new features, e.g. maps, graphics, game modes (double down after completing the story).
Both ways, achievements and currency, would make the game rather grindy. If you want to restrict players access to units and upgrades, make the restriction beating a certain map. That's it.
It's not really that far-fetched to add something like this. After all, we still expect that a tech tree is coming, and that will require a resource or currency. Even if that 'currency' turns out to be the technology itself that you find on various maps. (A rose by any other name . . . )
Hello Mapmaster and welcome to the forums. I do believe that I've heard Virgil consider something along the lines of "skill points" that may bear close resemblance to your currency idea. It has been a while, and I'm not sure where he's at with that idea right now. The development of CW3 has taken a few strange twists and turns, with the implementation of CRPL being one of them.
Right now Virgil feels a little under pressure to get the game more ready and I'm not sure what features will end up on the floor of the cutting room.... I do know that Virgil has begin to anticipate a update release of the game sometime after being released, so features that are of interest and fits in with the game's development once it has been released may be implemented in that.
Some other ideas may also be held over for a future game, or just end up being held... :) SOme of my suggestions to Virgil for CW1 actually made an appearance in CW3, which was a happy occasion. SOme, even though Virgil liked them, are still in his "features list." :( C'est la vie.
If you get the chance tell Virgil there is absolutely no pressure, time is not of the essence and the more refined it is the better. Sacrifice of patience is a little thing to give in return for a well debugged and unraveled game. Besides we have plenty of CW2 custom maps and CW1 maps to catch our fancy :)
Also Mapmaster forget my first post it is irrelevant.
I think the idea fo a currency is a good one I just doubt it would be incorperated right now. Virgil attempts to incorperate specific themes into CW games and that might mess wiht the theme. Also would there be a shopkeeper and who would the shopkeeper be? There tends to be a lot of complex elements to adding a currency.
I have been enjoying your thoughts and hope to hear more :)
Quote from: Chawe800 on January 04, 2013, 02:32:39 PM
I think the idea fo a currency is a good one I just doubt it would be incorperated right now. Virgil attempts to incorperate specific themes into CW games and that might mess wiht the theme. Also would there be a shopkeeper and who would the shopkeeper be? There tends to be a lot of complex elements to adding a currency.
I have been enjoying your thoughts and hope to hear more :)
I believe the OP was along the lines of the "currency" earned in some Flash games on Kongregate, for instance. There are some Penguin games where the penguin has to learn to fly, and then for each completed flight the penguin earns a certain amount of money to buy stuff in an in-game shop that improves his ability to fly further, longer, higher and faster...
Also in Gemcraft, for instance, ever level one wins allows one to gain XP and with more XP one can increase one's skills to enhance the player's ability.
The main difference between upgrades in existing versions of CW and the games I mention is persistence. In CW games (up to now) one always starts with a level field. One can get in-game upgrades, but at the beginning all players have the same attributes.
The OP refers to a system of persistent upgrades. Which has been mentioned and has possibilities, but also drawbacks.
As long as its not a system of borderline impossible to reach goals - but you can buy coins to get there faster - model like a lot of Apple and Android games I like the idea of persistent upgrades.
Are you talking about a cash-currency, where users can pay cash for 'premium' weapons?
Having to pay cash after already purchasing the game is kind of a rip off. And i don't think that virgil would do something like that because it would ruin the point of the game. Being able to purchase the 'premium' weapons makes the game go faster but makes it boring. Having normal upgrades in the game similar to those in the past can make the game fun and allow for more difficult maps. Having to purchase 'premium upgrades just to finish a map is stupid because barely any of the players here want to have to pay money just to finish one difficult map.
Usually, that premium stuff isn't needed to complete the game . . . it's basically a dev-authorized 'cheat mode' weapon.
I do agree that I don't really want to see them here, though.
Quote from: lurkily on January 06, 2013, 02:05:13 PM
Usually, that premium stuff isn't needed to complete the game . . . it's basically a dev-authorized 'cheat mode' weapon.
I do agree that I don't really want to see them here, though.
Although it's not usually needed to complete the game, a lot of times they make it so that you have to grind out the coins (Or other type of token) by replaying the earlier levels so frequently that by the time you grind out enough of the things to progress, the game is no longer fun. I really hate games like that. I'd rather just pay a fixed price for a game and get the complete game. When they artificially slow down progress so much that the currency feels mandatory if you want to actually enjoy the game, then as far as I'm concerned, even if the game is technically completable, it's still crippled.
Quote from: asmussen on January 06, 2013, 05:31:32 PMAlthough it's not usually needed to complete the game, a lot of times they make it so that you have to grind out the coins (Or other type of token) by replaying the earlier levels so frequently that by the time you grind out enough of the things to progress, the game is no longer fun.
I'm not talking about that . . . I'm talking about things you can get only through cash, not through play.
When you can basically buy currency that you can get through the course of the game, you're not actually implementing a currency - what you're really doing is asking the player to get a paid subscription to being successful in the game.
If you have ever played games by Kabam. Those games make you pay money to get more resources, troops, gem/crystals, speed ups. That is the thing we don't want with Creeper World overall.
Exactly - it's an ongoing cost to do well. A paid subscription to success. It's the game dev's attempt to generate ongoing income in a game that they can advertise as free to play. They want the benefits of subscription cost along with the larger number of players you can get when your game is advertised as being free.
As I said before, I agree that I don't want to see such things here.
CW2's technytes were probably my preferred method of advancing in tech, as you could feed them into whatever it was that made your particular approach to the game work, and adjust them for the level in question (lots of tight twisty tunnels? probably going for ROF/movement/packet speed over range upgrades). There's a few ways these could be applied, though.
*Single level implementation: classic CW2. Feeding packets into a research lab generates technytes, these get used to buy upgrades that apply during that mission.
*Single level implementation, unlocking: CW2 with a twist, technytes can be used to buy upgrades like CW2, but some structures (bertha, for example?) might require "geological analysis" or some other technyte investment before they're usable on a particular level (essentially allowing map creators to prevent the usage of certain structures in the early game by assigning them a technyte cost to unlock, an assigned cost of 0 meaning that the structure is unlocked by default).
*Campaign arc implementation with or without unlocking: within a particular "campaign" technytes are earned for completing missions and/or picking up collectible bits/salvage during missions. These can be spent for upgrades/structure unlocks that persist throughout the campaign/string of missions, or at least that chapter of a campaign. If the galaxy map is a "spiral galaxy" where you travel down different arms, each arm might be a seperate campaign/chapter for purposes of handling what's unlocked within them.
I don't really see Player-level upgrades that persist as long as you don't reset the game data being all that much fun, as there's really not a lot of replay value (for me at least) to going back and playing an early level with a ton of upgrades I didn't have the first time.
What if you had an 'overall technyte' level, and you could 'implement' different upgrades per map - so one map you could have all speed upgrades, and then the next, you could take just level 1 speed, and somthing else - but it would cost the same. As you earned more technytes, you could get more upgrades for furture maps.
My preference is to use campaign-wide resources to unlock technology to advance as you progress. Unlock new technologies and access to new upgrades step by step via artifacts or nanites, then use something more rate based and less restricted in the game - plain old energy would do for me, as long as it was a continuous cost.
When it comes to advancements, I would like to see different kinds of research buildings that do different kinds of upgrade procedures like different buildings in the starcraft series are able to research different upgrades over time. At the same time, different upgrades could be implemented. In CW2, I did not appreciate how a bunch of buildings could research upgrades for ANYTHING at once and become a matter of paying for different things at different times.
'Research points are a simple way to simulate time spent on research. Research still took time. It's just that the time was spent before aquiring the points instead of after them.
Honestly, I think we're getting close to too many basic units in CW3 already. If there is a way to fold multiple research structures into one building, that would be preferable to me.
How about two settings for the same building for it to either research economy things or military things? Not sure about specifics, but the player could then choose the exact bonus acquired from this, like the categories of research in CW1.
I still agree with all research being 'local', meaning that you start with none on all missions. It just seems to work better.
Units, of course, would be unlocked over the campaign, and their availability would be customised on all other maps.
Quote from: hoodwink on January 09, 2013, 11:52:07 AM
I still agree with all research being 'local', meaning that you start with none on all missions. It just seems to work better.
Units, of course, would be unlocked over the campaign, and would availability would be customised on all other maps.
I wholeheartedly agree to this statement. Just a level playing field regarding times and scores demands this, other reasons not even considered.
I'd like to clarify that I can't really favor unit-by-unit upgrades as I have in the past. I can't think of any possible way to handle unit-by-unit upgrades that doesn't turn into micromanagement by the player.
Quote from: hoodwink on January 09, 2013, 11:52:07 AM
How about two settings for the same building for it to either research economy things or military things? Not sure about specifics, but the player could then choose the exact bonus acquired from this, like the categories of research in CW1.
Just the point I have tried to make here. I hope to see research conducted for different categories, but not from the same exact building with the same exact purpose. Suppose tech domes were reintroduced and they could either research, as you say, economy or military things at different times. What ever is the final product by the research buildings, I pray it does not be allowed to grant the choice to upgrade the economy or military of your base at the same time and after the research is done. I personally think that the choice should be made sooner than CW2 allows with its research style.
Quote from: 4xC on January 10, 2013, 10:47:37 AMWhat ever is the final product by the research buildings, I pray it does not be allowed to grant the choice to upgrade the economy or military of your base at the same time and after the research is done. I personally think that the choice should be made sooner than CW2 allows with its research style.
I really think you're getting a bit hard-core about it. It's my opinion that CW3 is first and foremost a casual game, where Starcraft is defined by the burden of many complex decisions and many discrete actions that have to be addressed quickly.
I also think that demonstrations of what mainstream gaming does should show a company like KC where they should try to do things differently, not where they should try to emulate companies like Blizzard.
I really think we need to avoid overcomplicating the tech tree. Catering to casual players, I think you want strategic depth, while remaining as straightforward as you can be in areas like this.
I do indeed prefer strategic depth, but I hope this does not go too imbasic either. All I really expect is for as many areas of previous games as possible to be improved through the latest one.
And yeah, if something has recognizable hints of RTS in its gaming genre, I will get hard-core about its potential.
And its not emulation of Blizzard I am asking for. I was suggesting that CW3 should take a few pages out of their book. I mean, look how far along their games are. CW could rise close to their level with its capabilities.
Quote from: 4xC on January 11, 2013, 07:41:03 AM. . . its not emulation of Blizzard I am asking for. I was suggesting that CW3 should take a few pages out of their book.
And I'm saying that CW should be reading Blizzard's book to see how they can try something unusual and fresh, rather than recycling the useful pages. Starcraft adheres to very old, tried-and-true standards, standards that create a very respectable, but very predictable game experience.
I don't think CW should aspire to the capability of Starcraft or Age of Empires - whatever that means. (Commercial success? Mechanical complexity?)
It's not built to appeal to masses, it's built because it's what the dev loves. Since it's built on concepts that weren't looking to be every man's perfect game, it's always going to remain niche, to a degree. It'll never be the commercial equal of a mass-marketed game, in my opinion, not if it wants to keeps the elements that the fans of today's CW love so much.
I'm pretty sure V's quite capable of designing a game with complexity on par with starcraft, but in a casual game a dev should be more concerned with what complexity the game can do without.
Starcraft is much more for hardcore fans, people who know the genre, and are willing to work to master the structure and operating of a game that will reward them in the long run. Casual gamers are better served with something they can jump into. Ideally they should be able to jump in, play, and be able to understand the full the use of every concept within a couple minutes of first encountering it. All without ever having to read tutorial text.
Quote from: lurkily on January 11, 2013, 08:08:10 AM
Starcraft adheres to very old, tried-and-true standards, standards that create a very respectable, but very predictable game experience.
Starcraft
set these standards.
Nonetheless I agree to the rest of your statement. To exaggerate just a tiny bit: Asking CW to be closer to Starcraft in some aspects is like asking CW to be closer to Super Mario in others. Okay, okay. CW and Starcraft are both RTS games, and Mario isn't. But still CW is almost as far from Starcraft as it s from Mario.
No - starcraft just did them best. I played the original starcraft upon its release. It did not innovate - it only recycled what had come before, and did it better than anybody else did. Microsoft'd.
EDIT: I see the confusion. By standards, I mean established design or methodology, not a level of quality. For instance, FPS games almost always have a 'health' system, which is a standard that is often tweaked, but rarely does a FPS use a different system entirely.
I don't think CW is really so far from starcraft in nature. I think it is very far from its intent though. Starcraft is trying to capture every corner of the hardcore RTS market. It's very mainstream. CW doesn't try and pretend that it can capture every corner of the casual market. Instead, it presents the experience it sets out to present the best it can, and trusts that there are fans who will appreciate what the developer is trying to do.