Topic: Battalian Wars Online?

[Mario]

http://revolution.ign.com/articles/692/692479p2.html

Seems so. IGN supposedly have "insider information" that Battalion Wars for Revolution is in development, and will have online play. I haven't played Butt Warz yet, but a lot of people thought it would be awesome with multiplayer, this seems like a good move. Thoughts?  

[Artimus]

They said as much in their interview with the developer a while ago, I believe.

[Smash_Brother]

I'd never lose at Butt Warz.

Never.

[BlkPaladin]

I like the game, and yeah that the biggest thing missing from the game. It was too bad the orginal didn't have a multiplayer. If this game is as good production wise as the other one it will be a must buy.

[Ceric]

I agree it's a good game unless you have an old Cube.  If you have an old Cube like me it will mess up on a regular basis.  The graphics vertices go everywhere everything else is fine though but it makes it unplayable.  Battalion Wars is one of the reasons I can't wait for Rev.  The backward compatibility means that I can play the game through without the headaches.

[trip1eX]

Wel this game should play alot better with the Rev controller.  Battalion Wars had some promise but it had some medicore awkward controls that were a bit of a turn off.  

Also there was some disconnect on exactly what you were supposed to do in the game.  Sometimes it seemed like you got different results for the same orders.  

[Pale]

I disagree completely.  I think the orders system of Batallion Wars was brilliant in its simplicity.  One button for stay here.  One button for follow me.  One button for go get 'em.  On top of that, if NPCs were getting shot at, they would react in their own way.  This, to me, added realism.  If you failed to set up a proper plan, all hell can break loose during an attack.

The game really didn't receive as much credit as it should have.  Granted, I haven't finished it yet as I had to put it on hold to go crazy on Tales of Phantasia for my first PGC review, but from what I played, I had a blast.

The only thing about the game that leaves a bad taste in my mouth is how often I feel like it would be awesome to play multiplayer.  If the Rev fixes that and adds online, I think we've got a hit on our hands, or at the very least, a solid near-launch title.

[trip1eX]

Quote
Originally posted by: Pale
I disagree completely.  I think the orders system of Batallion Wars was brilliant in its simplicity.  One button for stay here.  One button for follow me.  One button for go get 'em.   .

Oh so the strength of the game was its controls???  Come on that's bs.  Your simplicity argument sounds good on paper. But in reality you had to cycle thru the groups of units to find the group you wanted to give an order to.  And everytime you wanted to change the order you can again had to cycle thru the groups.  What a pain in the ass.  Not to mention they had some weird funky scenario where certain orders would override orders for every other unit (I forget the exact nature of this, but it was there.)

It was also a pain in the ass to say take 4 troopers and individually send each one to a turret or something.  You had to find the group.  Then go to guy #1 and then try and lock on to the turret and then send him over there.  Rinse and repeat for each trooper.  And if you're lucky you don't accidently call them all back out of their turrets during the process.

Nah the controls were a pain in the ass.  They did the best they could given the input system they had to work with, but .....nah...

the REv controller will be much better for this game.  You'll be able to directly point at ithe con for a group of units, click a button to select them and then point exactly where you want them to go and click the button again to send them there.  

The fact the controller will let you look around a 3d battlefield so much more fluidly will dramatically help a game like this.  It should make using the camera more easier.  

Also aiming will be much more fun.  It wasn't too fun trying to get a lock on a certain enemy target amid a group of various enemies.  Nah this time you'll be able to point and click.  And you'll actually be doing aiming not selecting auto-targets.  

If they kept the same gui  scheme then one will be able to point at a trooper or pick out an individual trooper on the icon on the bottom of the screen.  Then you'll be able to easily aim at where I want the trooper to go.  

No cycling or fiddling around the controls.  Just point and click.  

With a Rev controller too the possibility of grouping different units together and forming a number of combined arms groups just became a reality.  The accuracy and precise nature of the control should let one pick out individual units and add them to a numbered group.  It should also just let you easily lasso all your units together and march them to any point on the map.  It should let you say click on a trooper to select it and then click on a tank if you want that trooper to defend the tank.

In the end the Rev controller will make this type of game a real pleasure to play on a console.  You'll be fighting much less with the controls and it will be much easier to pick up and play.  

 

[Ian Sane]

Point and click sounds like a pretty good way to control this game but I see an issue and this applies to the remote in general.  What if I have lousy aim?  With a mouse it is really easy to point where you want because you have the cursor.  With a touchscreen you're touching the thing you want to point at.  But with the remote you're going to be sitting a ways back from the TV on your couch.  Isn't that going to make it much harder to be precise with pointing?  You're going to need good aim.  You're going to need lightgun game skills.  Now it's all based on how individual games are designed but that sounds kind of hard to do.

[Requiem]

What the hell are you talking about? As with any computer game, you'll have a mouse-like pointer on-screen at all times. I've never played the game, but if they were to include point and click mechanics, I'm sure you'll have a pointer on-screen at all times.

It's easy to move a mouse precisely because you can always see how a certian movement affects your aim. It'll be the same with the REV.

From what I've seen of the game, I think they should employ two modes of play. For instance, when your out on the battlefield on foot fighting for your life, a some what zoomed out over the shoulder view with a little laser to aim would work the best. You could run and gun with ease.

As for giving orders, a certain button would pull up an image map of your troops. The top right would be your on-foot troops, while the top left would be air, and so on. You then aim with the pointer on screen to the approriate square then give the orders.

Again, I haven't played the game, but from what I gathered I think this could work well.  

[Ian Sane]

You're right.  It could just have a cursor.  I was thinking too much like a TV remote.

[Artimus]

Quote
Originally posted by: Ian Sane
You're right.  It could just have a cursor.  I was thinking too much like a TV remote.

I wonder at times whether you even understand the Revmote concept.

[Pale]

I don't think anyone really understands the Revmote concept.  There are going to be just as many people who understated it as their are people who overstated it.

I personally have never used a gyro mouse that actually worked well enough to translate into an action game like Batallion Wars.  Maybe Nintendo's will blow all those others away, who knows, but thinking that you are going to be able to rapidly pick out one gunner in a crowd and then send him to another place may be a little too optimistic.

I don't think precise pointing is going to be the revolution.  It is going to be about feel and gesture like movements.

[Smash_Brother]

Quote
Originally posted by: Pale
I don't think precise pointing is going to be the revolution.  It is going to be about feel and gesture like movements.

I think it had better be.

They already intend to make use of it with Metroid Prime 3 and a launch or near-launch FPS from N-Space. If the thing cannot aim accurately and QUICKLY, it's worthless.

[Pale]

That is actually exactly what I am talking about.  Aiming in an fps is like using gesture movements because the whole view pain will move, keeping your center still in the middle of the screen.  Putting a cursor on the screen and actually trying to click things is much more difficult.

Edit for more thoughts:
Have you ever played with a laser pointer?  I mean, those are technically perfect if you think about it.  Even using a laser pointer it would be difficult to click on things as if you were using a mouse.

[Ian Sane]

"They already intend to make use of it with Metroid Prime 3"

Am I the only person left that still doesn't want Metroid Prime to be a first person shooter?  If it doesn't play like one then why does it have to control like one?

"I wonder at times whether you even understand the Revmote concept."

I thought the concept was to make it look like a television remote so as to not scare away non-gamers who apparently find controllers intimidating.

[Ceric]

Just keep a Psuedo autolock.  When your in the general area of a character have it highlight or when your shooting at the general area of a enemy hit it.  In a game like Battalion Wars I really don't think that precision be to much an issue.  Most of the characters are a fairly good size and there isn't a system to due realistic damage.  You just do the same damage whether you shoot his pinky or his head.  I mean it would definitely make driving the vehicles a little easier with a better abstraction of  gun and steering.

[Guitar Smasher]

"I thought the concept was to make it look like a television remote so as to not scare away non-gamers who apparently find controllers intimidating."

Oh come on, don't play dumb just to prove your point (whatever it is?).  If that was the case, why would they include motion control?

[trip1eX]

The Rev controller isn't just a gyro mouse tho.  It's more than raise it up/down/left/right.  



Here's a few quotes from the IGN hands-on:

"Demo #1: Point and Shoot
Like a laser pointer, the main controller was used to move a simple cursor on the TV screen and shoot square blocks for points. It was simple, merely colored lines in 2D, but effective. It was easy to get a feel for just how sensitive the device is -- it responded to all the movements quickly and smoothly. We did feel the need to use two hands, however, to steady it and improve accuracy, but that only lends to the idea of just how sensitive it is."

Now of course I can already see the reply.  Someone is going to post and say, 'See, the thing will be shakey."  That's a decent point.  But that can easily be programmed out just adjusting like the dead spot on an analog stick.  And as the quote above said it only shows the sensitivity of the controller.  Also 'shakeyness' is what you get when actually aim in real-life.  That's the 'challenge' of shooting a gun for instance.  To hold steady.  Shakeyness also doesn't mean the screen will shake.  It's also not like analog sticks are immune from the shakeyness of trying to aim a cursor.

"Demo #3: Shock Stick
Like the first, this was to show how you can point and move something. It was a bit like the board game Operation, only instead of navigating tweezers you navigated a rotating stick through a two-dimensional cave. The skill was to keep a steady hand, collect coins, and avoid hitting the walls. Small springboards on the side would change the direction of the spin of the stick, which aided in creating a strategy for navigating around things."

Here's a few quotes from the 1-up hands on.

"DEMO: BLOCK BUSTER
A firing-range-like contest where two players compete to see who can shoot randomly appearing squares first. Aiming is done by pointing the controller itself at different points on screen, pulling the B trigger to fire.
IMPRESSIONS: A great demonstration of how intuitive the controller can be-pointing it to aim felt perfectly natural, right from the very first second, just like with a light gun. It always shot exactly where it felt like I was aiming, and was incredibly responsive to even slight wrist movements-I barely had to move my hand at all."

"DEMO: IRRITATING STICKS
Two players guide rotating sticks through a side-scrolling maze of tunnels and moving obstacles, gathering coins and avoiding touching the walls. (A lot like the PS1 game Irritating Stick, and exactly like the import-only GBA game Kuru Kuru Kururin.)
IMPRESSIONS: Another demo that needed no explanation, you just "got" it immediately-move the controller in whatever direction you want the stick to go. As a 2D game that requires exact movement (the caves get really narrow in parts), this one reinforced how precise and steady the controller's movement detection can be. Another interesting tidbit-if your controller fell outside the detection "box," the demo had an arrow pointing off the edge of the screen in that direction so you could get it back in the correct space."



The promise of the controller is more precise and accurate movement along with being inviting.  The media hands-on acounts point to greater accuracy and precision.  

It would be pretty pointless if it didn't deliver on this.  Pardon the pun.  

IT's also rather pointless to just say well the controller might suck and thus it might suck for those games.  Well thank you for pointing out the obvious.  Yes there's always that chance that Nintendo bet their console (and all their future & current console franchises) on a controller that totally sucks.


     

[Ian Sane]

"Oh come on, don't play dumb just to prove your point (whatever it is?). If that was the case, why would they include motion control?"

Isn't that what Nintendo said inspired the whole idea?  The whole controller is designed to make gaming more inviting to non-gamers.  It may improve games or offer more functionality but the non-gamers thing seems to be the underlying concept of the whole thing.  They included motion control because they feel it's a more intuitive way to control games for someone unfamiliar with current controllers.  It all relates to the blue ocean strategy.  I've never heard Nintendo say anything about the remote design without reference to non-gamers.

[Guitar Smasher]

The controls are going to be more intuitive for everyone, gamers and non-gamers alike.  I'm sure Reggie's said something to the likes of this.

[Pale]

Alright, lets try not to derail this into just another Rev argument.  Those are in too many threads as it is...

I know I'm partially to blame.