New Player Feedback - Legitimate

I actually really like the jumping. To me the "charging" aspect of holding down the spacebar compliments the combat system. The charging of the deck cards is very similar and once a new player has mastered the charging for jumping learning about charging the deckcards is the same way make sense. Its really nice and to me doesn't feel too much like a platform / ultima 8 style game...

 

It would be great if a little triangle indicator appeared in 3D space over your target's nameplate, including players. This is what FFXI does, and sometimes it's the only way to find out where the damn mob is hiding.

But the worst thing about jumping isn't jump-on-release, it's that you don't jump at all when you have forward motion being stopped by an obstacle in front of you... like a step in the ground that's too high to count as stairs. The other day when I complained, I called it "toe glue", so I'm going to use that term again. I understand why double jumps were a problem, so they prevented jumping unless you were on level ground, even though it's the leading cause of needing /stuck. But I never understood the point of "toe glue" preventing jumps.

I would be much happier if jump was on press, and you kept it held down longer while jumping to "charge" it. And if there was no "toe glue".

 

The Jump thing is not at all intuitive, I have yet to meet someone who hasn't missed some aspect of it outside the select few who enjoy jumping puzzles and thus have learned it the hard way through hours of trial and error.
So even veterans who has been here since the chicken room can usually be taught a thing or two about jumping.

For the platform jumping quests in game you need to know:
Space release = low jump
Hold Up Key + Space release = low short jump
Space release + doubletap Up key + continue holding Up key = low long jump
Space hold, if released before 'squatting' = low jump
Space hold + wait till sqatting + Space release = high jump
Hold Up key + Space hold + wait till sqatting + Space release = jogging short high jump (but doesn't work jumping over stuff if too close)
Space hold + wait till sqatting + Space release + hold up key = short high jump (works on jumping over too close stuff)
Space hold + wait till squatting + doubletap Up key + hold Up key + Space release + release Up key just when landing = controlled long high jump without overshoot
Doubletap Up key + Hold Up key + Space hold + wait till sqatting + Space release = sprinting long high jump with overshoot (again doesn't work if too close to stuff)

etc, the list continues.

In the "Welcome Outlander" lot in Soltown I have a practice track set up. I'd guesstimate less than 5% of new arrivals get past the first bits and only about 50% can even get to the more sofisticated part. Simply due to the timing+dexterity it takes.


Mind you I like the jumping puzzle thingies and I like the skill of it.

But user friendly it ain't and intuitive it ain't.

Compare this to ordinary platform games like Mario where it is much more intuitive with only one button.

 

I've lost more exp to jumping misses and then falling then I have from monsters lol. Jumping is defiantly a challenge in this game so maybe a tutorial would be helpful such as a jump zone with air vents below them so that if fall from the high jump practices you don't die. Once you learn the system however it can make certain pvp zones quite entertaining especially with the elevation bonus to damage. OH and @Spoon thanks for that list I pinned it in my guild channel for new players )

 

Not to forget double tap space, release then double tap up, plus press ! and ? with your nose. Then use your feet to press ESC and / at the same time! After that, press left and right, right, left, left and right plus U and then hold Return for exactly 0.765 seconds. Release and press R followed by Shift. Then press F5 and hold Space again. This is the Uber Jump which puts to shame all other jump methods

 

Argh - but that list isn't even complete!
I just wrote that as a starting point to showcase that the system is very very complex and not easy to know/learn.

However feel free to send folks to that Jumping Training Course in Soltown.
It is in the back of the "Welcome Outlander" lot, just ask the towncrier for "Spoon".

 

There's a very important distinctions between:

• using the tools available
• role-playing (or trying to anyways).
• not being intuitive enough despite the knowledge.

Just because the "tools" are available, doesn't make it "good design" as a good designer will weave those tools into something the players can not only easily understand but also easily execute. The ability to control one's character is possibly the most important aspect in player's perception of "game feel"; SotA fails in this regard.

The problem with this mindset is that it only looks at extremes as possible outcomes. Asking for proper directions is not the same as needing quest markers. Having better jumping controls doesn't mean that it suddenly becomes Super Mario Bros. Whenever the jumping in this state is intended or not is irreverent.

Also, that's insinuating that the supposed "other games" are bad... or that SotA needs to differentiate from them.

It isn't about the jumping as it is how the devs essentially handles every aspect of the game. Whenever it's questing, fighting, crafting, looting, etc; it doesn't feel good. It clearly highlights one of the many issues with game has on a fundamental level. They are items on a checklist. Things that Richard Garriott claims he prefers to inject "fun" AFTER the features are added in... and it clearly shows.

I don't care. Much like you wouldn't care if I said I feel embarrassed to be associated with elitists who think they're above other people. It doesn't do anything to the subject at hand.

The problem is that some of us ARE willing to read and WE have a problem with how it's laid out and it's even more frustrating when other members of the community are putting us in the same bucket as the "lazy ones".

What about the possibility that the developers might be lazy? When does that factor in the equation? A dev that just slaps documentation and say "the tool's there; use it!" leaving the community to blame the players who don't read as being lazy. That is not good design. The best games have always been those that taught players through game-play; not through loading tips, tutorials and documentation. SotA doesn't need to be the "best game" but it still needs to play well WITH the knowledge gained. It doesn't.

That's not to mention the many times the game has given me reasons to not care about the dialogue.

------

Because whenever the user is using the tools or not is irreverent. Any developer worth their salt should know that when a player has a problem (regardless of the reasons), that needs to be looked into. There's also a distinction between looking into an issue and changing something. Any dev's goal is to make the best possible game ever... and dismissing complaints is the exact opposite of that goal.

"I don't have a problem" has no meaning to the conversation other than to confirm that you don't share the OP's thoughts on a given subject.

The tools are there to grind, does that mean that no one should complain about the grinding because "they're not willing to use the tools available"? You know, I could spam AoEs non-stop but I'd rather play an role-playing game.

"Maybe this isn't the game for you", you might ask... well, this feedback wasn't for you. It's not on you to tell us that we're wrong, but it's definitely on us to tell the devs how we feel. We can have a discussion, debate, argument on the subject matter but not on whenever or not the opinion is "legit".

 

I think we need to get away from the attacking people who are clearly trying to help make the game more appealing to the outsiders.
This game does NOT have a easy entry level, nor should it, but this game as opposed to Ultima Online is not defining the MMORPG genre.

It's already been defined. This game is doing something different, but now your targetting 35+ year olds who have been playing older RPGS for a longer time and can still appreciate some of the antiquities that this game has.

This cannot be your target if you are looking to make this game successful, and you can't be lashing at people who are clearly giving you what outside feedback is from other people.

I'm sure @DarkStarr and @Lord British are trying to have the most amount of people on that they possibly can.

However, this doesn't mean change the entire concept of the game to meet the standards of today's game. But it does mean, change to things that people have been accustomed to for 20 years already.

As the OP originally stated, this includes the Jumping. I get it might be different and whatever, but it is something so engraved in players brains already that it does have a turn off to alot of people, and it also makes it feel less responsive being on key release.

I don't think its worth doing it like that for the sake of some puzzles, its honestly just not worth it. Its better for the game to feel as smooth and responsive as possible, and the jump charging honestly does not help in that regard.

I am constantly stating that in a game today, especially in the age of youtube and twitch, you need to win the player over for just about an hour.
Get them to invest 1 hour playing the game, and the player retaining levels will be much higher.
All this advertising and promoting will do no good to anyone if you can't retain these players.
Games that take advantage of this free advertising do extremely well.
And you don't have to rebuild the game, you just need to make things more fluid, smooth, and intuitive.

The first things people see are movement, scenery, combat, and new player presentation.

If we're being completely honest...
Movement: Transition Animations need definite improvement.
Scenery: Absolutely beautiful
Combat: Only needs some sound improvements, charging mechanic animation so its visible when charging an ability, and anmation transitions.
New Player Presentation: Its a bit different the way quests and the chat dialogue is layed out here. However, I can dig it, but it does get stale pretty quickly. Maybe thats my own quirk with it, but its definitely something thats targetting old school rpg players, and def not new ones.


I'm also one of those guys like the OP had stated, kickstarted, followed the game logging in through 20 or so releases, every time, waiting for it to get to a point where I am OK with movement fluidity, and it hasn't. So I'm still waiting. And I'm in the same boat as the OP as well, none of my friends will give this game a look, and we all played UO for over 10 years, the one person I got to log on and play with me gave up after 30 minutes because movement felt poor and the jumping turned him off.

There's a lot of people like me. The game could be absolutely great, but people won't play a game when you don't like the movement in it. But at least for me it doesn't mean that I just log off and never come back to this game, I understand the vision but I am trying to get devs to polish the areas that need polish.

N to the people who are unwilling to accept change to the game that they already like and refuse suggestions and improvements, this isn't about you, this about the game as a whole. The devs can't survive with 5-10k players total. You need to be willing to accept change in your game, so that this game can continue to actually be a game.

 

These two concepts are mutually exclusive.

 

After playing for 18 months or so, I just learned jump was on release lol (due to this thread) I had no idea, I normally just tap my spacebar to jump and didn't notice you can charge jump. Lot's of games have a learning curve, SotA is certainly no exception in that area lol. (steep learning curve) Some of the most fun MMOs I have ever played had a steep learning curve. SWG, AO, EQ, UO...I could go on and on. Either people like the game or they don't, if they rage quit over a jump mechanic I kinda feel they were going to rage quit or something as there is a steep learning curve.

 

I'd also like to point out that if the older die-hard backers can't even convince their own kids to play because of these issues - then we're shooting ourselves in the foot.

 

I don't think the argument here is the "learning curve". Its that there's some fundamental barriers to entry for most players.. Stop assuming the game is just "too hard" for people. The problem isn't the difficulty level. Almost every conversation I've had with anyone who I tried to get to play the game ends up talking about movement, in some way. The one friend I got to play the game logged off with me after 30 minutes for the same reasons and jumping.

If you didn't notice it was on key release, that means you aren't the type of player that visually sees the unresponsiveness of some stuff, like the delay then that the jump has because of it being on release and not press.

People are just not playing because the game doesn't have a good "feel" to it. And its hard to describe the way a "feel" is, but its there, and its a real thing. I've tried to sum it up the best I can in a different thread, but from what I've gathered, the "feel" isn't great because of the jumping on key release and the transitions between movement and combat animations.

That's about it, thats my and many others only barrier to entry, but its big enough to make us not want to play, not want to stream it, not want to youtube it, etc.
The general consensus is outside of whos already playing, people aren't wow'd by the movement here, and when thats happening, its not as fun to stream it, which means less free advertising, which means less people playing, and less people willing to give it a shot.

 

Not really.
EDIT
To clarify;
Key_down =initiate
If no key_up within Xms go to hold action
If key_up within Xms go to jump action.

Thus the user wouldn't 'feel' any delay.
EDIT

The main issue with the current implementation is that when holding something then the user expects the longer you hold the bigger the jump, but it isn't. Instead it is binary - Low/High. And the delay in holding is just to wait until the binary state of 'crouching=High' state has been reached. However that prep doesn't have to be in the key, could simply be in the avatar execution of the command.

My old suggestion way back when was to keep Movement behavior consistent.

IF all the other movement keys all have a tap and a double tap behavior.
THEN the consistent behavior of the jump key should be the same.
Tap to make a low jump.
Double tap to make a high jump.
Binary feature meet binary user input.

Which coincidentally is what a lot of platform games do so would be more intuitive for the user as well.

Where if you'd do Press+Hold and Double tap+hold, you would then activate the 'release' to jump behavior for better control.

Then combine that with the jog and sprint behavior and you pretty much cover all of the things we can do now but in a more exact and more intuitive way.
Where the precise movement would depend if you start the movement jog/sprint before or after the jump.

Easy peasy to explain in the manual as well.

 

Why should you have to be taught to do something unnatural, instead of fixing the thing to be more natural?

Holy crap, will there be a test? Will this be on a quick reference card? Can we customize those key mappings?

Maybe that's because it's much more hard and complicated than it has any right to be. And un-intuitive.

You forgot double tap space with Alt-F4! (Yeah, I know Alt-F4 doesn't quit the game SotA but it had to be done.)

I'm here to play a game about fantasy combat and economics and dance parties, not "master the 100 jumping key combinations". All I know is that the design gets in my way when I'm just trying to jump over things. Especially my #1 "toe glue" complaint. I'd rather be forced to go full PvP than have to learn 100 ways to jump, but the natural way is still broken.

Many of these are the very ones complaining about the jumping. (I know you were probably talking about quest markers, but still.)

Well that just makes it worse, if it's merely one of two values whether or not you hold it longer than some threshold time, and not even a function of the hold time, then why is it making us do this backwards "jump on release", and not "keep going up while held"?

I'm not aware of this being used by other games, is it supposed to be a thing these days? All I know is that basically all the classic video games from the '80s did jump-on-press.

 

Agreed.
Hence:

Would have been much better.



EDIT
Aha. I think I got the angle of your response.
My post was aimed at Barugon's post to showcase that the two was not mutually exclusive.
Hence the
Mutually exclusive = not really
But his quote only made sense by quoting your quote first.

So what you clearly read as disagreement was actually agreement which should have been clear in context.

 

And there's me sitting here reading @Elwyn 's response and mentally throwing "stop...no...wait....kill it... KILL IT" gestures at him...

 

You may be dismissive about my comments on people not understanding something without reading the manual. But this whole discussion about jumping not feeling "intuitive" or it's just not what people expect is just anti-innovation. The only real argument that seems to be put forward is that it's different from most games so people don't understand it. So, just because people are vocal about their dislike of a mechanic (that they often don't fully understand because they didn't read the manual) everyone that has no issue or actually enjoys this difference is irrelevant? Do we have to start a campaign to "Save the jump!"? I don't want every game to be designed only for people that will quit in the first hour because they struggle with learning basic functions. Jumping has been done differently in so many games. Why does this game have to do what other MMOs do just because that's what people are used to and is that the only reason it's not "intuitive"?

You are basically asking the devs to throw away their code for jumping and just make it when you press the jump button you go up. This can actually lead to issues like what the Elder Scrolls games have where you just jump up the side of mountain. That is why you can't jump when you're up against objects and terrain.

If you really want a suggestion that could be considered more "intuitive" is what Ultima IX did for jumping. You basically look where you want to jump. The farther you look away the farther the jump will be and it is jump on press.

 

In most of the MMOs that I have played, this is abused by gold farmers and newbies hunt around to turn it off.

 

The entire point is that your asking to be too "innovative". Too, "different". Its not about reading the manual. I will never in my life read a manual for a game, I may have in the year 1997, but I will never now, and neither will most people. You don't want to center a new game around the fact that your doing it super old, and read into everything first before you dive in, etc. This jumping stuff they are building isn't being innovating, its just being counter-intuitive.

Look at the purchase numbers.. Your not redefining an mmorpg genre, your PUSHING to be relevant in an era where games are struggling to become relevant. I mean, I don't get how developers don't understand this.

I mean, cmon. Say they have 20 developers on the team total (I have no idea how many they have). Say each of them make 50k average annually.
This game will have to make 1 million dollars annually JUST to keep people on the payroll. Do you think an MMORPG struggling to hit even 10k players online at once is going to hit that every year? This game is LAUNCHED and there's sub 900 people in discord atm. There's games that were on kickstarter that are still in alpha 1 and have 5k average that are mmorpgs. There's a serious problem here and we're pointing out the major issues, and your complaining that we're being anti-innovating, no we're just be real with the devs and the community.

I know you we're just talking about jumping right now, but its more than that in the grand scheme of things. Its people trying to hold onto this notion that this game needs to be completely different and that people who are trying to convince the staff and players that it needs some familiarity to the global MMO scene. Being completely different is great when it comes to story, the deck system, etc. It's nice, and its fresh, and its new. Not when it comes down to the core things that make a game familiar, so its easy to transition to from a different game.

This all ties in with your first impression of the game and when your first impression is ok, there's some kind of delay when jumping, and movement is a little clunky, and doesn't transition well, and combat animations are a little lacking... Well, its not a good first impression, its not good for retaining players, for recording gameplay on social media, etc.

 

I thought we were here to be innovative and different. I always thought that was what the Ultima games strive for.

Do you really think the developers just care about numbers and profit? Do you really think you know better than experienced game developers? Do you really think this game is designed to have even 100k players? You seem to just want them to forget about doing even the basics different and just homogenize with the top MMORPGs because being popular is more important to you. The developers created the jump system and other systems to be innovative and different. The "issues" you have with things like jumping seem to be part of the intended feel. We live in the age of games like Dark Souls that innovate on game-play and we all benefit from this. How do you feel about the jumping in that game?

A developer designs it a certain way so you play it a certain way. You don't care and just want it to be like games people are familiar with because that would be convenient for people.

Why does it need to be familiar? I wanted something that wasn't familiar.

Also, please think of the offline players.