[glob2-devel] bugs and features

[Gabriel Walt]

Hello,

I played quite a lot today, and here are a few beta test comments [keep 
in mind that I don't have the latest cvs but win32 alpha6]. If anyone 
doesn't agree with one of the suggestions or have a better idea, please 
tell it.

First the bugs:
- As already said, the game crashed once on loading a saved game.
- Some globules are sometimes trapped inside forbidden areas, this 
happened when I wanted to build new buildings.
- When wanting to build new buildings, the second area [space needed for 
future updates] is sometimes not drawn. Nct, note that I didn't use the 
GL acceleration but the bug appeared anyway!
- When placing a building completely in the black [not yet discovered 
ground] but just at the limit, the building doesn't get constructed, but 
a forbidden area appears without reason.
- And now a probably very windows specific bug: the settings are not 
saved. For instance I have to set fullscreen on again each time I start 
glob2.

Feature requests:
- The game menu appears when hitting ESC, but when hitting ESC again it 
should disappear again, instead of having to click on "return to game". 
By the way, I suggest that wherever you are in the game menu [for 
instance in the "alliances" or "options" sub-menu], when you hit ESC it 
returns to the game.
- In the game menu, I would place the alliance option first since it's 
probably the most used while playing. A more logical ordering would be: 
alliance, options, [space], load, save, [space], end the game, quit 
glob2, [space], return to game. Note also the "quit glob2" option that 
could be appreciable.
- The alliance menu is not clear enough, there should somewhere be a 
hint of what the different steps mean.
- While playing the "Settings" screen isn't accessible, only the music 
volume is available in an "Options" screen. Thus it's not possible to 
switch fullscreen/windowed mode while playing, this could be very 
appreciable. For tuning the display speed, the other display settings 
could also be useful to be available in the game menu.
- There should also be a tooltips for the forbidden area drawing mode.
- I find the middle mouse button scrolling too fast, could it be 
possible to make that the mouse has to move at least 2 pixels for moving 
the screen of one tile [this means two time slower scrolling].
- The units could have a DIE button, as the buildings have a destroy 
button. Probably easy to implement, but what do you think about the few 
gameplay implications? This could solve overpopulation situations and 
shorten the suffering of blocked units... ;)

And a little discussion about the flags and area drawing:
- Flags:
  - can be moved and scaled
  - can have a number of units assigned
  - can have options [what units are concerned]
- Areas:
  - can have any size and shape
  - are global so no units or unit options can be assigned

You chose to set flags for exploration, attack and clearing - and areas 
for forbidden areas. This is logic, but two things stay frustrating:
- it would be really cool to be able draw clearing areas too
- it could be useful to tell what units are forbidden from different 
areas [e.g. only workers]

Here is my suggestion for a better area mode:
- There are two kind of areas: clearing [green hatching] and forbidden 
[red hatching].
- There are two tools: draw and erase with different brushes.
- When you draw an area where no adjacent area already exists, it 
creates a new area. When you draw an area and begin drawing above or 
just aside [your brush "touches" the area] an existing area you enlarge 
the existing area.
- It would not be possible to have several areas layered [even clearing 
and forbidden areas cannot be layered, they are exclusive], so if you 
pull your brush above an existing area, the existing area is cleared and 
replaced by the one you're drawing.
- When erasing, every area under your brush is erased, there's no 
consideration next to what area you have begun erasing.
- There must be a trick to select an area differently from the buildings 
lying beneath, I suggest shift-right click selects areas as a normal 
right click selects a building.
- Once an area is selected, you can assign workers to it if it's a 
clearing area, or assign unit kinds [worker, warrior, explorer] if it's 
a forbidden area. There must also be the delete button that deletes all 
the area at once.

When you build a building there's a little conflict: a new forbidden 
area should be drawn by the program to make units leave, but you have 
possibly already drawn an area at that place [clearing or forbidden]. I 
suggest that the program adds anyway the new area at the needed place, 
thus erases a piece of the existing area. I can't imagine a situation 
where this would be really problematic.

So what do you think about this system?

Furthermore, I've two more suggestions for areas:
- In globulation everything is "round", I'd suggest you to make only 
round drawing brushes. The square ones are not useful at all in my opinion.
- When a building upgrades and needs space, there should also be a 
forbidden area at the needed space.

Pfffiw... that's it! Next step will be to play more against human 
players to make gameplay tuning suggestions. Anyway, thanks for having 
read until here! :)

Gabriel