Bay 12 Games Forum

SCAD is a super awesome place, and I've seldom had better teachers all around, but I begin to wonder if I should maybe plan ahead and transfer back to a state school closer to home for the reduced cost and put the extra money towards supporting myself before my creative endeavors become profitable. I don't even want to think about what's going to happen to me if I break down again... maybe it's the anxiety, or just lack or sleep, but I can't seem to find any sustainable paths through life... it feels like shooting for this difficult thing is my only chance, but at what cost to my friends and family and myself?

MEOWXIMUM GAINS.

First of all, thanks for the responses, I apologize for not checking in again, I had a busy workload.

One thing that I should mention, I also find dating in general horrendously akward, and could probably do with finally getting off my butt and losing some weight. So it's not like I'm this stud that sits in his fortress of solitude constantly shooing away ladies.

But everytime it DOES come around to someone being interested, or me feeling attraction, I sort of shut down. Even though that I do sometimes feel lonely.

The big issue is something that was mentioned: I have a hard time finding somebody where the interests align. Any girl I ever met and was interested in me, had little to no interest in games, or any other media I consume for that matter. And I assume that this majorly hinders any sort of development as well.

I think you guys are insightful with these posts about the game's visual direction. We definitely won't be going with a RimWorld / Prison Architect sort of style. I haven't played those games before, and while I'm sure they're amazing, I don't think that visual style would really fit the experience we're trying to create here.

We're 100% going with an orthogonal / isometric projection for the new visuals, in order to more properly display the world in 3 dimensions. When we're talking to artists now, we share screenshots of Stone Sense, Baldur's Gate, Planescape Torment, and a couple other late 90s / early 2000s isometric games. The style hit an interesting kind of peak then, and I think it'd just fit great with what we're trying to make here. I don't think we want to go very low-fi with our graphics, because I don't think it'd fit quite right with the game's overall feel.

We still haven't had any luck finding someone to work with us, despite my eagerness to shovel cash at a qualified candidate. I've tried recruiting from DeviantArt, but haven't had good responses in the last few weeks. Would you guys be able to suggest a place for finding a freelance pixel artist? I'm halfway considering going all out and hiring somebody as a W2 / regular employee to get this done, as that's what it feels like it might take to get somebody with the necessary skills. At that point, I'd probably post the job on Indeed / Monster / Careerbuilder. Any ideas you can share for recruiting a pixel artist would be hugely appreciated!

The basic controls of the game are very smooth and are in no way difficult to get used to.  The single rigged weapons are the sole exception to this rule, and any number of people have commented upon it on Focus/Deck13's forums and the steam forums, there was even a major patch that altered the moveset of that particular weapon class so that it would be possible to animation cancel.  If you want to talk about the Single-rigged weapons being clunky, then you have all the ammunition that you could ever desire.  However, the moveset and controls of one weapon class out of FIVE (heavy, single-rigged, dual-rigged, one hand, and staff.  Did you actually play the game?  Your posts say you did but that's some awfully basic data to get wrong.), not including basic movement and evasion controls, is hardly an accurate picture of the game as a whole.

And agreeing with a criticism of a mechanic is in no way defanging the argument I made, the basic controls of The Surge are excellent, and the VAST majority of weapons share that trait.  Further, in spite of the criticism that single-rigged weapons have received they are still considered to be excellent by much of the community (I personally disagree, but that is entirely due to playstyle.)

I also never said that the injection system 'wasn't great', nor did I praise it.  I also did not say that the jump/duck mechanic 'wasn't great', I just didn't have cause to use it so it seemed extraneous, go watch some youtube videos of actually skilled players (unlike me, I am barely acceptable to middling), they can do some really goddamn impressive shit with those mechanics.  I am not fanboying.  There is room for improvement in the game, which is why I am interested in seeing where they go with The Surge 2.

I very seriously believe that if the first weapon other than the reclaimed piston you can lay hands on wasn't the goddamn plasma cutter the claims of clunky controls wouldn't even exist.  For Hel's sake even the Endras TITAN hammer is smoother and easier to control than those huge sweeping attack animations.

Ah elitists who moan about using suboptimal loadouts. I don't think Monster Hunter will ever manage to get rid of them. They've been around since the first installment and its cluster bowgun-only expectations for Fatalis fights. The problem here is that unlike in some other games, the fun gameplay and the process of farming are one and the same and if you co-op with randoms there will always be clashing goals and ideals.

Just finished this. I really wanted to like it more than I did but it ended up being more frustrating than fun.

Not because it was hard -  it was not exactly easy, but I actually found it to be easier than dark souls was (at least DS1, the only one I've played). Not because of the grinding - I didn't grind at all, it seemed pointless... I finished the game at level ~55 with rank 2 lynx armor. Not because of the respawning enemies - I just ran past most of them. It was not even the clunky controls, though they did feel excessively clunky sometimes.

No, the frustrating part was the absolutely atrocious level design.

It's a bunch of bland, boring industrial corridors, sewers, and industrial ruins from start to finish. The last few levels in particular, it felt like half the map was just running around in those small tunnels... and then finally near the end when you think it can't get any worse... you had those tiny small tunnels filled with poison gas. The hardest part of the game was just figuring out where I was supposed to go next... I had to look up a walkthrough 3 - 4 times just to figure out what I was supposed to be doing because there's absolutely no guidance of any sort and wandering through a confusing maze where everything looks exactly the same hoping you stumble on the correct area is not fun....

So I guess what I'm saying is, I really hope surge 2 has better level design because surge 1 probably has the worst level design of any game I've ever played. There were a lot of other things the game didn't do perfectly, but I could have forgiven it all if the level design was not such a nightmare.