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I Hope that you'll manage to release somthing !!
Thanks, and good work.
I appreaciate your maps, and thought that it could be source of inspiration for an other game (Unreal World. A kind of roguelike which takes place in Finland. The aim is simply to survive in the wilderness. No big monsters. The system aims at being rather realistic)
So thanks Toady for showing us what you are doing !
By the way, would a beginner find your version ? Or does the original LCS have more visibility for now on the web...
[ December 16, 2007: Message edited by: flap ]
[ December 16, 2007: Message edited by: flap ]
I am not comfortable with that screen, and what is controls... It displays and gives access to very different things :
- Assembling squads
- Review the liberals by groups
- Promote Liverals
First I don't like having the squads diplayed in the same list as groups. These groups really are just an option...
Maybe we should give access to these 7 groups, but give the option at the bottom of the screen. A 8th one could be added : squads. It is the same screen as "Assemble the squad !", but when you press a key you view the profile of the man.
It would be very good one could travel from all these 8 list when veiwing any of the these by pressing a number from 1 to 8. (and no need to go back to the "Review and Reorganize screen"). Or a key to go to "Previous list", and an other to go to "Next List".
Also when the player ask to print a list with noone, it might be better to actually print it, with the message "Empty" instead of doing nothing like it is now.
I would see something like that :
code:
Review your Liberals and Assemble Squads
----SQUAD NAME-----------------LOCATION------------ACTIVITY---------------------
A - Squad 1
B - Squad 2
C - Squad 3
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------A-L - Select a squad 1 - Active Liberals
Z - Assemble a New Squad 2 - Hostages
U - Promote Liberals 3 - Clinic
T - Assigne New bases to Squadless 4 - Justice System
5 - Sleepers
; and : - View other liberal pages 6 - The Dead
7 - Away
8 - Squads
And when you view a list, the same layout could be displayed :
code:
Active Liberals
----CODE NAME------------SKILL---HEALTH---LOCATION-------SQUAD / ACTIVITY-------
A - George Diaz 18 Liberal Shelter SQUAD
B - Taylor Venus 8 Liberal Shelter SQUAD
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------A-L - View Status 1 - Active Liberals
Z - Assemble a New Squad 2 - Hostages
U - PromoteLiberals 3 - Clinic
T - Assigne New bases to Squadless 4 - Justice System
S - Back to squad list 5 - Sleepers
; and : - View other liberal pages 6 - The Dead
7 - Away
8 - Liberals engaged in squads
And by the way, why not merging with "Activate the uninvolved" ? Or use the same layout for that list ?
Maybe at the top, add an option that you toggle on and off : by pressing a letter you either view the status, or activate it.
An other suggestion to merge these screens (or use the same loyout) would be to add a new option on the status screen of the "Active liberals" : A - Activate liberal
Speaking of that "status screen", is there any room to add the squad it is part of, its activity, and its location ?
Well that's it for now.
Many new player stopped when their main character lost his squad. If there is no squad available, there should maybe be message warning that the player as to reorganize a squad.
Exiting screens :
There is no homogeneous way to leave a page. Some examples :
- X to leave "equipment"
- Enter (and it is not written) to go back to main screen from "Activate", or from "Bulk activiy" to Activate
- Enter again when decide to do nothing of "Taking Action", (and many other places...)
- 1 to leave "Assemble the squad!"
It would be much more user friendly if we could leave all screens in the same way.
So, yes, I guess that you're right : letters, eventually ponctuaion and figures, but not those on the numpad.
Maybe a init file wich allows you to remap all keys ? That would be -very- usefull...
Basically the arrows are intercepted and then treated like letters. Toady probably felt that it would be easier (I suppose that he didn't want to go through all his screens to change the keys behaviour. So it intercepted it at the beginning. Well from what I understood at the time and without reading the code)
But that would probably give him few points of wisdom : these liberals are not any better than the conservative.
[ December 16, 2007: Message edited by: flap ]
quote:
Originally posted by Jonathan S. Fox:
<STRONG>Having that job would involve a mandatory activity every day -- they'd only be available in "activate the uninvolved" or squad formation on their days off. </STRONG>
If you implement that, it would be good to have an other list in the "review" screen : 8 - Jobs
But do we really want these guys to do things with us ? They might get spotted. Well, true, we might want to train them, and give them more juice...
"How could you reconcile organizing protests and coordinating disruptive activities with not making the LCS a bloated, common person's political party that just happens to also have a violent wing? "
Hey, it might be in the same scope, or a way to do it more easily (I don't know) : There could be some evens happening in the town, you can join to.
Steps : Radio, TV, or some guy in the street tell you "There will a protest that day".
The specific day, you join the protest, and do either join, or create a mess (pretending to be part of the neo-nazis and braking everything, or wearing stupid disguise and signs to take the piss of other people in the protest you don't want to support... Or simply take part of it, as LCS, or as normal citizen).
Hmm, I really see also and option to organize a protest or whatever, a command like "spread the word", about something to do at a specific day,specific location. And you might see people not from the LCS doing it.
Well, all does not have to very precisely done, with a lot of simulating behind. But just a little, simple mecanism to add a bit of flavour and give the feeling of more depth.
Also, here are a few quick comments to the Activate screen (Which were already true with the previous versions)
- All keys don't react in the same way. For most of them, when you press, you stay on the screen and can change your choice again. But for "S"teal car, once you press it, you are sent back to the list of liberals.
- Some keys open a screen with a new menu straight away (such as "Make cloth"). Some will open that Menu at the end of the day (for Steal car, when you select the type of car you want to steal). We should maybe either put all these screen at the activation of liberals, or at the end of the day ?
- I was looking at the "Z" option (assign task in bulk). I wonder how relevent it is. Maybe would it be good merge it somehow with the other activation screen, or update it.
- If I remember, some tasks do automatically continue next day, some don't. There should maybe be some work done on that.
- A graphical comment about the "Make clothing screen" : The first top line is in white, while in most others it is grey. There might be something to think about to improve the use of colors. On the other hand, the it is good the interface not to be totally the same everywhere. It maybe gives that felling of liberal not restricting each other to go in all directions. Hmm. To think about.
