My view of Renegade-x changed

[Demigan]

The first few times I played Renegade-X, I played it as if it was Renegade. And boy, it just didn't meet my expectations.

So I let both Renegade and Renegade-x lie for some time. And I recently I started playing a few games again. Renegade-X... It's awesome.

Tl;dr:

Vehicles and infantry feel great, balanced and powerful, each shot feels like an actual shot, hard and damaging. <--- this is the main thing of the thread, I might spend more time on a few issues before but you guys should get the incredible credit for the balance and feel these weapons have got.

At the same time, hitting feels off. The weapon feels great, but hitting something feels underwhelming. Even hitting stationary enemies can bring up the question "but did I actually do it?". Similarly getting hit seems off, often I die or have my vehicle destroyed without having had the idea I had been hit severely.

Warping by quick direction change seems to be a thing, people use it to avoid fire rather than fighting back occasionally.

Long version:

Many of the glaring faults of original Renegade are gone. Vehicle movement now matters much more, making the Light tank viable against the more expensive, armored heavy-hitter the Medium Tank. Mobile Artillery is now less a general purpose vehicle and more an actual artillery. The Mammoth tank is the mastodont that it is supposed to be. The added recoil after each shot gives much more realism and balance between vehicles.

Infantry has been rebalanced as well. No longer is the ramjet the mainstay weapon that dominates infantry fights, the added COF's, short sprints and overall changes in the gameplay create a much less arcadey gameplay and a more modern feel.

There are a few things I did notice, that might be looked at.

First off, I feel that hits don't have a good feel to them. In a vehicle I'm often wondering if I actually hit when there's more people shooting it, even when It's a harvester at 10m distance I don't really have the feeling I hit it. The same counts for infantry combat: even when I am firing a stream of bullets at a stillstanding player and get the kill I am feeling somewhat lacking in the feeling of "I did that".

The same goes for getting hit. Regardless of me being in a vehicle or on foot, I often have trouble noticing if I've been hit or not. In other games, or the old Renegade, I would have an idea how the fight went during it, now I really have to look at my health afterwards and see how damaged I am. Often I die during a battle without even having had an inklling how damaged I was.

So what it comes down to from my experience: a better way to see if I hit something, as well as a better way to gauge how much I'm getting hit. 2 different sounds for hits to the head or body for instance, or something else. Don't know for sure how other games manage to get a better feeling for hitting and getting hit.

Another thing is infantry movement. Someone started doing a tiny circle while sprinting and it was almost impossible to see which direction he was going, as his character seemed to be build out of sprites with only a side, back and front. It feels like people can warp a bit when using quick, constant changes in direction, and use this to their advantage. Something to look at, don't know if others experience the same but seeing a black-hand sniper use this rather than fight me I guess the answer is clear: it works, and it's useful.

[Ahrimansiah]

Hmm i do agree with his points... the answer to hit and getting hit is better visual projectile impact on infantry and vehicles and better sound, maybe blood and spark with a high sound so u can feel getting hit hard and also when u hit hard.

about infantry i do agree too, the infantry correctly is to agile and can maneuver around to fast! there need to be some kind of pause or reduce speed during infantry maneuvering, Specially when sprinting.

correctly being sniper in this game need super shooting skill because lets face it... only noobs run straight at u or stand in one location and shoot. and normal players who run around and maneuver like light are almost impossible to shoot in long range.

this is exactly what i dislike about counter strike, everyone jump around and move so unrealistic when shooting u right in the head, where good player is the one with fast shooting focus and mouse control instead of skill and tactics! i like fast shooting but i do also like tactical gameplay too!

so when i see an sniper instead of rushing toward him and jumping around like a rabbit i will try to shoot him and change cover to get close to him, u know my point im sure

thanks alot for ur aamazing free game again

[Movoza]

I started playing again too and have to agree on the hit and damage markers.

The old Renegade had had a slower combat pace, which helped with the visual cues of hitting other people. Also the less detailed landscapes made enemy health stand out much more. In Renegade-X the pace is too fast, the environments too detailed and the colours of the health don't stand out so much like in the old Renegade that it is hard for me to see all the damage I've done.

I've seen in other games that they sometimes give a very soft sound when you hit an enemy. It creates a certainty that you hit an enemy, even over great distances and even if it is only a sliver of health. It would be great in the chaos of battle to have a this certainty that your attacks have an effect.

Getting hit was much more visual too. The ring of damage markers showed the location, the health bar was large with extra colour cues for the different stages of health and in addition to the visual cues the sound of being hit helped with identifying being hit and often even what weapon hit. In Renegade-X these cues are buried in a minimal HUD that is small in a corner. Depending on the background it is hard to see either the health or the armour bar at times and losing health can only be seen easily when watching these bars directly. For me at least it is hard to see changes from the corner of my eyes with this HUD. The battles themselves often drowns out any sounds that you are hit and the damage markers seem to be completely gone.

The current health HUD, although a nice design, isn't very practical. At least for me. Maybe options for a centralised HUD or a possibility for the colour changes in health again. Also a damage marker would be nice, even if it doesn't show the direction from where you are hit, or possibly a louder sound of the weapon that hits you.

I haven't seen the warping and weird movements yet, so no comment.

Most suggestions seem small to me, so I hope it is possible.

[Ap2000]

First off, I feel that hits don't have a good feel to them. In a vehicle I'm often wondering if I actually hit when there's more people shooting it, even when It's a harvester at 10m distance I don't really have the feeling I hit it. The same counts for infantry combat: even when I am firing a stream of bullets at a stillstanding player and get the kill I am feeling somewhat lacking in the feeling of "I did that".

The same goes for getting hit. Regardless of me being in a vehicle or on foot, I often have trouble noticing if I've been hit or not. In other games, or the old Renegade, I would have an idea how the fight went during it, now I really have to look at my health afterwards and see how damaged I am. Often I die during a battle without even having had an inklling how damaged I was.

So what it comes down to from my experience: a better way to see if I hit something, as well as a better way to gauge how much I'm getting hit. 2 different sounds for hits to the head or body for instance, or something else. Don't know for sure how other games manage to get a better feeling for hitting and getting hit.

I think you just play too many contemporary online shooters, since those games unfortunately throw that crap in your face all the time with a million indicators and messages. Yuck.

[Inilitus]

First off, I feel that hits don't have a good feel to them.

Whenever I oneshot an engi with a railgun I think it feels pretty good

[XD_ERROR_XD]

First of all, i want to say that i couldn't agree more with pretty much everything Demigan has to say. And having spoke to him several times in C&C Renegade quite a while ago, i know how he feels because i feel exactly the same. I'm just still not playing that much Renegade X lately because i'm still too much of a co-op whore which C&C Renegade does supply, but Renegade X doesn't. I'm still too used to the old mechanics to smoothly transition to this game yet. And the fact that I'm in another continent right now with no computer for the next 5 weeks

Also, regarding Movoza said...

I started playing again too and have to agree on the hit and damage markers.

The old Renegade had had a slower combat pace, which helped with the visual cues of hitting other people. Also the less detailed landscapes made enemy health stand out much more. In Renegade-X the pace is too fast, the environments too detailed and the colours of the health don't stand out so much like in the old Renegade that it is hard for me to see all the damage I've done.

I've seen in other games that they sometimes give a very soft sound when you hit an enemy. It creates a certainty that you hit an enemy, even over great distances and even if it is only a sliver of health. It would be great in the chaos of battle to have a this certainty that your attacks have an effect.

Getting hit was much more visual too. The ring of damage markers showed the location, the health bar was large with extra colour cues for the different stages of health and in addition to the visual cues the sound of being hit helped with identifying being hit and often even what weapon hit. In Renegade-X these cues are buried in a minimal HUD that is small in a corner. Depending on the background it is hard to see either the health or the armour bar at times and losing health can only be seen easily when watching these bars directly. For me at least it is hard to see changes from the corner of my eyes with this HUD. The battles themselves often drowns out any sounds that you are hit and the damage markers seem to be completely gone.

The current health HUD, although a nice design, isn't very practical. At least for me. Maybe options for a centralised HUD or a possibility for the colour changes in health again. Also a damage marker would be nice, even if it doesn't show the direction from where you are hit, or possibly a louder sound of the weapon that hits you.

I haven't seen the warping and weird movements yet, so no comment.

Most suggestions seem small to me, so I hope it is possible.

Yes, yes, oh yes! most of these changes would make the game so much easier to... overview. Although the faster pace of the game is kind of part of the game now and i think changing all the other things mentioned would make the faster pace much easier to handle. I really like the slick look of the current hud, but to me personally, lack of weapon numbering in your inventory and a small health bar does trouble me. The old one, maybe not as flashy but definitely very functional pretty much screamed to your face what your current status was, with your current health popping up on the middle of the screen every time you got hit or healed whenever your armour ran out (extremely useful to assess your current damage and repairs intake which more accurately allow you make dangerous moves more safely, calculating how much damage you can take from which vehicles compared to the amount of shots you can make during that time), ammo count showing up in the middle of the screen every time you shoot... I should stop now before this post gets too long.

The weird sprinting issue is a bug however, and a fix should soon arrive on the servers.