Are we finally Happy? i'd like to know.

[AndyChilly]

So for some of us, July 2016 seems like so long ago. Now we finally have what we have been promised, reworked from the ground up, A console friendly version of KSP. Did we get what we want? Did we get what was promised?

I only had a chance to play with it for 20 mins last night so a few questions,

Are the controls clunky or is it just me?

I saw no launch button in assembly build and have to access it from the start menu. Is this intentional?

Is there a Debug menu? wasnt that supposed to be part of the update?

Auto-struts, is that was the Rigid assembly button it all about? i thought there was supposed to be more options than that?

Still....pretty Shadows right?

Edited January 16, 2018 by AndyChilly

[bewing]

59 minutes ago, AndyChilly said:

Are the controls clunky or is it just me?

It takes a bit of time to get used to a new set of controls. And you have two other sets to try. 20 minutes isn't enough -- you'll have to try it for awhile and decide.

Quote

 

I saw no launch button in assembly build and have to access it from the start menu. Is this intentional?

Yes, you have to go through the Pause menu. You'll get used to it.

Quote

Auto-struts, is that was the Rigid assembly button it all about? i thought there was supposed to be more options than that?

 

You have to enable Advanced Tweakables, and unlock the strut Tech Node before you get autostruts.

 

Edited January 16, 2018 by bewing

[AndyChilly]

11 minutes ago, bewing said:

It takes a bit of time to get used to a new set of controls. And you have two other sets to try. 20 minutes isn't enough -- you'll have to try it for awhile and decide.

Yeah I guess you are right

12 minutes ago, bewing said:

Yes, you have to go through the Pause menu. You'll get used to it.

that doesn't seem intuitive to me

13 minutes ago, bewing said:

You have to enable Advanced Tweakables, and unlock the strut Tech Node before you get autostruts.

I have enabled Advanced Tweakables but was trying it out on sceince mode and thus didnt have the strut Tech node so thanks for clarification on that front.

[Leopard]

controls will take a bit of getting used to - especially the throttle adjustment, hopefully thats switchable to behave normally not 0 or full with fine control needing a modifier.

Its more 'unlearning' stuff though really so far.

Q: in the VAB when you remove a component, how do you delete it? can remove from the craft, but it just hangs there

 

Otherwise so far so good, will take a while to get used to how stuff works now but it seems to be working.

of course it took a while for the bugs to become apparent last time

[DD_bwest]

51 minutes ago, Leopard said:

controls will take a bit of getting used to - especially the throttle adjustment, hopefully thats switchable to behave normally not 0 or full with fine control needing a modifier.

Its more 'unlearning' stuff though really so far.

Q: in the VAB when you remove a component, how do you delete it? can remove from the craft, but it just hangs there

 

Otherwise so far so good, will take a while to get used to how stuff works now but it seems to be working.

of course it took a while for the bugs to become apparent last time

not sure if there are other ways, but last night i was able to deleted parts by using the cursor and dragging them back to the sidebar and placing it there, as one would on pc

[bewing]

Yes, you drag them back to the parts bin.

 

[Kerbal Sofa Program]

It's easier to get used to if you change the control scheme to 'cursor', somewhere in the settings... OH YEAH AND IM STILL HAVING GAME RUINING SAVE ISSUES. Slightly different, on the ps4, i can dig out my keyboard if youd like to know the details. Maybe its just me. Dont own a pc so typings a pain sorry

Edited January 17, 2018 by Kerbal Sofa Program
Dun got confused

[Kerbal Sofa Program]

2 hours ago, Kerbal Sofa Program said:

It's easier to get used to if you change the control scheme to 'cursor', somewhere in the settings... OH YEAH AND IM STILL HAVING GAME RUINING SAVE ISSUES. Slightly different, on the ps4, i can dig out my keyboard if youd like to know the details. Maybe its just me. Dont own a pc so typings a pain sorry

Since posting this ive realized i can pause the game and go to the space center and save there without incident, not always convenient but its fine

Edited January 17, 2018 by Kerbal Sofa Program
Left critical 6 words out

[AndyChilly]

Question is, will they support the game this time and provide quick patches....none of this 'just hold on for 6 months while we sort everything out' bull. take a handful of high priority bugs, fix them, release the patch wait for people to say ' thats great but you missed this' then follow up with a fine tuning patch....i dont want to have waited 18 months just for them to give me a second game thats also broken.

[Space Station 4 Crash]

For me it is not an absolute but relative answer. I have tried to remain positive through the year and a half wait. It was certainly frustrating but only because I love the game so much. I have played a little bit of the new release and it is night and day between the 2 versions. So to answer your question. Yes, I am happy. I am happy because SQUAD kept their word and made good on their promise. They are also going to fix bugs and support the new release. I am happy because in hindsight I believe that the wait was justified by the complexity of the problem. I am quick to forgive and from here on the past is water under the bridge and I am going to try and judge SQUAD on the current release and treat it fairly for what it is: A brand new port, built from the ground up that has just released on console. There will be bugs, and I believe they will be fixed. And if I was to Hazard a guess it will not be in months but in weeks.

Happy Launchings.

[Leopard]

On 17/01/2018 at 2:34 AM, bewing said:

Yes, you drag them back to the parts bin.

 

nice to know.

not intuitive, but nice to know - having an actual trashcan icon or similar may help with the discoverability of this, as opposed to assuming someone has played it on the PC

[Leopard]

Ok, now played for more than five minutes

Career mode is unplayable, separate thread as to why (basically the R&D centre is non-functional due to a bug that even the most basic of actual play testing would have discovered)

Other points noted:

1. During loading there are graphics that attempt, but fail, to fade in and out - going from nothing in a jump to about 25% transparent, gradually fading to about 75%, pausing, then jumping to 100%, same in reverse - this problem was "Solved" with computer game graphics about 20 years ago and its hard to fathom exactly how it could be gotten wrong? Heck even I've coded stuff that gets this correct, same with other graphics during loading, seems to be something going wrong

2. no sound during start up, is this intentional?

3. when the game finally loads it notes to "press A to start", as with the previous edition you can press A all you like but for about five seconds the game isn't going to respond to it - if its not finished actually loading, simply delay showing the "Press A to start" message until it has?

 

Have to say disappointed, have waited a year for this, having been told more or less weekly for six months how its undergoing testing, yet one of the three game modes simply doesn't work? while the loading phase appears to have been phoned in and just signed off as "it will do"?

 

Don't get me started on the default controls, switched to cursor mode to get the throttle control functioning in a workable way.

The game looks wonderful, but it feels like each and every function has been through automatic testing of the code, without anyone actually bothering to actually try and play it - because lets face it, its not like fine control of the throttle is something you will ever need is it? or putting the trim controls so trying to actually fly a craft and adjust the throttle means you just adjust the trim instead.

The core code may be perfection itself in terms of functionality and stability, but the interface is several steps back on the previous port - suggest allowing full remapping of all controls to whatever the user wants - with say four "slots" for user controls, able to be renamed and switched between at will - and a default set assigned on a per vehicle basis?

[bewing]

5 hours ago, Leopard said:

nice to know.

not intuitive, but nice to know - having an actual trashcan icon or similar may help with the discoverability of this, as opposed to assuming someone has played it on the PC

Agreed. It's in the instructions somewhere, I think.  But yes, a trashcan icon in the parts bin is a very good idea and I will see what we can do about that.

 

[Leopard]

Just now, bewing said:

Agreed. It's in the instructions somewhere, I think.  But yes, a trashcan icon in the parts bin is a very good idea and I will see what we can do about that.

 

Trashcan, or just some on screen text, but a trash icon would seem to be nice, a part category with nothing included within it ever, so you just have a box to drop parts in as waste presumably wouldn't be a huge amount of additional code, just define a new part type in whatever object table, give it a graphic and a bit of text "drop here to delete part"

[Monkey-CH]

Why not just have an additonal options for delete and save as a template in the radial menu?

Edited January 19, 2018 by Monkey-CH

[Clipperride]

For me, playing Science mode on PS4, the answer is yes!  I've not found any game breaking bugs so far and, once you spend some time with the radial control, it quickly becomes second nature.  I'd argue that it actually becomes quicker/easier than hitting keys on the keyboard.

The only slight issues I've seen so far are; Spending science points in the R&D Dept then going to the VAB/SPH, the game sometimes forgets what I just unlocked.  A workaround seems to be, spend the points, exit R&D, then go back into R&D.  That way I've yet to find anything missing once I start building things with the new parts.  The other is just a case of getting used to the fact that the targeted vessel indicator isn't quite where the ship actually is.  It caused a near miss during my first rendezvous in darkness, but it's fine once you add a little lighting.

Overall, very happy indeed!

Edit: Oh, and I forgot to add, playing KSP whilst spread out on the sofa with a large screen TV is simply awesome!!

Edited January 26, 2018 by Clipperride

[Greenthumb Gaming]

On 1/26/2018 at 11:51 AM, Clipperride said:

The only slight issues I've seen so far are; Spending science points in the R&D Dept then going to the VAB/SPH, the game sometimes forgets what I just unlocked.  A workaround seems to be, spend the points, exit R&D, then go back into R&D.  That way I've yet to find anything missing once I start building things with the new parts.

I've encountered this as well while playing science mode. I too have to do the same workaround in order for the spent points and parts to register correctly. Currently making a list of problems I've noticed while playing. Nothing really game breaking but definitely some things could be reworked and fine tuned a bit. I will report back later. Fly safe!!! 

[Clipperride]

@Greenthumb Gaming

Whilst, strictly speaking they are bugs, I prefer to think of them as "quirks".  They don't break the game and the workaround is trivial.  I've had the game freeze on me once, but some AAA titles have done the same (or worse).

I get that those whoo bought the original console edition (luckily, it was never released here in Europe) have had a long wait and really want to see a perfect game straight out the box (or in this case, download). As long as the "quirks" get patched in the not too distant future, I'm happy.  Maybe it helps that I love playing Science Mode?

Having bought the game on PC and PS4, I've paid about the same as a top title on release day.  I have literally hundreds of hours gaming already and it's been great value.  One of my tests for a really awesome game is "does it make you go and get a pen and paper to make notes".  If a game is that immersive, it's probably for me. KSP has to be the prime example

[Agarwel]

Well. Im happy the game is released. Im happy I had a change to try it. (it is awesome when it works). But Im not happy with the state of the game.

You can basically play tutorials, scenarios and sandbox more or less without gamebreaking bugs. Also the start of the career is kind of working. But once you get to more complicated missions it is one bug after another. (locked controls, ignored progress, recovering wrong ships from orbit,...).

I really hope they will provide support for this time (as you mentioned, quick support, not another year of silence). If it will be threated like No Mans Sky (problematic on release day, but they released two or three updates each week so you could see the game improving under your hands each few day) I will be happy. But so far almost two weeks after release nothing happened :-( Not even some quick patch to fix stuff that can be patched quickly.

[Leopard]

Sorry I don't see basic functionality like on screen controls failing to respond as a "quirk", I see it as game breaking and a sign of an exceedingly poor QA process.

QA is meant to try and break stuff, which is then fixed, not simply added to a list and ignored.

You could argue some of the features the failed controls enable can be worked around, but the actual control failure itself is not acceptable and should have been discovered through the most basic of testing.

 

Stuff like the way Trim is set/cleared making the game significantly more difficult than it has any need to be, the binary nature of the default throttle control could be considered "quirks", while they are an irritant, at least they actually work as intended, even if "as intended" is not "as desired" or "as expected" by players

 

Other game play issues smack of poor design, and again poor testing with a very script based testing approach and not going off script.

e.g. the ability to recover a craft in flight as opposed to just when landed back on Kerbin, or the way saves are not working correctly or reliably - which given this was a massive issue on the FTE port is unacceptable to still be present here.

 

This new port, on its first release had one job, work better than the previous port, by just about every objective measure as a player it has failed in this job - the previous version was actually more playable, for longer, with fewer control failures

[Eterna1Soldier]

Like the previous version, whenever you capture an asteroid in the enhanced version that save bug occurs where you can no longer save or progress the game. This bug happens 100% of the time. progressing after capturing an asteroid is simply impossible.

 

Was asteroid capturing seriously not even tested? I even submitted a bug report a year ago for the previous version.

 

 

[mikey117]

On 27/01/2018 at 9:39 PM, Clipperride said:

@Greenthumb Gaming

I get that those whoo bought the original console edition (luckily, it was never released here in Europe) 

I believe it's just the ps4 version that was not released in europe. 

Im on xbox and was able to download the old port. (I live in scotland) technically part of Europe.

[Clipperride]

From what I have heard about the previous version @mikey117 you have my sympathy!  I hope you're finding the current version a lot better?

[Leopard]

tried again today, again all previously completed missions wiped and the one I was actually trying to do turned out to have vanished by the time I launched.

they spent six months testing something, I'm guessing actually playing the way an end user plays didn't feature

[mikey117]

9 hours ago, Clipperride said:

From what I have heard about the previous version @mikey117 you have my sympathy!  I hope you're finding the current version a lot better?

Thanks. Although as buggy as the old port was, im a stubborn fool and still managed to build a station with over 300 parts even though the framerate dropped to pretty bad levels half way through , and my dreams of actually being able to use the station as a moon relay were dashed.Well i thought ive started now and the obsession carried on through to completion.

(I've still got a few screenshots of the build ,it was a pretty cool design ,will need to see If i can upload them to here at some point. Not sure how id go about uploading clips /screenshots to the forum though. )

So yeah  i still had fun learning docking etc on old port.

Yeah to be fair the new port is running pretty well. And i personally am trying to give the devs their due , by not comparing it too much too old port and being realistic that there will be some bugs to be ironed out. Also there will be limitations on how big I can build on console etc.

The main thing is there' more effort on the console side and i am confident we will see more effort this time around and more frequent patches/updates.