[Discussion] Questionable design decisions

[r4pt0r]

Squad is on pace for a 5-year dev cycle. If you ask me, that's a bit too long for an indie game.

I just wanted to say that No More Room in Hell took 7 years so far and has become the best zombie game I've ever played. plus its a free mod.

people seem to think squad having an undefined, evolving vision for this game is a bad thing.

[Mobjack]

I think part of the reason Squad doesn't have an dV indicator is that it is very hard to implement. Once you have complex staging or docking involved, the calculations aren't going to be accurate.

[Dodgey]

I'm just going to leave this here, https://kerbalspaceprogram.com/terms.php .

Carry on.

[r4pt0r]

I'm just going to leave this here, https://kerbalspaceprogram.com/terms.php .

Carry on.

this guy knows whats up.

[macegee]

i agree with the devs. my most fun mission was a manned ike return mission where i returned to kerbin with only 2units of fuel left. nerve wracking and very rewarding to make it.

Do you realize that you just got LUCKY? Now let's talk about all these other times when you get UNLUCKY and end up having to do everything again and again and again and again, or send a refueling mission again and again and again, if it's even possible. And all just because you were unable to plan your flight delta-v wise. That's gonna be frustrating for some players, me included. I don't like to fly blind. I like to plan. But why do I have to calculate such things by hand or use mods just because I like to plan my flights delta-v wise? Seriously, is there an answer for this issue?

If the option were there to display craft stats, like mass, TWR, and Delta-V they could begin to learn WHY their craft or mission didn't work. Providing a problem and/or situation to solve; rather than a "mystery" to solve, AND THEN a problem to solve.

To this end, I believe craft stats would be a good addition to the stock game. An indispensable utility for the pros, and a learning tool for the beginners.

So much this ^! A very good statement.

5. Publicizing development schedule - Letting the public know your full direction, schedule, and priorities for stages of development would be a bad thing for the entire community.

Can you tell us why do you think so? There are quite a few of developers out there that work on Early Access games and do this, and they're doing quite okay. TB's video discussion (in the OP) addressed this topic quite good.

6. There's a mod for that - From what I understand Squad is not that big, and from what I assume can't afford to be big. So the amount of Devs available to dedicate to aspects of the game is limited. Because of this I don't expect them to be able to keep up with player demand for more options, more parts, more features, and all the other creative ideas that the public comes up with. I actually like that mods are allowed to be applied, and that the community creates their own additions to the game. You get to, well, modify the game as you wish. If you want to fully cheat, you can, if you just want a little more information about your craft you can. It creates a level of player involvement with their game, you can choose to have pure stock, just one or two mods, or a plethora of mods.

Yes, sure, I'm not against mods, I use them myself. But I'm just talking about attitude. Even in this thread I was told twice to use mods and stop ranting and even try to create my own game. That's what I'm talking about. It comes up every time when someone's upset with the stock game. Like there's nothing wrong with the stock game and dev's vision is 100% solid and should not be debated. Which isn't true. We can and should criticize the stock game.

Edited February 8, 2014 by macegee

[r4pt0r]

Seriously, is there an answer for this issue?

Falange: I wanted it sometimes, and I un-wanted it other times. In the end, it takes away a gameplay element because it takes some of the guesswork and some of the trial and error and figuring out for yourself what the delta-V is. It might take some of the magic away. One of the great things about KSP is doing just what Chad was doing just now [Editor's note: this was Thursday afternoon, and Chad Jenkins was in the process of livesteaming his creation of a flying rocket-powered surfboard, killing two-dozen Kerbals in the process]. That ridiculous contraption he was doing, just trying to see if he could make it to the water, just shooting it on a rocket. If you make it too technical, it’s certainly possible to calculate it. But it’s like giving the answer to a puzzle sometimes, and I don’t know if we want that. The same applies to showing how much burn time you have remaining. I think there’s always this element of tension of trying to calculate in your head how much fuel you have left and if you’re going to make it. It’s like filling out the crossword puzzle for you.

the answer is no.

[crazyewok]

I 100% agree with the OP

But the rapid fanbois will likley get there way as they cry the loudest. Its normaly those sort of "people" that dont understand KSP is a sandbox game and try and force there game play style on others and dont get that things like DE and DV indicator could be added as options that could be decided on at the strt of the game.

[macegee]

Given Squad's tendency to embrace (eventually) some reasonable amount of realism, I would not be surprised to find in future updates: more realistic aerodynamics and "deadly reentry", along with heat shields. Perhaps the devs will even require us to feed, water, shelter and supply oxygen to space bound Kerbals in the future, but that's speculation. Imagine radiation and solar flares; did we think to add that shelter module to our space station or interplanetary ship?

Unfortunately, with how things are going, I don't think something like that is gonna happen. But surely, it would be great if I got proved wrong.

this is not the peoples game, its Squads. it will remain squads decisions on what features are added. Promises, especialy promises made for a game not even at v1.0 are invalid.

True, but that doesn't mean that we can't criticize things some of us find questionable and/or wrong, and discuss it, like we do here.

I disagree with the notion that Squad are not listening to the players. Watching the devstream, MaxMaps seems to be aware of a lot of the controversial issues, at least insofar as mentioning them in the stream. Whether or not the devs agree with one side or another on any of these issues is another matter, but listening does not seem to be the issue.

That's why I said "don't really" instead of more definitive "don't". Sometimes they do, but even then they're not completely open to us, but actually very vague and inconsistent. One more thing. My last e-mail with another Q&A session (we've had one a year before that) to Maxmaps that I sent him 3 months ago got completely ignored. Not even "we're busy", or "we can't answer these community questions you've gathered at this time", no anything. That's what I mean by saying "not really listening".

Incidentally I'm aware of TotalBiscuit's video on early-access games. Generally I agree with his stance. For me, this is one of three early-access games I've paid for. In this particular case, it was my opinion that (with mods) the game was already complete enough to warrent purchase, and that frankly the game is doing something different enough that I wanted to encourage development of the game. As it turns out, I've paid roughly €0.0197005516154452 per hour of gameplay for the privilage. Even if development stopped tomorrow, I couldn't really feel like I was ripped off.

I don't say we're being ripped off. No, on the contrary, KSP is one of the awesomest games out there. But it's still an Early Access game that's not finished. The way I see it, the tinier and vague bits of info we get from time to time, the more drama comes. Any incidents that happen (including the one with DLCs/expansions), actually happened because of lack of transparency in the first place, and inability to write statements that are not vague.

Here's an interesting perspective on this, that I will leave here and never speak of again.

I am a professional IT systems programmer. I recognize the kind of work Squad are about.

I'm an IT systems engineer myself, a programmer, and also a Mission/Game designer. It's a lot of us here. Even NASA guys play this game. I guess most of us can recognize the kind of work Squad does.

Many of the complaints about the game seem to assume that the resources of all computers are infinite, and that their capabilities are too. In reality, many of the problems squad faces are due to the limits of the technology, or even the limits of our science.

The end process of this simulator is not a real-world product. Therefore, it's not a real-world simulator. Expecting it to be one is silly. It's a fictional game world. I enjoy it on its own merits.

So? Does that make Tsiolkovsky rocket equation less important? During the last Devcast a term "delta-v" was used two times by Harvester and once by Maxmaps. Why is there a need to pretend like it's some kind of magic?

I also rarely visit the intentions of another artist, which is what this also is. It is a work of gaming art. At some point, people need to understand that things like this aren't actually a democracy. The guy making the work has to please himself first or he can't continue making it, because if it isn't the work he wants to make, not even tremendous amounts of money can force him to keep working on it if he hates it.

This is why I'm not asking SQUAD for anything anymore. I'm here only to discuss their decisions with other players. I've said that like a dozen times already.

If you're that out of shape about how the game works, it costs you virtually nothing you don't already have to write your own game.

Here you go. "Do it yourself" is an attitude that's even worse than "there're mods for it, stop ranting" one. Even though I'm actually considering making a computer game at some point in my life, this is not why we're here.

Edited February 8, 2014 by macegee

[Dre4dW0rm]

Maybe they are too busy making KSP even more great than it already is too listen to an anonymous person on a forum who thinks he/she knows better than the people actually making the game?

Ever thought of going into politics?

Any time spend tinkering with rockets can never be ruined time for me...

Our? We? Please don't speak for me, i really don't feel the way you do.

Wow, you really know what everyone wants, huh?

Ow goody......

I don't think you do.

WHY??!

Nope, I have no idea what you're on about. There's a base game, there are mods for people who want more. So? You think the devs should incorporate every popular mod? Any idea how much time, money and complexity that adds? Don't you think it's more important they concentrate on finishing the base game before incorporating a bunnyload of mods?

I think you can spend your time a bit more constructive.

Could you grow up before replying, please ?

[Balto-the-Wolf-Dog]

I'm on the fence about plenty possibilities for this game, but when it comes to basic mechanics and behavior I am distinctly hopeful for proper aerodynamic simulation and effective reentry heat risk. KSP is, at its heart, a building game, and what parts of it aren't are space flight simulator. These attributes are what set the driving mechanic of the game: tasking the player with solving problems. Getting to the mun is one such problem. The player places his or her own goal there, then sets out to solve the problem with creative engineering and creative flying. What this means is that nearly all of the "game" part of KSP is derived from problem solving; so, simply, more problems = more game. Reentry heat is an additional problem to engineer a solution to, and what separates it from the whole "random failures" frame of mind is that it is also a fair problem. I don't see how it could be any less an acceptable manner of challenging players to build better rockets than simply trying to get places. That said, I see no reason why such specifics of realism shouldn't be optional. As far as aerodynamics are concerned, when it comes to vertically launched systems, its another avenue of challenging players to build better, more aerodynamic rockets. For aircraft, however, the issue is a little more fundamental. Vanilla KSP aerodynamics aren't even remotely realistic. I was able to push an engine-less craft from the surface to kerbin ejection with nothing but creative control surface placement and without part clipping. Disregarding obvious glitches, even reasonable aircraft preform more like shoddily constructed paper airplanes than aircraft with lifting surfaces. As a real-world aviator I can say with some credibility that Farrem is a decent approximation of how things should preform. Imperfect, but reasonably close, especially for an engine allowing you to cobble together your aircraft out of junkyard parts and others found laying on the side of the road. I would be satisfied with an official implementation of an equivalent system. Until then, I shall continue to hold myself over with Farrem.

[Kasuha]

Most importantly, the fact that certain feature is not included does not count as "bad development decision" because it can be added later. Bad development decisions are those which prevent adding useful or important features in later stages.

None of the original six points count as bad development decisions IMO.

1. My favorite, and a big one - lack of Delta-v indicator for ships and other important editor/in-flight info.

I don't think such indicator is necessary. It would be a nice to have feature, at least for some people, but the game is playable without it as well. I can tell, I never used one. In my opinion, a hyperedit-like tool allowing us to test the design or its parts in various conditions is IMO much better because it does not tell you a number. It tells you whether you will succeed at the situation or not - with not only your design, but also your skills.

2. Lack of reentry heat.

Nobody says it can't be added later. And honestly, being able to aerobrake thousands m/s when returning from distant spots is kinda comfortable so I would even say I'm not really missing this bit of realism.

3. Tech tree as a mean to introduce parts to the new players.

We should only judge career implementation when it's finished. The idea of tech tree is IMO not silly, but the tech tree as it is IMO kinda is. But remember, the tech tree could only be completed when the list of parts is completed. And I don't think there will be no more stock parts added.

4. Manned flights give too much advantages over the use of unmanned probes

I don't see too many advantages of manned flights. You can repair some broken parts with EVA Kerbals and you can still control the craft somewhat if it runs out of electricity, that's about all the advantage in sandbox. There's a bit more you can do with them in Career but not really that much. And you don't kill or strand your Kerbals if you send a probe. Sounds like a reasonable tradeoff to me.

5. No public roadmap.

I'm not missing one. Everyone who has a roadmap keeps changing it constantly because conditions change and people tend to change opinions. And if you have a roadmap you get some explaining to provide why it keeps changing. It's less wasted effort without one.

6. “There’s a mod for it, stop asking for it†attitude.

The game is in alpha stage. Of course there are some great mods out there which should be integrated into the game and I strongly believe they will be in the end. But the game's base feature set needs to be finished first. Until that's done, there are mods to fill gaps in what the stock game provides.

Edited February 8, 2014 by Kasuha

[macegee]

1. No stock dV indicator: I agree. I understand the whole "mystery" thing, but some of us spend a lot of effort calculating it out of game anyway. For such an intuitive feature, the "mystery" is not worth the pain of doing it over and over out-of-game.

Exactly what I'm trying to tell. Harvester himself told us many times that he doesn't want the game to become grindy. While flying blindly might be fun for some people, it's gonna be frustrating for others, and, actually, for everyone - to become a grind. Even doing calculations by hand all the time IS a grind.

2. No reentry heat: I'll bet many people (including me) get tremendous performance gains by doing ridiculous aerobraking. RIDICULOUS. AEROBRAKING. But, I think this is a feature, not a bug. Ridiculous rocket design (from an IRL perspective), ridiculous aerobraking, ridiculously Kerbal. I'm glad there's a mod for those with more hard-core tendencies.

You still can do aerobraking with Deadly Reentry. You don't even need heat shields if you do it the smart way, in the upper atmosphere. Doing an aerocapture (making your orbit stable in one go with the help of atmosphere after coming in from another SOI) is still possible with reentry heat enabled. You just need to plan for it, using heat shields. I think it's a good trade-off - if you want to do aerocapture, you need an additional stuff for it to work.

Public roadmap?

Two words: Adam. Osborne.

Can you expand your thought a little bit? I don't get it. I'm a Russian, actually.

This post helps me a lot understanding what's going on with the roadmap. Especially the whole multiplayer thing seemed very strange, as devs said there will be none not long ago and now are already putting coding efforts into it. I think this also explains the most causes like for "dev dont hear to the community", "its in a mod so stop complaining". Everyone in this forum has already paid for the game and so we aren't in their main target audience anymore. If you think of the slow progress the development makes, it is obvious that there are new money ressources to search for to keep the dev team together.

Regarding multiplayer. Actually, I think you're right. I remember the old CMs (Damion and Skunky) saying that multiplayer isn't gonna happen. And now they're not a part of the SQUAD. So yeah, this is what a lack of an actual open roadmap does - people get cofused, rumors spread, even community managers make mistakes on what they say to the public, and then drama comes. This is why I'm pro for being open and transparent from the start. But that doesn't mean that you don't have to be careful with what you say.

[PrivateFlip]

Do you realize that you just got LUCKY? Now let's talk about all these other times when you get UNLUCKY and end up having to do everything again and again and again and again, or send a refueling mission again and again and again, if it's even possible. And all just because you were unable to plan your flight delta-v wise. That's gonna be frustrating for some players, me included. I don't like to fly blind. I like to plan. But why do I have to calculate such things by hand or use mods just because I like to plan my flights delta-v wise? Seriously, is there an answer for this issue?

It isn't luck just luck, just because you don't do calculations doesn't mean you can't make some estimate based on experience. I don't do delta-v calculations and in most situations I've had enough to spare. Sure sometimes someone got stuck on the mun or there was a need to send a massive refueling mission to Moho because the estimate was way off, but these things add to the challenge and sense of adventure (for me at least, your mileage may vary as you indicate above).

One of the devs did mention it was one of their aims to put as little information to the player in the form of numbers, so there is a vision behind this and some players like that more while others like it less. It can't please everyone. This doesn't mean I think you shouldn't tell sqaud what you like and don't like about the game, but it'll could save you a some frustration if you accept they won't necessarily listen.

[Kasuha]

Regarding multiplayer. Actually, I think you're right. I remember the old CMs (Damion and Skunky) saying that multiplayer isn't gonna happen. And now they're not a part of the SQUAD. So yeah, this is what a lack of an actual open roadmap does - people get cofused, rumors spread, even community managers make mistakes on what they say to the public, and then drama comes. This is why I'm pro for being open and transparent from the start. But that doesn't mean that you don't have to be careful with what you say.

Regarding multiplayer, I'm pretty sure it was not planned until the multiplayer mod came out with really clever ways how to get around problems with time warping.

It has nothing to do with roadmap. If there was a roadmap, you'd see there is no multiplayer one day and the next day you'd see the multiplayer appeared there. And something else would disappear or be postponed on it. Because that's how roadmaps work. And there would be much more unnecessary discussion about why and what.

And I'm also pretty sure multiplayer has nothing to do with people leaving the team.

My own opinion on multiplayer is, I'm afraid it will not be as much success as people expect. It will be a cooperative multiplayer with very limited ability to become competitive. But multiplayer is about competition in the first place.

[crazyewok]

It isn't luck just luck, j

One of the devs did mention it was one of their aims to put as little information to the player in the form of numbers, so there is a vision behind this and some players like that more while others like it less. It can't please everyone. This doesn't mean I think you shouldn't tell sqaud what you like and don't like about the game, but it'll could save you a some frustration if you accept they won't necessarily listen.

Yes you can please everybody. Its a little thing called PRE GAME OPTIONS! I dont see how people can grasp this simple concept. Before you set up a new game you get a little menue listing game options you want and the player can CHOOSE what they want, dont like DV calc? Turn it off, dont like re entry heat? turn it off, dont like resources ? turn it off.

Wow simple everybody is happy then!

Its not rocket science!

[Dodgey]

Ok, be honest here, if all of us were to personally calculate how much it has cost us per hour to play this game I believe that number would be close as so makes no difference to zero, even more so if you think about how fun this game is.

Now I'm just providing an objective point of view, however just a few points I want to cover. Macegee, you commented about multiplayer, saying that the before they said it wasn't going to happen and now it is. And that (correct me if I'm wrong) the lack of an open roadmap (plan) creates confusion and drama and the such, now am I right in assuming that you would prefere that Squad is able to change their mind about what they had said I the past, rather than stick to a concrete plan even of the situation changed, KMP for example.

(Dammit it, you ninjad me Kasuha)

Secondly I would ask you to stop speaking on behalf of everyone in your arguments, and I quote "While flying blindly might be fun for some people, it's gonna be frustrating for others, and, actually, for everyone - to become a grind. Even doing calculations by hand all the time IS a grind." end quote. It is an argumentive fallacy as evident by this discussion.

Crazyewok, one issue which I believe Squad tries to avoid is segregating the community based on what options they limit them selves to, we can already see this with MechJeb in some cases.

(edit) Which is one of the reasons we don't have a random solar system.

As a final statement I would ask everyone to go read the terms of agreement, just a suggestion not intended to add fuel to the flames. And would people stop bringing up resources, not s personal attack just an observation of the forums.

[crazyewok]

Crazyewok, one issue which I believe Squad tries to avoid is segregating the community based on what options they limit them selves to, we can already see this with MechJeb in some cases.

(edit) Which is one of the reasons we don't have a random solar system.

.

And I think its a stupid decsion. Beyond stupid. Infact beyond beyond beyond stupid and couldnt disagree 1000000000% more.

Sorry but you have diffrent types of players, we dont all want to play the same style. Forceing as all into one play style is just going to 1) create alot of tension, 2) limit market sales. 3) if they want us all playing in a uniform forced way then they shouldnt of added mods.

Let player play how they want! It doesnt hurt anyone. On the other hand forceing the community and shoe horning players down a single route does! It creates tension, limits playablity, restricts market appeal. Its just too much hassel and greif for such little benifit IE a few forum challenges that most players likley wont do seeing im sure most people dont even vist the forums.

Also fine I get while keeping something as big as the same solar system but options such as DV calc and heat re entry.

As for bringing up resources? Er no, alot of players want them so its going to be kept being brought up. dont like em? Well if they are added dont use them.

Edited February 8, 2014 by crazyewok

[Kerbart]

Can you expand your thought a little bit? I don't get it. I'm a Russian, actually.

Adam Osborne was a famous computer entrepeneur in the late 70s/early 80s. Making his fortune with selling software, he started selling the "Osborne 1," a CP/M (the predecessor of DOS) computer that was, at least for the time, truly portable. (Portable means you can easily transport it. It wasn't small. It was just not a mess with monitors, cables, powersupplies, etc, all was encased in a suitcase sized box that could be carried around easily).

The Osborne laid out his "road map" for the Osborne 2 which was going to be even more awesome even though at that point it was still in development and pretty much vaporware. People who were planning on buying an Osborne I held off, as the II would be sooo much better. Cashflow dried up and his company went bust.

This has been named "the Osborne Effect" and has been a warning towards developers (both hard and software) to be reluctant advertising new versions too much ahead of time.

While the Osborne Effect is not in play with Squad -- KSP has already been paid for by existing customers and there's no penalty for buying early -- the lesson to learn is that revealing too much in advance can have negative side effects that are hard to predict.

As far as "questionable design decisions" go -- Squad is very clear that they are developing a game, not a simulation. The reason the game attracted hard-core simmers at first is because you had to be, to get any enjoyment out of the game. With the mechanics of the game nearly fully developed, focus is now shifting to enhancing gameplay, especially for the more casual gamers. So it is fully understandable that development is now going towards career mode, contracts (providing goals, an alien concept for hardcore simmers), good in-game tutorials. All that makes perfect sense in the development of KSP The Game but it means that less (or no) resources are spent on KSP The Simulation.

Is that a bad thing? Obviously it is, when you are looking for a realistic simulation (which the opening screen will tell you right of the bat KSP is not), but for development as a game it is natural.

For me personally, atmospheric behavior (both at launch as well as re-entry, but I think re-entry heating is very closely related to good aerodynamic modeling) is the one part that needs improvement and that I expect improvement since it can only enhance gameplay (it adds an "it's not over till it's over" element to the game).

What I see with most requests for "more realism" is a desire to make the game more "hardcore." N-body physics! Lagrange Points! Random Failures! Which will make the game a miserable experience for all but the most committed players. Running out of fuel in Duna, and quickly sending in a fuel tank while time accelerating because you don't want to wait half a year? LOLZ u didn't maintain ur orbit! Fuel arrives, mission has disappeared... That might be ok for some, 95% of the players will not be happy about that.

In the end, Squad will make decisions that make the game appealing for the majority of the players. And with KSP getting more and more fame, that will be a focus on making the game easier and "fun," not harder and radical.

[ElJugador]

1. I very much agree with this one. Discovering these things by yourself in this case is not /fun/, it's _FRUSTRATING_. Though I agree that calculating it by yourself does give you a better understanding of your designs, dV calculators are just too important to be left out.

2. I feel ambivalent about reentry heat.

3. Agree. There are also some part placement decisions in the tree that don't make sense at all, even in the light of this paradigm. (The probe science parts are only unlocked very late and not all together? /Wat/?)

4. I agree somewhat on this point. There needs to be a few more ways to get usefulness from probes

5. I've never felt one is needed, but I do feel Squad needs a good and solid vision of what KSP will be.

6. I agree somewhat.

[Dodgey]

Ok, I'm going to say this before I move on, we have been given a decision about resources from Squad and simply complaining about it not being in the game, or saying it should be without good reason will not change their mind about it. I will not comment on it anymore as it is off the original thread topic.

Now moving on, your argument about giving the player the choice and if you don't like it don't use it could be applied to any and all ideas for the game, essentially saying, don't like guns in the game, don't use them. Don't like FTL, don't use it, and so on.

What you call and I quote "Forceing as all into one play style is just going to 1) create alot of tension, 2) limit market sales. 3) if they want us all playing in a uniform forced way then they shouldnt of added mods." Could also be called focus, direction or scope. Let's take Battlefield 4 for example, it could be said that the developers of that game forced their community having a single play style because they have to kill each other, now was that wrong of those developers? No because that's what Battlefield 4 is as determined by the developers, Squad has determined that not having a Delta V display or re-entry damage/heat is how the game should be.

Going back to what I said before about guns, they developers have determined that not having guns, FTL travel, alien civilisations is how the game should be. And the they would rather dedicate their time towards developing the game to how they think it should be, instead of adding in guns, alien civilisations ect and making them optional for those that think that it sould be in the game.

If I had made any wrong assumptions about your argument please let me know, I do not want to quote mine you.

[ElJugador]

Wrong example. Battlefield 4 is an FPS. Killing stuff is part of the whole point of that genre.

dV calculators are a critical part of this kind of simulator. Leaving them out of stock is a bad decision IMO.

[macegee]

Yes, it would. And this is a game about discovery and learning. The question is: what will happen if you give players with the correct solution from the start on? It's a bit like a hint system in a point & Click adventure: from a design point of view, it definitely has pros and cons. It might improve the gameflow, but it also might make the game less challenging.

Delta-v isn't a solution per se, but an indicator. We've got lots of them already. We've got center of mass, center of lift, actual mass during flight, orbit altitude in meters. Why do we need all this? I'm pretty sure it's possible to play without any of this, even without looking at your orbit in map view. Some people actually play like that, from the IVA view. But they've got options to know more info.

There is often a very thin (and very personal) line between challenging and frustrating. You could argue that your frustration is caused by a broken design, or that you are not the person which KSP is meant for. It's a matter of taste, and enough people would disagree with you.

It's true. This is why I'm interested to hear how many of you feel the same as I do.

From a design point of view, separate tutorials are breaking the game flow. They break the current progress, and they force the player to follow one instruction after another, instead of letting him explore the next step in his own time and pace. Most games today try to avoid them, and rather incorporate them in the normal campaign. You could argue that every game that requires constant learning is basically one long tutorial.

As I said: this is actually quite common. And KSP needs much more than just a few tutorials to be fully understood.

That's a valid point. But why then they would work on tutorials separately?

the answer is no.

I explained at least a few times already why I consider his statement wrong. Do you have anything to add to it?

Most importantly, the fact that certain feature is not included does not count as "bad development decision" because it can be added later. Bad development decisions are those which prevent adding useful or important features in later stages.

None of the original six points count as bad development decisions IMO.

Interesting thought. But too optimistic. It's fairly clear that said features are not gonna see a light of day, at least until 1.0, and doubtfully, not even after. This is what I think by looking at how development goes.

I don't think such indicator is necessary. It would be a nice to have feature, at least for some people, but the game is playable without it as well. I can tell, I never used one. In my opinion, a hyperedit-like tool allowing us to test the design or its parts in various conditions is IMO much better because it does not tell you a number. It tells you whether you will succeed at the situation or not - with not only your design, but also your skills.

Uhm.. This idea looks really weird to me, to tell the truth. Especially the "skills" part of it. I don't get it.

Nobody says it can't be added later. And honestly, being able to aerobrake thousands m/s when returning from distant spots is kinda comfortable so I would even say I'm not really missing this bit of realism.

Answered the same question already. Reentry heat still allows aerobraking and even aerocapture. Even aerobraking without heat shield is possible.

We should only judge career implementation when it's finished. The idea of tech tree is IMO not silly, but the tech tree as it is IMO kinda is. But remember, the tech tree could only be completed when the list of parts is completed. And I don't think there will be no more stock parts added.

Yes, of course, I was saying that about the tech tree itself, not the idea of it. And I think it's okay to critisize it while it's still WIP, since the general concept of how they want to fill the tech tree has been discussed by the devs already a few times - they see it as a tutorial to introduce parts to the player. This affects what's exactly in the tech tree.

I don't see too many advantages of manned flights. You can repair some broken parts with EVA Kerbals and you can still control the craft somewhat if it runs out of electricity, that's about all the advantage in sandbox. There's a bit more you can do with them in Career but not really that much. And you don't kill or strand your Kerbals if you send a probe. Sounds like a reasonable tradeoff to me.

EVA reports alone can make lots of science. There's simply not that much of probe-sized stuff there yet, and I didn't hear devs saying anything about that there will be eventually. And that's bothering me, cuz I think there should be enough of both of them.

It isn't luck just luck, just because you don't do calculations doesn't mean you can't make some estimate based on experience. I don't do delta-v calculations and in most situations I've had enough to spare. Sure sometimes someone got stuck on the mun or there was a need to send a massive refueling mission to Moho because the estimate was way off, but these things add to the challenge and sense of adventure (for me at least, your mileage may vary as you indicate above).

I didn't mean to sound as if everything's a pure luck in this case. Of course, player skill matters here too. But it's still a guesstimate. A leap of faith.

One of the devs did mention it was one of their aims to put as little information to the player in the form of numbers, so there is a vision behind this and some players like that more while others like it less. It can't please everyone. This doesn't mean I think you shouldn't tell sqaud what you like and don't like about the game, but it'll could save you a some frustration if you accept they won't necessarily listen.

There're millions of ways of doing UI in games. They use gauge plus numbers for maneuver nodes. It's a valid design decision right there.

Edited February 8, 2014 by macegee

[Kasuha]

dV calculators are a critical part of this kind of simulator.

I disagree. Thinking that dv calculator is critical for KSP is a sign you grew too dependent on one. You don't even realize the game can be played without one just fine.

[crazyewok]

Squad has determined that not having a Delta V display or re-entry damage/heat is how the game should be.

And alot of us are disagreeing. Not one or two but 50% of the community. We think that decsion is stupid and we are telling them so. I and Im sure a number here just dont see the logic or sense from a gameplay role to a market role how how adding options and pleasing everyone on these matters (and seeing as there a few mod it wouldnt be to hard for the devs to do) isnt a good idea? why make a descion that restricts gameplay style, divides the communitys and creates tension and could limit sales when a very simple option screen could save all that hassel?

[Atoning Unifex]

Squad has determined that not having a Delta V display or re-entry damage/heat is how the game should be.

This. The game is Squad's. Whilst it's nice that they listen to us players it is essentially their game and they can make it how they want. If they had released as a finished game, rather than alpha, then none of this would even have come up.