LoooSeR Posted November 14, 2018 Report Share Posted November 14, 2018 Review of Metro-2. Metro-2 was developed by Orion Games and released by Buka in late september of 2005, it was Soviet themed FPS set in early 1950s and was telling fictional story about conspiracy by MGB and Beria to nuke Moscow and Stalin. In an interesting twist, this FPS have plenty of bits that you can see now in Metro 2033/LL series of FPS. Maybe because "Bad things happen in Subway system, but this is an FPS" isn't really that diverse theme, or because 4A Games were looking at Metro-2 as learning material - IDK, but similarities at times are very close. Visuals On my system (and looks like on many not even most modern computers) this game doesn't work properly. Textures and light system are broken, with sometimes texutres being replaced by black void. In 2005 this game already had at times very dated visuals, but it generally was on more or less on par with games from 2003-2004 on technical level. Some levels lacked details, some of them (usually Moscow Subway stations) were made rather well, outside of random low-res textures. Parts of Metro-2 on surfface were mix bag, and one of last levels in Kremlin were looking like Google Earth made into FPS. Spoiler Same moment in my game: Overall, even if technical capabilities probably were there, game looked dated by 2005 standarts. Today, even with understanding of Metro-2 being "old game", visuals still leave not very good taste (and i am not speaking about broken visual system, i played it in 2005 and watched a footage of properly working Metro-2 before review). Models of enemies were made at some places not well enough (faces especially, HL2 in 2004 had way better human faces which still holds even today), random low-res textures and low level of details in some parts of level leave a feeling of slapdash work. Spoiler Metro-2 also lack any serious attempts to create an atmosphere, as majority of levels are grey underground tunnels with rather low detalisation. Maybe they tried to represent low number of consumer goods in USSR through their level design? Spoiler Few levels that had promise of creating atmosphere and immersion, but developers managed to undermine visuals with either gameplay or level layout itself. Sewer system level for example was promising, but key hunting and locked doors made it to feel very "game-like", with backtracking and enemies spawning in tunnels that you already cleared without even a hint from where they managed to get in, making obvious for a player that it was a triggered script. Another example was MGB: Tomb Raider section, where game suddenly decided to make a brake from endless shooting and added yet another Moscow sewer system map, where there are no enemies of proletariat to kill (for part of this level). It looked rather great in concept - dark tunnels with few light sources and only your torch helping you to see in the dark for majority of your path. Problem is that game designers made this level full of an easy but numerous jumping puzzles and unbelievable number of bandits. All this broke a mood and made me cringe at it (Moscow ancient tunnels are full of GULag prisoners!). This lack of art direction in eyes of some people can be compensated by Soviet-themed 1950s things in this game, but IMO modelling a telephone or a random placard from USSR and slapping them together isn't an "art direction". One example of their slapdash work - placard for welding safety tips that was located in MGB administration building for some reason. Or this: Spoiler Door that is located somewhere in 1.7 floor. Some of cutscenes were outsourced to local school. If only that was in game presentation, i would give it a "bad" mark in presentation, but there are few things that holds me from doing this. 1) Highly detailed bush at 2nd level. Spoiler 2) Some of bullet holes were made as a bump/parallax texture, those things give you an illusion of 3d/deph of those damages on walls. Just like in FEAR! Spoiler 3) Big amount of objects with physical models. They are not used for gameplay in any way, but they help to create a feeling of desctruction and some interactivity of this world beyond button pressing and murder. Spoiler All this leaves us with mediocre presentation at best. Gameplay. Metro-2 continues to be "mediocre at best" in its gameplay. Because this is an FPS, let's start with weapons system. Spoiler A lot of guns leaves awkward feeling after use, with exception of SKS and SVT when firing at heads of bad guys. AK and PPSh are really hard to control, even if you try to compensate with mouse their "general" recoil, you can't compensate a Parkinson's attacks of first person camera that start to shake like crazy. Pistols are bad in general, PTRS is unusable in close and medium ranges because of fragmentation from bullets, that explodes like 40 mm UBGL grenades (probably bullets were loaded with Komsomolets hate towards enemies of the State), RPG-2 can't be shot from the move and needs time to be shouldered after player stops to move. All gun models are huge and some of them even obscure your aim (like AK-47), main character holds them at awkward angle (like he is aiming at a point 0.5 meters away from his face or trying to aim at right corner of my monitor). Frequently, just after a shot, main character starts idle animation, that brings gun closer to the face like player's avatar decided to read something on it, and gun obscures almost a whole screen WHILE YOU ARE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FIGHT! Spoiler Fragments start to fly towards us. One hit a floor about 10 meters in front of us and bounced from it. Was too close to this enemy when firing. I barely can see enemies that i am shooting at. Add here electrocuted first person camera just to understand ho hard is sometimes to even track enemies at medium ranges. And those problems on their own already make firing in this shooter to be not really fun activity, but wait! There is more! Taking cover in Metro-2 isn't best idea ever for several reasons. First is that you can't shoot over a cover because of strange way game register origin of you shots and how it tracks them (bullets in this game are not hitscan). Spoiler Take that, edge of a box just in front of me! Second reason is metal. All bullets with bounce from any metal surface in Metro-2 at any angle. This mean if you are trying to take cover and shoot at enemy (many weapons have burst fire as default), you can fire a burst right into yourself. Even some thin doors can kill you like this if you try to shoot through them, because they are made out of metal. Also, this mean that player need to take into account what is behind him - enemies can hit metal object behind a player and hit him in the back, even if player avatar body is in cover. Spoiler And this is not all! Several guns have "zoom in" as their secondary attack, which is awkward on its own (some guns have semi-auto assigned as secondary attack, some don't have any kind of second firing mode, some weapons have zoom, and there is no indication which one have what kind of secondary attack), but during this zooming game doesn't scale weapon model properly. Spoiler Shooting at long ranges with those rifles is also strange. Bullets at some distance start to fly above aiming circle, so in order to get a headshot, you need aim to the chest or even lower, and there is no way to change aiming circle/zero ir/etc. Great job! On top of that enemies feel bullet spongy. Some of them can eat 5-7 bullets in chest before dying. Spoiler The only good thing about gunplay is headshots with SVT and SKS rifles. It allows to single tap enemies, and thanks to ragdoll, hits feel powerfull. Altogether this makes Metro-2 gunplay and shooting mechanics to be rather bad on their own, unpolished, strange, awkward, sometimes disconnected from game design (like PTRS that you can't use for majoirty of levels as many of those a close range) and sometimes rage-inducing. For majority of this game i used SKS, SVT and PPSh, as they work well enough - rifles thanks to their headshot abilities, PPSh for close range, where big magazine partially compensate terrible recoil mechanics. Level design is Metro-2 is very mediocre. All places that Stock Charactorovich Communistov visits are linear and uninventive corridors with button pressing and vents climbing sections, totally as an allegory of a single party political system of USSR and not because of other reasons. Some of them feels like they were taken from HL2, some are completely forgetable. Battles doesn't have interesting space orientation or layout - all enemies are on the same level shooting at you from standing in the middle of open position from a hip. You never get into situation when you fight bad guys pushing from 2 directions, you never even have stock "defend X!" objective! Almost the whole game player is just moving through corridor and shot bad guys, with very small exception of several Subway stations, where player can move though arena-like level. But developers managed to make them feel like corridor shooter - enemies wait behind pillars and jump one by one to fight you instead of something different. Spoiler Average level of Metro-2. Average mission objective in Metro-2 Map makers in few levels used unkillable enemies in order to block your way in certain places (usually in those arena-like Subway stations), which is terrible for immersion. All levels pacing is also very generic - i don't remember any level having emotional structure, like something as basic as "start - build up - climax - end". You move through level and kill 2-3 humans with guns that are standing around in this room and continue this until the end. Only few levels in the end of Metro-2 started to feel like game with some sort of direction, but last level managed to kill it, as it was yet another "walk around, kill people and press buttons/flip switches". Fighting with traitors is also uninteresting. Bad guys don't do anything cool, they don't have any mechanics attached to them other than "Shoot me! IF you will hit head, i will get way more damage!" During almost whole Metro-2 they are just standing around and wait when player will appear, and that is all. Spoiler This is one time when enemies dispatched a squad against you. It was such a big deal for developers that they made this cutscene. Oops, i killed them too quickly. So in short - awkward gunplay coupled with generic and boring level design, flavored with generic amount of generic and boring bullet sponges on 2 and few times on 4 legs. Plot and characters Main hero is boring and uniteresting, 2 females that help to Gleb are boring and uninteresting, plot is stupid and uninteresting. I don't remember who was main bad guy who took father of protagonist as a hostage. At least there are few cutscenes here and there! And it feels like when devs started to make Metro-2, they didn't knew how to make cutscenes, but closer to the end of the game there is a much nigher number of those. It feels like they started to make an actual game and not a demo right before Metro-2 singleplayer story end. Cutscene are cheap and at times also awkward. Spoiler Personally, story left a bad taste in my mouth. When main hero was fightng back against attacking forces of conspirators, i was Ok with this. When main hero started to break in their offices and kill everybody inside of administrative buildings, going from office to office and just breaching doors, throwing grenades and violently murdering people, i felt bad as Gleb lost this small feeling of hero that fights back against forces of evil and started to be a violent killer. Than game became weird when those "go in this building and kill guys" sections were becoming to be way too fucking long, for example in last mission you need to clear 5 floors of those rooms and kill everybody inside. Player and main hero in last missions also killed several WW2 veterans with disabilities (who were never used in other levels), whole MGB administration on top of a battalion worth of enemies in previous level, shaking out of protagonist positive qualities of a generic hero like forgiveness and "not starting firefights in a building full of non-combatants against people, and who can be arrested anyway". This... is uncomfortable for me, but not in "thought provoking way". I perceived those sections as a dream of anti-Soviet violent murderer, dreaming about walking into high ranking officers cabinets and blasting people in their faces. Not sure if it was just bad over-repetative level design or it was something else. AI and enemies Metro-2 have several breakthrough technologies in AI, like ability to stand still and shot from the hip, strafe to the right, throw greandes in very long animation and self-destruct. There are 3.5 types of bad guys - normal human with a knife, normal human with a gun, normal human with a gun that moves a little bit faster and a dog. So let's see their advanced capabilities, like: 1) Climbing stuff. Spoiler 2) Spotting player: Spoiler 3) Advanced pathfinding Spoiler Level designer also left his mark on AI. 4) Grouping together for convenient dying, attacking one by one in a line and similar: Spoiler 5) SOME enemies know how to strafe right and use cover! Spoiler 6) Ability to be easily killed by grenades. Spoiler "Hey, this is a grenade!" "Should we move?" "No! We are stronger than those communist bastards!" 7) Build-in Self-destructon system Spoiler AI in Metro-2 is very advanced, FEAR and Far Cry should be affrain to put their own bad guys against those traitors of People's Socialist ideals! Bugs and glitches Because they are funny. Spoiler Conclusion Metro-2 have number of sections that you can see in Metro-2033 and Last light games, like train chaise, Moscow catacombs, arena-like levels based on Moscow subway stations, main character moving through underground and several times through surface levels, both games end point was at/connected to D6 and so on. I am not sure if those connections were purely accidental, or somebody in 4A was doing homework, based on Metro-2. Metro-2 as it is can be called mediocre at best, with bad shooting/weapons mechanics, at times broken AI, boring enemy and level design, forgetable/bad plot and completely flat characters (not counting breasts of female 3d models). I don't recommend it to anybody, with exception of sarcastic Youtubers to make a videos of all stupid shit that happens in this game (not only bugs and glitches). Scolopax 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 14, 2018 Report Share Posted November 14, 2018 Played EndWar 2 days ago to have a break from Metro-2, had surprisingly long and very close game against Normal AI. Maybe because they were in defence, and it is sort of easier than attacking build up positions. As this battle was rather long, i will post pics in several spoilers, according to "stages" of this fight. First part: Preparations. Spoiler Still testing Normal AI as enemies and trying to look at Hardcore AI as a teammate. Siege gamemode was chosen as it is more "directed" type of battle because of 2 stages of it. Attackers have 10 minutes to capture A or murder all defenders while defenders don't have any support outside of their prepared positions and automatic defence turrets. After 10 minutes mark defenders get a big amount of reinforcements of regular Army and get all kinds of support attacks, airstrikes and so on. Will try to support AI teammate by providing artillery support and defences against counterattacks. Rank of units depends on chosen Task Force (several types are avaliable) This map would have been better at night with more fire and smoke from battles in the background. Devs said that EndWar at some point had weather system, but they decided to cut it out. Sad. Command vehicle. I want to make a little in-depth review of units in EndWar, including their external design. That thing on roof, near rear of hull is UAV module. Those triangles and hex-shaped things make this IFV look toy-like. Movement spotted. In EndWar recon can and should be done by all means player have. This time - just by using binoculars. UAV is out to have a look at our foe. Oh, those wonderful octagonal wheel arches I picked left flank, AI took right part of map. Will try to get to Yankee point and take it. I like and don't like idea that infantry need to enter buildings only from specific point. This mechanics should have been slightly reworked. Better protected structures should have 1 exit, while civilian houses should have several entry points. SPGs are closing to their firing positions. I am advancing slowly as enemy choppers are expected to appear nearby. Part 2: Battle for American Kremlin begins. Spoiler Battle begins and we open up with SPGs. AI deployed plenty of tanks and infantry, but no long range firepower. I will try to make a breach in left flank in order to sneak in an infantry sqauds there. SPGs are moving around to pick better position. Infantry reached Yankee and taken blocking positions. Friendly AI wants to capture Y, so i leave it for AI. Zhukov SPGs are getting shelled All automatic turrets were destroyed on left flank (thanks to SPGs, we probably can try to sneak in. AI already is trying to push into this breach in enemy lines. Enemies have 2 lines of defence. First line is unit 6 and 3 of infantry squads, trying to hold on central bunkers. Artillery 4 and 5 is using them as shielding from raiders. Second line is located near uplink A itself - infantry unit 8 in a bunker, APCs under number 7 and what looks like tanks designated as enemy unit 1. AI committed a complimentary composition of units to hold on A. Let's try to get in enemy area. We will probably not get to A in time, but at least we can try to start a process of capturing it. Second comander of our forces lost IFVs and tries to retreat his gunship unit (he will get their price back and will be able to call another unit). AI picked tank platoon instead of gunships. Not a bad choice, we will need direct LOS firepower soon. I am suppressing middle part of hostiles forces line. My light infantry squad is out of battle. Combat engineers are in serious trouble, as Russians responded with artillery barrage of attackers and deployed APCs to deal with what is left of them. Tanks were called instead of infantry unit 2, all my units, including Command vehicle, are participating in attack. Almost done. But no time is left for us. Part 3: Recover and getting back to the battle. Spoiler 3 units out, but SPGs are ok after giant missile strike. Evac chopper is so big... fat Americans need a C-130 sized evac choppers to haul their fat bodies! Buhaha, that was a low-hanging fruit! SPGs took this position as barriers in front of them will block AFVs from getting in. If needed, those gun carriers can get behind building for cover. IFVs are getting deployed to defend what we have from waves of attack helicopters. Waves of Russians will be hit by kinetic rods. There are still too many enemies to deal, and this group of Kamovs are getting a bit too close to my SPGs. Time to relocate. Tanks arrived, Yankee was still not captured (AI aborted that in order to send his infantry to attack through a gap in enemy defenses), so infantry is being brought in to do that. MRLS attack from SPGs. Those are literally hordes of Shpetsnaz gunships to deal with. 4 units of SGB helicopters means at least 16 of those things over our heads! 2 IFVs and combat engineers should be good enough to hold on our positions. AI commander also bringing in a platoon of IFVs for AA work. Air attack failed, artillery is covered from the front by big ass building. Russians will try to assault us on ground, because those SPGs continue to be a big problem for them. Part 4: Russian Shpetsnaz armored onslaught. Spoiler First group of tanks was dispatched to hunt down SPGs. Enemies think that we have SPGs and few IFVs, but i brought tanks to the battle and combat engineers to help with AT work, and they were not spotted yet by our foe. IFVs of JSF are fast and can be used to harass enemies. 5 out of 6 of my units are firing at this tank platoon. They are trying to run away, but it is too late. They will be toasted in no time! Finishing last tank. More tanks are coming in. Note another platoon on the background. First armored attack was done by 2nd enemy AI commander (his units have desert camo). Another platoon is down. Attackers tried to fight with my tanks as a priority target, as IFVs were doing small amount of damage to them. We have complete fire superiority in this part of map and we can focus fire counter-attacking units before they can deal any serious damage to us. 2nd hostile AI is bringing more of his own armored forces to help to his partner. I hope they will not try to combine into a Voltron. They were distracted for a moment by AI-commanded choppers. Just a bit more time for our artillery to soften them. And enemies brought 2 platoons of tanks at least. Now we need to move and not just retreat, if they will commit to attack. Enemies decided to clear air before doing tank assault, we have few moments to breathe, while artillery continues to do their job. Now Russians are commited to this attack. We need to deal with each tank platoon separately if we want to get through this with minimal loses. First tank platoon is getting hit by artillery and airstrikes, hard. Tanks are shelling them, while IFVs will work as distraction, if needed. We need to do as much damage as possible to exploit a tactical mistake by enemies - their tank assault timing was not coordinated well enough between those 2 MBT units, so one is in front of another. We managed to deal enough damage to make them less of a threat, as they lost 2 vehicles. 2nd tank unit is still OK and they are getting into the range. My tanks are in trouble, as enemies now have number superiority (6 of SGB tanks vs 4 of our MBTs). IFVs ordered to relocate, tanks will follow them. Combat engineers were sneaked into middle section of this building, it will provide good ambush as a wing of this structure is obsuring LOS of Shpetsnaz tanks to their positions, until tanks will get too close. My MBTs are luring Russian tank platoon in a perfect place for ambush. Shpetsnaz tanks just spotted combat engineers and are switching their attention to building. Our tanks now have a chance to get back into this fight. Ambush in process. That was a direct hit! Last tank of this defeated unit tries to get away. Evac chopper arrived to pick up crew of last vehicle. Not today, Shpetsnaz guys! Part 5: Unexpected plot twist! Spoiler Russian flank is open, again. Let's advance! Combat engineers are entering part of building that is closest to defensive positions (or what is left of them) of SGB. They will provide AA and AT protection for attacking units and SPGs. This is fucking incredible picture. My tanks should be able to deal with Russian regulat army AFVs, especially with artillery support. Shpetsnaz infantry hit by airstrikes. What the...? Damn, i forgot that enemy used his WMD a minute earlier than we did, thats why his WMD "recharged" earlier. And... i have only 1 unit left? And it is artillery?! This means that any asshole that can get close to us will destroy my last unit, even those dudes could do this. I have no reinforcements left to call in... Those SPGs needs to be used with precision and care as they are my last forces on the ground. Choppers are going to be my biggest fear now. Yes! Now we can use our own WMD, and i managed to kill infantry squad and Russian Kamovs in 1 hit! Run away! Enemies also have no reserves left. This is going to be a tight victory... for one of us. Not sure who will win, enemies have opportunity to snatch a victory from us, if he use what is left on the field well enough. AI can use those guys as firesupport, for example. Thats why i will try to soften them. My teammate have only 2 squads of infantry and 1 group of IFVs. Enemy infantry can be seen near point W, but because of Maskirovka, there is no HUD icon and i can't order to shell them directly. But i can use groundfire instead! Using groundfire with EndWar camera design against targets at long ranges is hard and feels like commanding artillery battery personally. I think this should be a solid hit. Hahaha, those guys were last Shpetsnaz forces on the ground! Part 6: Views of battlefield moments after. Spoiler Observations about AI: Have defensive command style, when needed/according to objective of gamemode/map Can change it during game AI can understand when and where enemy defenses are breached, can use it If encounter resistance and loses units, can try to dispatch bigger number of units to break this resistance When AI picks targets against which it will use WMD, it takes into account proximity of units to each other Defending team AI can coordinate with each other (if 2 AIs are actually used) Defending AI can understands when enemies made a breakthrough and can send units to counter attack / contain forces that are moving through a breakthrough point Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 15, 2018 Report Share Posted November 15, 2018 @Scolopax My attempts to install You Are Empty were almost all failers - game didn't bothered to launch or get through intro video. I found one version that is able to launch a menu, but changing any video settings made it not work anymore. I will try to find a version that works (2 out of 3 failed, but very first one was able to load a menu with missing background). Also, i found a Metro-2 addon, if tomorrow YAE will not launch, Metro-2 expansion will become my next target for review. So instead of You Are Empty i continued my skirmish battles with AI in EndWar. First phase: Before fight begins Spoiler New map, more chances to kill more JSF Cowboys. Will observe AI behavior on top of that. Not sure where comrade AI will go, but we need to capture as much of uplinks as possible. I picked infantry-oriented Task force for this, especially because map have a lot of forests and about 40% of map is urban area. Strange loadout of my AI comrade - command vehicle and choppers. Maybe he want to counter early expansion of our opponents. Capturing first position. While looking at helicopter that brought light infantry, i spotted enemies. They decided to to go for middle point directly, even before point near LZ. Interesting decision, it appears that AI is taking position not just based on their proximity to LZ/units. Riflemens are usable for this map, lots of forests and buildings [probably] full of American combat engineers. AI teammate Kamovs were dispatched to fight with enemies near Alpha point. Rocks can be used as a cover by soldiers. Mi-26/24 hybrid... contraption. Tanks will be needed for combat in central area. Interesting thing that movement of tanks hulls (when they smash objects) was also well animated in a way that tries to imitate suspension work effect on vehicle hull movement. Although tracks are not animated (except driving forward/backwards) or physically simulated, which is a bit sad. Pathfinding of AFVs sometimes tries to hug hill slopes, which is Ok from path distance POV, but looks strange. Shpetsnaz combat engineers approaching position A. Enemies after attack of our choppers decided to retreat and take B. APCs are moving squad of light infantry to military base, near uplink Delta. Hotdog eaters captured Bravo, D proable will be a place where we will clash. Tanks are supporting combat engineers in the middle part of map. Infantry delivered, but enemies are already at Delta, very close to us. Note that W is still not taken by them, enemies are very aggressive and tries to deny territory for us. Phase 2: Battle begins! Spoiler JSF Gunships were tasked with killing light infantry, but my APCs are very good SPAAGs. Hostile unit under number 4 are American IFVs, which are about as powerful as my AFVs, and this is a problem. Gunships are running away, but IFVs stepped in. Riflemens are going to help to APCs. When inside of structures infantry is a serious force. Tanks and combat engineers damaged another group of helicopters. At long ranges tanks can shell gunships without receiving fire from their practice targets. Hostiles are waiting for us in military base. JSF tanks are supporting infantry near Delta. At least now i have SPG team to deal with Cowboy's armor. We need to take this point to avoid losing this battle. Tanks from middle area were tasked with flanking our foes near Delta point. A is in our hands, but opponents decided to go for both flanks, as you see on the map. Seeing that i left A without defences, JSF pushed MBT platoon there. Phase 3: After WMDs. Spoiler We are close to losing this battle, WMDs exchange is on the way. Enemies didn't managed to hit us well enough. But they brought a lot of artillery. Point D is in our hands, finally. JSF tries to push middle area, from which they can take A and attack both F and D. 2 groups of SPGs. Great. Just great. We are pushing to position B, light infantry is hacking it. Enemeis are concetrated in middle line between W and A (they managed to capture A). Counterbattery fire. Also, AI brought in his own SPGs. We established parity of hacked server hubs with Americans. And those bastards now pushing with a lot of forces position B. Gunships are best counter to artillery, if they are not protected by certain type of units. One group of cannon carriers is killed, now helicopters will fight against attackers of B. Friendly AI is working on Alpha server hub. Another exachange of WMDs ended very well for us! Part 4: After more WMDs Spoiler Observation about AI: Able to choose points to capture based on tactics, not only proximity to units/LZ/already captured points Able to change tactics during battle, depending on situation/position of hostile units Can retreat from places with heavy resistance Can flank enemies, including from both left and right flanks Commitment to attack with multiple units against position with heavy resistance, if it is really needed Responsive on both tactical and "strategic" levels - can change direction of attacks and can choose selection/composition of units under it's command Random shit: Spoiler MAZ commanded by AI launched a drone, using rocket boosters. I like rocket boosters, they should be attached to everything. Sneakers, spoons, books - everything is better with rocket boosters. Imagine this MAZ truck, but with MRLS launcher instead of UAV launcher. So it will be both artillery AND SPAAG. Those T-100s are based on Black Eagle, for sure. Rear door for dwarfs and control panels for 3 meter tall giants near rear door. Recon in EndWar sometimes is like this: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 16, 2018 Report Share Posted November 16, 2018 You Are Empty install attempt number 4 is in the process. Is this normal for a game installer claim that we will soon, very soon show Kuzkina mother to those decadent capitalists? I feel this is how game installers would work if Soviet Union still existed. @EnsignExpendable @Scolopax Meanwhile, i will post more about EndWar Skirmish mode! Found new map to play and to fuck around with AI. First time we lost, this is second attempt: Chapter I: Let AI do it, i am busy with my tanks! Spoiler I want to futher test AI and picked conquest game mode and picked only AFVs, no infantry to actually capture points (which is one of main objectives of this gamemode). Let's see how AI reacts. Will send my forces to middle part of map, in attempt to hold it and break any attacking forces. AI are set to maximum difficulty, BTW, and first attempt on this map ended up with defeat (we lost middle point and didn't managed to take it in time). Heh, not bad. AI picked infantry to balance my AFV-only loadout, even if it could take any other type of units (we didn't got to limit of specific unit type number). Our Shpetsnaz armor was tasked to get to positions not far from Fedya, AI colleague ordered his soldiers to split up and take 2 uplinks in the same time (Dima and Fedya). APCs drivers are dicks. APC drivers are massive dicks. SPAAGs are in front so if Eurochoppers arrive, we will counter them without much of problems. Infantry is behind all of my armored vehicles. Map is pretty good for infantry, as part of roads are blocked for vehicles and there is a lot of cover for footmobiles. Chapter II: Small and Big explosions exchange Spoiler First to attack are Eurocopters. How usual for them. Euro wheeled death traps tried to sneak in their cannon meat, but tanks are on watch against cowardly attempts to sabotage Shpetsnaz victories! Euros started to lose (we captured 2 points vs their 1) and they hit us by Space Laser. Our Big Ass Missile are as good as your Space Laser, Euroidiots! Chapter III: Wrestle and Wrap up Spoiler Our reinforcements are moving in to hold Fedya from dirty hands of our enemies. AI comrade also brought his heavy armor. Europeans switched to long range firepower. They are preparing for assault of Fedya uplink. 2nd commander was in the middle of securing server hub Yanov, we need to help them. Kamovs are going to deal with artillery. More of Eurocopter spam. Tanks are retreating after receiving serious damage from European engineers and choppers on our right flank. They are too cocky. Our Kamovs will make them more cautious. Run to cover and sit there! My light infantry is trying to sneak in to Yanov server hub. Now we have a moment to support AI commander in his push of Yanov. My main forces are located near Fedya to defend it from flanking attack by infantry, while infantry squad is hacking Y. We need to hold just for a few moments, Yanov is almost in our hands! Epilogue: This never happened Spoiler I would like to know how exactly AI make a decision what units to take into battle. It is not as simple as "if player have Y use any other unit type than Y". Those APCs LOOK slick. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EnsignExpendable Posted November 16, 2018 Report Share Posted November 16, 2018 A Soviet installer would be performed in a hall with 15 windows (all but one are closed) where you stand in line to hand your hard drive to an uninterested woman who will reluctantly give you a ticket so you can stand in line to the payment kiosk, then once you have paid return to the woman so she can install the software for you. LoooSeR 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 16, 2018 Report Share Posted November 16, 2018 YAE still resist to my attempts to make it work. Will try to launch first version i got, it was able to launch starting menu at least. Meanwhile, had pretty cool session in skirmish battles, picked Siege gamemode in Moscow. Americans in Moscow! Spoiler Siege is pretty good gamemode as it is allows for more play styles and have more "meat" to work with. Going for maximum difficulty AI to spice things up. Selected a task force with good artillery and command tracked van. I would like to see how AI will try to assault them, although i would also like to win this battle and capture Moscow. Sobyanin was mayor for way too long! Will we attack Kremlin and sanction Medvedev personally! All units from number 1 to 6 are mine, while 6+ will be under friendly AI command. Moscow meets us with snow (of course!), cold air and giant banner over a road saying that oil price went up by 47.3%. Soviet-era residential buildings were looking at our forces with their empty windows and deserted streets around us were adding to general feel of place being left by locals. Only sparse cars, left in random places, acted as a reminder to American soldiers that this place just recently was alive. We have 10 minutes to take Kremlin before Russians will get reinforcements. They prepared for our operation - both nearest bridges have 4 robotic turrets guarding them, plus behind old red walls of Kremlin there were more of those things, waiting for air vehicle to appear in their optics. My colleague decided to breakthrough middle bridge defenses with majority of his forces, while sending group of IFVs on left flank. I will capture Lima, while SPGs were left in their position to shell automated turrets that Russians set everywhere on their side of the river. Command vehicle is using big brick building for cover. CV launching UAV copter to scout Shpetsnaz forces. They are very likely to be positioned under protection of Kremlin walls. Friendly forces are going to take Sierra, while riflemens are going to Lima, where my engineers are already (although they are not capturing it currently). Artillery is working on scouted targets. One of them looks like decided to cover this group and now is watching their 6. Counterartillery work - most important during Siege. Started to capture Lima, 2nd commander's tanks are pushing right flank of Russians. My task forces are advancing on left flank, while artillery is suppressing Shpetsnaz AFVs in the middle part of Kremlin. Hardest fight probably will occur inside of those big walls. Don't like to shell old churches, but our enemies picked this position. Second launch of UAV. Launching with some fireworks, haha. Again, Shpetsnaz Zhukov SPGs are located, we will try to hit them. Russians soldiers are going to break in one of those temples and use it as a shelter. We cleared all defences on left flank as much as we could, the moment has come to assault! Americans break into the Kremlin! Spoiler 2nd commander is trying to gauge footmobiles from this old church, but he will lose them. Choppers were shot down, but we have a chance to take SPGs with airstrike. My engineers are loaded into IFVs, assault forces are ready for operation to get inside. Haha! Now things will be way easier. Attack! Those leftovers of artillery (N7) are easy to smash like a bug. Commander tries to capture gates in the tower near Bravo. He distracted Russians well enough for me to use a moment. Tanks are going to deal with turrets, easily. Infantry needs to be inside by now, we are behind schedule. Engineers are going to secure tower to wait until tanks get inside. Those barricades blocks AFVs from entering, 2nd commander brought helicopters and currently is firing at those things. I decided to push futher as time was running out, tanks could block a tight street from Alpha to Bravo and screen engineers while they were doing their job. Those barricades are blocking entrance, yet again my colleague helps with firepower of his gunships. Tanks are going in, engineers taking Delta, gunships of 2nd commander are dealing with defenses and Shpetsnaz Ogre tanks are getting hit by our Airsupport, but we have no time left. We need to render inactive as much of Russian manpower as possible. Relocating CV and SPGs closer, so artillery support can reach deeper into our opponents territory, while CV will provide protection to them with UGVs. Finishing last survivors of our assault seconds before this operation will become a shitshow, SGB will throw everything they have to take Moscow back. Cowboys are in serious troubles as Sheptsnaz hits back! Spoiler HOLY SHIT... Shpetsnaz hit 2nd commander's forces really hard, knocking 5 units out of battle with 1 missle, and now waves of transport helicopters are tearing the air over us by hundreds of blades of their giant rotors. HOW MANY MORE OF THOSE THING YOU ARE GOING TO SEND HERE? Jesus fucking Christ... Scavengers are back to pick easy targets. Tanks are moving to Delta, under cover of engineer's missile launchers. We need to retreat anyway, those waves of angry Shpetsnaz guys are going to be here in just few moments! Haha, Kinetic rods will definitely help us to fight back waves of Russians! Tanks are near Delta, we deployed UGVs to defend it on top of combat engineers, a platoon of tanks and 2 SPG batteries that are ready to fuck up all counter-attacking forces of Shpetsnaz Guards Brigade. JSF 2nd commander have only single unit under his leadeship, which means that only i left to deal with bulk of counter-attacking forces. But we know their tactics, and this fight in ruins of expensive palaces is not ended yet! 2nd commander is relocating his tank platoon closer to my forces. Another banner over his armor says "Oil is getting more expensive every day! Only stars are above us!" Those crazy Russians are so happy about Saudi Arabia being nuked. Shpetsnaz are still bringing in their forces! At least we have some time to bring our own guys to fight for this small piece of Moscow. Smoldering remains of the Kremlin is the only thing you will get! Spoiler Russians started their assault! They are sending regular Army soldiers to soften our positions, then Shpetsnaz bastards will get into the fight and take all the credit for any success. Those guys are crazy, driving full speed right into bulk of our troops! Tanks are trying to retreat to keep at least SOME distance from those crazy Russian soldiers. Sheptsnaz infantry occupied the building in the back of the streets and now they are waiting, probably waiting to report to command results of this small hellish close range slaughter. As i said, those assholes are just going to sit there until they feel we are weak enough for them to finish a job, bulk of which was done by those mad conscripts. Don't think i didn't spotted you, Shpetsnaz guys. We are sending a present to you, a rocket boosted one. Everything outside of this palace is going to be filled with fragmentation. Sorry for ruining all those nice and rich-looking facades of historical buildings, but you asked for those measures! Second group of conscripts on 4x4 lightly armored and badly armed cars just drove between our MBTs, but those guys don't know how quick their suicide will be now. 3rd group of regular Army troops was badly damaged by our MRLS attack. Those mad Russians on scout cars are now firing rockets at back of our tanks, while UGVs from Delta are chasing them with their gatling guns and launchers. Combat engineers are adding firepower to deal with counter-attackers. Those scouts will burn and die here in their badly protected wheeled death traps. Question is how Shpetsnaz will use this moment, as frontal assault through tight corridor from A to D was ruled out by my massive rocket barrage, that nearly totally wrecked 3rd Army unit. SGB fuckers would definitely utilize heroic death of regular soldiers in their advantage. Smoke from burning scout cars is still rises and here are those Special forces cowards, trying to squeeze 2 tanks platoons through Kremlin ruins to hit us from the back. One of them looks like Shpetnsaz T-100s, second platoon is regular Russian army T-90s. 2nd SGB commander decided to hit us frontally anyway. We are going to be pushed from 2 directions, which will not end well for my troops. 2nd commander of JSF still have very small number of units to help me, his platoon of heavy armor just crossed left bridge and they will not get inside in time. This is bad, really bad. All enemy forces are concentrated against 2 of my units inside of Kremlin walls, they are pushed from the front by 4 T-100s and 2 platoons of T-90s from the back. Sheptsnaz is using hammer and anvil tactics, trying to block retreat routes by parking T-90s in this spot, while T-100s are advancing to Delta. 2nd platoon of Ogre tanks, that was going to flank us is parked futher away in the middle part of Kremlin, watching T-90s. Those assholes are still using regular army as cannon meat! Tanks are destroyed, and combat engineers don't have any way to get out of this murder alley. My last units inside of Kremlin are out of action, Russians manage to take back their precious leftovers of repository of their oppressors. At least we manage to seriously degrade their offensive capabilities. We still were able to hold on our positions near Delta, from which we can launch counter-counter attack. Although enemies still have plenty of forces to hit us hard. We will have as many battles for Kremlin as needed! Spoiler My UAV is in, it will guide fury of our artillerymen. They will level all regular army units and kill all Shpetsnaz units they can reach! Shpetsnaz forces become too aggressive and now tries to hunt us down near our LZ. We are breaking back into Kremlin with help of 2nd JSF commander tanks. IFVs are going to cut this air corridor from enemy territory to our LZ. CV is also committed to this push. Artillery helped to suppress tanks, now we have some space inside of establish foothold. We have a shooting gallery now, we trapped tose cocky Kamovs! 2nd commander retreats his damaged gunship to change it for something else. Shpetsnaz tanks, that were suppressed by artillery, are back! Now they don't have a meat shield of T-90s, as artillery cleared them. All JSF forces are concentrated near Delta point. Artillery is helping to fuck up Sheptsnaz units. They lost all cannon meat near D, so we can resume our attack and start to get futher. At this point Shpetsnaz lost tank platoon, MBTs under number 4 are few steps away from metal scrapyard, they lost all their gunships. They don't have artillery, so only forces left here are infantry, maybe APCs and Russian Army personnel. Almost all Shpetsnaz forces retreated to Alpha uplink, probably they are affraid of our artillery. At least they have regular army forces there. Tanks and IFVs were sended to probe central part of Russian defenses of Kremlin, 2nd leader of JSF troops placed combat engineers at Delta, so we are again back in our positions. Artiller continue to provide us with good fire support, enemy still didn't managed to get their location right, or they don't have anything to hit us. We are going to finish SGB combat engineers that were blocking our way to Alpha. My colleague managed to recover from loses, so we can get into serious battle with what left of Sheptsnaz forces. Just few units left to kill. Because i managed to save my most important troops, we managed to get back into this fight and now enemies are in really bad situation. At this point we are almost won this battle, our troops are clearing area from pockets of resistance near main entrance and near Alpha. An team of Shpetsnaz soldiers in the end of death alley are going to eat an airstrike. Last unit of Shpetsnaz is defeated by gunrun and cannon shells. Russians are going crazy and launching another missile to try to negate our victory. Views of Kremlin after battles Spoiler Views of Moscow Spoiler "Gas +36.9%. Vigilantly guard won peace!" "Gas around the clock! We will succeed" Thoughts and some additional observations about AI. That was a very cool game. Some parts of it were almost like it was a directed single player campaign, like massive assault of enemies during their counter attack on Delta. Positioning of CV behind building, same methods used for SPGs allowed to keep them alive for whole battle. UAV use was probably a key to maximize artillery effect on this game session. IDK why many reviewers were saying that "you don't need it anyway". I like how this battle had several "stages" - first was penetration of defence lines, with main gameplay being centered around choosing where to commit attack, trying to stay out of opponents LOS while clearing roboturrets, counter-artillery fight and maneuvers over relatively big territory, establishing foothold. Second stage was assault on Kremlin, with main gameplay being direct combat, CQB, positioning and maneuvering of units in tight spaces. 3rd was based on damage control - trying to survive long enough to get reinforcements, keep key units alive and move them between concealments during gunship spam attack, re-establishing troops composition and positions. 4th stage devolved into war for attrition with what was left in our and in opponents hands as we both no longer had reserves IIRC. AI showed few cool things that i never saw in any other RTS, especially for a friendly AI. When my tanks approached first gates of Kremlin fortress, there were barricades, blocking our way in (for AFVs). Friendly AI diverted and than ordered his gunships to shoot at those barricades. Spoiler Decided to test if it was just a coincidence, so moved tanks to next blocked entrance, and AI did this again. Spoiler Don't remember anythig like this in other RTS i played, ever. Few more observations: It appears AI can take into account actions of regular army units and use them. Not totally sure if it is a case, but this session gave me this impressions. At least they probably understand when enemy unit is under fire and hurt by friendly unit, so they can take advantage of low HP of hostile squads. Again, flanking. This time it was done on a tactical level - with that massive tank assault that killed all my units inside of Kremlin. Friendly AI changed point of attack when lost some units, enemy AI changed tactics several times from defensive, to counter attack, then to harassing and then back to purely defencive. Almost no defending units left area behind walls of Kemlin, except 2nd last unit of engineers that tried to get to forests and Kamovs. AI probably have some sort of understanding of space/territory of map. Units probably have individual tactical roles that they can change if needed. Like infantry squad that was moving to Delta and jumped into a building when scout cars started to drive to Delta. Instead of running to next building and pushing forward, they were waiting, maybe working as observers and guiding tanks units against defenders of Delta point. Enemy artillery was rather actively moving around, making them harder to catch. Friendly AI firesupport against scenery objects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 17, 2018 Report Share Posted November 17, 2018 Managed to launch You Are Empty, after 4 attempts. Spoiler It is buggy (when hit screen became fully grey) and FPS sometimes goes below 15. Game feels like slower paced Painkiller with lower number of enemies, although i didn't managed to get to end of 1st level. WIll try to get futher, if YAE will work. On the other hand, i continue to play around with skirmish battles in EndWar. I suspect that not much is left for me to squeeze out of this RTS, although it did delivered more than 10+ hours of pretty good playtime. Picked Raid gamemode, defender side, 2vs2 format. Establish defensive positions of Xavier's institute. Spoiler Enemies can get to Alpha and Delta directly, Bravo is located in protected area. We are fighting against Euroweaklings, they will probably spam choppers to hit Bravo, thats why we need IFVs. AI commander choices of units is not bad - infantry is not really needed in this type of game mode. Choppers will be usable to deflect some attacks, while IFVs can work as AA and anti-light infantry force. Both of those units are fairly mobile, too. AI commander have upgraded IFVs with missile launchers. My engineers are moving to uplink Zulu. Exoskeletons, Javelins and 3 barrel gatling gun. JSF engineers are Space Marines of EndWar. Very [tactical voice on] tactical [tactical voice off] gear. Upload Freedom.exe! Battle begins! Spoiler AI-lead gunships already smashed some Euroweaklings. Minute later - AI lost gunships and now tries to hold attackers by driving his IFVs right into EuroLZ. That guy is nuts. Meanwhile, i'm relocating my IFVs to counter that group of Eurocopters, as they prepare to attack X-Institute. Tail rotors? We don't need them! Europeans lost their gunships, while JSF 2nd commander retreats his IFVs after dealing plenty of headache to raiders. We already took Zulu and now my engineers are going for Whiskey point, Eurosnails didn't even started to capture Foxtrot. UGVs deployed to defend Z. Euroweaklings delivering more of their forces to this battle, 2nd attack will be way more powerful, as my buddy lost his only unit. Euroweaklings are trying to do this "assault" thing! Spoiler Another group of Eurochoppers arrived to eat some lead from IFVs. JSF AI commander delivered his armor to deal with ground units that are pushing Yankee and structure A. Choppers arrived to slow down raiders, while 2nd platoon of MBTs are deploying. Gunships are getting out of range of AA fire (Euroengineers got into a building). They are trying to carve a corridor for their tanks. Eurotanks went a bit too far from protection of their engineers and now are under crossfire of helicopters and tank unit 8. Even more helicopters arrive to get shot down by IFVs. Hordes of Euroweaklings are attacking building D, we need to save at least 3 out of 5 structures. Schwarzkopf MBTs are engaging Euro infantry. Our enemies looks like decided to go for target B directly, leaving D behind. EuroAPCs are trying to attack from our left flank IFVs are getting into cover to let heavy armor to sort things out. AI attacked our flank with tanks, APCs, combat engineers and light infantry. That would have been a serious forces... if it wasn't Euroweaklings. APCs were killed in less than 20 seconds, our combat engineers are holding raiders so they can't run away from my tanks. Also, EMP used to disable tanks. Antitank job is for SPGs and choppers. Combat engineers can't hold for too long against 3 squads. Heavy infantry defeated, but Euroweaklings will lose their tank platoon. Now it is time for dealing with squishy Euroweaklings. 2nd squad of cannon meat is better served dead! They decided to run into forest, but tanks and IFVs are chasing them. That is desperate attempt to get to any cover. IFVs need to move to allow tanks place to use their main guns. Meanwhile Euroweaklings managed to blew up weakest structure - gaint oil tanks. Now their cannon meat on 2 legs is sitting in this tower trying to see where they can run to get out of this! They are done. So no spotted enemies. Probably they have few left, we need to find them. Find those cowards! Spoiler I see you! Just moments after we opened fire, Euroweaklings started to run back to nearest building. They jumped into a building where they can deploy their AA launchers. Thats why i ordered vehicles to make a new LOS to their position. Time is quickly running out, Euroweaklings! When they thought that we are gone, they exited a building to run to nearest target. Too bad for them, tanks are going to shell their asses. Schwarzkopf tanks have some sort of ATGM jammer that deflects missiles. After fire exchange they are done. And those guys was last units of Euroweaklings on the ground. Airstrike was called on their position, just to further insult those Euroweaklings. Scolopax 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 18, 2018 Report Share Posted November 18, 2018 It appears that this version allows only 1 launch. After that game don't load at all. Re-installed it, restarted singleplayer. Next time i need to find savefiles and use them after re-re-installation of You Are Buggy. Rest of 1st level Spoiler Health packs in this game are pure alcohol. Looks like normal old part of St.Petersburg, only with 100% communist banners. Even with crappy graphics option that game chosen (and because i can't restart it - we are stuck with them) there are some not bad light map/shadow mapping going on. That is so familiar for me. 2nd level Spoiler No details were modelled inside of this car. At least it have working suspension! Not bad level of modelled details of enviroment. 3rd stage Spoiler Level 4 Spoiler Reflections! We are playing a Spirit of Communism. This is usual picture here (in St.Petersburg), at least in places where trees were "shortened" WTF is this giant thing with a star on top of it? Those angry grandpas have a very comedic barks (at least for Russians) of stereotypical (for us) Russain angry grandpa. It appears that Metro-2 AI cover algorithms were used here as well. It is like i am back to my old old work. Looks EXACTLY like it was back in a day when we were isntalling security cameras on one of ex-Kolkhoz buildings. Seriously, is that a re-creation of my summer working time when i was a student? Very realistic, actually. Number 5. Levels are rather short in YAE. Spoiler You can't fool me! Friendly NPC! During his speech this strange animation was going on. In the middle of telling some bullshit he became cockeyed and weird. I would like to see more bad games doing this sort of hilarious shit with NPC objective marker spewing. Rats are also crazy in this part of USSR. Dogs are on drugs Early moments of level 6 Spoiler Curscenes are weird in YAE Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 19, 2018 Report Share Posted November 19, 2018 YAE (as expected at this point) didn't bothered to launch, so it was deleted. Reinstalling it (savefiles were copy-pasted in different place, so there will be no need to re-play 2 hours of it, i hope) should allow to launch it (1 time use install, lol). While YAE is creating problems with playing it, decided to re-play Siege of Moscow in EW, but now picked defenders side, 2vs2 format (as usual). Will do several more of skirmish battles to test few last things, after wich will try to put a review of EW, tactics guide, unit description/overview and so on. Americans invaders to assault our Glorious Kremlin! Spoiler AI set to hardcore, let's see how they will assault us and how friendly AI will defend Kremlin. My task force is artillery-centered (yet again, should allow some time to look around). Mixed loadout of AI is not a bad pick for this battle. I forgot that during Siege battle all attackers are always "spotted" for defenders, making my CV less useable. Probably by locals with help of their mobile phones. This allows to start shelling of enemies in first minute of the game. Parked my SPGs in the middle of churches, like AI in previous battle on this map, haha. JSF spreading their troops, aiming 2 groups on flanks and 1 group is positioned in the middle. UAV isn't usefull for defenders in Siege mode, except if it was upgraded enough to be armed. Luanching it for the sake of looking at process. Rocket booster separates from UAV. 2nd American SPG team spotted. Cowboys gunships are trying to attack middle section of our defenses, near SPGs. But they are countered by AI-lead engineers and tanks. Overal situation. A big force is accumulating at our left flank near bridge. 2 artillery detachments in the rear of enemy territory, one unit on the right flank. Counter-counter artillery fire. My combat engineers are relocating closer to Dima, to defend one of entry points. I'm expecting after invading forces will be done with L uplink, they will try to get Kremlin tower entrance near Dima. Light damage, MAZ trucks are big and armored. Like Bears. Combat bears. WIth rocket launchers and MGs. JSF gun carriers are now retreating after eating a deep plate of HE. Cowboys are rushing to Kremlin walls! Spoiler On our left flank Americans started their assault. Zhukovs will deal with their armor. Right entrance to internal part of old fortress is guarded by AI commander's tanks. AI have a problem with units spreading too much because of speed differences. American engineers are rushing through the gates, where AI-commanded Shpetsnaz engineers are on guard, covered by automatic turret. JSF tanks are defeated, evac choppers can be see over their unit. Counter-Counter-Counter artillery barrage. "We were ordered to change positions...." "..so let's stand like we are posing for something!" AI tanks were shelled by a group of Imperialist choppers, they are retreating under cover of my combat engineers Counter-Counter-Counter-Counter artillery shelling And another JSF SPG platoon is trying to get away from our fury! Surrounded but not defeated! Spoiler Enemies are pushing from both flanks now, engineers arrived to position D, where they can stop attackers from breaking in through the gates of guard tower. American soldiers are trying to advance, but we will shell them with our artillery. Another group is trying to get through our left flank. They managed to sneak in number of Joes into one of guard towers. At this point my SPGs were shelling other SPGs for vast majority of this battle. Too late, invaders! Spoiler Reinforcements are arriving. Death is near, Americans! Not many units left for attackers, anyway. Finally have time to shell American CV and its babydrones. Ally helicopters are harassing enemies Time to put dead Americans in bodybags and wrap up this operation. Spoiler Another attack by gunships. I noticed that AI retreat his units when they are down to "red" level of HP. Cowboys are being shelled by my artillery. THey are going to jump into neareast building. Shpetsnaz AI commander went all the way to other side of the river to hunt down one of last units of JSF on the battlefield. Another squad of their soldiers got destroyed. Defeated unit, waiting for evac. Views of Moscow after this battle. Spoiler Well-placed minefield (by AI-lead engineers). Russa = Bear, Sheptsnaz, Kremlin towers. Watching replay, this battle was a counter-battery galore: Spoiler Rest, first stage of game session: Spoiler Enemies started their attack by shelling defensive installations. American CV stands and wait. Hostile AI is waiting for something. AI start their attack JSF assault: Spoiler 4 shots in the same time against damaged tanks looks very cool in dynamics. Shpetsnaz engineers > Americans invaders! Wrap up: Spoiler AI-commanded engineers left a minefield here. I am interested if those a semi-scripted (placed on pre-designated areas) This thing in motion is gigantic. As big as some buldings here. Clock tower have pieces missing after firefight with Cowboys. Friendly AI drops infantry to defend entrance. It looks like a Victory Day parade suddenly was ordered to change direction. AI teammate is sending his troops to other side of the river. AI of infantry unit allows it to change positions and advance closer to trargets. Suspension works! [Partially] Reminds me how suspension worked in one of WoT versions. Giant helicopter Spoiler Observations: Attacking AI was heavy on artillery. Knows how far he can move SPGs to get out of my artillery range (at times), was trying to use counter-battery against my cannons, prioritise SPGs and/or other units based on situation. AI tried to retreat SPGs after they started to take damage, although was sometimes too slow for this. Also, it appears that decision about changing positions of SPGs is not tied directly to HP level of a unit (AI moved different units at different moments of receiving fire/taking damage from my artillery) Attacking AI was able to assemble units for attack on one of flanks, it took some time to do for him and was waiting for a moment to attack. Enemy AI had main attack on one side and secondary attack on other flank (with small forces). Defending AI placed minefields, used APCs to bring engineers, that got out and garrisoned a building near entry point. APCs, after dropping engineers, left to harass attackers (with help of gunships), defender AI used his fast moving units to counter-attack while leaving slow-moving infantry to defend entry points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 20, 2018 Report Share Posted November 20, 2018 You Are Empty worked for some time until it failed to load one of next levels. Time to reinstall it. Each spoiler - new level. Spoiler Spoiler Spoiler "Poor acid into a water, not water in acid." "Glory to KPSS!" after fight became "Glory to ..SS!" I got this joke. Spoiler Very similar place is located near my university. Looks exactly like backyards of some parts of St.Petersburg. Umm.. ok. Enemy is jumping from a car, my avatar is holding his pistol by magic powers. Everything is fine, usual day in USSR. Spoiler "Who gets the national income? In USSR - to workers" Soviet SFs. I think iron sights on that thing are not ok. Spoiler Metro-2, is that you? Is this some kind of communist thing to die while pretending to sit/stand? Spoiler Player don't need reminder that Soviet special services were oppressive, don't need to make bad guys float above floors and look down at protagonist. Beria? "We made best movie ever! It is showing Communist utopia, but all people that saw it became crazy! It is too good for human brain, that is wired to live animal-like lifes! Take it and watch it in neareast cinema!" "Now i am going to pretend that i killed myself!" "Pew! Guards, this anti-Soviet element killed me!" Spoiler That is one big and oppressive lamp post. Forgot to tell that several previous levels were called "Totalitarianism" YAE, what are you doing? Game? Are yo... damn, it crashed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 21, 2018 Report Share Posted November 21, 2018 You Are Empty was almost completed, but last 2 levels didn't wanted to load (which are like 20 min of gameplay). Last levels are like end section of HL2 inside of CIty 17 tower of Evil Aliens. Finally deleted it completely and will review it in near future. Some of levels: Spoiler There are some secret areas in YAE, although not as eleborate as some secrets in Painkiller. Small number of short scripted scenes are not a bad way to keep atmosphere. YAE also have not bad ambient soundtracks Propaganda dirigible That looks similar to 2nd building of my university. Lenin's speeches were coming out of it almost whole level. Giants rats are annoying enemies. Spoiler Chapaev! Metro-2 Comrade Ragodollov is working here as well "Educating a generation utterly devoted to the cause of communism!" Spoiler Nazi communist skeletor soldier. He is very angry about headshot Door is stuck! Rear window is floating in the air, hehe. Spoiler Spoiler Spoiler Theatre... a lot of shooters that i played have theatre levels. Spoiler Spoiler Spoiler Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 22, 2018 Report Share Posted November 22, 2018 EW, Siege mode, Paris and as usual - 2vs2, AI enemies and teammate. This time we are playing as Euroweaklings and our task is to take back Paris from American tourists, who flooded our beloved city on their oversized SUVs while holding AR-15s in both hands and firing randomly everywhere. Première partie Spoiler As usual, i am here for relaxing and observing AI (this time - Expert difficulty level), thats why artillery-centered task force was choosen. Don't have much of a plan, will try to adapt to situation. If you were following my singleplayer playthrough, than this map is familiar. All 5 bridges are blocked for AFVs to cross by barricades. Euroweaklings CV. I know what vehicle insipred them to create this thing. Funny how only Russia use infantry to defend Command vehicle. It looks like this drone don't have suspension and first wheel is clipping through hull bottom. Those Euroweaklings are used to have roads everywhere, it seems. European wheeled deathtraps. Is grey part on the front tip of the hull made of some sort of rubber? For safety reasons of pedestrians? AI already started to clear defensive structures. European recon drone. Not sure if that thing can lift with those huge missiles. A lot of American tourists are located in the middle section of their side of the river, enjoying view and firing their machine guns in every direction. Flanking attempt by AI commander using APCs loaded with infantry. Yeah, looks like AI is trying to breach barricades on left bridge to get to Zulu. Teil zwei Spoiler We are opening with some major fireworks! This does look as a scene from Mecha animea, with all those "missiles" flying through the air as in many of those Mecha fights. AI on left flank managed to get though bridge, but lost his APCs. He also is pushing infantry squad to right flank. And another infantry unit is advancing through the middle bridge. Those SPGs are don't have long range of Americans, it feels. We are supporting AI soldiers unit, that tries to get through central part of this map. On right flank my infantry and APCs are softening defenses in preparation to cross to American-controlled side. AI now is clearing the way for his own units (last time i saw this behavior he tried to clear a path for my tanks) Not much time left, i am planning to hold this line (although we are playing as Euroweaklings, so "hold" will probably mean their quick death). 20 seconds eft before Americans will bring all what they have against us. Meanwhile, on the background, our foe gunships got laser'd by jets. Parte terza Spoiler This shirtshorm just started! You can see how many of US Army manpower is flooding this whole place! Euroweaklings are overrun by Americans! Both squads were defeated, as expected from Euroweaklings. CV is out, both my infantry units are defeated, only wheeled death traps and rage trucks are left to hold US attack. AI commander have only 1 infantry unit on the ground. 1 group of gunships left this battle after losing 2 helicopters, not bad. Americans are attacking through left bridge, using 2 platoons of IFVs. My APCs are not fast enough to get out in time. SPGs are in LOS of those IFVs. AI teammate brought 2 squads of engineers (good choice), but they are far from my forces. Time to run, like a real Euroweakling! Combat drones that were defending Foxtrot are working as a distraction so my SPGs can get out. Tanks were called in to fight this horde of IFVs. This is a lot of Americans that counter-attacked us, and they managed to bring us to the edge. Part quatre Spoiler We need to soften ths horde of Americans somehow. Fuck you, i am using Giant Space Laser to combat those hordes! Gunships decided to pre-detonate. WTF? And this is European Super weapon? WMD of Europeans means something like Wankery of Mass Distraction. Tanks were defeated by gunships, APCs were too slow to get to the battlefield. Now they are in and try to counter air units. I lost 1 group of SPGs and only 2 units are left. No reserves left to call in. We managed to clear central area from all JSF units (this group of gunships is retreating after receiving heavy damage). Red triangles on the map near D is US Regular army, artillery will work on them soon. Cuid a cúig Spoiler Those idiots came back for more. Now we can attack regulars. And because we are euroweaklings, we need to deal with American cannon meat without getting into direct fight! AI made a mistake and went through a road which was in range of US Army tanks. Only 2 European units left on this battlefield and lots lots lots of US Army personnel with guns, vehicles and tanks + unknown number of JSF troops. Great. We need a good tactics to combat all this. First of all - never park units near each other, it will probably trigger WMD strike, or airstrike that will kill or cripple both units. Second - never get into direct fighting. We are weaklings and we need to keep distance from those powerful and dangerous Americans! 2 JSF infantry squads behind regulards. Those units will eat several airstrikes and groundfire and will be done soon. Low range of those SPGs force me to get uncomfortably close to enemy forces. Wheeled deathtraps are used as spotters. Nice tinted smoke. If you not botheredto make smoke painting machine, but mounted a better gun, we wouldn't need to bring those SPGs too close to frontlines. Nice place to park your truck - on top of destroyed cars. Damn, i was too close to enemies and they called an airstrike on wheeled death traps. Because they were made from wooden sticks wrapped in aluminium tinfoil, they all blew up from a single airstrike. 2 JSF infantry units spotted earlier are defeated, but game still continues - this mean that there is more of them alive. Survive. Adapt. Win. Spoiler HahAHAHAha.... we have only 1 unit left. ONLY 1! Never had such situation. Now i need to be super extra careful. Blue paintjob doesn't help with staying undetected. Didn't saw any JSF airunits, so we are probably safe from gunships. But ground forces can still fuck us hard, that why we need to relocate to place from which they assaulted our positions - a bridge on left flank. Units that we groundfired. Using binoculars is now the only way to spot targets without getting into direct LOS. Also, this moment was rather tense and i forgot to make screenshots. Groundfiring a drone between Z and A uplinks. We need to stay in such positions, from which we can brake LOS, but we have a great open view on area in front of us, so i can see anybody moving to us and give orders before SPGs will get spotted. I am on edge, we are pushing on enemy territory on 4 unarmored trucks. Camera is now spinning 360 to spot even a glimpse of any counter attack of QRF. Before moving to new positions i check them with long range optics as much as possible. Even that train. For a moment i thought it was Iskander flying towards artillery, but a moment later my memory reminded me that we are playing against forces who use Kinetic Rods from SPAAAACE instead of giant missiles. And yes, i am so paranoid now that even background "immersion" stuff make me tremble. Also, if you look at minimap you can see that we are moving on the endge of this map, to keep distance from probable place of enemy locations. Z seems to be clear. Because camera is tied to units in EW, i need to move units to get different LOS/look at things obsctructed by buildings. Still watching in all directions and observe all places where there are some objects on the ground to see if there is a light infantry squad waiting behind cover. Our uplinks are still uncaptured, Americans probably have only AFVs left. This is kind of bad, SPGs are rather slow. Some forces were spotted ahead, ground fire will help to clear them out without getting into LOS. JSF infantry now have no support, they should be an easy target. My assumption was incorrect, Americans have infantry, but it was left to protect uplink A. Hahaha, that was 1 last unit they had! Euroweaklings won because of their trickery! Yes, it took 40 minutes to win this battle. Maybe 15 minutes alone was just slow push by single unit of SPGs. Observations about AI: Was able to conduct serious counterattack using flanking, sneaking big group of forces into central part of map Expert AI is not as dedicated as it could be, which is why i managed to save 1 SPG unit - attention of IFVs were taken by infantry and later by tanks. AI could ignore those and take out SPGs. It seems that AI generally use infantry in defence more often than any other unit type. Breaking scenery objects to get in again was observed during this battle. Not sure how it is made, but it works. AI sometimes doesn't take into account firing range of some units, or specifically ignore those. It also appears that AI can't use long range "optics" that player can use to spot enemies that are "spotted" by units. I suspect that during Skirmish battles game randomly picks different AI "personalities", as during this battle hostile AI didn't used their WMD, but used airstrikes and Force Recon (which are kind of rare in my experience). Enemies also pushed into combat units with very low HP (red HP bar), which usually they order to retreat and get points for it to pick different unit or conduct special attack Forgot to mention that friendly AI is using same pool of resources as you do, so AI appears to use exactly same type and amount of resources as a player. It also means that during 2vs2 skirmish player can "steal" resources and call more units or special attacks, and AI can do the same with you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 22, 2018 Report Share Posted November 22, 2018 Started to play Eastern Front: Unknown War FPS for a review. Probably need a chart of CIS/Russia-made shooters to review/already done. This FPS is from rather... interesting bunch of people who worked on another FPS title i will cover for sure, but later. For now EF:UW looks like Generic Shooter with low budget and bad voice acting. Or like Wolfenstein, but made with duct tape and sticks, smeared with "boring". Spoiler Main Hero - Brainwashed Kraut with all harizma surgically removed from him before game starts. Frequent sutscenes... And how i'm gone kill somebody if main character 3D model is aimig somewhere to the left from center of the screen? Is this game related to Metro-2? Bullet physics is strange - gun is aimed to the left, bullets flying to the aiming circle. Graphics! And for some reason his left hand is visible when holding pistol. Vents. Boring long vents. This thing doesn't shoot me and it have custom made 3D model, so i suspect that this is friendly NPC. Engage superpowers! This shield stops bullets and you can walk to enemies and insert those bullets back into their bodies. You also can send them back if shield is charged enough. 3 headshots are needed to extend sheild time. AI doing its own thing And this gun is also not aimed properly... main character is not capable operating weapons without using superpowers to guide bullets into aiming circle. Damn, i stepped into another cutscene. After dying enemies start to eject all things from their 3d models like pouches and other gear, Special Nazi Forces. Game was making impression of more polished experience than Metro-2, until this point, lol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 23, 2018 Report Share Posted November 23, 2018 Eastern Front: Unknown War completed (2.5 days, ~5 hours in total). Less than mediocre experience, repetitive, uninspired, full of cliches, badly animated, bad level design, very linear and scripted. It also have too many explosions on top of being ugly (bad/terrible art design). Spoiler Cannon fodder. Explosions! Matrix powers. After dead bodies despawn, only piles of gear and blood are left, for some reason. Big empty halls is usual for EF. Using some texture work devs managed to make an illusion of embossed surface, for its time this tech wasn't widespread enough. Ramming container into a brick wall also create explosions 3 headshots -> increased Neo bullet stopping powers. Nazis left exploding barrels everywhere. 3 melee kills - higher max health. And this is all combos you can make, just 2 in this whole game. Strange that this thing didn't exploded (i was making this screeshots expecting it to actually blew up). Jerky animations of those copy-pasted "German Resistance" fighters speaks about level of quality of this FPS. Ugly texture work and boring color pallet Level testing? Why you will do this? Bloor = cutscene. Game is about stopping Germans from creating Uberzoldatens, but we are busy with destroying Tiger tank production. Probably because it is a German [wehraboo mode on] Uberwaffe [wehraboo mode off] Spoiler "-Hmm, this building is too far from fence section. Should we move it? -No, this is too much work, just slap another fence section. -But it will clip right through here and.. -SLAP THIS SHIT TOGETHER AS CHEAPLY AND QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE, WE NEED TO SELL IT ASAP!" After turning off bullet shield, all "accumulated" projectiles will fly to where you aim. This almost looks good, thanks to different light sources. This part of tunnel level looks rather bad and flat, thanks to bad choice of light. Spoiler Stealth section out of nowhere Damn, i stepped into explosions, my cover was blown. It is simply ugly. It exploded. Turret section! Despite what this screenshot suggests, AI in EF:UW isn't that bad (usually). It exploded. It exploded. I think something exploded nearby. Turret sections... And explosions! At least those turrets can be left unused by player, but he will have harder time fighting waves of Nazi almost-brain dead cannon fodder. "I don't care if it looks wrong, put it together even faster!" Spoiler Submarine crew didn't noticed many explosions, which allowed to sneak in as a German engineer. "Testing doors? Why do you need to do that?" Just add sparks and this will feel like a Star Trek episode Time to play other game. Back to unskippable long turret sections. Spoiler U.G.L.Y. Love_Interest_3D_custom_model I think something exploded. "Should we do algorithm that puts empty cases more realistic? -No! This cost too much! Just make them stop falling when they hit a geometry and don't bother to make them change their position after collision!" If you bump into things, they will be broken I don't think that tiles are breaking in such pattern. Man, those empty cases make me angry. This is probably the only thing devs actually cared about, that's why it looks kind of cool. Something exploded, as usual. Turret section... and those damn carefully arranged empty cases. Maybe because this MG is German? Germans were here. Everybody knows that Germans leave piles of Nazi-era gear after them, even German tourists in Israel do that. It exploded. Somebody use telekinesis to attack our [insert main character personality here]. Heh, i thought that we need to do something different from point and click. Enemies were not introduced, no build up. no indirect enviromental story telling, nothing was done to prepare player to those guys. Great job! It exploded Guy was fried with power of Elektrizität - another 3rd Reich invention. I saw this guy being killed in 3rd mission (i also put 5 bullets into his head on top of that). Spoiler Lvstr.exe Really ugly level. And people complain about TIger suspension service - just blow up it and all rollers will be free. Especially if they are not attached to the hull! We are opening doors with explosive now. Spoiler After Venom:CO vents in all other games are unacceptable if they don't have squads of bad guys quickly crawling through them and if those vents are not made as a level-wide network. Those crazy Nazis have explosives even in canteens. Elevators and rogdoll don't like each other. Probably the only place where i used flamethrower. New type of enemies, and again no presentation/build up/story/anything connceted to those guys. Spoiler "Grrr, i am villian of this game! I'm gona kill your loveinterest_1 !" Those are just scripts, in combat they are sort of bad. Those bad guys could be fun, in the other game. Spoiler If this shooter was more about that, it would have been better. This device bring people back to life. You know how our main custom 3D model will use it. "Why this switch looks so much like a handgrenade?" "Boss fight is on the schedule" type of gates. Well, at least this bad guy have introduction. I thought that when he have this blue ball crap, main_hero_modell_1 should do something, but no, you just need to shoot at this guy for 15 minutes. Like a movie! Very cinematic! Especially those black stripes! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 23, 2018 Report Share Posted November 23, 2018 Testing last bits of AI abilities in Raid mode. Conquest and Assault are not worth of much testing, as majority of my campaign was spent in those game modes, plus they are less "organised" than Siege and Raid. 2vs2 (tradition at this point), Kopenhagengrad, Euroweaklings in defence, Shpetsnaz attacks. 15 minutes time limit, attackers need to destroy 3 out of 5 structures. Preparations. Spoiler Enemies have only 2 entrances to our side of map, where all targets are located. Those 2 roads are far from each other, between them - big walls. Early game harassment from Kamovs. Both Shpetsnaz commanders brought their gunships. Shpetsnaz onslaught! Spoiler T-100s platoon is advancing to left entrance. Russians are also spotted on the righ entryway. We just managed to put mines and now engineers are jumping to closest building. A lot of enemies spotted on the right. Green camo - 1st Shpetsnaz leader, desert camo - units of 2nd commander. 2nd SGB captain decided to use MAZ in this assault and push tanks closer to building F. Right entrance is a shitshow - a big ass group of Shpetsnaz forces are trying to break in, and on top of that - all at once! Both SGB commanders units participate in this assault. It appears that this attack is their main direction of push, while on the left we see only secondary/distraction fight. Hehehe. MAZ was damaged (but thanks to huge HP pool it still operational and have a lot of HP left to chew through), but infantry support for CV is easily killed by mines. Ogres suffered casualties and now try to retreat. Attack on the left, that was eating some of our forces attention and firepower allowed to right flank attack to establish some presence in our part of map. MAZ managed to get to S, but it have low firepower so we will deal with it later. Right flank attack failed, thanks to concetrated number of units and defensive UGVs of buildings D and F. Those are CV "bodyguards". Cleaning remains. Spoiler Infantry tries to retreat, but the only way out of those guard towers is on our side. No evac for today! Shpetsnaz engineers are trying to exploit a fact that big number of forces are on the right, so they are moving to the left. Hehehehe, come closer. They are trapped here! And now we can counter-attack. Their last unit. Additional battle to confirm my thoughts about AI. Spoiler Several entry ways, most of them are blocked for AFVs. AI relocating tanks from entry that can be crossed by AFVs to somewhere else, while infantry forces are moving in opposite direction. That would be a strange behavior, if it was guided only by pathfinding/what is closer. Also, only unit he could spot here was transports, which are easy target for tanks, so it is probably not just AI understanding of simple balance of EW. Light infantry attacks this entrance, with support of airstrikes. Light infantry in buildings =~ to APCs. At first i thought that tanks were probably diverted against APCs, but looking at where this unit is going, i suspect they are trailing CV. Main attack was on the left flank. On the right flank light infantry managed to push out engineers (riflemens are hard counter to engineers). Infantry secured entrance, AFVs are pushing from other way. EW was spammed to keep MAZ disabled. Interesting to see that AI put so much effort to kill Command vehicle. My and 2nd AI commander gunships sorted this shitshow out. After AFVs were defeated, attackers re-directed infantry from closest structure to fuel tanks (i think they have lower HPs, but i am not sure about reasons of this decision). Observations: I suspected that AI understand "entry points" but now there are more interesting things about it, after summirzing what was observed about behavior of opponents. Developers probably used some sort SWAT 3-like system when some pre-designated areas of maps are connected between each other with chokenodes, representing possible way to get inside of certain places. Zones are probably generally devided as "our part of map" and "enemy part of map", which allows for AI to do some behaviors that are needed for certain game modes. At "our" part of map AI move units freely and can relocate them if he wants to or leave standing around and waiting for a right moment. I also think that hostile units inside of "our" part of map are subject of agressive attacks (or at least AI have it in priority), and this behavior allows to execute defensive playstyle/tactics for AI, stage counter-attacks and try to stop advances by opponent(s). Without this system several gamemodes like Raid and Siege would not be interesting to play, as AI-commanded units could be easily "lured" from their positions, or AI would just spread them out, outside of easily defensible parts of map (like Kremlin or military bases on pictures above). Chokenodes allow to developers to programm AI to execute coordinated assaults, distraction attacks, prepare assault "teams" according to what was spotted inside, guide "attention" of forces and places of defence. I think it maybe done in such way - if X/Y/Z type of units are spotted in a zone, connected directly to chokenode, AI can try to pre-designate units Z/X/Y to counter them and "assemble" assault team to deal with defenders. For defenders, chokenodes/entry points allow to programm "guard" behavior, AI-lead engineers to place useful minefields, designate area where most/all units are best to be positioned. In Raid game mode opponents are agressive, moment of attack can be different. As far as i saw their attack is more or less coordinated effort, even in 2vs2 set up, and not just simple "AI 1 attacks through entry X, AI 2 attacks through entry Y", as i saw mixed forces doing attacks through same entrance. And i forgot to post this: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 24, 2018 Report Share Posted November 24, 2018 Instead of polluting this thread with pics, decided to make Imgur albums. Installed addon to EF:UW, AFAIK it was called Ubersoldier 2 for Western markets. Released in 2005. First level: https://imgur.com/a/aq0oRFt Second: https://imgur.com/a/vH2Nn8z Third: https://imgur.com/a/azGXHMV Accumulating some material about EW AI abilities. AI can assemble units into groups, and those groups are moving with one speed/coordinated. Note positions of gunship squad relative to infantry unit and remember that helicopter are way faster than a soldier. Spoiler In Conquest mode main goal is to capture points around the map. AI assembles a teams of units to do this job - infantry to capture uplink, IFVs to carry them, gunships for firesupport. Spoiler Still not sure how AI is able to fight scenery objects that obstruct his way, but it does this. Probably some sort of semi-scripted/"smart terrain/object" type of deal. Spoiler AI can retreat his units in event of spotting certain type of units. Here AI-commanded APCs were advancing against our troops until he saw 2 teams of combat engineers moving to their positions. Spoiler AI also understand when enemies are distracted. This team of wheeled death traps was pushing central area. Spoiler My platoon of T-100s was moving to counter this attack by Euroweaklings. 2nd AI leader of our faction diverted his gunships to attack tanks, while those APCs were firing at some infantry. Tanks started to engage APCs. Gunships left tanks without finishing them and started to attack APCs (which are hard coutner to gunships). Earlier: This group of Kamovs was firing at APCs when they were busy with our own APCs/SPAAGs. AI puts mines on roads, sometimes near entry points, sometimes - just in the middle of highway. I guess same pathfinding algorithms that were used for units was used here to detect where to put mines. Spoiler At entry point: Scolopax 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 25, 2018 Report Share Posted November 25, 2018 Ubersoldier 2: German Resistance HQ level: https://imgur.com/a/HWmW7vR Train level: https://imgur.com/a/R9obTwV EW Paris, Siege gamemode (didn't posted it eariler, but this game session was fun). Russia as a defender, US - attacker, 2vs2 as usual. American attack: Spoiler We need to defend point A, until 10 minute mark we will not have any kind of support or ability to call reinforcements, after 10 minutes mark - we will have serious support. AI went with balanced composition of troops. I picked lots of artillery, because lazy and want to see what enemies will do about that. Gunships scouted this area, as i understood later. AI left SPAAGs to guard area near LZ/SPGs. If you look on the minimap, it becomes obvious that enemies are assembling troops for attack. JSF infantry charging through the middle bridge. Those engineers are getting to close to my SPGs. Artillery tries to kill unit of riflemens, so my own light infantry will have easier time dealing with combat engineers. And now we see AFVs are pushing to our right flank. Middle area attack was either distraction, or for scouting. And this is how enemies decided to deal with SPGs - infantry managed to spot them and Americans used airsupport to drop bomb on us. My Shpetsnaz operatives are on the way to kill JSF engineers. Americans are pushing almost all of their forces on our right flank. Only 1 team of engineers tried to get though middle section this time. Our opponents managed to breach through barricades on the bridge and now they pouring their forces into our part of city. Attackers separated their forces into 2 groups. One is moving towards A, another one probably is aimed at W. SPGs are working on those attackers. Those gunships tried to hunt down those tanks, damaged during airstrike on my SPGs. Number of enemy untis that managed to get through is decreasing, thanks to just several artillery vehicles that survived airstrike. This team of enemy MBTs is getting way to close to A. In order to avoid capture of A my forces were ordered to hunt down infantry, as vehicles can't hack computers inside of Alpha uplink. Only JSF tanks left to deal with. AI sended his own badly damaged pair of Ogres to fight American Schwarzkopf MBTs. Those are last US troops on our side of the river. Counter attack of Shpetsnaz forces! Paris will be ours! Spoiler Called for 2 platoon of T-100s, badly damaged Zhukov SPGs are retreating to free slots for something else. Americans also repleneshing their forces. And they already started to send gunships to poke our defenses, while sending yet another squad of infantry to the center area. AI commander prepared minefields on road that lead to A. It will be usefull if we need to retreat. They are fucked. Those guys are also fucked. SGB tanks will now assault Americans from our left flank and crush their re-established forces. 2 plattons of Ogres and 1 unit of SPAAGs will be used for that. But first, we need to clear the way for AFVs. Good opportunity to get rid of hostile choppers. Now we are on the way to defeat those Americans imperialists! SIngle SPG was called to soften those idiots before being crushed by tracks of Sheptsnaz tanks! We will begin with anybody on foots and then will get to enemy tanks. Cowboys called 2nd platoon of tanks, this will not be good for one of my MBT teams, but i have 3 platoons of tanks anyway! 1 armor unit defeated after killing 2 units of JSF forces, my forces are regrouping for next firefight. AI commander sended his own tanks to support my assault. Let's take those guys out while they are suppressed by SPGs. End: Spoiler Observations: Enemy AI again used attacks through 2 entry points, one with infantry, second with AFVs + infantry. Also, a place of one of those attack was probably scouted/cleared by gunship unit. After breaching to our side of the map AI re-routed his units, creating 2 groups that were moving in different directions (probably to avoid situation when defenders can easily concetrate all their forces against single group of attackers and shell/splash damage them all with artillery) Not sure about 2nd commander sending a single tank platoon in the end - if it was part of "harass them" behavior, or he was giving me a helping hand. I suspect that it could be both. AI in Endwar have some recognizable patterns, but specific execution, unit composition, etc of those behavior is different. Maybe they used some sort of fuzzy logic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 26, 2018 Report Share Posted November 26, 2018 Ubersoldier 2 playthrough continues. Mission in North Africa part 1: https://imgur.com/a/VZxOiRr Part 2: https://imgur.com/a/qpzNq8E Part 3: https://imgur.com/a/DFdsgIW Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 27, 2018 Report Share Posted November 27, 2018 Ubersoldier 2 is almost done, and it was unistalled when plot reached last boss fight. It was very tedious and badly designed, so i didn't bother to finish it. In fact, this was maybe the worse bossfights i saw in FPS. Berlin level: https://imgur.com/a/kK7eZuT Tibet: https://imgur.com/a/V0KghDv Last level: https://imgur.com/a/2xmtDcM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 28, 2018 Report Share Posted November 28, 2018 Review of Metro-2 addon - The Stalin Subway: Red Veil (2006). Developers of original Metro-2 released an addon to their highly acclaimed best shooter of 2005, 2015 and 2115 - Metro-2. Main hero of this Russian made FPS is a girl and we deal again with same events as in original game. Addon is around 3 hours long, so let's look if they fixed things that were wrong in Metro-2 (which is like... everything). "Hello. Oh, we sold it? How many? One? Make an addon for it, quickly!" Spoiler "I heard it was you who bought our Metro-2 shooter. I have an offer you can't refuse, boy" Visuals This time texture bothered to actually work, so game doesn't look broken. But.. it is ugly. Not because of technical side of this FPS, but simply enviroments, color pellet - everything looks ugly and wrong in a context of a game story. Mix of brown and grey, or grey and grey reminds me Timeshift, but Timeshift at least had interesting looking retro-sci-fi.. things in it, that made a not too bad picture on a screen. Spoiler At least fake 3d damages decals are still here. Metro-2: Death of the Leader take place in 1950s, but for some reason all buildings in this game are pre-abandoned and pre-damaged/in state of decay... even if they look like they were build in 1950s! Whole visual side of this project leave a bad taste. No levels or enviroments in this game were visually interesting, maybe outside of small section on Red Square and inside of one Subway station. All other levels are boring, ugly, bland, with very linear layout and no imagination put into constructing this linear experience. Developers also forgot to fill them with as much physical simulated object as was in original, which only increased a feel of enviroments being very.. static, i guess. Game managed to not improve its presentation but become even worse than original Metro-2. Gameplay Best thing i can say about gameplay in The Stalin Subway: Red Veil is that it exists. As a FPS this game sucks even more than original. Gunplay was not improved, but it became worse as now number of weapons player can carry is smaller than in Metro-2, where you could take all weapons in this game with yourself (oldschool style). This limits selection of weapons you can use in firefights or swich between. On top of that firing a weapon is still as awkward as in main game - terrible uncontrollable recoil, all metal surfaces bouncing bullets back at any angle (which mean hitting metal plate located perpendicular to a weapon will bounce bullet back into a player and damage/kill him). And problems are not over - scenery objects still like to pull nearby flying bullets (like in previous game), giant weapons models that obscure vision and aiming circle, strange aiming with rifles is still here (bullets are flying above aiming circle). Last thing they fucked up - they change something in comrade Ragdollov, so headshots don't feel powerful (they were probably single good thingabout gunplay in a main game)... Spoiler This weapon have optical sight, even if it is not modelled. Zoom still brakes skybox. Moment before being killed by my own bullets. Level design is as terrible as gunplay. All places you visit not only look ugly, but play badly, with no good pacing or interesting situation to play through. Enemy spawns are obvious, level makers like very much to trap player from front and rear in a corridor. They use this "ambush" group of scripted spawns like million times, which is fucking awful. Levels are also unintuitive, i stumbled on exit points several times while trying to find ammo/health instead of finishing mission. Objectives of each "mission" is "go from area A to place B", with exception of 1 terrible glitchy but quick turret section on a scripted car, 2 atrocious escort NPC mission and 1 very small but still bad sniper section within escort mission. For majority of Metro-2 addon you are moving inside of linear level while being ambushed each few meters with enemies spawning everywhere, sometimes in front of you. Spoiler Truck wheels are now chasing us, instead of a truck full of local AI idiots. After reloading game, trucks and soldiers decided to not participate in this terrible scripted turret section/car chase section. Escort missions were especially bad. In first one you need to escort NPC that is wounded and have no weapons. He moves very slowly and you can't run far away from him, because devs made a script when if you are futher than 'X" meters, they spawn a soldier somewhere on a level that will have AI of Fire and forget missile and will run directly to NPC and kill him in few bursts. This script was so consistent that i started to use it to farm health packs. On top of waiting NPC for ages game throws at you terrible level design, badly made enemy spawns (on this level i had several soldiers appearing on my screen from thin air), ugly enviroments, and bad gunplay. Spoiler Fuck you, Gleb! Go away! I don't want to escort you anywhere! Just go somwhere outside of screen and despawn already, asshole. All those problems are amplified by new damage/health balance. In first game you felt like oldschool shooter hero, who can tank a lot of damage. In addon your health melts in milliseconds, which means you need to hug cover. And thats make awkward gunplay to shine in all of its bugs and bad design. You still can be killed by enemies missing you, because bullets are coming back from metal surface somewhere behind you. Add here a fact that bad guys dump magazines worth of ammo in your direction if they even saw a small pice of your shoes, and you will get an idea how bad this whole thing is for a player. Spoiler Firefights from vents are terrible, as this is a tunnel made out of metal... I smelled her perfume! Fire all rounds in a magazine! AI and enemies. Metro-2 addon have even stupidier bad guys than original game. First - because of terrible design of spawns ("ambush" in tight corridor) they are scripted to take positions (during which they don't pay attention to you), and frequently - without cover. Second - they are bad at spotting (especially with sophisticated geometry between them and a player). 3rd - they don't move much, but when they move - it is badly animated jerky movement thanks to not accurate/straight pathfinding and lack of polish when they change direction of movement. To add to this pile of problems - those bad guys fire in long bursts (frequently until their mags are empty) at any visual stimulus of player model, even if player moved back to cover. So enemies for the most part are script-guided mindless human-shaped automatic turrets. Spoiler Bullet holes on the right is from this guy firing his pistol against me. AI spotted edge of player body and started to shot... center mass. Still not spotted. Railings are still hard for enemies. After some time when you get an idea how scripts are working, you can catch enemies before they finish scripted animation of getting to positions. NPCs are not better. Venom school of obstacle crossing - no special animation, just run over obsticle like it is not there. Enemies conitnue to fire in a direction of player, even if he(she) is obscured by concrete walls, floors, stairs. AI cheats in Metro-2: Death of our game... ... which doesn't help them anyway. Funniest part is that is that there is a cat on roof level that do things that soldiers doesn't - move around player, seek nearest cover and changed positions if player moved to close. This is way better than "spawn, run to pre-designated point while ignoring everything, than take position, aim and start to fire endlessly until dead". I suspect that AI plrogrammer tried to show that he know thing or 2 about AI, but drunken game designers did not allowed to do anything with AI outside of scripted crap. Spoiler Straifing to the left makes this cat to move to the right, under cover of this pipe. Enemy variety is as bad as in main game - all mooks work in the same way with no visible diferences in their actions. Glitches - even funny glitches are less cool here. Spoiler At some point after killing enemies (with normal weapons) they started to emit this smoke. Some doors are missing. Plot and characters They exist. Conclusion Everything bad from main game remains, everything good was cut out and replaced with worse. The Stalin Subway: Red Veil is a terrible POS of a game that waste your time and don't give you anything, worse than original in several fields like level design, AI, gunplay, health/damage balance, etc. It feels like it was put together in a month or so with 0 effort given to any part of it, with exception of scanning Soviet placards, and no testing of their creation as it have some nasty difficulty spikes in several places. If, for some reason, you will be offered to play this game, do it only if people that offer it to you are armed and have electrodes attached to your nipples. Soviet placards that were randomly placed by devs on levels: Spoiler Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted November 28, 2018 Report Share Posted November 28, 2018 Some random pics from testing things in EW. Euroweaklings hordes. Spoiler Friendly AI forces are moving to clash with enemies. Spoiler I like how big those wheels are on those APCs, looks cool. AA flamethrowers. Spoiler Flamethrowers are also good to destroy concrete barricades. Because reasons. Spoiler Massive assault. Tanks! Spoiler Very STRNK Russian combat engineers. Spoiler They are attacked by helicopters. Less than 30 seconds after killing group of choppers those engineers are attacked by Euro wheeled death traps. Within seconds Euroweaklings were defeated. Asshole tries to run away, but rockets are faster! Artillery strike. Spoiler Infantry pics. Spoiler Strong infantry: Spoiler At first (about 1-2 weeks ago) i thought everything was observed, but some new things about enemy behavior or game mechanics are popping out, catching my attention. Siege battles are more or less done, few things left to see in Raids and than will try to see if there is anything interesting in Elimination and Conquest. In Raids it appears that devs specifically made something with AI so flanking would work well. Like to the point of AI ignoring your existance once you get to certain part of the map (tested on one map so far for attackers with Normal, Expert and Hardcore defenders AI). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted December 1, 2018 Report Share Posted December 1, 2018 ÜberSoldier review. ÜberSoldier is a WW2 themed FPS with bits of Nazi crazy wunderwaffe, made by Burut Creative (hehe) team (Russia) and released in 2006. Visuals. For 2006 they were not bad technically, but art direction and level design is pretty bad and uninspired. For majority of your time in Ubersoldier, your eyes will be subjected to this mediocre picture: Spoiler At times it becomes simply ugly or/and badly made: Spoiler In few moments Ubersoldier manages to look kind of good, usually in places where they use more than 1 source of light and more than 1.5 colors of grey and grey-ish grey. Spoiler Overal presentation is so-so at best, particle system is also mediocre. No really memorable locations, almost no effort was put in level design and how enviroments look with very few exceptions. Devs probably knew that, and tried to spice things up with explosions. Lot's of them. Spoiler You can't walk for 5 meters in this game without causing explosion of something. Gas tubes, red barrels, gas cylinders, artillery shells, explosives, breaching charges, tanks, fuel stations, cars, electric hardware, even fucking air in this game explodes. Plot and characters. They exist. Main hero is a victim of Nazi Wunderwaffe experiments, which grant him exactly 1 distinct superpower. He is saved by his love interest, who will die, but not really. Cliche after cliche, in short. Spoiler In a plot based on Nazi super weapons, you would expect to see some of them. You do.. kind of. Developers didn't bothered to create many of them. For very few they did, creators didn't made any sort of build up, only one (final boss) got a cutscene few seconds before bossfight starts. You got no lore/info on Nazi SFs, wunderzoldatens with psi-abilities or anybody in general. In fact main hero fight first exemplar of crazy Nazi doctors you just stuble across 2 Nazi wizards in a random back alley of a prison, without dialogue, cutscene, even a music que. Overal handling of theme, lore, plot is terrible or simply non-existant. If you want to see how much you can work with similar theme - just look at recent Wolfensteins. Gameplay. Ubersoldier is very mediocre shooter. Imagine Wolfenstein 2001 mashed toghether with Call of Duty 2, set in a single linear corridor and you will get a picture. Enemy spawns, they run to cover, you shoot them with some weapons that don't have noticeable characteristics outside of "this is a SMG" or this is a rifle", walk to healthpacks that those guys left after their bodies de-spawned. I completed this game about 2 weeks ago and don't remember what weapons you could use (at least screenshots help to remember). Nazis are not too tough, regulars are rather easy to kill. Gunplay overall also doesn't leave any distinct impressions. A [slot for a main character] have 1 superpower that devs managed to make not totally forgetable - bullet shield that require energey, that can be earned by doing 1 specific combo (3 headshots). Spoiler Levels are linear, with few rooms outside of the main path, enviroments are bland, at times empty of things. Player sometimes will be haunted by ghosts of turret sections or even whole levels of turret sections (fucking submarine level). Enemy spawns are frequent, around player and in front of him, at times on balconies or on MG nests (this is one of most creative usual spawns you will find). Basically you walk through corridor, stepping on triggers that spawn enemies and kill them, proceeding to next section of triggers and scripts until button is reached and pressed. After pressing X buttons - enjoy your cutscene. Spoiler Bossfights in Ubersoldier 2 are atrocious. This bossfight thing here is nothing more than shooting endlessly at a fat dude that ate many health packs when a *insert main character name here* was busy killing hordes of low-level Nazis. There are no "phases", interesting AI behavior, unusual attacks that you need to take into account, nothing. Just normal mook that was clicked on and stretched to 150% of normal size. Oh, i said bossfights? Sorry, i remember only one, in the end. Although maybe this is a good thing, those who tried to enjoy this FPS will not like local bossfights. Spoiler AI and enemies. As this shooter have pretty much nothing going for it, let's look at those guys that we will fill up with bullets while having bored faces. They are... mediocre! Surprise! Regulars are not too terrible, at least they can throw a grenade without killing themselvs (unlike what we saw in Metro-2). Run to cover, pop out, get killed - usual deal, a CoD school of bad guys. You will fight several variants - normal WW2 3rd Reich soldiers, Nazi SFs, guys with psionische abilities and a dudes with MGs. SFs from regulars are different by size of their HP bars, dudes with MGs work like Juggernaut light and German wizards attack you with piles of trash until killed. Spoiler Completely forgot about test subjects. They are first and basic melee type enemies you will fight, they will appear only once after first level. Very good AI! Regular enemies. Very effective! Those Nazi SF are so cool, they look like Elite Mercenaries from Far Cry 1. Attacked by piles of crap First time you meet with MG soldiers Conclusion Very bland and rather boring shooter, don't bother with it. It is interesting to see how much better almost the same theme was handled in recent Wolfensteins, and it shows how badly it was handled here. Game doesn't have human emotions behind any part of it. No powerfull secret test weapons to play around, no cool enemies outside of "above average" Nazi wizards (you encouner like... 3-4 of them in whole game), no interesting characters, nothing to touch human feelings, strike a cord. Game feels like it was procedurally generated using cliches and low budget as ingredients. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted December 1, 2018 Report Share Posted December 1, 2018 News on my tactics guide for EW - all Raid missions were tested, from both sides (attackers and defenders), with different difficulty levels of AI. Few more things to test on Conquest and Assault game modes, but it appears that now i'm near the end of this testing. Different personalities/strategies of AI did made this whole test playthrough longer than expected. Here is one fun Siege skirmish battles from attackers side and as always - 2vs2, all Hardcore AIs. First stage of battle, before defender's reinforcements arrive. Spoiler I'm going with artillery-heavy loadout, expecting enemies will have them too. Planning to push right flank this time. Looks like we are both pushing right flank. Friendly AI is pushing hard, don't even try to save gunships from damage. Huh, as expected - Russians brought their Zhukovs. Crusaders JSF SPGs are usefull here, clearing automatics turret and defenders inside of Kremlin. We breached through right flank defenses. Not sure how far we will push, but at least we can significantly damage SGB forces inside before reinforcements arrive. Kremlin is well defended, very unlikely that we will capture it in time. Time to groundfire those Shpetsnaz tanks. Almost all forces of AI commander are with me (except Lima). SGB infantry guarding entry point near Alpha are getting hit with tank shells and IFV rounds. SPGs continue to pound Shpetsnaz forces into dirt. CV is usefull tool in hands of good player. AI commander lost units on my side, now tries to attack left flank. LOS spotting is a thing in EW, good positioned CV can spot enemies well through this tight entrance in guard tower. Artilley is bombing those SPAAGs. Enemies are moving around, i am moving my CV to not lose line of sight. Now tanks are our target. We have little time left, need to kill as much as possible. Tanks are trying to get under cover of walls and building near them. Few seconds left before arrival of Russian army hordes and Shpetsnaz troops. Time to leave, so we are leaving a lot of minefields as a present for them. Time to lob WMDs at each other. Spoiler Russian SGB WMD are flying right now somewhere to southern part of this map... KABOOM! At least my engineers, IFVs and 1 SPG unit. I can work with that, although hordes of Russians are coming. Those hordes, specifically. They are going to be hit by our own WMD, picture of which was lost, thanks to my Command vehicle being destroyed by WMD warhead detonation. Previous CV left those UGV guards on a bridge, they will help to hold our frontline. Hordes of gunships needs to be slowed down and destroyed before they got to my SPGs. Long range firepower is now a key to the gates of Victory. Hordes and hordes of Kamovs. They are distracted by UGVs that guards Sierra uplink. Engineers are moving to a building to cover IFVs, as they are in not good situation. 4 teams of gunships are now 3. 3 damaged groups of helicopters. Engineers are already helping with their missiles, firing across river. 2 MORE OF THOSE THINGS! This is like... 5 gunships units... which is 20 individual helicopter. Now they are going down, after getting into crossfire. TIME TO DIE! Those UGVs that my previous CV left are helping, hehe. Chase them! Kill them! No one should survive! Jesus fucking Christ, HOW MANY OF THEM DO YOU HAVE, AI?! Yet ANOTHER gunship squad (number 4) is in the air. I am moving my forces closer to Kremlin walls with help of freindly forces, 2nd Russian Sheptsnaz commander tries to counter that with his tanks. Just.. just move few meters closer, damn it! Helicopters are meking their move, IFVs will catch them by their tails. 2nd commander's gunships join our helicopter killing spree. My forces are re-established after getting hit by WMD, friendly AI lost almost all of his troops in direct combat. This mean we are main force left on the field to win this fight. Kremlin is in ruins... again! Spoiler We are right outside of Kremlin walls, with parts of them damaged after my SPGs delivered HE rounds to targets inside. This is next platoon of T-100s that needs to be groundfired to death. Yeah, like that! Situation after friendlies finished group of enemies on left flank. My CV is in front of all troops to tank damage, SPGs under IFV protection and near bridge so they can run away if needed. Another group of tanks that tries to clear Red Square from our American asses. 2nd commander's tanks breached barricades and now pushing futher. SPGs are helping them to clear area from Russian army tanks. Area is clear, we can continue our advance. Only Serious weapons will finish this battle. Spoiler .... urghh.. and after playing so many Raid missions i forgot to keep an eye on WMD. Shpetsnaz commander knew where and which units to hit. CV with support of tanks are clearing entry way through one of guard towers. A lot of forces inside, our UAV and 2nd commander tanks amaged to spot where last Shpetsnaz manpower is. We are going to pay our debt. And they are nicely bunched up. Perfect. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted December 2, 2018 Report Share Posted December 2, 2018 Some views of EW maps that i didn't played in singleplayer mode. Cosmodrome Spoiler Kursk firebase. Spoiler Beach. Spoiler And few old ones. Spoiler Grissom AB Nuclear powerplants Ramstein Some random pics (cool, interesting, etc). Euroweaklings. Spoiler Yes. Lasers. Shpetsnaz T-100 Ogre tanks strng. Spoiler CV charge Spoiler US stuff Spoiler US snipers Russian stuff Spoiler Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoooSeR Posted December 3, 2018 Report Share Posted December 3, 2018 Battle for Kosmodrome. 2vs2, Assault game mode. Objective is to KILL EVERYONE. BUHAHA! This gamemode is kind of fun, removes everythign in the way of mutual annihilation. Fighting for central part of Kosmodrome. Spoiler New map and playing a gamemode that i didn't played much in singleplayer. Picked balanced loadout. No idea how battle with flow, as middle area is relatively busy with structures. I hope a Roskosmos rocket on this Cosmodrome will not explode with my forces nearby. Very Soviet look of this part of the map is coming through the screen thanks to this big ugly building. And first customer to be "serviced". Note how many fuel tanks are in this part of the map. And they are explodable. At least 3 units were killed (AI commander lost 2, at least APCs were killed by enemy long range fire), more of enemies are near Fedya point. I am planning to do a little bit of flanking, don't want to fight in the middle of those fields of giant exploding fuel tanks, especially during artillery strikes. Kamovs are getting out of fire, enemy artillery is targeted by airstrike. My SPGs are maneuvering to get into range for counter-battery barrage. Even more of enemies are getting into central plato. Pushing enemies to the edge Spoiler This position should provide a good place to hold thanks to terrain and proximity to Y uplink, where engineers have cover and where additional defence forces can be deployed after hacking Y. JSF CV tried to avoid 2nd commander's forces, and went to edge of plato, effectively scouting my SPGs. Tanks with gunships support were quickly assigned by enemies to attack my troops. CV will tank damage, SPGs will bombard tanks, while Kamovs are finishing CV. Engineers and SPAAGs will provide serious AA firepower. Trying to separate enemies. When gunships started their attack on my command vehicle, i ordered it to move back, while moving SPAAGs closer. Artillery with support of gunships are pressuring MBTs to fuck off. My play paid off, although my squad of choppers was badly damaged by JSF CV UGVs. But this fight is not over, opponents are trying to sneak in their footmobiles. MAZ truck is back to block plateau exit, using easily replacable conscripts. Infantry is shelled by SPGs, but hostile gunships are here. They didn't bothered with taking out infantry on Z, probably because they feel that after damage they manage to inflict here, they can keep pressure and brake us. I am dispatching SPAAGs to support 2nd commander's forces. Just in time - SPGs defeated infantry squad that was trying to get to a good position. This wave of US troops was defeated, we have upper hand. Counter attack begins! Spoiler One single squad of engineers... at least SPGs will have something to do. My forces are advancing now, We will try to take F. They manage to save their SPGs, some of 2nd commander troops suffered casualties from them. Gunships are leaving enemy infantry behind and go after cannon carriers. American infantry is trapped. My artillery is destroying fuel tanks in order to avoid enemies using them on our troops that will hack F. Finishing American invaders. Spoiler We are going to block them in their LZ. Ohh shit... Good old WMD exchange. Some observation on AI. AI and Command Vehicles: Spoiler AI back ups CV after spotting helicopters and moving SPAAGs to fight them. AI frequently use CVs for tanking damage, for attack and deep strikes. In fact here is friendly (number 9) and enemy AI (number 5) doing that in the same battle and in the same time: Here is "deep strike" with CV. That MAZ (number 3) drove from military base entrance almost to most rear part of it. CVs have maybe highest HP pool of all units and can eat a lot of damage output of hostile units. At close range CVs use their own weapons to fight, at medium range command vehicles can send their escort to deal with enemies. Escort does have hard counter units - artillery, tanks. In fact CVs can be used rather creatively and seriously help with balancing unit composition. This unit is almost a hidden gem, because at surface it is usefull only for giving player ability to look at VR map. But this thing have a lot of uses, thats why lately i frequently deploy it. Here is JSF CV with UGV escorts. UGVs are powerfull against gunships, IIRC APCs, but in general they can deal damage to any type of units. Those escort troops/drones add to overall firepower of Command unit and make it interesting to fight against - depending on positioning, range, units and situation you can go directly for CV or destroy escort at first and leave CV for less usefull units at the moment. Here is AI tries to save one of his units by rushing his CV into bulk of our forces. A bit late, i ordered tanks to finish enemy squad 5 anyway. Now my forces are focusing on escort drones to decrease danger for friendly units 11 and 12. Now we can go for CV directly. AI understood that his vehicle lost all defense and now is trying to get out. Huge HP pool allows it to live long, even under fire of several units. Note that friendly AI also deployed command truck and his MAZ is on the frontline. AI tries to use vehicles for maximum and just before losing CV they sometimes deploy UAVs to distract/spot our troops. Another example of CV used in attack (failed, as Shpetsnaz is superior! Hahaha!) Guarding entry points. Spoiler AI sometimes use teams to guard roads leading to important places. Units that are assigned to guard those places can chase enemies for some time, but they try to stay relatively close to their assigned position. Friendly airvics are trying to attack them: Tanks left their position and chased helicopters, without crossing guarded bridge exit And after short amount of time tanks came back to their positions. AI frequently use tanks with infantry support: Spoiler I have a suspicion that AI can use buildings/structures as a cover. Will try to watch for more about that, already several possible occassions (although not sure if it was specific attempt to get to cover/out of LOS or just retreating pathfinding/accidental positioning). Spoiler Those tanks came under artillery fire and after number of shells they moved right next to walls of nearest building (they probably were guarding entry way for infantry in guard tower). And just AI troops party. Probably concentration of forces that happens before AI starts assault. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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