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by Mischief Maker 04/29/2005, 9:44am PDT |
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Well this is my first impression based off the retail version (v. 3-09) which I just picked up.
FABIO wrote:
the extreme rock/paper/scissors nature between races (marines > machina, machina > spawn, spawn > marines) that made most intra-species matches pretty lopsided
Their website's news section from the last two years is pretty much a constant stream of stat balancing. According to their forums, the three are pretty well balanced now. The only grumbling is how the greys' cloaking devices make fighting them a chore. Nothing strikes me as broken yet.
an all A.I. machina force being much more powerful than a diversified force in most situations
It was my impression that scanners and hunters are the cornerstone of Machina forces, providing the intel needed to give the big bulky AI and Missile tanks something to shoot at.
The fact that playing marines required a ridiculous amount of clicking, calculating, angle measuring, and lots of prayer that the not very consistent collision detection wouldn't bounce your own grenades off walls right back at you.
If you hold down the right mouse button when aiming, any terrain obstacles get highlighted in red. Snipers and Commanders are great at punching holes through terrain to give everyone a clear shot. Holding down the right mouse button with grenadiers gives you a "most probable" bounce pattern that's usually on the money unless you're bouncing it wildly off 7 different walls or something. No grenadier complaints from me.
I like the way you issue orders in this game. I tried to get into X-Com/JA, but that abstract "move your guys one at a time, conserve an arbitrary amount of Action Points to shoot at any boogums that pop up" system was too impenetrable for my simple little mind. The great thing about Laser Squad is that you give your orders to your whole team at once, and instead of mucking around with action points, you have 10 seconds to play with and the cost of every action is measued in time.
Suddenly my dudes are working together as a team and I'm a tactical genius! Lasers and grenades fly as my dudes answer a spawn rush with a whithering barrage of SUPRESSING FIRE! while the commander watches their backs and picks off any stragglers. I have one dude poke his head from around the corner and run, grabbing the enemy's attention, while my main force flanxorz him. And one of my favorite moments, I have a grunt walk up to the automatic sliding doors of the enemy HQ and open them just long enough to allow a grenade to bounce through, then runs away and lets them slide shut on any return fire, followed by a satisfying BOOM! And thanks to the "test orders" button (the game's equivalent of caltrops' preview button) I can make sure the orders I give the units all run smoothly without them bumping into each other or bottlenecking in hallways.
I guess the flipside to the coolness of the sheer volume of orders you can give per turn is the sheer volume of orders you have to give per turn.
I heartily recommend everyone give the demo a try. Even if you're picking up the game this afternoon, still get the demo. Because the real catch to the game is that you need to pay a monthly subscription to play anything but campaign or hotseat games (retail version gets you 3 months free.) The demo lets you play 3 games for free and there's a huge crowd of dudes who call themselves 'Field instructors' who'll gladly play you and show you the ropes. Why are they so selflessly nice? Because if you give them credit for recruiting you when you sign up with the full version, they get a month of play for free. |
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Laser Squad Nemesis is fun! NT by Mischief Maker 04/28/2005, 9:43pm PDT 
Has it improved it in last two years? by FABIO 04/28/2005, 10:25pm PDT 
Re: Has it improved it in last two years? by Mischief Maker 04/29/2005, 9:44am PDT 
Re: Has it improved it in last two years? by FABIO 04/29/2005, 3:28pm PDT 
Solution. by Eyo 04/29/2005, 3:52pm PDT 
Whimper... by Mischief Maker 04/29/2005, 7:32pm PDT 
So how do you watch that replay? by FABIO 04/29/2005, 10:12pm PDT 
Double-click on it. by Mischief Maker 04/30/2005, 8:17am PDT 
from like a million years ago by FABIO 04/30/2005, 3:44pm PDT 
holy shit by FABIO 05/04/2005, 4:34pm PDT 
Re: Whimper... by FABIO 05/17/2005, 11:57pm PDT 
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