Star Control: Origins - Star Control reboot from Stardock

[Zarniwoop]

What the actual fuck?

Melee is definitely not the core of SC2.

It's possible (and in fact, recommended) to skip it entirely and it's still the best game ever made. The exploration/space adventure is the core of the game. That's the reason it's a LEGEND while SC1, where the combat IS the core, is barely spoken about.

Tell me how you stop the Sa-Matra in this "skip it entirely"-pacifist run.

And when you're done with that, do Fallout next.

Big difference between pacifism and skipping manual combat.

You just set the fights to Cyborg++ and enjoy.

Personally I fought the Sa-Matra manually but if you leave the combat on auto, it just auto-wins. One thing Origins does right is ask you before every fight if you want to auto-resolve. Unfortunately, as I said before the auto-resolve was programmed by a toddler hyped up on sugar so it's entirely worthless.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

SC2 combat really is the core of this game

what

 

[Zarniwoop]

SC2 combat really is the core of this game

what

My point exactly. It fucking isn't.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

So you missed the Point as well, just like Stardock?

The melee combat is the Core of all the Star Control games, the bit in the middle surrounded by all these other gameplay elements, and it's their combined efforts that make the games what they are. Obviously there will be players who don't like the Core that much and prefer the other elements, but that doesn't change the facts. In there also lies the reason why SC2 gets all the love and praise: Because the other parts of SC2 actually work and are enjoyable in addition to the Core, they don't overstay their welcome and are kept smooth and simple. SC1 doesn't get so much praise because there's very little else to it than the Core, and I've yet to find a poor soul who enjoyed the colony management aspects of SC3. Origins then tries its hand and somehow mucks it up, even though it's copying a tried and tested formula.

The fact that almost all combat in SC2 can be skipped doesn't refute my Point, it emphasizes it. It also shows more brilliant game design at work that there are options available to skip the Core, that's flexibility at work. That's why I brought up Fallout: At heart it's a role-playing game, yet it also has this rather neat combat system. Which part of Fallout is the Core? The character design/interaction? The S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system? The exploration of the Wastes? The combat? Which part of it is the most fun to play? Does the answer to the previous question change what is the Core of Fallout?

Just because you and some others enjoyed the exploration aspect of SC2 more than the melee mode, doesn't change the fact that the melee mode is what sits at the heart of the game. It is the Core.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

that's like saying the core of PST is the combat

 

[Grauken]

So you missed the Point as well, just like Stardock?

The melee combat is the Core of all the Star Control games, the bit in the middle surrounded by all these other gameplay elements, and it's their combined efforts that make the games what they are. Obviously there will be players who don't like the Core that much and prefer the other elements, but that doesn't change the facts. In there also lies the reason why SC2 gets all the love and praise: Because the other parts of SC2 actually work and are enjoyable in addition to the Core, they don't overstay their welcome and are kept smooth and simple. SC1 doesn't get so much praise because there's very little else to it than the Core, and I've yet to find a poor soul who enjoyed the colony management aspects of SC3. Origins then tries its hand and somehow mucks it up, even though it's copying a tried and tested formula.

The fact that almost all combat in SC2 can be skipped doesn't refute my Point, it emphasizes it. It also shows more brilliant game design at work that there are options available to skip the Core, that's flexibility at work. That's why I brought up Fallout: At heart it's a role-playing game, yet it also has this rather neat combat system. Which part of Fallout is the Core? The character design/interaction? The S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system? The exploration of the Wastes? The combat? Which part of it is the most fun to play? Does the answer to the previous question change what is the Core of Fallout?

Just because you and some others enjoyed the exploration aspect of SC2 more than the melee mode, doesn't change the fact that the melee mode is what sits at the heart of the game. It is the Core.

That's retarded on so many levels

 

[Norfleet]

SC2 combat really is the core of this game, even this year I know someone new to the game who approached the adventure mode by looking at everything in Super Melee first.

That's certainly the perspective one would have if approaching SC2 from SC1, for sure. If you came from SC1, you already knew the combat, and thus the adventure part was mostly the wrapper to justify you getting into fights, just like in SC1, you had the melee mode, and then the strategy wrapper to justify why you were getting into fights.

Of course, the plot was pretty damn good, so some people have come to see THAT as the big deal, and then you have imitators who then try to focus on the plot, while giving a relatively poor experience in the fights...and those haven't honestly panned out well. But honestly, if you think about it, the plot of SC2 never took itself all that seriously and it was mostly just a thing for getting you into fights.

The Starsector guy seems to understand this, and thus has resisted calls for making the game into something else, like a trading game or something (which he has declared he hates), and instead focuses on the other elements of the game as context for getting into fights.

 

[Grauken]

SC1 was just a tech demo, with SC2 they had polished out the kinks and could focus on what really mattered, the actual game

 

[Norfleet]

Yes, but SC1 was a tech demo of FIGHTS.

I think we can see this in Starsector vs. Starcom: Nexus. Both appear to draw some level of inspiration from SC2, in the sense of "one man wanders the galaxy looking for stuff".

But StarSector understands that it is about getting in fights, and all the exploration and economy is there as a framing device to provide context to fights: Why you have these things to get in fights with, why are you getting in fights, and how you are going to get more things to get into fights with. The actual plot of the story is currently not really made yet, but people are still gleefully getting into fights.

StarCom, on the other hand, took the opposite tack, having an SC2-esque story of "one man and his support base exploring the galaxy against the forces of doom out to get them". The problem? The fights are lackluster. The story does a decent enough job providing context for why we get into fights, BUT THE FIGHTS AREN'T ACTUALLY ANY GOOD!

 

[Unkillable Cat]

that's like saying the core of PST is the combat

The combat is the core of the Infinity Engine, not PST. PST demonstrated what could be done if the emphasis was to distance the game from that, which is very unconventional... but then again there are a lot of unconventional things about PST.

And your (false) comparison is precisely what Bethesda had in mind when they snapped up Fallout and churned out all of their games: They thought that the combat is the core of Fallout. The Bethesda Fallouts clearly demonstrate that... and they're Wrong.

SC1 was just a tech demo, with SC2 they had polished out the kinks and could focus on what really mattered, the actual game

You're basing this on the false assumption that SC2 was the game that they intended SC1 to be. The original release candidate for SC2 was just to fly around space, collect resources, build the ships and go fight the Ur-Quan. What happened is that TFB decided to withhold the game and work on it some more for six months. When they finally sent the game over to Accolade they had added the planets and the planet landing mini-game, but most importantly they also added the aliens and the interactions with them. These aspects were not part of the original design document, except in an abstract sense, at best. The design document states, and I quote it: "Star Control II will use much of the code and data developed for Star Control I, and add on a good (though not necessarily epic) role-playing shell."

Guess what? That shell turned out to be pretty damn epic. It's so epic that you lot can't see past it and see the game underneath it, you think the shell is the game.

 

[Grauken]

Yes, but SC1 was a tech demo of FIGHTS.

I think we can see this in Starsector vs. Starcom: Nexus. Both appear to draw some level of inspiration from SC2, in the sense of "one man wanders the galaxy looking for stuff".

But StarSector understands that it is about getting in fights, and all the exploration and economy is there as a framing device to provide context to fights: Why you have these things to get in fights with, why are you getting in fights, and how you are going to get more things to get into fights with. The actual plot of the story is currently not really made yet, but people are still gleefully getting into fights.

StarCom, on the other hand, took the opposite tack, having an SC2-esque story of "one man and his support base exploring the galaxy against the forces of doom out to get them". The problem? The fights are lackluster. The story does a decent enough job providing context for why we get into fights, BUT THE FIGHTS AREN'T ACTUALLY ANY GOOD!

That's like saying Colony Ship's core is the combat, because the demo is a combat-focused demo, when it's a just an important but not the defining part of the game. Same as for SC2

 

[Zarniwoop]

Saying the combat is the core of SC2, or Fallout for that matter is so retarded, everyone in the thread is now stupider after having read it.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Just coming in to point out that all the posters that are going on about how other posters are retarded or stupider for stating their point, while not actually stating a counterpoint... yeah, thanks, morons. Great to have you here, care to try again?

No? OK, bye then!

 

[Reality]

I actually tried to put the fabled "all autopilot" adventure mode in SC 2 to the test a few weeks ago -

It is actually covered reasonably for the entire game … but it does take ship losses that would be seriously facepalmy compared to human play - In my opinion it kind of incentivizes getting full flagships engines and avoiding non-quest combat even harder than in a naturalistic playthrough.

The main silly things -

Ur Quan / Kohr Ah *early* throwing the AI controlled ships against them with anything that's NOT a yethat/utwig kind of ends in tragedy, while in human control they will be mowed down en masse by fwiffo - For all intents and purproses the optional fight to rescue the zoq foq pik was the single most interesting part of my playthrough

Mycon - exceedingly sloppy play against them - AI will throw away both Pfunk and Arilou against them, when they should be pretty trival for a human -- I actually flat out re-ordered the playthrough and did the full Yehat sidequest first. And I don't mean fighting infinite numbers of them in space -- I did it JUST for the 6 guarding the sun device.

Flagship with Hellbore Cannon - Don't give it to the AI until you have tracking, and even then they let Kohr AH/ UR-Quan do tons of unnecessary damage before winning (usually not lethal if you also take the time to ~200 crew, but it sure isn't the powerboost into godhood it is with human control)

The AI is fine for everything else VUX/Druuge/Umgah/Thraddash - Ilwrath are kind of a special mention in that Arilou AI tend to work better than any others,(I know you don't need to fight with working cloaks any but for the purposes of simulating a blind playthrough)

I can't completely judge what this would be like because I played it with human control first, but my impression is that a SC 2 playthrough emphasizing Autopilot combat makes the game feel more "quest-focused" than exploration focused... and while it's true that the AI isn't particularly great if you pick the best ship for the situation at all times (or kill everything with Fwiffo) it completely closes the door to silly, but fun and challenging things you can do with human controlled combat --- learn how to kill Kohr-ah with earthling cruisers, blowing up the Sa-Matra with Druuge instead of boring old Pfunk, and so on.

 

[Deadyawn]

I'd argue that exploration is the actual core of SC2 since not only is the main gameplay loop but also what you do in between other activities, like resource gathering and combat.

 

[Zombra]

Down to $8 again on gmg, tempted to try this again, please talk me out of it again.

 

[Efe]

you should definitely try it.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Down to $8 again on gmg, tempted to try this again, please talk me out of it again.

If skipping content is okay in games, then skipping the game itself oughta be a piece of cake.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

Down to $8 again on gmg, tempted to try this again, please talk me out of it again.

Eh... I'd say $8 is a decent price for it if you've got nothing better to play. You'll probably get at least 5-10 hours of enjoyment out of it before the package starts to wear thin. I also think it's worth pointing out that SC:O is basically one of those rare games that is less than the sum of its parts. A bunch of ok-to decent systems and writing just come together to make a mediocre whole. Can't speak to whether or not the DLC rectified any of this, but I think Unkillable Cat had a pretty negative response to it.


Edit: Also, for the record, $40 (which is what I paid for it) is an absolutely absurd price-tag for it. I suspect that they launched at that price-point because they had to justify its extended development time, not because they had confidence in the product.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://forums.stardock.net/502901/star-control-end-of-2020-status-report

Star Control: End of 2020 status report

AddThis Sharing Buttons
December 24, 2020 6:53:37 PM from Star Control Forums
It's Christmas Eve as I write this. 2020 has been a pretty crazy year. Covid has affected us just as it has probably affected many of you.

In the case of Star Control, it has put a big crimp in our plans.

The roadmap for Star Control is for us to bring the engine to be cross platform between PC, XBOX and PS. The problem is that the project has a single dev kit per platform. Normally this isn't a big deal. But with everyone working at home, we can't realistically "Share" the kit. We have the game largely ported to the XBOX but it's not ready for certification. We haven't even started on the PS version of it.

In the process of porting, we've been able to make a number of improvements to the game from a performance point of view but again, not enough bandwidth to put it together for a PC update.

Once we have a unified version of the game, we will release it onto PS4/PS5/XBO/XBSX. But I don't have any timeline for that as we are still all working from home sharing a single kit.

Meanwhile, the Star Control team has been sent over to other projects we have going on that you will likely start to hear about sometime next year.

The next Star Control sequel is still in the works but remains in pre-production. We learned a lot during the development of Star Control: Origins and are pretty eager to apply those lessons to the next Star Control game. But rest assured, that the Tywom, Phamyst, Arilou, Mowlings, and of course Jeff will be back for more plus a bunch of new aliens as Earth begins to explore new parsecs in the Scryve sector.

Stay tuned and have a merry Christmas!

 

[LESS T_T]

https://www.stardock.com/games/article/506573/star-control-originsversion-15-preview

Star Control: Origins–Version 1.5 preview

With more people coming back to the office work on the console version of Star Control: Origins has picked up. The first part of this has been to do a pretty thorough revamp of the game’s underlying systems in order to optimize it for the XBOX One, PS4 and also next-generation consoles.

During this process we greatly improved the quality of the texture maps throughout the game which includes aliens and ships.



(click on thumbnail to enlarge)

The team was also able to substantially reduce the memory footprint during many rounds of optimization.

We’ll have a full change-log soon with the public update next month.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I thought they'd just given up on the 1.5-update.

A pleasant surprise they're still working on this.

 

[Zarniwoop]

I thought they'd just given up on the 1.5-update.

A pleasant surprise they're still working on this.

Why pleasant? It sucks. A slight visual improvement isn't going to save it.

 

[Cael]

I thought they'd just given up on the 1.5-update.

A pleasant surprise they're still working on this.

Why pleasant? It sucks. A slight visual improvement isn't going to save it.

The same reason why slow-mo train wrecks are oddly mesmerising.

 

[LESS T_T]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/starcontrolorigins/announcements/detail/2950409820293818893

v1.5 Opt-in Beta Now Available
The update includes a major visual overhaul for the aliens and starships.

The memory footprint of the game was simultaneously reduced thanks to new updates to Stardock’s Cider engine.

The v1.5 update makes significant improvements to the game’s rendering technology. Players will enjoy finer details and smoother framerates when talking to alien leaders, while also gaining boosts in performance thanks to reduced memory usage. Ships benefit from this visual overhaul with more detail and an overall better performance during battles.

In addition to the visual improvements, v1.5 reduces the game’s memory usage by about 40%, depending on the player’s graphics card and computer system.

To enable the patch, please do the following:

• Select Star Control: Origins in your Steam Library list
  
• Right-click and select Properties
  
• Select the BETAS tab
  
• From the drop-down, select "opt-in" and click Close (if you don't see this option, restart Steam)
  
• Steam should pull down the changed files; if you ever want to go back, do the same as above but select "default".

Please note: The opt-in is an early preview of the next update and you might experience bugs or other issues. We encourage players who try the opt-in to report any issues to the forums.


Changelog

• Major visual overhaul of the leader's conversation graphics. Not only you can see more detail but the framerate is much smoother.
  
• Ships also benefit from this visual overhaul. You'll see more detail and have a better performance during battles.
  
• Significant reduction in memory usage.