Rant v1

First of all, nice so far one what you guys have done etc...
except the game kind of sucks. Anyways, I'm an ideas guy and an armchair developer so give me 50% in profit when this game takes offff

Some things I like atm:
The core gametype (the levels still suck though)
Stand-still energy boost

Things I don't like:
a lot

First of all, the modules suck. omg, heresy.
Boost is a bit OP... slow it down a tad or increase energy use. Get rid of the double-tap boost-- it breaks the flow.
Shield is very OP: one cannot survive in the game without shield. Keep the energy use the same, but take a bit a way whenever you get hit. Seriously though. I cannot do anything without shield.
Repair is ok... but you should be able to damage enemy players and buildings. Due to the close proximity required, perhaps make it do double damage or something like that.
Sensor: WTF happened. A direct, passive counter to cloak? Are you kidding me?
Cloak: it's ok (hahaha)
Engineer: throw it away. I mean, really? It completely breaks the game. Turrets fricken everywhere. No maps use it correctly.
Armor: get rid of the maneuverability disadvantage. It sucks to lose a second module slot already. Either that or throw this out as well

Anyways, I think you should just get rid of modules altogether. tbh, it kind of slows down the game. They also appear to be difficult to balance.
It'd be neat to see a pure game mode without all that extra garbage attached imo

Weapons:
Phaser is op. Cannot go without it. increase energy requirements
Bouncer is underpowered (takes too much energy).
Triple needs a slight buff
Burst is OP (a little bit of energy for a ton of damage?)
Mines are ok.
Seeker: whyyyyyyyy

I think it'd be fun to see all the weapons replaced with some sort of laser-type thing (i'm talking hitscan weapons here). Make the damage variate based on how far the crosshair is from the enemy ship. Crosshair on the ship = max damage (headshot -- aimbots will be a problem, but I doubt that'll happen with this game). If the crosshair creates a line from ship to enemy ship = some damage (variable). Just something that sounds fun.

Some random things:
Burst and ships do not bounce off walls at the correct angles (especially noticeable at 45º).
Weapons preserve momentum when moving forward or backward relative to the ship, but not side-to-side. Kind of awkward, but I assume it makes aiming easier... but still.
Asteroids: WTF? Spawnkilled all the fricken time. At least put in something that shows whether it will spawn soon or not.
Aesthics need an upgrade. Easier said than done I know etc... but still. Make it something like geometry wars and it might be a bit more appealing.


Idk.
just some food for thought.
I know this is your baby and whatever, so take it with a grain of salt. The point is, zap is gone now. I'm pretty much suggesting a whole new game... but it wouldn't hurt to try some of these ideas.

[raptor]

Thanks cloakdood!

[bobdaduck]

They also appear to be difficult to balance.

Nobody has, in the history of Zap! or bitfighter, made an actual change to modules or weapons, with the exception of mines costing 50% energy instead of Zap!'s 80%. They're not difficult to balance; we've never made an attempt.

Weapons:
I think it'd be fun to see all the weapons replaced with some sort of laser-type thing (i'm talking hitscan weapons here). Make the damage variate based on how far the crosshair is from the enemy ship. Crosshair on the ship = max damage (headshot -- aimbots will be a problem, but I doubt that'll happen with this game). If the crosshair creates a line from ship to enemy ship = some damage (variable). Just something that sounds fun.

Seriously? No. No No no no no no No No no No no

Aesthics need an upgrade. Easier said than done I know etc... but still. Make it something like geometry wars and it might be a bit more appealing.

Did you ever play Z.A.P.? It failed pretty much exclusively on its graphics "upgrade" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyBtakk70dE

The point is, zap is gone now. I'm pretty much suggesting a whole new game... but it wouldn't hurt to try some of these ideas.

You're not suggesting a whole new game, you're suggesting CoD. If we're going to imitate aspects of another game, we'd need to pick and choose them with extreme prejudice. We won't be able to compete with them, so we should actively go for a different niche.

Weapons and modules could use some reworking/tweaking, yes. The game flows fine as it is though. They're not screwing up the game.

[Quartz]

Some things I like atm:
The core gametype (the levels still suck though)

Blaming anything ever on levels is a logical fallacy in my eyes. Especially considering you could be making better ones yourself.

Boost is a bit OP... slow it down a tad or increase energy use. Get rid of the double-tap boost-- it breaks the flow.

I agree with increase energy use. Double-tap boost is awesome and adds a whole new element to the game. Just because you dunno how to use it yet (because you haven't tried), doesn't mean it "breaks the flow" and wah wah wah.

Shield is very OP: one cannot survive in the game without shield. Keep the energy use the same, but take a bit a way whenever you get hit. Seriously though. I cannot do anything without shield.

Shield is a necessity, and I agree I don't like that. No module or weapon should be an absolute necessity. That said, I don't pretend to know how exactly to solve it. Probably would take a lot of messing around, and even when a good balance was decided upon you'd get a lot of whining, of course, until people bothered to learn how to change tactics.

Repair is ok... but you should be able to damage enemy players and buildings. Due to the close proximity required, perhaps make it do double damage or something like that.

Repair being a Vampire module ... honestly sounds pretty stupid. Why do that when you could just shoot the person/building, ever?

Sensor: WTF happened. A direct, passive counter to cloak? Are you kidding me?

WTF happened, it's actually useful in several ways now? It's not just countering Cloak, it also added Spy bugs which adds a great element of teamwork and cooperation to the game. Sensor has been buffed and is actually worthwhile now.

Engineer: throw it away. I mean, really? It completely breaks the game. Turrets fricken everywhere. No maps use it correctly.

"No maps use it correctly." Once again, that logic is awful. I've seen a few maps out there that used it correctly ... what do you know, there were like 2 Resource Items in the entire map, and what do you know, there weren't "turrets fricken everywhere." Problem solved by map makers not sucking. Moving on...

Armor: get rid of the maneuverability disadvantage. It sucks to lose a second module slot already. Either that or throw this out as well

Agreed entirely. Remove manueverability disadvantage and possibly make it so that you can't stack Armor with Shield or something.

It'd be neat to see a pure game mode without all that extra garbage attached imo

Possibly a good gametype idea, yeah.

Phaser is op. Cannot go without it. increase energy requirements

this.

Bouncer is underpowered (takes too much energy).

Disagree. Bouncer is badass if you know how to use it, and the energy requirements are entirely legitimate in that case. I find great use for Bouncer myself.

Triple needs a slight buff

this.

Burst is OP (a little bit of energy for a ton of damage?)

this.

I think it'd be fun to see all the weapons replaced with some sort of laser-type thing (i'm talking hitscan weapons here). Make the damage variate based on how far the crosshair is from the enemy ship. Crosshair on the ship = max damage (headshot -- aimbots will be a problem, but I doubt that'll happen with this game). If the crosshair creates a line from ship to enemy ship = some damage (variable). Just something that sounds fun.

I wouldn't mind some form of Sniper, but I'm thinking more like a Spartan Laser in that it would have a charging phase that would be CLEARLY visible for people before they get roflpwnt. Also, it would require a direct hit (actually aimed at the ship, not behind or in front) and take up a fair chunk of your energy.

Asteroids: WTF? Spawnkilled all the fricken time. At least put in something that shows whether it will spawn soon or not.

Once again maps' fault. I believe Asteroids should almost never be put in maps, they are more a novelty than anything. People will learn that in time. As such, who cares. This is something for the community to deal with, not the devs.

Aesthics need an upgrade. Easier said than done I know etc... but still. Make it something like geometry wars and it might be a bit more appealing.

Funny, I think Geometry Wars is pretty ugly.

You're not suggesting a whole new game, you're suggesting CoD. If we're going to imitate aspects of another game, we'd need to pick and choose them with extreme prejudice. We won't be able to compete with them, so we should actively go for a different niche.

Agreed. Zap/bF kinda has its own thing going. Especially since it's a top-down view game, you have to treat it a whole lot differently than almost any game on the market at the moment.

Weapons and modules could use some reworking/tweaking, yes. The game flows fine as it is though. They're not screwing up the game.

this

[watusimoto]

Asteroids: WTF? Spawnkilled all the fricken time. At least put in something that shows whether it will spawn soon or not.

Would a marker at the location of asteroid spawns be good or bad?

[bobdaduck]

Asteroids: WTF? Spawnkilled all the fricken time. At least put in something that shows whether it will spawn soon or not.

Would a marker at the location of asteroid spawns be good or bad?

Gameplay wise, its a must. Aesthetics/consistency with game theme wise, it doesn't fit at all. We'd need to figure out some way to pull it off within our genre. Some kind of "door in the middle of empty space" is my best idea at the moment.

[watusimoto]

I could easily think of a faint blue (say) asteroid mark surrounded by some warning markings. Something very vaguely like this;

http://us.cdn2.123rf.com/168nwm/hoperan ... ground.jpg

Engineer: throw it away. I mean, really? It completely breaks the game. Turrets fricken everywhere. No maps use it correctly.

"No maps use it correctly." Once again, that logic is awful. I've seen a few maps out there that used it correctly ... what do you know, there were like 2 Resource Items in the entire map, and what do you know, there weren't "turrets fricken everywhere." Problem solved by map makers not sucking. Moving on...

Nailed it. Turrets are great. Engineer is great. Neither are a requirement of every single map so they don't break the game. When used properly engineer is a ton of fun, and even when used improperly having a sense of childhood amusement can make engineering a metric ton of laserbeams and teleports be so silly.

@watusimoto Please do add in a marker for asteroid spawns. The suggestion you made could look great with some Bitfighter-esque touchups.

First of all, nice so far one what you guys have done etc...
except the game kind of sucks. Anyways, I'm an ideas guy and an armchair developer so give me 50% in profit when this game takes offff

Some things I like atm:
The core gametype (the levels still suck though)
Stand-still energy boost

Things I don't like:
a lot

First of all, the modules suck. omg, heresy.
Boost is a bit OP... slow it down a tad or increase energy use. Get rid of the double-tap boost-- it breaks the flow.
Shield is very OP: one cannot survive in the game without shield. Keep the energy use the same, but take a bit a way whenever you get hit. Seriously though. I cannot do anything without shield.
Repair is ok... but you should be able to damage enemy players and buildings. Due to the close proximity required, perhaps make it do double damage or something like that.
Sensor: WTF happened. A direct, passive counter to cloak? Are you kidding me?
Cloak: it's ok (hahaha)
Engineer: throw it away. I mean, really? It completely breaks the game. Turrets fricken everywhere. No maps use it correctly.
Armor: get rid of the maneuverability disadvantage. It sucks to lose a second module slot already. Either that or throw this out as well

Anyways, I think you should just get rid of modules altogether. tbh, it kind of slows down the game. They also appear to be difficult to balance.
It'd be neat to see a pure game mode without all that extra garbage attached imo

Weapons:
Phaser is op. Cannot go without it. increase energy requirements
Bouncer is underpowered (takes too much energy).
Triple needs a slight buff
Burst is OP (a little bit of energy for a ton of damage?)
Mines are ok.
Seeker: whyyyyyyyy

I think it'd be fun to see all the weapons replaced with some sort of laser-type thing (i'm talking hitscan weapons here). Make the damage variate based on how far the crosshair is from the enemy ship. Crosshair on the ship = max damage (headshot -- aimbots will be a problem, but I doubt that'll happen with this game). If the crosshair creates a line from ship to enemy ship = some damage (variable). Just something that sounds fun.

Some random things:
Burst and ships do not bounce off walls at the correct angles (especially noticeable at 45º).
Weapons preserve momentum when moving forward or backward relative to the ship, but not side-to-side. Kind of awkward, but I assume it makes aiming easier... but still.
Asteroids: WTF? Spawnkilled all the fricken time. At least put in something that shows whether it will spawn soon or not.
Aesthics need an upgrade. Easier said than done I know etc... but still. Make it something like geometry wars and it might be a bit more appealing.


Idk.
just some food for thought.
I know this is your baby and whatever, so take it with a grain of salt. The point is, zap is gone now. I'm pretty much suggesting a whole new game... but it wouldn't hurt to try some of these ideas.

I was going to write a whole novel on this, but I noticed the others already did that xD

But DOOD! If you are SOOOO mad and you are an "armchair developer", why don't you make your modifications and post it on google code?

And, FYI, the original Zap is not gone. Bitfighter is EXACTLY the same of Zap, but with WAY better graphics, more features, less bugs, great community and OpenSource.
Zap and Bitfighter are the same. Oh and look at that, more and more players are joining Bitfighter. There isn't allot of players because there is barely any ads for Bitfighter.

But seriously, if you are persuaded that your modifications must be implemented, do it yourself!

So after playing in the quartz party, I had a chance to try out some of the new bitfighter gameplay elements. My two cents:

- Double-tap to boost is a nice idea but unpractical as is. I often tap boost rhythmically when I'm in a hurry to get somewhere; it speeds me up a little while conserving energy. However, on several occasions I've accidentally activated the double-tap boost and completely lost my energy/ended up in a crappy location, which usually resulted in death. :/ Please give the option for button customization on this.

- Faster energy when ships are unmoving is simply brilliant. Hats off to whoever came up with this. It makes sense and is a really great way to repair more efficiently.

- Also: Black hole!? All these unofficial, experimental objects are making my head spin. (But in all seriousness they're pretty cool. Keep up the good work.)

[bobdaduck]

- Faster energy when ships are unmoving is simply brilliant. Hats off to whoever came up with this. It makes sense and is a really great way to repair more efficiently.

That was Unknown.

- Also: Black hole!? All these unofficial, experimental objects are making my head spin. (But in all seriousness they're pretty cool. Keep up the good work.)

Black hole isn't an object, its a levelgen script. You really should play around with them sometime

[Quartz]

Please give the option for button customization on this.

Okay, that's far less nazi than "LAWL GIT RID OF IT!!", I can actually agree with this. =P

Levelgen script? Man, I'm way behind - I still thought that levelgen was only used for generating mazes.

[watusimoto]

In 018, they can be used for responding to events during the game as well.

Shield is very OP: one cannot survive in the game without shield. Keep the energy use the same, but take a bit a way whenever you get hit. Seriously though. I cannot do anything without shield.

Shield is a necessity, and I agree I don't like that. No module or weapon should be an absolute necessity. That said, I don't pretend to know how exactly to solve it. Probably would take a lot of messing around, and even when a good balance was decided upon you'd get a lot of whining, of course, until people bothered to learn how to change tactics.

No, shield is not a necessity, its just a completely different fighting style without it, which revolves around dodging phasers. Although, I do agree about it costing more energy upon being hit. Cloak/repair and armor/repair are good assassin/tank builds that can 1v1 someone with sheild.

[Quartz]

No, shield is not a necessity, its just a completely different fighting style without it, which revolves around dodging phasers. Although, I do agree about it costing more energy upon being hit. Cloak/repair and armor/repair are good assassin/tank builds that can 1v1 someone with sheild.

Good response Cracatoa.

I will agree that you can make do with Repair in place of Shield by dodging ... you'll mess up a few shots but you can Repair them when it's convenient. I've done this before and done *okay.*

That said, I agree with cloakdood's concept of ridding of Armor's movement penalty. Thus making the choice of Shield (active absolute protection) vs. choosing Armor (passive good protection) a legitimate concept.

[sam686]

Engineer: throw it away. I mean, really? It completely breaks the game. Turrets fricken everywhere. No maps use it correctly.

Should of complained earliear about Engineer, but only a few levels allow using engineer.

Armor: get rid of the maneuverability disadvantage. It sucks to lose a second module slot already.

You aren't the only one that say that.

Armor doesn't need to make movement harder; we've already given up a module. Give Armor full speed.

From Simplification

Weapons:
Phaser is op. Cannot go without it. increase energy requirements
Bouncer is underpowered (takes too much energy).
Triple needs a slight buff
Burst is OP (a little bit of energy for a ton of damage?)
Mines are ok.
Seeker: whyyyyyyyy

There is an old topic that talks about Balancing.

Getting rid of modules? SERIOUSLY? Modules are one of the MAIN THINGS in bitfighter! We can't just throw them away! It would make the ships about 10 million times less fun to use and we would just be stuck with 6 weapons. If we listen to this guy. We are so screwed.