The new docking isn't very popular, the map feels completely schizophrenic and the new areas are just cobbled together and bland as hell. Please, the map wasn't without it's problems but this?. No Thanks.
I get 15 FPS on Descent using an Thinkpad X230 (Subnotbook) with i5 and Intel HD 4000 on 1368x768 and everything set to low. I can boost the FPS a lot when playing at very low resolutions, but then I can't read the interface etc. so this is still unplayable. Ping was 22. Guess the main bottleneck for me is the renderer. Loading times were also way too long. It took ~10 minutes until the map was loaded. Thanks for this important patch, but it seems there is still a lot to do if you want to compete with heavily optimised mainstream engines like Source 1.
You didn't really believe that NS2 will EVER run fluently on your subnotebook(!) which even doesn't nearly reach minimum requirements, did you? I mean HD 4000 is an CPU integrated graphic card which doesn't have its own VRAM but has to use the DDR RAM of you subnotebook which makes it to slow besides the obvious lack of computing power. And comparing the old Source Engine to the Spark engine is a little bit inappropriate, don't you think?
I am sorry but NS2 will NEVER run satisfyingly on your current system no matter what optimization will come up in the future. Your subnotebook is below doday's low end gaming PCs, thats the truth you have to face disregarding a subnotebook is not made for gaming but for mobility and long endurance on one battery load.
Yes, you are right and I was even told before buying the game that it will not be much fun right now. Some guy at his NS2HD promised that performance will increase drastically within the next patches and modern integrated graphics will work in future revisions of the game. I probably should have waited for the free weekend to see if and how well it works on my machine. Well, I bet this will never be playable for me, but at least I gave something back to Flayra and his crew as I had lot's of fun with NS for Half-Life 1 back in the days.
@Tom-R
I need time to get to know the new docking but during the beta patch I found it a little awkward, especially losing Cafe as a tech point. That said, it's good to try new things and SOMETHING needed to be done about stability, it was far too important of a room as it was. I'm certain more changes will come. After all a change this large will obviously require some more fine tuning and the best way to make this map perfect is to provide healthy constructive criticism after a good dose of play testing. So KANPAI to some much needed change.
I'm also glad there is no double on this map like Veil, I'm really tired of "NANO NANO NANO!" when (in my opinion) giving them nano and taking three hives is waaaay better. No jetpacks or exos? Yeah, that sounds good, have all the flame throwers and jet packs you want, I'll just bile bomb them.
Where would be the best place to provide feedback anyway?
First off this is just my experience after playing a few games as marines. The generator hive is pretty open through pressure control if you just get some arcs up in there while the marines shoot down the hive through the entrance. We keep winning a lot of games just by going for lockers first and then claiming a lot of tech points in between. It just seems the Hive should be further in Generator a bit further away from the door. Maybe in the middle Idk.
This is an old change but I also wondered why the power node in departures was moved farther away from the hive a few patches back. As marines if aliens hold it we tend to just build power and and a phase easily away from the hive and it's defenses and then just pour in. The actual departures room feels claustrophobic as well though it is hard to describe since the room is not very small but compared to rooms like old cafe and terminal and maybe even lockers I felt that the structure of gen and departures should be a bit more spacious and less enclosed with the hive being a bit tucked away from the entrances but still arcable. Maybe allow allow aliens vent access through the middle portion of departures to spice things up a bit.
This is just also just a personal feeling but I wish there were more vents in general to allow more alien mobility in non marine spawning points just to give them more of an advantage on their home turf. It felt like shooting fish in a barrel on those two areas.
Comments
I recommend you disable all mods to start with, as per usual with a new patch release until they get updated.
Changelog will follow soon.
Yes, you are right and I was even told before buying the game that it will not be much fun right now. Some guy at his NS2HD promised that performance will increase drastically within the next patches and modern integrated graphics will work in future revisions of the game. I probably should have waited for the free weekend to see if and how well it works on my machine. Well, I bet this will never be playable for me, but at least I gave something back to Flayra and his crew as I had lot's of fun with NS for Half-Life 1 back in the days.
I need time to get to know the new docking but during the beta patch I found it a little awkward, especially losing Cafe as a tech point. That said, it's good to try new things and SOMETHING needed to be done about stability, it was far too important of a room as it was. I'm certain more changes will come. After all a change this large will obviously require some more fine tuning and the best way to make this map perfect is to provide healthy constructive criticism after a good dose of play testing. So KANPAI to some much needed change.
I'm also glad there is no double on this map like Veil, I'm really tired of "NANO NANO NANO!" when (in my opinion) giving them nano and taking three hives is waaaay better. No jetpacks or exos? Yeah, that sounds good, have all the flame throwers and jet packs you want, I'll just bile bomb them.
Where would be the best place to provide feedback anyway?
On docking? You could create a post for it if you had stuff to say
Well, sorry that it didn't turn out like you expected. Nevertheless Thanks for your contribution to UWE!
First off this is just my experience after playing a few games as marines. The generator hive is pretty open through pressure control if you just get some arcs up in there while the marines shoot down the hive through the entrance. We keep winning a lot of games just by going for lockers first and then claiming a lot of tech points in between. It just seems the Hive should be further in Generator a bit further away from the door. Maybe in the middle Idk.
This is an old change but I also wondered why the power node in departures was moved farther away from the hive a few patches back. As marines if aliens hold it we tend to just build power and and a phase easily away from the hive and it's defenses and then just pour in. The actual departures room feels claustrophobic as well though it is hard to describe since the room is not very small but compared to rooms like old cafe and terminal and maybe even lockers I felt that the structure of gen and departures should be a bit more spacious and less enclosed with the hive being a bit tucked away from the entrances but still arcable. Maybe allow allow aliens vent access through the middle portion of departures to spice things up a bit.
This is just also just a personal feeling but I wish there were more vents in general to allow more alien mobility in non marine spawning points just to give them more of an advantage on their home turf. It felt like shooting fish in a barrel on those two areas.
There's this huge container somewhere before stability I guess that blocks doorway so much, at first I thought there is no doorway >_<
Courtyard doesn't look like open space anymore, more like another room.
Cafe... ah, where did that techpoint go? No it's like huge room with one resnode.