Natural Selection 2 News Update - NS2 Build 185 released
Flayra
Game Director, Unknown Worlds EntertainmentSan Francisco Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 3Super Administrators, NS2 Developer, Subnautica Developer
Game Director, Unknown Worlds EntertainmentSan Francisco Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 3Super Administrators, NS2 Developer, Subnautica Developer
Comments
too lazy to find a better 'happy dance gif' sorry
Looking forward to trying the new umbra and new lerk.
Good fixes
Getting pretty horrid performance this patch sadly
Where is the fade nerf? Or am I blind. :S
Its hidden, or should i say blinking.
"Reduced Fade stab (secondary attack) range to be the same as primary (it was way too long at 3 meters)."
Also, I can't remember if it was this build or last but his health was significantly reduced recently. Overall he is easier to kill (but probably needs a little more work).
One issue with the new lerk flight model is you instantly stop if you flap wings while moving forward and not holding forward. You shouldn't lose all your momentum.
New sounds are ok, but the marine heart rate monitor sound is pretty annoying. Why is that needed?
There is no way to tell if you are on fire as alien now except seeing your health go down. I like being able to see now, but that's a little too much.
Aliens still stay on fire WAY too long after getting burned. It needs to be limited to 5 seconds of burn maximum, not 60 sec or whatever it is now.
The issue of the fade dealing damage before it comes out of blink from the marine perspective still needs to be addressed.
Collision issues fixed. YAY! That's a huge improvement.
But overall, I like the patch and all the changes. Lerk is pretty darn cool and fairly well balanced.
The automated changelog went a bit out of control with the maps it seems. :D
There was a lot more work being done on Tram than Summit.
Also I've always had 60 fps in all previous versions, and now when 185 has been released. I have 25-28fps all the time.
<b>[All FPS considerations are for populated servers with structures across the map. <i>Edit:I tested the rate of one of the anagram servers which was at 30</i>]</b>
FPS in 185 seems to stay in the 16-25 range out of combat and mid 10-20's in combat
Build 184 (primarily basing this on ns2_summit servers) i belive i was in the range of 30 - 35 FPS out of combat and in combat i would stay in the 20 - 30 FPS range maybe dipping a little below 20 during intense action
The games i played on B185 were the first of the patch, so maybe things will smooth out for me.
WinXP SP2, Asus P5B motherboard 2.93gigs Dual chan mode DDR2 ram
Core2 Duo 6400 @ 2.13 and 2.54 Ghz, XFX Black edition GTX 260 896mb RAM Graphics card
<i>Edit: Sound blaster audigy2 sound card</i>
In game Graphics setting on High, default console commands, 1280 x 1024 res
1) I love the new lerk spore mechanic. I teamed up with another lerk and gassed heli in a in-out fashion as aliens followed and cleaned house. It's a lot of fun. Spikes are pretty deadly now.
2) Fade blinking\attacking is a lot more responsive. It still needs some work, but its getting much better.
3) Many of the new sounds are good. Standouts are the countdown, the 'predator' sound with alien flashlight, and "panther" like sounds for skulk. Haven't heard all of the new sounds yet including bacon.
Cons:
1) Teammate kills are heard everytime they make one. This should only be heard by Alien Comm. Also this individual sound is a bit jarring (regardless of the current bug with it). I like hearing it when I'm alien comm to quickly gauge how my team is doing. But if I'm going to hear it a lot, its better to make it easier on the ears.
2) If I get a personal kill when I'm on aliens, it sounds like there is a tuning fork vibrating in my head. I sort of miss the old NS1 style sound where it sounds like I'm collecting something and is almost soothing. I believe I heard a remix of this in previous patches that were decent.
Overall:
Good patch with many good additions\changes. Sounds are overall top notch minus a few that need some more tweaking to find the right sweet spot. Will have to play around on marines a few times to see how they play.
I went from having 60 fps and now I get 17...
Also in console we are getting an error pop up that says that the game is out of "video memory"
but in game, fps no go up from 30. vsync?
Can't wait to test it soon :-)
I hope there enough players, but after a patch, there most time a lot of players.
-Replaced the Tech Point in Marine Expansion (Holoroom) with a res node.
-Changed lighting in repair room.
-Shortened route to Observation from Marine Start."
I think these are supposed to be under ns2_tram? :p
And whats this simon is awesome thing. did you guys put in a sound egg? :o
Oh i miss the old fade sounds :(, but the unstated balance changes to fade are much better. 200 hp and 3 swipe kills! Something seems to have gone wrong with client ticks though - they've dropped from 40-60 to the 20's so like others stated before it doesnt play very smooth this build.
I like the new lerk, we won a couple of games just with lerks, anybody tried lerk rush ? I'm sure it will be really efficient. Against shotgun we can shoot them from far away, you can spike shotgun lmg's in the face and blind everybody with spores.
On the balance side, aliens should be able to dominate even more with the new lerk.