The high interp and overall bad server performance definitely causes a more than acceptable amount of cases of instant death or large health loss before the damage indicators come up in any timely manner.
The game's causes, effects, and feedbacks needs to make intuitive sense to the new player. I mean, the animation smoothing lag is ridiculous enough by itself.
I don't agree with most of OP's points, but you're not going to hear me deny the issues that real world ns2 'netcode performance' and collision has. That's just doing everyone a dis-service
Very much this. I recently gave NS2 some play time with my new and beefy hardware. It felt quite awkward. I was constantly unsure on how much the enemy had taken damage, how much I had taken damage and all that. I didn't feel comfortable how the collisions worked, everything felt unreliable. I found myself struggling to pull off the basic stuff and had to spent a lot of my attention on making sure the HUD status has any resemblance to what I think it should be. After shooting a skulk I had to go "OK, did something hit me there?" and check my HUD. I had very little intuitive grasp of whether my character had a limb missing or not.
Probably with time I could get used to a lot of the things, but that's asking quite a bit of commitment already. The game just doesn't feel crisp enough that I'd get excited about trying to pull off awesome stuff in it.
What on earth are you on about? When you take damage the screen flashes red, even showing you the direction the damage came from. When you're low on health your hearing is drastically reduced and you can hear your heartbeat. Very similar to many AAA franchise games.
Also, everyone needs to check the HUD lol. It's one of the first things you learn how to do when you play a game. You'll get the hang of it eventually
The HUD effects I'm not sure. I definitely found it tricky to determine for example whether I was bit once or not during a fight. I don't know if I somehow miss some effect, but I definitely have far better idea of what and how much I'm being hit in practically every other game. It might be the interp that makes me feel uncomfortable. The sound is also really weird, it often feels very difficult to distinquish the damage sounds even when you're getting hit.
The AAA bloody screen effect isn't exactly what I'm looking for. It tells me when I'm almost dead. What I'm looking for is the way to have constant awarness of how much damage I'm taking, preferrably the sources and such communicated also. Usually you want to be making decisions when you're halfway hurt at max, not when you're dying to the next parasite or spit or so. If the rest of the damage communication works, you don't really need the bloody screen anyway, you're constantly aware of the taken damage anyway.
As for HUD checking, I damn sure know how often I should check it. The difference is that in most games you have far better grasp on when you should be checking it. In NS2 I feel I need to check it constantly all the time while in other games I can get a grasp on when I'm taking noteworthy punishment and then proceed to check my HP and move on from there. From example in NS1 I have very natural grasp of my HP, up to a point where its almost subconscious and I'm constantly able to tell how many potential damage chunks I can take and so on. Meanwhile in NS2 I have to put extra effort into managing my HP, just to be able to handle the basic stuff. I'm not sure on what I'm missing, but I find NS2 to be practically the only game where I have such problems.
Could you guys clarify a bit on what exactly should happen if a skulk gets a bite on me? Let's say I face a skulk and shoot him down while he gets to take a bite near me. What are the differences if he misses and if he lands the bite? I remember having such situations and feeling really awkward because I had to go to my HUD to figure out whether I had been hit.
As marine I distinquish hits and misses by sound. If he hits, you get this "PFDSH" kind of sound, instead of just that "BWRG" kind of sound. You know what I'm sayin?
I don't think it is that important to know that you got hit, though. The comm needs to know, sure, but you actually wouldn't have to know. It's not like you could avert your death by knowing how many times you got hit. I just try to concentrate on shooting and dodging the best I can.
I have to say I still have some trouble with the sounds. As I already mentioned, with time I'd probably have a lot easier time with this stuff, but it doesn't work intuitively at all for me.
As for knowing whether you got hit, it's bloody important. Am I going to chase that gorge past a shooting hydra? Am I going to try to get an angle to shoot the lerk by running through spores? Can I actually tank a bite for my buddy who definitely took a bite? Can I actually duck and tank a bite to make the skulk easier to predict or do I jump around hoping not to take the hit? It makes a world of difference whether you can take 1 or 2 bites in a tough spot.
In NS1 I can focus on making the decisions because I instinctively know the punishment I'm taking and able to afford. In NS2 I kind of have to double check things and then go if I still have that as an option.
Just to clarify a bit more, take a look at the NS1 clip:
The landed bite is confirmed by blood splatters, a bit of knock on the screen, damage marker, the marine going oomph and a pretty distinct bite hit sound. You can instantly count the bites at almost any occassion.
In NS2 I have the damage indicator somewhat works as long as there aren't multiple damage sources. After that it's mostly the sound confirmation, I guess.
The high interp and overall bad server performance definitely causes a more than acceptable amount of cases of instant death or large health loss before the damage indicators come up in any timely manner.
The game's causes, effects, and feedbacks needs to make intuitive sense to the new player. I mean, the animation smoothing lag is ridiculous enough by itself.
I don't agree with most of OP's points, but you're not going to hear me deny the issues that real world ns2 'netcode performance' and collision has. That's just doing everyone a dis-service
Very much this. I recently gave NS2 some play time with my new and beefy hardware. It felt quite awkward. I was constantly unsure on how much the enemy had taken damage, how much I had taken damage and all that. I didn't feel comfortable how the collisions worked, everything felt unreliable. I found myself struggling to pull off the basic stuff and had to spent a lot of my attention on making sure the HUD status has any resemblance to what I think it should be. After shooting a skulk I had to go "OK, did something hit me there?" and check my HUD. I had very little intuitive grasp of whether my character had a limb missing or not.
Probably with time I could get used to a lot of the things, but that's asking quite a bit of commitment already. The game just doesn't feel crisp enough that I'd get excited about trying to pull off awesome stuff in it.
What on earth are you on about? When you take damage the screen flashes red, even showing you the direction the damage came from. When you're low on health your hearing is drastically reduced and you can hear your heartbeat. Very similar to many AAA franchise games.
Also, everyone needs to check the HUD lol. It's one of the first things you learn how to do when you play a game. You'll get the hang of it eventually
The HUD effects I'm not sure. I definitely found it tricky to determine for example whether I was bit once or not during a fight. I don't know if I somehow miss some effect, but I definitely have far better idea of what and how much I'm being hit in practically every other game. It might be the interp that makes me feel uncomfortable. The sound is also really weird, it often feels very difficult to distinquish the damage sounds even when you're getting hit.
The AAA bloody screen effect isn't exactly what I'm looking for. It tells me when I'm almost dead. What I'm looking for is the way to have constant awarness of how much damage I'm taking, preferrably the sources and such communicated also. Usually you want to be making decisions when you're halfway hurt at max, not when you're dying to the next parasite or spit or so. If the rest of the damage communication works, you don't really need the bloody screen anyway, you're constantly aware of the taken damage anyway.
As for HUD checking, I damn sure know how often I should check it. The difference is that in most games you have far better grasp on when you should be checking it. In NS2 I feel I need to check it constantly all the time while in other games I can get a grasp on when I'm taking noteworthy punishment and then proceed to check my HP and move on from there. From example in NS1 I have very natural grasp of my HP, up to a point where its almost subconscious and I'm constantly able to tell how many potential damage chunks I can take and so on. Meanwhile in NS2 I have to put extra effort into managing my HP, just to be able to handle the basic stuff. I'm not sure on what I'm missing, but I find NS2 to be practically the only game where I have such problems.
Could you guys clarify a bit on what exactly should happen if a skulk gets a bite on me? Let's say I face a skulk and shoot him down while he gets to take a bite near me. What are the differences if he misses and if he lands the bite? I remember having such situations and feeling really awkward because I had to go to my HUD to figure out whether I had been hit.
As marine I distinquish hits and misses by sound. If he hits, you get this "PFDSH" kind of sound, instead of just that "BWRG" kind of sound. You know what I'm sayin?
I don't think it is that important to know that you got hit, though. The comm needs to know, sure, but you actually wouldn't have to know. It's not like you could avert your death by knowing how many times you got hit. I just try to concentrate on shooting and dodging the best I can.
I have to say I still have some trouble with the sounds. As I already mentioned, with time I'd probably have a lot easier time with this stuff, but it doesn't work intuitively at all for me.
As for knowing whether you got hit, it's bloody important. Am I going to chase that gorge past a shooting hydra? Am I going to try to get an angle to shoot the lerk by running through spores? Can I actually tank a bite for my buddy who definitely took a bite? Can I actually duck and tank a bite to make the skulk easier to predict or do I jump around hoping not to take the hit? It makes a world of difference whether you can take 1 or 2 bites in a tough spot.
I get what you're saying. Never really thought it though. I just somehow know how much damage I received and what I can still tank.
What I was trying to say is that I try to not concentrate on how much health I have left, trust the commander to med me and avoid damage as good as I can. I feel like concentrating on my health too much makes me panic and miss shots that could have saved me.
In NS1 I can focus on making the decisions because I instinctively know the punishment I'm taking and able to afford. In NS2 I kind of have to double check things and then go if I still have that as an option.
Just to clarify a bit more, take a look at the NS1 clip:
The landed bite is confirmed by blood splatters, a bit of knock on the screen, damage marker, the marine going oomph and a pretty distinct bite hit sound. You can instantly count the bites at almost any occassion.
In NS2 I have the damage indicator somewhat works as long as there aren't multiple damage sources. After that it's mostly the sound confirmation, I guess.
IIRC a lot of players were / are against too much visual clutter and camera shake. Isn't there a small camera shake when you get hit in ns2 though? I'm really not sure atm.
edit: There is camera shake on hit in ns2. It's just more subtle than in ns1.
The high interp and overall bad server performance definitely causes a more than acceptable amount of cases of instant death or large health loss before the damage indicators come up in any timely manner.
The game's causes, effects, and feedbacks needs to make intuitive sense to the new player. I mean, the animation smoothing lag is ridiculous enough by itself.
I don't agree with most of OP's points, but you're not going to hear me deny the issues that real world ns2 'netcode performance' and collision has. That's just doing everyone a dis-service
Very much this. I recently gave NS2 some play time with my new and beefy hardware. It felt quite awkward. I was constantly unsure on how much the enemy had taken damage, how much I had taken damage and all that. I didn't feel comfortable how the collisions worked, everything felt unreliable. I found myself struggling to pull off the basic stuff and had to spent a lot of my attention on making sure the HUD status has any resemblance to what I think it should be. After shooting a skulk I had to go "OK, did something hit me there?" and check my HUD. I had very little intuitive grasp of whether my character had a limb missing or not.
Probably with time I could get used to a lot of the things, but that's asking quite a bit of commitment already. The game just doesn't feel crisp enough that I'd get excited about trying to pull off awesome stuff in it.
What on earth are you on about? When you take damage the screen flashes red, even showing you the direction the damage came from. When you're low on health your hearing is drastically reduced and you can hear your heartbeat. Very similar to many AAA franchise games.
Also, everyone needs to check the HUD lol. It's one of the first things you learn how to do when you play a game. You'll get the hang of it eventually
The HUD effects I'm not sure. I definitely found it tricky to determine for example whether I was bit once or not during a fight. I don't know if I somehow miss some effect, but I definitely have far better idea of what and how much I'm being hit in practically every other game. It might be the interp that makes me feel uncomfortable. The sound is also really weird, it often feels very difficult to distinquish the damage sounds even when you're getting hit.
The AAA bloody screen effect isn't exactly what I'm looking for. It tells me when I'm almost dead. What I'm looking for is the way to have constant awarness of how much damage I'm taking, preferrably the sources and such communicated also. Usually you want to be making decisions when you're halfway hurt at max, not when you're dying to the next parasite or spit or so. If the rest of the damage communication works, you don't really need the bloody screen anyway, you're constantly aware of the taken damage anyway.
As for HUD checking, I damn sure know how often I should check it. The difference is that in most games you have far better grasp on when you should be checking it. In NS2 I feel I need to check it constantly all the time while in other games I can get a grasp on when I'm taking noteworthy punishment and then proceed to check my HP and move on from there. From example in NS1 I have very natural grasp of my HP, up to a point where its almost subconscious and I'm constantly able to tell how many potential damage chunks I can take and so on. Meanwhile in NS2 I have to put extra effort into managing my HP, just to be able to handle the basic stuff. I'm not sure on what I'm missing, but I find NS2 to be practically the only game where I have such problems.
Could you guys clarify a bit on what exactly should happen if a skulk gets a bite on me? Let's say I face a skulk and shoot him down while he gets to take a bite near me. What are the differences if he misses and if he lands the bite? I remember having such situations and feeling really awkward because I had to go to my HUD to figure out whether I had been hit.
As marine I distinquish hits and misses by sound. If he hits, you get this "PFDSH" kind of sound, instead of just that "BWRG" kind of sound. You know what I'm sayin?
I don't think it is that important to know that you got hit, though. The comm needs to know, sure, but you actually wouldn't have to know. It's not like you could avert your death by knowing how many times you got hit. I just try to concentrate on shooting and dodging the best I can.
I have to say I still have some trouble with the sounds. As I already mentioned, with time I'd probably have a lot easier time with this stuff, but it doesn't work intuitively at all for me.
As for knowing whether you got hit, it's bloody important. Am I going to chase that gorge past a shooting hydra? Am I going to try to get an angle to shoot the lerk by running through spores? Can I actually tank a bite for my buddy who definitely took a bite? Can I actually duck and tank a bite to make the skulk easier to predict or do I jump around hoping not to take the hit? It makes a world of difference whether you can take 1 or 2 bites in a tough spot.
I get what you're saying. Never really thought it though. I just somehow know how much damage I received and what I can still tank.
What I was trying to say is that I try to not concentrate on how much health I have left, trust the commander to med me and avoid damage as good as I can. I feel like concentrating on my health too much makes me panic and miss shots that could have saved me.
The exact thing with NS2 is that I feel I have to focus on my health, I think. Usually in games the damage feedback works naturally for me and I very instinctively estimate the incoming damage. In NS2 I have to put lots of effort into knowing my HP because I can't seem to reliably feel it through feedback.
In NS1 I can focus on making the decisions because I instinctively know the punishment I'm taking and able to afford. In NS2 I kind of have to double check things and then go if I still have that as an option.
Just to clarify a bit more, take a look at the NS1 clip:
The landed bite is confirmed by blood splatters, a bit of knock on the screen, damage marker, the marine going oomph and a pretty distinct bite hit sound. You can instantly count the bites at almost any occassion.
In NS2 I have the damage indicator somewhat works as long as there aren't multiple damage sources. After that it's mostly the sound confirmation, I guess.
IIRC a lot of players were / are against too much visual clutter and camera shake. Isn't there a small camera shake when you get hit in ns2 though? I'm really not sure atm.
The thing with NS2 is that there's quite a lot of less essential information popping out constantly, which then again makes it harder to distinquish and find the essential information. For example you don't probably need to know the exact HP of cyst in the middle of your screen or the amount of score you get for destroying something. It's very possible and quite likely that the necessary bits of information are there even now, but they kind of get buried into the pile of all the information flooding in. In my books cutting away the unessential information and emphasizing the important bits would make NS2 a lot more fun learning experience.
As for the specific bite nudge effect on NS1, I think massive, 'immersive' screen shakes aren't that cool, but the little nudge in NS made a nice distinction between melee and ranged damage. The key is quite likely that it more pushes your character a tiny bit rather than doing anything to your controls. As a result at least I didn't feel it interrupting anything. I guess you might have missed a lerk snipe by getting your aim thrown a pixel to the side while trying to pistol whip a far away target, but that's really it, I think. Many times you don't really even notice the nudge, but it isn't such a big deal because there are enough of other tells going on.
TLDR lots of it. If you feel weak on any of those teams it prob means your not that good (of course, I havent seen u play). When I play lerk, I feel like a friggin overlord.
Please install the beta and join gathers, or better (for now) register at www.ensl.org
You keep claiming how you feel invincible as a lerk. I play lerk competitively, and let me tell you even when I end up having an amazing round, I still feel VERY vulnerable as lerk. An organised game with 5 marines on the field (spread out) who can aim well and know how and when to trap lifeforms is a fantastic thing. But it's terrifying for a lerk. No sooner than you've gone around a corner to see 2 marines, you're on half health. I'm not even exaggerating.
Not just lerks, man. I fade in pubs and am pretty much invincible. But during a pug or comp match, I have to very careful how and when I engage. Small mistakes will cost you a lifeform.
ORRRRRR you can come fight me with your fades/lerks. Ill only use mines :X
edit: There is camera shake on hit in ns2. It's just more subtle than in ns1.
I think one important thing to note is that in NS2 the screen shake goes off at hydra spikes and such. In NS1 every time you get knocked around, it's a big chunk of damage that deservers an exclamation mark.
Meanwhile in NS2 I don't think the shake tells much difference whether it's a single stray spike or a fade tearing you apart. The same goes for the damage direction indicator too. Once again it would be important to be able to tell the difference between various threats that may require different reactions. In NS2 the amount of alien ranged damage threat is far bigger than in the predecessor, so the ability to distinquish damage sources and portions clearly is probably even more important.
...
The Marine weapons are really floaty and horrible, there is no kickback, no screen shake, nothing to suggest I'm shooting a powerful gun, they just feel like Pea Shooters. ....
isn't screen shake a toggle in the menu as screen animation? I remember turning it off.
Another thing we barely get to use is the Onos/Mechs, they're really fun and yet games barely go that far, when you finally get them and upgrade them, the match is almost over...
Its called late game tech. Also I guess SC2 players should have carriers/BCs/and Broodlords spawn at game start.
You do realize that update rate works differently in NS2 than it does in games that are on other engines, such as the Source engine and the Unreal engine, right?
I concur that marines, skulks and lerks in ns2 feel weak (though all can be very effective in skilled hands). NS1 felt considerably deadlier, combat would often end in less then 2 seconds. In ns2 even combats with 1 skulk fighting multiple marines (or vice versa) can take many seconds of clusterfucky jump horeing.
And the UI could use work, more so for commander than fps, but it is hard to tell when you are getting shot/bit.
It is just too hard to find a good game, no one works together, every server lags so much due to the poor netcode and the Frame rate is all over the place due to the crap engine they made.
I don't understand how any one can defend how this game performs, it's 90% of the reason why hardly any one plays. None of my friends can play the game at a stable frame rate and we don't have crap PCs. Not only that but there is so much lag, constantly you'll warp back 5m because of it... this ain't 56k and all our pings are low, just seems like the servers are struggling so much.
No one can defend the dire performance, I could maybe stand the rest of the game, but the performance just puts me off. Trying to find a good game is another one, it's too team based for public servers, maybe just the way they put players together sucks... I dunno but I rarely have an enjoyable game. When I look at clicking on the game in Steam, I often don't bother because I know it can take hours to finally have an enjoyable experience.
The core game is good, I like the game, so don't tell me that NS2 isn't for me... I just think so much that surrounds it, is an off putting experience.
You complain about rubberbanding...yet continue to play on 24 player servers...the absolute maximum supported playercount around which the game isn't even remotely balanced around.
These are also the environments where teamwork and communication tend to break down because of how messy and chaotic it is.
Maybe at least attempt to seriously play with smaller playercounts?
It has been said, and confirmed many times over, that the heavy CPU usage is NOT THE ENGINE THE GAME WAS MADE ON.
The CPU load comes from the game being written and codded in LUA (a non-compiled langue iirc). Granted that either way, performance is bad, but if someone were to put in the effort to re-write the game into another language, there would be next to no performance issues.
TLDR lots of it. If you feel weak on any of those teams it prob means your not that good (of course, I havent seen u play). When I play lerk, I feel like a friggin overlord.
Please install the beta and join gathers, or better (for now) register at www.ensl.org
You keep claiming how you feel invincible as a lerk. I play lerk competitively, and let me tell you even when I end up having an amazing round, I still feel VERY vulnerable as lerk. An organised game with 5 marines on the field (spread out) who can aim well and know how and when to trap lifeforms is a fantastic thing. But it's terrifying for a lerk. No sooner than you've gone around a corner to see 2 marines, you're on half health. I'm not even exaggerating.
Can you people for once let me say something before you shoot it down with the same response every time? Anyways, competitively would mean for ranking leaderboards or getting some prize, which means the focus is not to have fun and I play games for what they're meant for, just fun. Other organized games are more correctly called a pug. I never said there aren't points where I dont feel vulnerable. But, when I'm putting at least some attention into the game, I excel at avoiding risky situations and position myself well to give me the best scenario to destroy them rines, similarly to what nexus said.
Actually Elodea it's a public server that's populated daily. Not passworded and treats regulars to high tick rate, improved rates/interp and supports all performance increasing mods.
Client update rate works no differently in Spark than in Source afaik. Server 'tickrate' does however, which is why NS2's somewhat low tickrate of 30 is not so bad.
Another big part of that is how the rate is capped to 25k or so, NS2 has big problems with choke at times.
As a note, I think newer versions of Source actually work similarly to Spark (post orange box), however it has been awhile since I looked into that and cannot really confirm.
You do realize that update rate works differently in NS2 than it does in games that are on other engines, such as the Source engine and the Unreal engine, right?
Did you not read my post?
The update rate is fixed, which is pretty different from source's variable client set rate. I'm talking about the hidden client update rate, not the server tick rate (i would have obviously said tick rate if I was referring to that derp).
Want to know why the minimum playable interp/mr is 70/50?
*The depressing thing is that allowing client update rates to get any higher will detrimentally affect server performance even more, leaving NS2 quite literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Actually Elodea it's a public server that's populated daily. Not passworded and treats regulars to high tick rate, improved rates/interp and supports all performance increasing mods.
That may be the case locklear, but how many servers are there that are not like this? There will always be exceptions in any observation. The point is taking a look at the average experience taken at random.
It was ridiculous for Gibs to straight out illegitimise the OP just because he didn't happen to play on the one or two super servers that are open to the public. These are new players. They don't know what servers to join and not to join, and in any decently implemented game they shouldn't need to
the fack?.... you remind me when i played Coh for the first time, and be rolled up by german tank army 56 time in a row
just stop whinning about everything, i didnt read all ur slab but a lot of ur argument are just invalid, you fall on the floor everytime you try to take the aeration tunnel? even my grandma can do this, you crying about the camera do not turn when u walk on the wall, lets play avp2 and you will see how bad it was; you die in 2 bullets? learn to walljump and evade bullet, its not supose to be easy; you joining the loser team? and...? most of time i was like 40/5 and still losing a lot, in ns ur personnal skill do not prevail over the entire teamwork and you must deal with it, you cant alway win, but you mostly remember when you lose because it have a heavier impact on ur self satiscation
when i play both team i dont feel weak because i know every advantage i can take of my class, and i know how to hunt my "prey", and about the fps, just fix your computer or search on ur google friend how to optimize your game, i can easly up to 70-105 fps on my 3d screen (even if its limited or not) and my config is not the bigest of all
Comments
I have to say I still have some trouble with the sounds. As I already mentioned, with time I'd probably have a lot easier time with this stuff, but it doesn't work intuitively at all for me.
As for knowing whether you got hit, it's bloody important. Am I going to chase that gorge past a shooting hydra? Am I going to try to get an angle to shoot the lerk by running through spores? Can I actually tank a bite for my buddy who definitely took a bite? Can I actually duck and tank a bite to make the skulk easier to predict or do I jump around hoping not to take the hit? It makes a world of difference whether you can take 1 or 2 bites in a tough spot.
In NS1 I can focus on making the decisions because I instinctively know the punishment I'm taking and able to afford. In NS2 I kind of have to double check things and then go if I still have that as an option.
Just to clarify a bit more, take a look at the NS1 clip:
The landed bite is confirmed by blood splatters, a bit of knock on the screen, damage marker, the marine going oomph and a pretty distinct bite hit sound. You can instantly count the bites at almost any occassion.
In NS2 I have the damage indicator somewhat works as long as there aren't multiple damage sources. After that it's mostly the sound confirmation, I guess.
I get what you're saying. Never really thought it though. I just somehow know how much damage I received and what I can still tank.
What I was trying to say is that I try to not concentrate on how much health I have left, trust the commander to med me and avoid damage as good as I can. I feel like concentrating on my health too much makes me panic and miss shots that could have saved me.
IIRC a lot of players were / are against too much visual clutter and camera shake. Isn't there a small camera shake when you get hit in ns2 though? I'm really not sure atm.
edit: There is camera shake on hit in ns2. It's just more subtle than in ns1.
The thing with NS2 is that there's quite a lot of less essential information popping out constantly, which then again makes it harder to distinquish and find the essential information. For example you don't probably need to know the exact HP of cyst in the middle of your screen or the amount of score you get for destroying something. It's very possible and quite likely that the necessary bits of information are there even now, but they kind of get buried into the pile of all the information flooding in. In my books cutting away the unessential information and emphasizing the important bits would make NS2 a lot more fun learning experience.
As for the specific bite nudge effect on NS1, I think massive, 'immersive' screen shakes aren't that cool, but the little nudge in NS made a nice distinction between melee and ranged damage. The key is quite likely that it more pushes your character a tiny bit rather than doing anything to your controls. As a result at least I didn't feel it interrupting anything. I guess you might have missed a lerk snipe by getting your aim thrown a pixel to the side while trying to pistol whip a far away target, but that's really it, I think. Many times you don't really even notice the nudge, but it isn't such a big deal because there are enough of other tells going on.
Meanwhile in NS2 I don't think the shake tells much difference whether it's a single stray spike or a fade tearing you apart. The same goes for the damage direction indicator too. Once again it would be important to be able to tell the difference between various threats that may require different reactions. In NS2 the amount of alien ranged damage threat is far bigger than in the predecessor, so the ability to distinquish damage sources and portions clearly is probably even more important.
You do realize that update rate works differently in NS2 than it does in games that are on other engines, such as the Source engine and the Unreal engine, right?
And the UI could use work, more so for commander than fps, but it is hard to tell when you are getting shot/bit.
I don't understand how any one can defend how this game performs, it's 90% of the reason why hardly any one plays. None of my friends can play the game at a stable frame rate and we don't have crap PCs. Not only that but there is so much lag, constantly you'll warp back 5m because of it... this ain't 56k and all our pings are low, just seems like the servers are struggling so much.
No one can defend the dire performance, I could maybe stand the rest of the game, but the performance just puts me off. Trying to find a good game is another one, it's too team based for public servers, maybe just the way they put players together sucks... I dunno but I rarely have an enjoyable game. When I look at clicking on the game in Steam, I often don't bother because I know it can take hours to finally have an enjoyable experience.
The core game is good, I like the game, so don't tell me that NS2 isn't for me... I just think so much that surrounds it, is an off putting experience.
These are also the environments where teamwork and communication tend to break down because of how messy and chaotic it is.
Maybe at least attempt to seriously play with smaller playercounts?
It has been said, and confirmed many times over, that the heavy CPU usage is NOT THE ENGINE THE GAME WAS MADE ON.
The CPU load comes from the game being written and codded in LUA (a non-compiled langue iirc). Granted that either way, performance is bad, but if someone were to put in the effort to re-write the game into another language, there would be next to no performance issues.
Can you people for once let me say something before you shoot it down with the same response every time? Anyways, competitively would mean for ranking leaderboards or getting some prize, which means the focus is not to have fun and I play games for what they're meant for, just fun. Other organized games are more correctly called a pug. I never said there aren't points where I dont feel vulnerable. But, when I'm putting at least some attention into the game, I excel at avoiding risky situations and position myself well to give me the best scenario to destroy them rines, similarly to what nexus said.
Another big part of that is how the rate is capped to 25k or so, NS2 has big problems with choke at times.
As a note, I think newer versions of Source actually work similarly to Spark (post orange box), however it has been awhile since I looked into that and cannot really confirm.
The update rate is fixed, which is pretty different from source's variable client set rate. I'm talking about the hidden client update rate, not the server tick rate (i would have obviously said tick rate if I was referring to that derp).
Want to know why the minimum playable interp/mr is 70/50?
*The depressing thing is that allowing client update rates to get any higher will detrimentally affect server performance even more, leaving NS2 quite literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.
That may be the case locklear, but how many servers are there that are not like this? There will always be exceptions in any observation. The point is taking a look at the average experience taken at random.
It was ridiculous for Gibs to straight out illegitimise the OP just because he didn't happen to play on the one or two super servers that are open to the public. These are new players. They don't know what servers to join and not to join, and in any decently implemented game they shouldn't need to
fixed
just stop whinning about everything, i didnt read all ur slab but a lot of ur argument are just invalid, you fall on the floor everytime you try to take the aeration tunnel? even my grandma can do this, you crying about the camera do not turn when u walk on the wall, lets play avp2 and you will see how bad it was; you die in 2 bullets? learn to walljump and evade bullet, its not supose to be easy; you joining the loser team? and...? most of time i was like 40/5 and still losing a lot, in ns ur personnal skill do not prevail over the entire teamwork and you must deal with it, you cant alway win, but you mostly remember when you lose because it have a heavier impact on ur self satiscation
when i play both team i dont feel weak because i know every advantage i can take of my class, and i know how to hunt my "prey", and about the fps, just fix your computer or search on ur google friend how to optimize your game, i can easly up to 70-105 fps on my 3d screen (even if its limited or not) and my config is not the bigest of all