Game News Battle Brothers released on Steam Early Access

[Robert Jarzebina]

Why is everything "procedurally generated" today, feels like a cold shower every time I read that about some game.

New word for "we will settle for throwing random shit at you".

The alternative is often no game at all though. If you, the developer, just know programming/scripting, it's usually easier and cheaper to create procedural content than hiring someone to do custom made content.

I disagree.

As a programmer and gamedev I know that it is much harder and time consuming to create a good procedural generator than creating a hand made content of similar complexity.
With procedurally generated maps and game content you cant have scripty AI, so you must create more dynamic and advanced AI. The same is with rest of the game elements.
Also procedural games are much harder to test and debug.

Personally I prefer procedurally generated games cos every time you start a new game it is different. You cant memorize map design - go here kill that enemy etc. so procedural games can be much harder and challenging.

 

[Raapys]

Who said anything about quality procedural though? Most games use pretty shitty procedural algorithms.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Personally I prefer procedurally generated games cos every time you start a new game it is different. You cant memorize map design - go here kill that enemy etc. so procedural games can be much harder and challenging.

I don't like procedurally generated games for the same reasons you describe. Whenever you start a new game it LOOKS different but it's really not. And in this kind of games usually there is no good story, so that's another reason I am not fond of them. In many games there is good and advanced AI and yet custom maps with scripts and events and that's the kind of games I both like and want to make.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Personally I prefer procedurally generated games cos every time you start a new game it is different. You cant memorize map design - go here kill that enemy etc. so procedural games can be much harder and challenging.

I don't like procedurally generated games for the same reasons you describe. Whenever you start a new game it LOOKS different but it's really not. And in this kind of games usually there is no good story, so that's another reason I am not fond of them. In many games there is good and advanced AI and yet custom maps with scripts and events and that's the kind of games I both like and want to make.

Go play Baroque for Sega Saturn/PS1. AFAIK it uses pre-designed maps, but it swaps them every time you enter the Nerve Tower. It also uses this against the player, because enemy/item placement is different every time, plus you can't take too long to get to the bottom of the tower. Ignore PS2/Wii versions, they use the same mechanics, but they're filled with faggot shit and the atmosphere is ruined by the new soundtrack.
If you can't bear moonrunes, then the joke is on you.

Edit: Replaced the video with the right one. Forgot to mention that the game has badass soundtrack.

 

[Ninjerk]

Now that's a proper amount of darkness

 

[Craig Stern]

Why is everything "procedurally generated" today, feels like a cold shower every time I read that about some game.

Games with procedurally generated worlds enjoy a much higher ratio of "time spent producing content" to "number of hours the player can spend playing the game before getting bored of its content." It's a lot harder to program, sure, but the time it takes to produce good content for a single player RPG is killer--that's the sort of trade-off that makes games with large scale possible for small teams to create.

As a bonus, procedural generation has the salutary effect of making one's game about a billion times more attractive to Youtubers and Twitch streamers, since each playthrough will be dramatically different from the playthrough of any other Youtuber/streamer (and, indeed, different from your own past playthroughs).

 

[Brayko]

The setting and characters look so friggin' generic. Only ironclad mechanics can save this one. Report?

 

[Lucky]

Game is first and foremost a combat game with everything else building on that. Tight combat with high lethality. No cooldowns and no magic powers.

Just going to quote myself:

Game is ace. I got sold on the game when I got slaughtered by some bog-standard zombies in the demo for breaking formation. Fights can go badly rather quickly if you’re not careful.

Combat is similar to HoMM3, in that it takes place on a grid and is turn-based, with turn-order being decided by initiative. There are also zones of control; friendly fire by archers; fatigue, morale and armour mechanics, with an injury system on the way. The troops themselves are single characters that you level up, rather than troop stacks, and you don’t level up the ‘hero’. Same goes for gear. You don’t kit out a hero but your mercenaries and what gear they have decides what skills they have. That’s one of the things I really like about the game, since it incentivises switching between weapons as the situation demands it rather than always using the same things.

The overworld map is where you travel around in real-time (with pause, if needed). There’s a day/night cycle that affects travel speed and visibility, plus traveling takes up money (mercenary wages) and supplies. Running out can mean desertion. There’s no base like with HoMM3. You can recruit mercenaries in towns and get supplies, but those are locations to visit rather than bases you control. This also means that losing all your mercenaries in battle means game over (though you can try and flee during the battle). Towns are also where you get contracts, which are your main source of income, and can get destroyed by enemies. There’s also a lot of emphasis on exploration, with enemies and sites that aren’t towns being hidden from you until they come into sight. You can also get ambushed in this way.

Right now the story is fairly bare-bones, but the developers plan to expand on that with there being a Great Enemy for you to fight that grows in power as the game progresses. However, the emphasis is on replayability, so while there will always be a ‘Great Enemy’ that tries to sweep the land, which one of the factions it turns out to be will vary per playthrough as it’s the natural result of the interaction between the different factions. You can also knee-cap it by disrupting the factors that would allow it to gain power.

You can play the old demo to get an idea of whether the combat appeals to you, though it doesn't have all the different encounter types and you don't get to play with the perk system. The Early-Access version is quite a bit further along and a lot more features are on the way, such as dungeon environments, an injury system, more factions and a reactive event system.

 

[agris]

I hate to be that guy, but are there any black or brown battle brothers? I didn't see any in the screenshots. Forget the social justice dynamics, it'll create a more visually diverse tapestry. Unless this is true western europe.. in which case, only the Irish and Spanish battalions should have blacks.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

are there any black or brown battle brothers?

Yes, they're gatherting tobacco and corn for their white battle brothers.

 

[Eyeball]

Procedurally generated worlds is a major point in favour of Conflict Siblings.

Fuck tha hataz.

Game is quite nice so far as well - I like how shield walls are actually USEFUL, as opposed to how gay they are in almost every other RPG, and everything dying to a few sword thrusts is also refreshing.

I do NOT like having shield and armour just being extra layers of HP on top of your dudes. Should absorb X percentage of damage or something instead until they break, IMO.

 

[Lucky]

Not right now. The area itself and the people in it are supposed to be Germanic, so no Moors and such.

You might get eventually see something like this, though. A Middle Eastern faction is one of the factions that might get put into the game, so mercs with backgrounds related to that could then start to occasionally show up. They'd probably be specific backgrounds and not that frequent, so your company would still mostly consists of white mercs.

Procedurally generated worlds is a major point in favour of Conflict Siblings.

Fuck tha hataz.

Game is quite nice so far as well - I like how shield walls are actually USEFUL, as opposed to how gay they are in almost every other RPG, and everything dying to a few sword thrusts is also refreshing.

I do NOT like having shield and armour just being extra layers of HP on top of your dudes. Should absorb X percentage of damage or something instead until they break, IMO.

They're actually not entirely a second layer, since there are attacks that ignore it and getting decapitated will instantly kill you. You can actually use this to get good armour early in the game (the scramax, dagger or knife are excellent for this), just puncture them 'tll they die and enjoy the loot.
Shields are also not part of the armour layer, as their function is to substantially increase your chance to not get hit. What you probably noticed is that the enemy will react to this and try to destroy the shield when they can, because that is much easier than actually trying to hit you. Not every weapon can do that though (axes and greatswords, mostly) and the better shields take a lot of hits to destroy - especially combined with the perk that improves their durability

 

[oscar]

I like the armour system. Makes getting some nice plate mail feel very significant (like power armour in the first two Fallouts) with the downside that unless the character has a lot of fatigue (via points investment or traits like strong and athletic) you will sacrifice a lot of their offensive potential in long, attritional fights where managing fatigue becomes an important part of your strategy.

It also makes having dedicated shield-splitters (axes) and can-openers (warhammers, two handed weapons) important for heavily armoured enemies like adult orcs.

That perk in the defensive tree can also make dodge builds worthwhile. Find that retired swordsman background guy and build him around initiative, dodge and one-handing and he'll put the heavily armoured guys to shame.

 

[Modron]

I like the armour system. Makes getting some nice plate mail feel very significant (like power armour in the first two Fallouts) with the downside that unless the character has a lot of fatigue (via points investment or traits like strong and athletic) you will sacrifice a lot of their offensive potential in long, attritional fights where managing fatigue becomes an important part of your strategy.

It also makes having dedicated shield-splitters (axes) and can-openers (warhammers, two handed weapons) important for heavily armoured enemies like adult orcs.

That perk in the defensive tree can also make dodge builds worthwhile. Find that retired swordsman background guy and build him around initiative, dodge and one-handing and he'll put the heavily armoured guys to shame.

Eh why not both? Got a heavy armor guy with base 60 melee defense due to nimble, add dodge's 15% of 80 something initiative to that and almost all enemies don't even bother to swing at him. Add that offensive perk that adds a percentage of body armor and he can hit up to 100 twice a round.

 

[Blaine]

Dear Lord, I hope the music in that trailer isn't representative of the actual game.

 

[Lucky]

This is the music you'll be hearing a lot:


It's not Medieval 1, but I've heard far worse. Important to me is that the combat sound-effects add to the action and help convey what's happening.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Is there an Indrick Boreale type character in the game yet, sser?