This is for the developers of Planet Nomads, to anyone else try to keep in mind that even though I play alot of another game that I quite like this game also and can see it has alot of potential and this is just my opinion.
Planet Nomads has had alot of improvements over the last year or so , its turning into something special in its own right.
The game being pretty young so to speak has along way to go and a few things that would in my opinion improve the general game play and make more players want to review the game in a positive fashion.
I have held off on a review of the game for now until I see where the torque of the wheels ends up going.
Firstly the build system, building itself is pretty good, nice menu, even my old eyes can see the pictures fine and it functions good, the electrical hook up system is unique and easy to use and is nice and customizable, bar wheel torque.
The FAD and refinery and 3d printers however have clunky UI screens, scrolling the item slots all the time is annoying, and it is much more organized if these machines had 2 seperate slot sections, one for the stuff that going into it to be used and a seperate set for what it produces, the output slots.
This would help ''clean up'' the UI menu on these devices.
Tutorial mode, it is my opinion that for learners of the game, to make it much easier to learn the building process in survival, there should be a seperate mode, so a tick box in the menu at the start that says, Beginners Ore Drop, where when the box is ticked it spawns a few of all Ores close to drop pod as rocks on surface, so a very limited amount of precious ores that would help greatly for brand new players that jump straight into the game, no creative first.
Some people say others are silly for not learning in creative first, but its my experience that a massive amount of people actually do jump straight into these games head first, so a learning mode like the above suggested isnt about changing the game in anyway other than making it more user friendly for the masses, the faster you can learn a few things in building sandbox survival games the more chance you have of keeping that player interested to a level where they get that itch to play it everyday.
Moving on, the terrain in this game I have found to be a nice change from my other game, its more detailed and its colourful and the resolutions are good, its a refreshing change, the maps could use some cliffs with massive rock faces, and the biggest thing is water.
This game should have flowing water.
With flowing water should follow devices that can be used to collect, store, release water, like trap doors, flowing water as seen in MC has been used for hundreds of different inventions / builds. It would be a real shame if none of these voxel building games ever recieved flowing water, the next big game that follows MCs path of stardom and million dollar paydays year in year out really is going to need flowing water, PN has a unique electrical system, its half way there to making some loopy insane designs, something that brings me to Workshop, which I would hope will be fully incorperated into Planet Nomads.
So water in my opinion to be flowing, doesnt have to be volume-metric , but is so important for the games true replayability that if it isnt on the list offeatures to do, it surely is worth consideration.?
Now my biggest gripe, wheels !
They are so slow, any incline and they loose all puff super fast, talking about a simple 4x4 with no containers nothing else but power supply, its really really unbalanced, its really boring going over slight inclines at 5 klm/h, its not even realistic let alone entertaining, and I see that adding more wheels slightly improves the problem but it creates other problems, like being to big to go mny places anyway, and they still get stuck even with 20 odd wheels so what is the point of all of that ?
A simple 4x4 should be able to traverse a slight incline with bugger all loss of speed because an electric motor, unlike a fuel motor has the same torque right through the band almost, so it makes no sense at all that a simple 4x4 with just a 2000W Uranium genny cant get up a slight hill.
Some solutions would be a second tier of wheel with ALOT more torque, that would keep the present wheels and make your first trip or few slow and be in step with the games balance.
Or you could add more settings to the custom menu of the wheel to all upgrades of torque, like more torque = less top speed sort of thing, have that trade off.
Or you could just make them more powerful straight up, but I dont think this is the best solution.
Another solution is to add a second set of wheels at half the diameter so the torque is increased but top speed reduced, just another way of doing the same thing.
Hover craft are not a solution for slow wheels, just sayin.
The beauty of Planet Nomads is in creativity, we can build right now slow machines in general, I would also suggest a small Segway machine you can build from the drop pod when you start, just a touch faster than walking speed, but protection from heat and rain , temperatures, its better than a motor bike, its cheaper than anything with wheels, its a starter Segway for early exploration, a Segway thats Enclosed, like a Bubbleway !
A Segway could be done as one full 3d model, or, it could be done in parts we then build ourselves, which is I think what most builders out there would prefer.
If it was a build it yourself system, then the wheels added to the game for the Segway, obviously alot smaller than the current large wheels, would be something that hundreds of builders out there would build machines with.
Some wishlisters, aircraft for in atmo with proper flight controls including the devices to make either planes or choppers, smaller specialized Urainium genny for wheeled machines the current is a huge one fits all type and is to bulky, alot more weapons, alot more types of enemy AI, although the ones in the game are unique and very cool indeed, keep them cool like that just need alot more, love those bees, run forest run, anyway, the ability to remotely drive machines with remote cameras also, and a GRAVITY GUN like in HL2 ! Please !
All in all the games looking great, just needs to be a little more new player friendly though.
Wish yall the best of luck, I really like devs that read there forums and respond like you guys also have on yours, good job indeed, I dont expect a response in this thread its just nice knowing you took the time to read it anyway, cheers.