I’m pretty much with the OP here. Won’t be asking for a refund but have already uninstalled and will wait until all the five announced DLC are released before picking PP up again (think I got a season pass already from backing the game early).
I don’t want to blow my top like some posts on this forum (it is just a computer game!) but definitely agree that I’m disappointed in what was released despite the game’s obvious potential.
I don’t want the devs to get discouraged, or to consider abandoning the project or anything - there’s a wonderful game can be built on this, flawed, foundation. Just a shame that with the Kickstarter and Epic money and a small army of free playtesters and bug reporters (I was one of them from BB4 onwards) a better game couldn’t be released already.
Enough has been said about all the flaws already (too many bugs, terrible optimisation, bland enemy ‘evolution’, uninspired UI, unbalanced difficulty, problematic procedural generation of levels, and a lack of variety in missions, enemies and environments) so I wanted to leave the devs (if they still even read these forum posts) with some of the things I love about the game and one humble proposal to consider:
- pretty original setting / lore and genuinely creepy atmosphere
- great writing - actually enjoyed reading the fluff text for a change!
- the flexible action system is great and, with some improved AI and more variety in enemies and environments, I think will produce some very tactically interesting games
- the ballistics system. WONDERFUL
My proposal is about cover, as it seems quite a few people are assuming ‘cover’ in PP works on the same classic ‘half/full’ model as in so many combat games and I wonder if having the ‘half-cover’ and ‘full-cover’ symbols is unnecessary and actually misleading… did you ever consider just doing away with these symbols completely? I know that soldiers duck in half cover (and lean in full cover?) but you could just have a couple of 0 or very low AP actions to ‘duck down’, ‘lean out’ and maybe even ‘drop prone / stand up’ that could be done anywhere - thus allowing people even more creativity in choosing their cover and, perhaps, helping to reduce confusion about how ‘cover’ works in PP. Anyway, maybe there’s a good reason not to do it like this but thought I’d mention it.
So, good luck with all the patches, DLC and ‘what next’ head scratching that I hope you’re doing lots of. I’ve got my fingers crossed that when I rejoin the game again at the end of this year / early next year (in time to write Steam reviews…), this game will have evolved (natch) into the awesome title it clearly can be and shrugged off its current cruddy bits like a discarded athron shell.
Cheers!