[net.micro.amiga] arctic fox beginner mode beaten

perry@atux01.UUCP (P. Kivolowitz) (03/15/86)

I have just completed beginner mode in arctic fox. I'd like to convey
my statistics for comparison  purposes with  others who have done the
same.
		Enemy Units Destroyed

	Air Converters			4
	Recon Sleds			1
	Light Tanks			4
	Heavy Tanks			1
	Recon Flyers			2
	Fighters			6
	Floating Mines			2
	Rocket Launchers		2
	Radar Stations			2
	Communications Fort		1

		  Resources Used

	Shells				42
	Mines				0
	Missiles			11*

	Tactical Rating			22,016

	Damage To Arctic Fox		None

*	I wasted three missiles on one rocket launcher that kept firing
	its missiles into my missiles. By the third try I was sufficiently
	out of phase with the rocket launcher that my shot got through.

Notes:	I think I succesfully side steped the heaviest emplacements hence
	few enemy killed but mission (main fort destroyed by two missles to
	the dome) completed.

Hints:	ArcticFox's weapons have better range. Use this to your advantage.

	Gun Sight will switch to cross hairs if it thinks something can be
	hit even if your cant see what it is.

	Running away while facing the enemy (eg: rolling backwards) is an
	excelent way to use the ArcticFox's better range and speed. The
	enemy is running into your shells but you are running away from
	theirs. (isn't this the kaufman maneuver from professional level
	start trek simulations?).

Emphasis:	get arctic fox - it is playable and enjoyable.

The Miga-Militant: Perry S. Kivolowitz

hardie@sask.UUCP (Peter Hardie ) (03/21/86)

>
> Emphasis:	get arctic fox - it is playable and enjoyable.
> 
> The Miga-Militant: Perry S. Kivolowitz

I agree with Perry's assessment of Arcticfox vs. Skyfox. I saw a demo
of Skyfox yesterday and it is just an arcade shoot-em-up type game.
I was expecting it to be a reasonably decent flight simulation but it 
is nothing of the sort. Thanks to Perry I checked it out before I 
wasted about $70 Canadian on the game and lucky for me Arcticfox arrived
in the store here first, a couple of weeks ago.
My best score to date is 36352 in F1/F5 tournament but perhaps we should
move this type of discussion to net.games??

Pete Hardie
ihnp4!sask!hardie

greg@ncr-sd.UUCP (Greg Noel) (04/01/86)

In article <348@sask.UUCP> hardie@sask.UUCP (Peter Hardie ) writes:
>> Emphasis:	get arctic fox - it is playable and enjoyable.
>> 
>> The Miga-Militant: Perry S. Kivolowitz
>
>I agree with Perry's assessment of Arcticfox vs. Skyfox.  .....

Let me check in with a dissenting opinion.  While I agree that ArcticFox
has much better graphics, I can't agree that the game is so much more
playable.  Based upon the recommendations I saw on the network, I bought
a copy of ArcticFox and tried it.

I'm afraid I'm dissapointed.  The game simply doesn't respond well.  When
I move the joystick, the little hand on the screen is supposed to echo
what I'm doing, and the viewport should reflect what is happening after
a finite delay.  Well, tain't so.  When you try to do a series of quick
operations, the little hand just flops around at random and the viewport
does nothing reasonable.

But the killer is that the response isn't uniform -- sometimes a small
movement will get a small reaction, and sometimes a small movement will
cause a violent, major reaction.  Even real hardware is more predictable
than this turkey.  This happens with both the joystick and the mouse --
in fact, the game is all but unplayable with the mouse, which isn't what
you'd expect, since the mouse is far better at transmitting a wide range
of directional control.

I experimented with the response by simply trying a series of the same
simple operation.  After moving the joystick, there was a three to five
second delay before the operation was started.  When the joystick was
released, there was a zero to four second delay before the operation
stopped.  The mouse is even worse: sometimes there will be \no/ reaction
to a three-inch move, but move it again and suddenly you are faced with
a viewport moving twenty degrees per second.  It seems to accumulate all
the mouse movements for five or ten seconds and then do them all at once.
Not intuitive.  And the delay between triggering and firing is so long
that you can't even anticipate it reasonably -- a target can crawl completely
through your crosshairs between the time you trigger and the weapon fires.
On top of that, it appears to be intentional, since the joystick/mouse is
still live and can move the crosshairs in the interim (but not to track the
target; it still moves randomly, as described above).  If you want to talk
about realism, I know of no modern targeting system that will allow you to
pull off a target after you've said that you want to hit it; they will latch
on to the target until the round is away.

On the other hand, the concept is intriguing and I think it would be a fun
world to explore.  Given the senario, there are a number of strengths and
weaknesses that I could exploit that the game won't let me; that would allow
a strategic level to the gamesmanship that I would also enjoy.  But it comes
down to this: if I can't shoot back at least as accurately as they shoot at
me, tain't worth it.

On yet another hand, a friend loaned me SkyFox (hello, Doug!).  Yes, the
graphics are cartoony, the senario is unrealistic, it's mindless, and it
is little more than an arcade shoot-`em-up, but if Doug wants it back soon,
he's going to have to fight me for it.......  And in a lot of ways, it's a
lot more realistic -- the guided missles are actually guided and will take
out anything at which you throw them; the pop up strategic displays will
automaticly go away when you have to respond to a tactical situation; and
many other niceties.  And it's very responsive (perhaps even unrealisticly
responsive), but at least when you go down, it's because of something \you/
did, not randomness in the game.

I didn't mean to go on at this length.  I suppose I'm half-hoping that someone
will tell me that my version of the game is bad, or there's something I don't
understand about how it works.  But I doubt it.


Speaking of games people play, if anybody needs proof that C-A is enjoying
what they are doing, just look at the little whimseys you encounter from
time to time.  "Are you there, Fonts?"  It still makes me grin; in fact, it
almost makes up for how \slow/ it is to load those fonts every time......
-- 
-- Greg Noel, NCR Rancho Bernardo    Greg@ncr-sd.UUCP or Greg@nosc.ARPA

cg@myrias.UUCP (Chris Gray) (04/05/86)

Huh? ArcticFox is a bit slow to respond, but I've found that it's quite
consistent about it (about a second is my guess). What it does lack is
some feedback and some options. E.g. when using the mode that lets me raise
and lower the gun, I'd like a way to simply STOP the ArcticFox without
going out of that mode (since I'm zeroing in on an approaching fighter).
It would also be nice to have some more distinct feedback about whats
happening with the missiles - the little 'time remaining' bars at the
bottom aren't very noticeable, and the image switches (I use the big screen
for the missile views) sometimes don't change that much when I goof and
plow the missile into a hillside). What would also be nice is a way to
ABORT a missile, especially after I've "locked on" to nothing.

I would suggest that the game takes a fair amount of practice to get the
hang of. Four of us have been playing, for a total of 50 odd games, and
we're still learning techniques and features. My best game so far (last
night) was in beginner mode (I still don't know my way around enough
to venture more than experimentally into Tournament mode), and I got both
the Communications fort and the main fort for a total of 26800 points.

A minor hint: the missiles on autopilot seem to zero in on the center of the
nearest/biggest target. This isn't always what you might want.

		Chris Gray (ihnp4!alberta!myrias!cg)

greg@ncr-sd.UUCP (Greg Noel) (04/08/86)

In article <233@myrias.UUCP> cg@myrias.UUCP (Chris Gray) writes:
>Huh? ArcticFox is a bit slow to respond, but I've found that it's quite
>consistent about it (about a second is my guess). .....

A second is a \bit/ slow?  I admit I've never tried the tracker on a real
tank, but I have tried the tracker for guided missles launched from ships.
At a \tenth/ of a second delay, the operators were complaining about the
responsiveness and that was at about the limit that the display hardware
could post the update.  Considering that ArcticFox is a faster-than-real-time
simulation, the response should be blindingly quick.  No matter how good
the graphics are, if the game doesn't "feel" realistic, it will be too
frustrating in the long run.

>What it does lack is
>some feedback and some options. E.g. when using the mode that lets me raise
>and lower the gun, I'd like a way to simply STOP the ArcticFox without
>going out of that mode (since I'm zeroing in on an approaching fighter).

In fact, it would make a better game (and be more realistic) if the driving
and the turret movement were decoupled, so that you could make course changes,
speed up, and slow down while fighting.  It should also be harder for the
enemy to hit you while you are moving, and harder still to hit you while you
are manuevering; it would bring more strategy into the game.  I also think
that it would make a better game (and be more realistic) if the targeting
system were a matter of selecting the target, the appropriate weapon system,
and saying "shoot."  Computers are better at hitting a target than you are,
and this is the major advantage you bring to this senario -- you \know/ that
everybody's an enemy you can shoot at, while they must delay so as not to
shoot at one of their own.  Now that would make the game deeper and more
strategic, where elements of evasion and camouflage are more important than
shooting down everything that pops up.  But then, I'm more of a fan of the
strategic games, I guess.....

>It would also be nice to have some more distinct feedback about whats
>happening with the missiles - the little 'time remaining' bars at the
>bottom aren't very noticeable, and the image switches (I use the big screen
>for the missile views) sometimes don't change that much when I goof and
>plow the missile into a hillside). What would also be nice is a way to
>ABORT a missile, especially after I've "locked on" to nothing.

You're right -- it's, er, unrealistic.  (Does it sound like I keep harping
on that?)  I've had a couple of instances of wanting to take care of some
sudden business a little closer to hand, but I couldn't get rid of that
stupid missile.

>I would suggest that the game takes a fair amount of practice to get the
>hang of.  ......

More than a little.  If it takes than fifty games at the practice level
before you begin to get results, then perhaps a more levels of play with
different senarios/layouts would have been a better idea.  I never moved
from where I started in my first five games; I couldn't control the turret
well enough to take out the first wave, much less the waves flowing in
from the edge of the screen.  Finally, I had to take three or four games
blowing away the waves with the F7 key and just practice aiming and shooting
at any isolated targets that showed up; after that, at least I had a chance.
That beginning was so frustrating that I almost didn't try the game ever
again -- if the store had been open, I would have taken it back on the spot.
Maybe my initial frustration has colored my later appraisals, but I still
can't reliably hit a target that I can see and point my turret at; even with
my hand off the joystick, the crosshairs will skitter off the target between
the time I pull the trigger and it fires.

I didn't plan to go on at quite this length, but the graphics are \so/ \good/
that I've been very disapointed that the rest of the game didn't live up to
its advance billing.  Now back to your regularly-scheduled interruption....
-- 
-- Greg Noel, NCR Rancho Bernardo    Greg@ncr-sd.UUCP or Greg@nosc.ARPA

hardie@sask.UUCP (Peter Hardie ) (04/09/86)

Greg Noel comments:
> I still
> can't reliably hit a target that I can see and point my turret at; even with
> my hand off the joystick, the crosshairs will skitter off the target between
> the time I pull the trigger and it fires.

I think you'll find that if the tank is on snow and ice (or if it starts
snowing while you are on mud) the tank will start to slide even when 
you aren't touching the joystick. Gotta be careful of that when you are
near a crevice. Other than that I have never had the problem that
you mention.
The lack of response to the fire button is a bit annoying (and I have had
the opportunity to tell EA so) but I didn't find it so difficult to learn
how to control the beast.
Pete
ihnp4!sask!hardie

terry@amiga.UUCP (Terry Ishida) (04/10/86)

---
Before you condemn Arctic Fox, check out your joystick!  I tried a bargain
basement, $10 stick with suction cups, hoping it would make the game play
better.  Surprise!  The tank would turn left when I pushed the stick right,
the gunsight would wander in directions of its own choosing.  I then tried
my trusty Wico and things were back to normal.  One $10 joystick in the trash.

Terry Ishida
Commodore-Amiga, Inc.