Hello,
I bought the game recently and I would like to share some thoughts and suggestions. Overall I really like the game but there is still quite a bit to improve.
I did not have time to properly sort my thoughts so excuse my incoherence (and my Paint skills ).
The biggest problem I have right now is general lagginess in the very late game (starting with a huge galaxy and so many races was possibly a mistake). I am getting 10-15 fps.

UI
The UI needs a lot of polish.

• The biggest issue is that inputs (clicks) are often not registering. This is made worse by the lagginess. Sometimes I need to click three times before the game responds. Very frustrating.
• It is not easy to tell what is clickable and what it not. Using highlights more would help. It took me many hours before I realized that I can click on the big production window in the colony screen to get to the possible production items (I was double clicking the Queue button before.)
• Clicking on planet's panel in the System view should bring you directly to the production screen.
• Clicking on an item in the production screen should put in the queue.
• There should be information about the planet on the icon that offers building the colony from an already colonized planet in the system:
  
• The maximum planet population should be displayed on the Production list as well as on the colony screen under the colonists' races.
• The Production list should not be 'transparent' to clicking. I accidentally selected fleets behind the list.
  
• The Production list could have icons of the production. Like this:
  
• Production list should be sortable by production/research/population/money etc.
• Uncolonized planets do not show the correct max population (it does not take the technology bonus into account).
• Blockaded planets should be displayed in the Production list.
• Easier way to move colonists.
• The ownership of a planet is not clear. I cannot see the name of the empire/the name of the races.
• The size of the fleets should have some sort of indication on the galaxy map.
• Add discovered planet's list for planning colonization.
• Ships prevent system selection on the galaxy map when they are travelling past it.
• Add an option to refit a ship according to a design. Manually refitting every ship in the editor is painful.
• Tech tree is hard to visualize.
• Indication where a ship component can be placed (turret, system etc.).

Battlescreen:

• Add information about enemy ship's systems into the bottom panel:
  
• Highlight selected enemy ships.
• Is the selected ship highlighted on the minimap somehow? I could not tell.
• Indicator that a ship is retreating.
• Display ship's facing in some way, you could copy MOO 2:
  
• Interceptors and missiles should display their trajectory or at least their target.

Economy

I have not played enough yet so only the first impressions.

• The markets seem useless. I have never build one and never have had money issues.
• Metal prices seem too low. One mine is enough for a Dread Star because of the slow production.
• There are too many good planets. It makes terraforming not so good since you get all you need by exploration/conquest.
• The star systems are too close. There are multiple instances when the enemy jumped from his system to my colony in a single turn. I did not have time to react.

Research and Technology

• Antimissiles should not be a prerequisite for a higher tier of missiles. It should be a separate tech option. This way you get better weapons and their counter in one package.
• Terraforming is confusing. The technologies need a better description and the mechanic needs to be explained better. Is the size of the planet a factor? Because I could not terraform certain planets.
• Armor seems weak in comparion to shields.
• Power generator technology does not scale well with research. You need at least two generators per ship no matter their tech level.
• There should be more ship components that synergize with a certain weapon type (like already implemented aditional missile storage). This way empires can specialize in one field even further. Right now it feels like you should be simply using the best weapon available for the slot.

Misc

• AI is really bad at coordinating attacks.
• Fighters/interceptors are faster than missiles?
• Carriers can be rendered useless by destroing the interceptors. I witnessed a great battle between AIs (I have the game save if interested) where carries killed two enemy battleships immediately at the start only to get destroyed later because they run out of interceptors. I guess you could use hit and retreat tactic but that would suck at defending your planets. So maybe add a ship component with spare interceptors or the ability to manufacture more?
• The attacking player should be able to deploy his ships before the battle or at least specify a formation. This should even out the defenders advantage in going first.
• Why does Stellar Surge cannon have AC mod? It says it always hits.
• Default ship designs do not use weapon mods even when there is enough power to do so.
• Estimated time to complete a research does not take into account leader's discount.
• Orthin should not have eyes since they evolved in the lack of light (priority fix pls ).

I think that is most of it. Thanks for the game, I have a lot of fun with it, and happy holidays!

Physicaque

Physicaque wrote:I think that is most of it. Thanks for the game, I have a lot of fun with it, and happy holidays!

Thanks for the purchase and for taking the time to provide detailed feedback. Many of the items you mentioned, especially regarding UI, are already on our (long) list of thing to do. Sven may want to ask you about some of your specific glitches, in particular your lag/click issues.

It's tempting to want to stuff the Planetary Report with more information until it becomes a full-page spreadsheet, but it's meant to be a shortcut rather than a definitive report. If we end up doing a more complete spreadsheet-like report, I think that would be a different/additional screen.

Happy holidays to you too!

Physicaque wrote:The biggest problem I have right now is general lagginess in the very late game (starting with a huge galaxy and so many races was possibly a mistake). I am getting 10-15 fps.

Thanks for reporting this. I've noticed the issue as well -- late game lag has been creeping up on us as we add more bells and whistles to the galaxy map UI, and the latest builds really need an optimization pass.

Some of the large-map test games I've seen uploaded have run at 10-15fps on my gaming desktop -- I'm horrified to think about how these big maps must be playing for those of you with integrated intel cards

What profiling I've done so far suggests that there's not going to be a single simple fix -- instead, I'm going to need to clean up and speed up a couple different display subsystems. (The ship icons and excessively-detailed Planetary Report icons are 2 big offenders, but, they're not the only ones.)

Recently I had not much time to play SiS. So I just watched the the explormination video. He seems to be on spot with his points for improvement.

which are:
-abilty to zoom in the strategic map and see the fleet content and the planets etc. in better detail
-change the techs to the usual comfortable tree display instead of a hard to oversee list.

my personal wishlist I would also add/remove:
-item buttons in the production list are still too big. I mean we use mouse pointers which are able to click on small icons. Why having a button which is at least 4times the size of a standard icon?
-invasion combat - at least some graphical display as it was in MOO2. Ideally you create a system which requires meaningful strategic/tactical decisions.
-text display of planets - too much unnecessary information, too few necessary information. For example the explorminate guy didnt even know if he is able or if it pays off to settle a planet in a nearby system with his race. But a game should deliver this information. Instead SiS, while very precise in displaying ever single damage point in space combat (which I love) this is not the case in colonization. There it provides not much crunch about which planets are good and which planet types are bad for a certain race and which numbers are behind this. This approach I find (if it is not an oversight) a bad design decision. You provides too much unnecessary fluff which gets boring after the second read and which eats up the space and time resources which should be used for crunch and learning how to optimize the decisions for settlement. I am not against fluff, but please not so much. A 4x game is no scifi novel. I also not like the unstructured way a planet text is displayed. With the lack of icons and hard facts it feels not very professional if you compare it with other space games.

Regarding your new buildings:
I hope they are worth the effort. They use a slot, so they should have at least the benefit of a normal lab or factory or building them seem to be unnecessary.

I love the space combat and I love the graphics and ease of use interface. All in all I think your game is beautiful and has great potential, but IMO it still needs some very essential upgrades like the above mentioned to compete with the best on the market.

I agree with this :


-text display of planets - too much unnecessary information, too few necessary information. For example the explorminate guy didnt even know if he is able or if it pays off to settle a planet in a nearby system with his race. But a game should deliver this information. Instead SiS, while very precise in displaying ever single damage point in space combat (which I love) this is not the case in colonization.