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Halcyon · 09-09-22, 05:33 PM

Hi Artur,

I had enough time this morning to run through the new tutorial and start a single small battle.
I'll have more time to test in-depth later, but here are my initial impressions and findings:

- In the "Single Battle" screen, the word "Convoy" is duplicated (i.e. for Small Battle, Convoy = 9 ships and also Convoy = 2 ships). I'm assuming the 2nd instance of "Convoy" is really supposed to be "U-boat"

- The tutorial got stuck for me on the "snap the spotlight to the periscope feather" part. By the time I had read all the tutorial text and pressed the spotlight button, the u-boat was behind me but shortly after it appeared on the opposite side of the destroyer (I guess it was doing circles?). After restarting the tutorial and quickly going through all the confirmation text boxes, it worked normally. If possible, it might be beneficial to pause the sim between instructions to give the player time to read the boxes and interact with what they're being asked to push or type in

- Part of the tutorial says you can click on a "?" button next to the three auto-crew options in the settings, but I couldn't see anything next to those check boxes

- The number keys appear to change stations, but they lose that functionality if you interact with a part of the UI directly, like grabbing the ship wheel with your mouse to change the rudder. Only by pressing W,A,S, or D to bring up that mini-UI window in the lower left was I able to continue using the number keys to cycle through stations

- Having to hit the "Enter" key after using the W,A,S, or D keys to change rudder/speed isn't really friendly to the hand or wrist. Generally you shouldn't make the user have to move their hand much if you want them to use the number keys to change stations and W,A,S,D to manipulate course and speed. I'm assuming we'll get to change the keybinds later?

- Having the time, course, and speed info in the lower left across multiple stations is great, but it's missing Gun Director, Lookouts, and External View stations

- There's no way to turn off motion blur when looking around the stations. This caused my game to lag a bit if you move the camera around too quickly

- The sound of the printer in the sonar/TRR screens is a little loud. Being able to turn down that specific sound effect would be good

- The top of the screen is cut off in an ultra-wide resolution (my native resolution is 2560 x 1080), which obscures parts of important tools like the compass in the upper left of the bridge station. Switching to a 1920 x 1080 resolution fixes that, but leaves black bars on the left and right of the screen

- Switching from true/relative bearings on the sonar station doesn't make either of the compass discs rotate. They're both stuck with 000 being at the top regardless. If I remember right in the older demo, one of them would rotate to show true north.

- The U-boat still seems to be able to dive/surface too quickly. I was chasing a submerged U-boat for a while until he surfaced. I was only able to fire my guns 2 times before he was already diving again

I'll add more feedback as I get to play more.

09-09-22, 05:33 PM	#7
Halcyon Helmsman Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: West Coast, USA Posts: 106 Downloads: 104 Uploads: 3	Hi Artur, I had enough time this morning to run through the new tutorial and start a single small battle. I'll have more time to test in-depth later, but here are my initial impressions and findings: - In the "Single Battle" screen, the word "Convoy" is duplicated (i.e. for Small Battle, Convoy = 9 ships and also Convoy = 2 ships). I'm assuming the 2nd instance of "Convoy" is really supposed to be "U-boat" - The tutorial got stuck for me on the "snap the spotlight to the periscope feather" part. By the time I had read all the tutorial text and pressed the spotlight button, the u-boat was behind me but shortly after it appeared on the opposite side of the destroyer (I guess it was doing circles?). After restarting the tutorial and quickly going through all the confirmation text boxes, it worked normally. If possible, it might be beneficial to pause the sim between instructions to give the player time to read the boxes and interact with what they're being asked to push or type in - Part of the tutorial says you can click on a "?" button next to the three auto-crew options in the settings, but I couldn't see anything next to those check boxes - The number keys appear to change stations, but they lose that functionality if you interact with a part of the UI directly, like grabbing the ship wheel with your mouse to change the rudder. Only by pressing W,A,S, or D to bring up that mini-UI window in the lower left was I able to continue using the number keys to cycle through stations - Having to hit the "Enter" key after using the W,A,S, or D keys to change rudder/speed isn't really friendly to the hand or wrist. Generally you shouldn't make the user have to move their hand much if you want them to use the number keys to change stations and W,A,S,D to manipulate course and speed. I'm assuming we'll get to change the keybinds later? - Having the time, course, and speed info in the lower left across multiple stations is great, but it's missing Gun Director, Lookouts, and External View stations - There's no way to turn off motion blur when looking around the stations. This caused my game to lag a bit if you move the camera around too quickly - The sound of the printer in the sonar/TRR screens is a little loud. Being able to turn down that specific sound effect would be good - The top of the screen is cut off in an ultra-wide resolution (my native resolution is 2560 x 1080), which obscures parts of important tools like the compass in the upper left of the bridge station. Switching to a 1920 x 1080 resolution fixes that, but leaves black bars on the left and right of the screen - Switching from true/relative bearings on the sonar station doesn't make either of the compass discs rotate. They're both stuck with 000 being at the top regardless. If I remember right in the older demo, one of them would rotate to show true north. - The U-boat still seems to be able to dive/surface too quickly. I was chasing a submerged U-boat for a while until he surfaced. I was only able to fire my guns 2 times before he was already diving again I'll add more feedback as I get to play more. Last edited by Halcyon; 09-09-22 at 06:22 PM.