itch.io

This is a brilliant remake of the old RR game. Lived up to all my expectations and then some, so many little features making it a much more pleasant experience than the original, I loved that I could turn the stress levels down on some of the run away from lava levels, but there are so many other little tweaks you've made that improve things

I've realised this game is kind of a precursor to factorio in several ways too, decades before it's time, a gem many will have missed out on, 

Even with the improvements you've made there is an extensive list of QOLs/features I'd like to see implemented some bigger, some smaller, I think many of them became more standard practice after RR was made and others were just too computationally expensive at the time (the requirements were a 200-400MHz processor and 32MB RAM) but I think that's less of a concern with more modern hardware. I also know the dev is taking a break but I want to make a list here anyway:

• Be able to queue vehicles like you can queue miners (though if there's no resources it won't teleport them until resources have become available)
• Be able to give each different sort of vehicle it's own task priority (this would let me turn off transport ore for miners if/when there's transport trucks to do that job, letting the miners focus on clearing rubble which transport trucks can't do, among other common optimisations I do)
• Separate Collect Studs from Collect Ore
• Separate Directed Rubble Clear from Automatic Rubble Clear
• Add auto mining and auto reinforce as options in the priority queue like auto clear rubble (have these off as default like the base game)
• Add Auto Repair Lava Damage to Priority Queue (off as default)
• Add Auto Training in the miner priority queue so they will auto-upgrade if they're otherwise idle (off as default)
• Add upgrades and repairs as part of vehicle priority (It can be a pain to find all the transport trucks to upgrade them with bigger engines and cargo capacity, if I'm doing those upgrades I want to apply them to all the trucks I have without having to track each and every one down one by one)
  
• The Hover Scout and Rapid Rider currently don't do mining tasks automatically even if they have the mining upgrades and the tasks are available for them.
• Have a way to mark every tile in some area with the same task.
• Having more power stations could allow for more consecutive electric fence discharges (or bigger Zaps) before waiting for the cooldown.
• Better Pathfinding, thin powerpaths lines generally aren't worth building to increase miner speed because the Miners don't preferentially use them to get to places faster, they always take the shortest route not the fastest route, avoiding uncleared rubble would also benefit from this change.
• Better Pathfinding, it'd be great if it was possible to choose the order in which things would happen when they're of otherwise equal priority, right now I think it's just whichever was queued first but for miners I'd like them to do the fastest task of a given type even if it's not the first one that was generated of that type (staying close to the base where possible so collecting ore isn't just the time to pick it up but also includes the time to drop it at a tool station or ore refinery), meaning they will often go to the closest marked wall to dig or closest rubble to clear, etc... while for vehicles if they're at the base (relatively near a tool station) I want them to go to the furthest pickup task from the base (meaning furthest from any tool station) cause they'll generally get there faster than the miners and when they're away from the base I'd like them do things that're the closest to them first. (Transport trucks are the biggest culprits here, right now they will zip back and forward according to the queued order to pick up things, and they can pick up a stud and carry it to the far corners of the map to get more items, losing inventory space and time in the process. If they went to the single furthest item from the base and then picked up the 2 or 5 next closest items to that point and run them back together that'd be much more efficient use of their time and the one stud that needs putting in the tool store should be the last thing for a vehicle to pick up (unless it's part of a building order) as it's a very quick job in most cases for a miner and it's also relatively safe being in the base even if it isn't in a tool store while far-flung energy crystals could be eaten by rock monsters, but I've seen inefficient behaviour with Loader Dozers too)
• Path Finding Overriding existing Tasks, even if something is already on route to a task if there's something else that would complete that task faster (and wants to do it) then kick the slower thing off the task and redirect them to do something else. (again transport trucks are the stand-out culprits, there might be several clusters of energy crystals across the map a miner might be sent to get crystal 1 then a truck will get 2 and 3 from that cluster and it'll ignore crystal 1 making the miner collect it at a far slower rate, and instead it'll zip across the map (maybe ignoring other crystals on route to another cluster perhaps again not picking them all up because another miner is on the way there by that point, so I think it'd be great if a vehicle that's right there any way would override a miner that's on the way especially if the miner would take much longer to complete the task)
  
• Better Pathfinding if the only way to get to a task is to use an empty vehicle to get there then the Miner should be able to do that automatically. This also applies to small vehicles using the abilities of the Cargo Carrier and Tunnel Transport or doing tasks only vehicles can like drilling hard rock. And all those special animations that have been added to jump gaps, I almost never see them cause I don't like micromanaging miners that much
• Mining Lasers should be able to automatically mine within a limited area around them including targeting inside corner walls (including those on vehicles)
  
• Mining Lasers could automatically target the Monsters and Slugs if the alert mode is on (including those on vehicles)
• Mining Lasers on vehicles could take a second miner along to operate the laser even when the vehicle is moving (though I can see this coming as an upgrade and requiring model changes)
• Better Fog, have the map colours show in overworld view to highlight things in unmined areas.
• Large Teleport Pads should be able to do everything a smaller teleport pad of the same level could do, so teleporting a small vehicle or standing in for a requirement if the small teleport pad is destroyed and you'd like to build another support station.
• Level complete, have an option where if every single task that could be done has been then end the level, if that's no minable walls, no depleted energy crystals to recharge, no rubble to clear, no miners to train, no crystals or ore left to collect etc then automatically end the level (since you've changed the level end to include taking the resources of which have been invested with you this is 100% completion no way of improving the score only the potential of loss of crystals and ore to monsters bashing open vehicles, buildings and powerpaths)
  

Some of these are likely very easy, some will probably mess up the UI and I'm betting many others would require a lot of thought about how to optimize them cause while they sound simple I bet they're full of hidden complications ^_^ if even a few of these ideas ever make it into the game I'll be thrilled.

And while I've said I'd like these changes even without them the game is totally playable and a lot of fun, the revamped campaign is familiar but different enough that even though I knew the original inside out I'm sure I have a lot to learn about MM over RR.

I'm now wondering if there are any other things I'd like to mod into the game if that ever comes about, maybe another resource and some extra processing, we have ore, these can be turned into studs/bricks and energy crystals for power, but maybe something that can only be collected by killing the monsters and slugs? Food maybe? make a use for the canteen. I'd also like a way to make a campaign more integrated with the LMS story, you start the game with space for 3 Rock Raiders on the LMS and in order to get more you have to find them in the levels and make sure you collect enough resources to expand the LMS with space for them... I can see that having to replay levels might be a significant part of that for example I'd need a labyrinth-like level with several places miners could spawn and different potential layouts as the way to find rock raiders, I'd also want very few resources to make it out of that level so being able to more directly control the amount of ore/crystals a wall drops would be amazing if that exists in the editor so far I haven't found it XD there's a lot to think about. 

I hope you understand this post is out of love and passion for what you've made and not a huge dollop of criticism for it not being good enough <3 

That info thing only happens on the Power and Alternat Tabs, I think it's cause the power station stuff isn't scaling... I have to scroll to see it all.

And I get that theres's a research but as far as I can tell that's not a way to "actively" play the game, that's a click the button and done... my suggestion was that the player could manipulate the stock market through their actions within that section of the game, or ignore it if it doesn't interest them. I think I may have also worked out how to implement it in sudo code:

//HR = HiddenResource
HRAmmount += HRSpeed
HRSpeed += HRAcceleration/10 * PlayerUsageHR
If HRSpeed < 0.5 * PlayerUsage then HRSpeed = 0.5 * PlayerUsageHR
If HRSpeed > 1.5 * PlayerUsage then HRSpeed = 1.5 * PlayerUsageHR
//HRSpeed is capped between 0.5 and 1.5x Player Usage
HRAcceleration += Random(-1,1)
If HRAmmount < -1 then HRAcceleration += log(abs(HRAmmount))/3
If HRAmmount > 1 then HRAcceleration -= log(abs(HRAmmount))/3
//HRAcceleration gets a random flux and a Bias to Accelerate to HRAmmount to 0, uncapped to allow long-term consequences (but could be capped by multiplying by 0.9999 for example gently bringing the acceleration closer to 0). This would be the place where you can slow or speed one resource based on another having a shortage, so:
//if CoalAmmount < -1 then IronAcceleration -= log(abs(CoalAmmount))/10
//allowing the iron price to react to the coal price but requiring time for the effect to come into play rather than instantly
HRActualPrice = HRBasePrice / (( HRSpeed / PlayerUsageHR ) + random(-0.25,0.25)
If HRAmmount < -1 then HRActualPrice *= (2 ^ log(abs(HRAmmount)))
If HRAmmount > 1 then HRActualPrice /= (2 ^ log(abs(HRAmmount)))
//This is how you could turn an amount of resource into a price, the base price gets modified by speed, if the production of a resource is slow then the price should go higher and vice versa, with some wiggle room for tick to tick price fluctuation when resource speed is pegged to max or min (which will be most of the time). And then this price is affected by the stockpile, for every order of magnitude increase in the stockpile the price halves, if there's a "negative stockpile" the price doubles for every order of magnitude. This is also where you can make one price a factor for another
//IronActualPrice += CoalActualPrice/100
//UraniumActualPrice += ElectricityActualPrice * 100
//Allowing for more instant buying of one thing affecting the price of another.

All in all, this keeps the near-term fluctuations, but would allow for the long-term price to be directly manipulated by player actions, and make for all sorts of different strategies.

A couple of QOLs

The "Game by...." info in the bottom left corner sometimes (especially out of full screen mode) covers up things you might want to click for now that's my nuclear stuff

Engineers aren't particularly smart, it'd be nice if they were able to purchase a store of consumables to ride out price peaks. Quantity to buy = profit/price * need, this means if the price is low and you get 2$ of electricity for each 1$ of coal and you use 20 units of coal per second your engineers would buy 40 units of coal, as the price per unit goes up the amount of surplus they buy goes down and if the price goes too high you don't end up with an instant crash of electric and population. Would be happy if that was a research.

Stock market manipulation, it's clear that over time the cost of materials goes up, I think I've seen that it's related to the total amount you've purchased, could you also link it to time? a big purchase a long time ago should have less impact on cost of materials than a small purchase a few seconds ago... You could simulate a coal supply rather than arbitrary prices, long term coal producers would know to produce around the same amount of coal as is used too much and the price crashes too little and no-one can afford to buy it and make a profit, so have the amount mined fluctuate around the rate the player uses (from 50% to 150%) perhaps smoothed so if you double coal usage coal supply speed doesn't double instantly and then use this hidden supply variable to set the price, the more supply is available the cheaper the resource, players could then manipulate the market to a degree making for some more active play fun, for realism iron cost could depend on coal supply since smelting, and uranium and oil mining speed could similarly be dependant on coal and iron supply, and electricity cost/availability as they're resources used in building the supply line