Why are the devs trying their hardest to kill this game?

I used to love it.
But it seems like every update is just making things worse and worse.

Performance has gone to s*** because of all the cosmetic things that needed to be loaded, texture optimization is non-existent, graphical artifacts everywhere - but all that could be excused if the balance and gameplay changes were actually good. But they are not.
This games development seems like "2 steps forward, ten steps back".

It's just a grindfest with no reason to play. No actual logistic (Ants had a purpose in PS1 that lead to actual organic gameplay and you had more s*** to do - actual supply lines. Actual things to do for small groups, like escorting ants, breaking blockades, etc..).

The current games seems bloated with useless content - too many bases too close, too little impact, too many "same" guns, too many cosmetic garbage.

P.S. - nefring the Vulcan, AGAIN? It already has crap for range and accuracy, you have to kiss the *** of a tank to kill it. A Harasser Vulcan was the only reason left for me to play.

They aren't.
This is your delusion.

You really want to drive ANTs from the warp-gate constantly to ever base, while under ESF & Liberator fire?
Which all must be manually driven...

Vulcan is incredibly effective against a lot of targets....

It doesnt seem like they are trying to kill the game,But they are trying their best to make it as best as they could since Daybreak took over. The Dev's are trying to please the higher ups while at the same time watching their budget on what they can and cannot improve on the game.Most of the improvements are not what everyone wants,But just generates enough cash for the higher ups to still keep this game going.

Ok, seriously, what the **** is up with those performance complaints that I'm constantly reading?
This game is almost playable on a Haswell Celeron, it's decently playable on a Haswell Pentium and it's steady 60+FPS on one of the cheaper Haswell i5s.
My GPU is a GTX 960 and I play at high.
I also got 12GB of dual-channel DDR3 1600MHz RAM if anyone cares.

The only real performance issue that I noticed is when you have it installed on an HDD. The loading times are atrocious, but a cache SSD fixed that issue for me.

What kind ludicrous budget rigs are you folks running on? What kind of systems did you have before those supposed performance issues? Are you trying to play on Atom CPUs with iGPU graphics and 2GB of shared single-channel RAM or what? Did the game seriously run on a rig like that? It sounds like a ******* miracle.
I know that support for Core 2 Duos was ended, but I'm sure even those would give proper performance if they still worked. And they are from before Intel stopped following Moore's Law.

The performance thing is a Microsoft problem, not much dbg can fix on their own.

Regarding depth I agree, this game has none. It's fun no doubt, but depth and startegy do not belong to ps2.

Logistics, meaningful resources, planning, tactical superiority... It's just a mindless meatgrinder where teamplay and coordination lost importance in favour of casual players farming kdr.

Adding more things like logistics isn't going to automatically create depth. In fact it could even reduce the depth of a game by getting people involved in menial tasks that doesn't contribute to the enjoyment of the game. Think HIVE's. It didn't add depth, it added an alternative people could pursue but ultimately didn't because the battle is slated in favor of the defenders from the beginning to the end. It didn't really contribute to the game's goals and achievements. It's current implementation is as much part of the game as forcing players to do a game of Mahjong before they can access terminals.

I always like to look at Minecraft: Extremely simple and low amount of actual things to do (mining, slaying, crafting, building and for a few people exploring), but the way they executed it gave the game almost unlimited depth in what you could do or achieve.
The same should be applied to PS2. Rather than add a bunch of new things like logistics, focus on the other things you mentioned: Make resources meaningful (which is difficult as you don't want the largest faction to start snowballing because of meaningful resources), add planning to the mix through better use of the tactical overlay and an updated map to increase situational awareness of what's happening beyond render-range, allow more interaction between classes so each has a more defined role in attack&defense without making any a prerequisite for attack&defense etc etc.

Why would you use Minecraft for the comparison?
That game is a prime example of wasted potential, where a good core got diluted via tacked on mechanics that completely fail to capitalize on the original strengths.

But yeah, the problem with logistics in PS2 is the snowball effect/slippery slope that gets created.
There's this joke that teamplay is OP, but the more teamplay you add, the truer it gets.
On the one hand, teamplay is a wonderful ideal. On the other hand, it's hard for most players to do teamplay at all times, so they'll quickly feel like they have no impact on the game if you make teamplay too strong.

I think the forward spawns and anti-logistics implants (regeneration, ammo printer, etc.) are a step in the right direction. It's basically a shift from collective to personal logistics, allowing solo players to even the field. And it's done without actually downgrading the greater logistics aspect - the player who runs regeneration does so consciously and because there's no reliable Medic to come by, while a player with a good Medic buddy will be able to use a better implant in that slot.
The choice to **** yourself in opportunity costs, but also gain the advantage of being able to function without a team, is wonderful. It's exactly what you need to reduce the slippery slope, because good solo players gain the ability to take back ground from organized squads.

I think personal logistics would be an interesting next step. Maybe allowing a Flash to carry a personal Terminal, which is only accessible by the owner, for example. (Make it a deployed state, so that you can't get a squad of infinite grenade lobbers in a no-deploy zone)

However, my line of reasoning goes the opposite way for the air game: While the ground game is often too collectivist, the air game seems to be heavily biased in favor of lone wolves. The massive nanite costs, high barrier to entry and major focus on duels makes it really hard to ever use air support tactically if you don't have sky knights on call.


For a crazy wish that aids team play, I'd want to have multi-monitor support. Platoon play would be much more interesting if I could follow my platoon lead's doodles on my second monitor, instead of needing to open the map screen.

i partly agree that the devs make plenty of illogical decisions that only damage the game,
like constant nerfs to defense which has caused noone to want to defend and so now everyone just zergs on the offense.
they made artificial queues which lock loads of players from playing, instead ditching them in the VR for 5 minutes. (see pic)


plus when they "optimised" the game they pretty much removed everything that made the game beautiful, it looks worse now than it did on my budget PC in 2013. (RIP motion blur and PhysX)

They still have PhysX.
What they removed is an aspect of PhysX that Nvidia isn't supporting anymore and which caused some really freaky bugs.
At least that's what I puzzled together from various threads. There's some interesting Youtube videos on how, for example, bullets would randomly turn into hills due to a PhysX bug.

Shame about the loss of those elevator particle effects, though.

Totally agree for what it does this game has amazing performance and stability. It's being run on medium high on all the rigs I have it installed on. Most are on ultra. Everything from quad cores with dated video cards to i3/i5/i7s running Windows 7 and 10..and up until recently one on Vista. It's pretty unusual for any crashes to occur on our LAN nights on anyone's machine...for months. Sure there is the odd patch that screws things up but it's quickly fixed (just recently the quad core fix...machine is running solid again).

I think for the most part from what I'm reading people have problems due to a lack of knowledge or method troubleshooting computers. Anyone can pickup parts, slap them together and declare themselves experts when nothing goes wrong. If something is wrong this is definitely the game that's going to expose that problem with your machine.

And good vehicle textures and camos.

They are not even closely trying to kill the game...

They could easily made PS2 paytowin or just get copyright on all youtube sources and sue the Youtubers...



I think the devs are giving their best...but the bosses do not want the game fixed because it would codt too much budget

No it's not like adding logistics would change much.
There are many things that add up and kill the value of coordination and strategy to make the game more appealing to casual players.
I'm not necessarily saying its a bad thing, but personally I don't like it. I'd like to see oitfits get the main role in the battle for Auraxis because enhanced coordination gives a tangible tactical advantage over random pubs.

In the end strategy in PS2 resolves around where to zerg, and there is basically nothing people can do about it. From this point of view PS1 used to be a kinda different game.

Isn't that a reason not to do it at all?

No
no
no
no
no
Teamplay and coordination should never, ever, be based on outfits alone. If an outfit member in a platoon meets a pubbie without even a squad, they should be able to do teamwork without the need for microphone's or dedicated channels. The game should offer the tools to communicate quickly and smoothly what another player asks and how to execute it. For example, allow players to see the general whereabouts of blobs of enemies that have been detected somehow, such as by Q-spot, radar or firing near enemies without suppressors. This instantly increases teamplay between players without them even needing to change what they are doing now. An infiltrator spotting a tank column approaching from another base? Currently that holds practically no value as almost no one will be in range to see them. With an updated map that shows the general whereabouts of enemies at longer ranges all the way to the other end of the map you've instantly increased the situational awareness of all your allies and allow them to anticipate on the coming vehicle attack and even set up ambushes. That's how most teamwork should be: Any communication is visible to the players looking for it (on the map for example), it's non-intrusive (looking at other parts of the map will not be interrupted and the additional info is only welcome), and players can then themselves react to that information.

So... We should avoid depth because currently there is no depth and zerging is superior?
If you add more teamwork you can make smaller groups working together stronger. additionally there's alternatives to combat Zerging, such as adding an attrition to the game. Each kill the attackers make subtracts time from the capture timer, each kill the defenders make adds time to the capture timer. Then, skew the amount of time subtracted/added based on how much overpop you have. If you outpop the defenders 2:1, they could get double or more time per kill. A good tight team could kill more than they die and effectively stall the capture of a base. This would be especially powerful against the Zerg, which often has it's members function as lemmings with little to no more strategy then "more guns pointed at the same direction means I die less and hope to farm my KD!".

Because the basic idea behind the game, mining stuff and using that to build something, is extremely simple but has a ton of depth.
And if we talk about wasted potential... Well the parallel to PS2 is easily made .

This is part of the social difficulty curve:




You should ease players into it, but that's currently almost completely non-existant in PS2. If you ease them into it enough, you can let the community take most of it from you and let them figure out a meta around what you've build.
That would allow a much broader form of teamwork, it would allow the players to create strategies to kill the Zerg (which is almost purely based on the fact that "teamwork" in PS2 equals "more guns pointed in the same direction with little to no strategy or tactics").

Forward Spawns are perfect examples of intuitive teamwork with little to no communication required for it's use. You dump one down, allies use it, you can use that to your advantage to keep allies together or open up frontlines build up out of people who died nearby and already know the situation of the battlefield they are stepping into.

Regeneration and ammo printer are hardly anti-logistics items. Few people run out of ammo, those that do often do so in area's where an Engineer isn't handy anyway (like Snipers and LA's behind enemy lines). Regeneration has been in the game for ages in one form or another, from Biolab advantages to medkits to old regen implants. But Medics aren't exactly valued for their healing capabilities, but for their revive capabilities. It's a unique ability but also high-maintenance. In comes the FS... And suddenly it's far easier for a Medic to keep their allies alive, but with a caveat: FS's have an exclusion range for other FS's, and the FS currently on the PTS has a giant green beacon that goes through anything to indicate where it's placed to friend and foe, attracting Infiltrators and LA's (who have the easiest way to avoid all the players spawning there and attacking the FS) and reducing the mainstay power of the Heavy. But even then there's teamwork going on: Heavies trying to take down the FS form a focal point of attention, creating windows for the LA and Infil to break through and take down that FS and their Medics.

The implants are ease-of-use items, with a few that can enhance or change playstyles.

The only reason I would be interested in personal logistics is as a step in that social difficulty ladder. Introduce people to personal logistics so they can achieve what they want on their own, then let them see the advantages of the team-oriented versions. It's also a nice addition for players to fall back to if they want to create solo attacks behind enemy lines or something.

Screw platoons. Screw leaders. First and foremost anyone should be capable of teamworking with anyone else. The large-scale teamwork with leaders and stuff, that comes after. You need a solid foundation, you need players to know the benefit and enjoyment you can get out of teamwork first, then you have a good ground to start from and let players listen and work together if leaders ask them to.

Hell, even leading shouldn't be one guy telling 40 other guys what to do. It should be one guy telling them "I want this to happen", then their immediate subordinates, captains or whatever you want to call them, tell their team "This is what needs to happen, I want to do it like this".
Then their lieutenants or whatever tell their teammates, "ok, we got the order to do this, let's organize. Jerry gets the recon duty, Haley gets the tank and you five get together some of the remaining classes and go in guns blazing". Delegation, rather than one guy screaming "everyone respawn now!" and swarming a point with Gals or something, which is basically what most leading is about these days.

i Thing new Player will come, if you rename it to
Boringside 2
Noobside 2
Campside 2
lockside 2
that maybe will help.
if not,tell the People, in this game you have stealth with shotgun (they called MP), if you can`t get a kill in other fps games, here you can Play your noob style ..

Stay at cliff, as infiltrator, no? still die??
better, take HA and free locks you will ´kill some idiot who can`t find you
100 % save

oh not enought? don`t scare for combined arms game, it`s a infantery (infiltrator) side game .
we allready, removed thermal from vihecles, that they can`t find you.
don`T scare for weapongs, we allready nerfed all weapongs who makes fun .
yep we have 5 infantery class, but don`t scare, you can use 1 for all.

oh at last, this you don`t like? we got 1 Point more.
we don`t nee Support from you, because we just ignore you


so i hope it is clear, now go and have fun, with what ever you do :/

Thermals didn't show cloaked infiltrators...
Infils don't have a shotgun - Until the new SMG which acts as one (idk why the ****)

Free locks?
Nothing is 100% safe but standing at the warp gate.

So I hope this entire post is sarcasm.

Not only did thermal scopes never show cloaked Infiltrators, it made them completely impossible to see by not showing the distortion effect.

You don't really know anything about this game, do you?

Personally i don't have any performance issues with the game and i feel like the Ant and base building was a great addition to the game, it makes it so you can do something else than just pew pew pew all the time , i enjoy it.

Been playing ps2 on and off since it came out, and im currently using a 4770k with 32gb ddr3 2133mhz and a evga 1080ti ftw3 edition , prior a 980ti ftw also from evga , ive had 0 issues at all with the game, but then again i'm not running a sub par computer, game isn't made for sub par pc's either , a 1000$ PC can handle this game without issues , which most are expected to have anyway to be able to run any sort of computer games.

Just because YOU wouldn't do that doesn't mean others wouldn't. (Not to mention, you could have automated, AI controlled ANT's)

Small teams and lone wolves as it is have little to offer, and all the action is centered around a few hot-spots.
Resources having to physically reach the base means real logistics. Real supply lines. Real blockades and attempts to break them.
You know, actual tactics other than zerg swarm. ACTUAL DEPTH. Actual variance.

What can you do now? Fight in a swarm to take a horrificaly designed base (their design seems to help the attacker more than the defender) - a fight that is ultimatively meaningless aside of getting some points. You're gonna loose in a few hours anyway, or when the coninent unlocks. The locks themselves are pointless and shallow.
You can build bases, but again, they last only until the next unlock and serve no real purpose.

Not to mention that re-deployside has completely undermined the whole point of vehicles and transports.

Half (if not almost all) bases should be removes, player bases should be permanent until destroyed (effectively taking the place of regular bases), logistics should matter, transportation should matter (re-span times that increase with deaths, decrease with time; more limited re-deployment)

Also, do you really think I'm wrong about performance?
While customization is nice, it's pointless and a resource hog. Instead of having unique harassers and other vehicles for each faction, we have 100 different bits and pieces, all of which have to be rendered. And the more new bits you add, the worse it gets.
Sure, if your outfit all has matching items and you're fighting another that all has matching items, the hit isn't bad - but in big fights, when everyone has a different cammo, different armor, different helm, etc, etc.? Disaster.