Hi everyone,
Today we want to talk about the battle distance on our game. In games with naval themes this is a very important thing, which makes a direct influence on whether the whole process is fun for you or not. In Blood & Gold we had it wrong, but we had no other choice for many technical reasons. So this time, with Feral Blue, we want to get it right.
So why is the battle distance so important? Because it can make the game challenging. If it's too close — then it becomes too easy. It's like going to the shooting gallery and shoot at a point blank range. It may work for stress relief, but is it fun? And if it does becomes interesting for you, we recommend contacting the psychiatric support as soon as possible (just in case).
With Blood & Gold, we forced Mount & Blade engine do things it was not really designed for. And if we had the possibility to make the distance longer, then we'd have a more meaningful aiming, we could introduce the concept of 'aiming shot' — when the gunner looks where the shell went, in order to make further adjustments.
However, the distance also relies on the speed of the ships. Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag, we're looking at you. Seriously though, Black Flag has pretty fun naval combat — but only for the first few hours. The jet ships change everything: no tactics to speak of, we're just shooting and dodging, like in a platformer game Cuphead, only without the ability to jump.
So our goal here is to make you think while in naval combat, but without overdoing it and making it tedious. After all, spending three minutes of real time just to get close to an enemy ship is not the most fun thing to do.
That's why on the gif above you can see how 'point blank' shot looks like in the game — when speaking of the visual side, this way the battle looks more dynamic. And yes, you're right — the catapult has no textures for now, it's just a temporary 'representation' of the catapult.