I truly think you have a good idea going here that can hook people into playing. The biggest problem I think you have is earth being the center of all. When everyone starts in the exact same spot, and builds from the exact same spot, you have noob fighting that will discourage some people from continuing, and you have more powerful forces that prevent people from expanding. I simply think you need a bigger universe. Allow for people to start in far away quadrants from one another. Just add to the story that the exploration and colonization of other worlds has already happened, but you need the corporations to maintain all of these universal mining operations and scientific research. This will help new people to have a better chance of growing before being decimated, and may allow for more unions between quadrants and create border type fighting while quadrants try to expand into other quadrants.

I can't think of any MMO that everyone starts on the same spot. I think it can lead to a way more intriguing story, have a little less competition at start up which will allow players a better chance to grow, and lead to more diverse relations. You can even add a faction type element in case you decide to run to another quadrant to run missions. Perhaps you have to work your way up to getting the good runs by getting the local boards to trust you more.

Arctic

Oh hell, so you can. Sorry about that, I just head it set in my mind that all module buying and selling happened through the maintenance ship. Disregard!

Arctic

And to add, I think you should be able to sell a module from your cargo bay. I have a cargo bay inside of a cargo bay, but I can't sell the stored cargo bay, I have to sell the one installed on my ship already, which I can't do, because it has a cargo bay in it 

Arctic

That's what I did, guess I'm talking more of the logic side of it. Same goes in reverse, not sure why certain modules that your trying to take from a station have to move to an install slot, instead of just transferring it to a cargo bay. Game should be consistent one way or another.

Arctic

Unless I'm doing something wrong, it doesn't make sense to me when you have a new ship, you can't give it cargo bays without it having cargo bays. Why would you not be able to transfer a cargo bay from one ship to an empty spot on another ship?

Arctic

Rock on. I did not know the diminishing returns thing was already in effect, I guess that makes this post unneeded. Thanks for the info on that!

Arctic

That's why you have a show/hide button. This game utilizes so little of the screen, I can't see how it could be an issue. That same show/hide screen can be used for other stuff, as I stated in another suggestion post. If it would be annoying to you, then keep it hidden. Game interface is a major factor for most players. Improving the utility of it makes the majority happy.

Arctic

I am still new, and have not yet had the opportunity to engage or defend in player combat. I do however know that one of the biggest problems new games have with getting off the ground is trying to keep people interested, and keep people playing. The usual thing you see in every new game is that there are a handful of people that have been around since the beginning, and buy time newer people come in, they pretty much get crushed before they can achieve anything significant, then move on to try a different game.

I'm not sure the enjoyment some stronger players have over completely devouring the weak, but it's a common attribute of many online gamers. But, if the people truly enjoy playing the game, then they need to make sure the game is successful by seeing the player population growing and becoming more involved.

One method that can be used to discourage older players from scaring away newer players can be a form of diminishing returns. What this means is that if a player with a very high power rating goes after someone with a much less power rating, then the reward from the encounter will be diminished. Thus, making the expense of pulling off such an annihilation not worth the reward. You can picture it as attacking something with excessive technology will lead to vaporizing your enemy as opposed to dismantling and occupying their resources for looting. Now, there will still always be those that will wipe out a smaller player just because they get some strange kick out of it, but it can help make sure that players try to stick more to fighting their own tier for a more enjoyable challenge.

I know there will be the argument of the food chain and Darwinism, but the basic fact is the game will only survive if people play. I would say at least 80+ percent of the games I've been a part of beta testing have not withstood the test of time.

Arctic

Tabs work...sure. But, I just find it annoying to have multiple tabs across the top of my screen to play one game. Having a separate window for training is just one example. Another would be, if I dock at a station, shipyard, etc, to have a secondary panel open up with the options that can be done at that location instead of having to dock, sell/buy goods, then perhaps check your manufacturing to see what materials you need to buy to produce something, then having to orbit, and dock again at the same location to buy materials when technically you should already be docked. Yes, I know you can check first, and write down what you need to buy, or open it in another tab, but having a location/training window and an actions window being open at the same time will reduce redundancy clicking or having the game opened up in 2-5 different instances in your browser.

Arctic

I don't know if there is a fundamental reason why the timer has to be 24 hours, but I would suggest making it 23 hours. Reason being, almost no one is going to be online to vote the moment the timer expires every day. That being said, every day you vote later and later, and eventually, the timer will be expiring after you rest for the day/evening. If you make it 23 hours, it gives people the chance to back petal a little bit in case that have to vote late in the day for themselves.

Arctic

Unless I missed a way to do this myself, I think that the training missions should be a constant on the screen. Perhaps keep it on the right, so you don't have to click back and forth from the training, to the task, and back again. Give a button to show or hide the info window if need be. Will just make things much more streamlined to learn the mechanics of the game without constantly having to click between windows. Especially since each task has multiple steps to it.

Arctic