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Challenges' Suggestion Thread (Games : Vector Thrust : Forum : Suggestion Box : Challenges' Suggestion Thread ) Locked
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Feb 11 2014 Anchor

You probably are already ware that the final version will have a challenge mode.
This challenge mode is a set a quick missions for every unit, that after clearing them you become allowed to use that unit in every other mode (besides campaigns).

Every unit will have a set of 3 to 6 missions, all linked to online leaderboards. This multiplying for the amount of playable units makes it quick to realize that the final version will have more than 1000 challenge missions.

Half of them are been already done, I’m trying to avoid “recycle” the missions the best I can. But inevitability some similarities will be noticeable in a few missions, but this is not really an issue because the same mission played with different units (from different families) have a completely different feel.

But I’m opening this thread so I could hear the suggestions of all of you and potentially increase the variety of challenges.

One thing to note is that the premise of the challenge mode is to explore the game mechanics and units to the fullest by playing around with the existing in game rules. One thing I want to avoid is using the challenge mode as a cheap trick to extend the game longevity, so the missions must be interesting and meaningful.

Also the challenges for every unit follow this format:
1st Challenge- generic/ explore unit’s main weapon
2nd Challenge - explore unit’s role/uniqueness
3rd Challenge – explore unit’s SP weapon 1 (if applicable)
4th Challenge – explore unit’s SP weapon 2 (if applicable)
5th Challenge – explore unit’s SP weapon 3 (if applicable)
6th Challenge – explore unit’s sub weapon (if applicable)

And finally, these challenges don’t really have to be too elaborated to work; here is an example of a existing mission:
-Only the main weapon is usable for the player.
- The mission boundaries make a long and tight corridor, around 80x8km.
- The player is placed on the end of the corridor facing the other side.
- And the goal is to kill a single F-117C as fast as possible.
And that’s it, that is enough to make an interesting challenge, it may sound too simple, but the idea of having to kill as fast as possible an enemy you don’t know here it is hiding make is really interesting challenge.

But there are other less conventional challenges, like coin collecting, flying in air space filled with mines, races, etc.

But if anyone as more ideas for challenges feel free to post them here, it can be either complex or simple, I welcome all of them

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Initiation: intended to unlock a variant of the very first-available plane (whether it's Draken or MiG-21). Using only guns, shoot down certain amount of balloons before the timer runs out, Once all balloons are down, a F-4E will spawn somewhere on the map. Shoot it down to complete the challenge.
Watch the birdie: to unlock a certain F-14 variant, fly really close and upside down above an enemy F-5E, and do the thing.

I suggest the challenges to be as less frustrating and can be done within less than 5 minutes to make things less complicated. Bonus point if they can have a reference/shout-out to the other media, whether it can be movie/anime, other game, book, or even actual/historical event.

Edited by: Nergal01

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Would it be possible for there to be exceptions to the basic model? The first two challenges are read as being a prerequisite for all aircraft, but some aircraft aren't eligible for the first challenge because they lack a Main weapon, like the F-117A or the completely unarmed P-42.

The F-117A challenge could be addressed obviously by its role and use of SP weapons, but how would you provide challenges for unarmed aircraft? Assuming that the Streak Eagle and P-42 are either unlockable or even available in the campaigns, would a speed challenge be used based on the second challenge's intent of exploring a unit's role?

Taking historical context into consideration, this would further deviate from the model, but if we look at the manner HAVE BLUE was used, 1001 was a flight demonstrator, while 1002 was the stealth demonstrator. Would we see challenges similar to actual flight testing?

Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Nergal01 wrote: Bonus point if they can have a reference/shout-out to the other media, whether it can be movie/anime, other game, book, or even actual/historical event.


I strongly approve that!
But yes, the challenges should preferably be 5 min time, but it can be exceptions, there are some challenges that recreate the infamous point based missions of the AC4, but with only 5-10 min time limit.

@ SpootKnight, about Streak Eagle and P-42 I’m still considering if it wouldn’t be best to make them combat capable, even while still retaining some limitations, this would make them a lot more useful in the game.

But it certainly can be exceptions for the challenges’ order, the format I stated above is mostly a guideline for making the missions, a very unique aircraft may need more than 6 missions to be enough to fully explore all the capabilities, but the minimum amount is 3 challenges per unit.

As for these units, the Streak Eagle and P-42, yes the challenges will be more focused on speed.
But for the F-117A, instead of the first mission be focused on use main weapon, it will have 2 challenges that explore the unit role. One will be to destroy a well protected base at night. (normal missions can also be used as challenges).

So yes, although only in a few, I’m considering historical context of the units in making these challenges.
Preferably most of the missions should be deeply connected to the units role/context, but that is not possible as it would consume a lot of time in think up these missions, so usually only one is very related to that specific unit and the remaining challenges have a looser connection but still relatable. (like for example, for an attack aircraft most of the challenge are against ground units)

Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Maybe a little offside comment, but for the whole target range place for the first challenges, I think it'd fit better if you were shooting just regular UAZs or scrap tanks would be better, as well as those balloons that were mentioned. Just a point of theme.

If the Destroy 10 Targets is constant between all of the aircraft challenges, I think it would be worth it. You nailed the scale of it though.

It still is a doozy cycling through all the targets, but if the boresight actually worked at times, it would be easier.

Anyway, some ideas that're reasonable I think are the inclusions of survival scenarions (scenarios where you are unarmed and have to outmanuever aircraft to survive) and maneuver kills as well with an altitude cap.

Edited by: flyawaynow

Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Ghost Hunter:
Your P.125 relies on synthetic vision, but this means you can only see what the radar sees. Destroy all of the E-76s and EA-6Bs to figure out how many aircraft you're actually dealing with, then mop them up with the help of newly-arrived reinforcements.

MyHatismyFriend
MyHatismyFriend Synchronized Drowning Expert
Feb 11 2014 Anchor

Just a point, I believe the Challenge Mode only unlocks planes for Multiplayer, Arcade, Quick Action and Skirmish. Campaigns will have a selection of planes already unlocked for you.

Feb 11 2014 Anchor

MyHatismyFriend wrote: Just a point, I believe the Challenge Mode only unlocks planes for Multiplayer, Arcade, Quick Action and Skirmish. Campaigns will have a selection of planes already unlocked for you.


That's what I thought too.

Possible hardest challenge in the game: "We've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is we've issued you a state of the art superplane: the S-24 Nighthound. Now for the bad news: An entire army is attacking from the coast and all our forces are committed elsewhere. You'll have to win this one on your own. Good luck!"

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Feb 12 2014 Anchor

bornloser wrote:
Possible hardest challenge in the game: "We've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is we've issued you a state of the art superplane: the S-24 Nighthound. Now for the bad news: An entire army is attacking from the coast and all our forces are committed elsewhere. You'll have to win this one on your own. Good luck!"

In Dynasty Warrior style, with credits rolls in background.

Once the credit roll done, it ends with a Bolivian Army Ending and you die no matter what. But hey, you've just unlocked that one hell of uberplane, right?

...glorious.

Edited by: Nergal01

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

MyHatismyFriend
MyHatismyFriend Synchronized Drowning Expert
Feb 13 2014 Anchor

ts pls even the challenges which were working before are now broken what happened

Feb 13 2014 Anchor

@ MyHatismyFriend, nothing much, just as things get developed other may break as a result, sometimes I’ll deliberately ignore these issues until the games reaches feature complete, because they may brake again with the following developments, but in that case I actually didn’t noticed.

One example was the target selection and boresigh have become less robust as the stealth and jamming got implemented, usually these are “15min issue fix”, but until beta, unless it is really important I prefer to get my hands on something else.

@ Nergal01, I like de idea but there is one issue, is that the credits even with the all the contestant names and iceberg staff is still a very short list. Unless it is presented very slowly.

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Feb 13 2014 Anchor

How about challenges to unlock those playable recon planes (like that U-2 Starfighter wannabe)? Most of them barely do anything other than, well flying through all waypoints without getting shot down.

Unless if you want to re-enact that one U-2 being shot down incident back in '60s (?), that is.

More: To help making the challenge slightly less tedious, I'd like to know whether this is a good idea or not:
-Category-based challenge to unlock starting tier plane families (i.e completing the 'Bavarian Stealth' series unlocks LA-2000 and Lamprydae I, 'Red Star Rising' unlocks early Flanker and Fulcrum, 'Overspeed' unlocks EE Lightning (if there's any), F-4 and F-104, 'Project ATF' unlocks YF-22 and YF-23, 'Black Project' unlocks Bird of Prey, X-36 and BAE Replica (assuming both of them are in game) and so on)
The rules remain the same (3-6 missions, regarding of the unlocked planes' tier) and every final challenge in the series, you have to face the most advanced variants of the respective plane family, with all of them pilotted by Ace skilled AI.
-The rest of the challenges to unlock other variants of an existing plane remain the same as before.

Edited by: Nergal01

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

Mar 6 2014 Anchor

I have no idea what you could really do with a spyplane besides directing ground forces like this

edit: and you could just as easily use a satellite to do that.

Edited by: bornloser

Mar 6 2014 Anchor

First I´ll add here a screenshot of the challenges mode, I´m at home at the moment but the version I have here is good enough to show how it works:

As you can see after you unlock an aircraft normally you can immediately see the next units form the evolution.

But as for the ideas that you posted
I like it, one of the problems I felt is how to begin the challenges mode.
I wanted to offer as least amount units as possible, this to avoid the player felling overwhelmed with choices. But at the same time I didn´t wanted to create an artificial relation like you need to unlock some the F-4 first in order to see the F-117.

So if I understood right what you said, at the start it can be "beginner/ category " category, and in that category it had several groups (Bavarian Stealth /Red Star Rising/ Overspeed/etc) each with their own challenges. And after clearing one of this groups it will be possible co start unlock the initial variants of some families.

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Mar 6 2014 Anchor

So if I understood right what you said, at the start it can be "beginner/ category " category, and in that category it had several groups (Bavarian Stealth /Red Star Rising/ Overspeed/etc) each with their own challenges. And after clearing one of this groups it will be possible co start unlock the initial variants of some families.

Not really, simply just some challenges to unlock various families along their initial variant planes; the unlocks are categorized/thematic as I've mentioned before.

Edited by: Nergal01

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

MyHatismyFriend
MyHatismyFriend Synchronized Drowning Expert
Mar 6 2014 Anchor

Just going off topic a bit here, but your image reminded me of something I needed to tell you- the Unlock Unit and Clear Mission buttons are too close together, I think it would be a better UI design if they were next to each other or something.

Mar 6 2014 Anchor

In that lieu I think Attacker - Fighter - Interceptor - Bomber - Multirole esque organization system might be needed. I don't have any problems but it feels unorganized at the moment.

Mar 6 2014 Anchor

@ Nergal01, what I said it was my own interpretation but I understood your idea.

@ MyHatismyFriend Those buttons are just for debugging, they won't appear in the final version. They are just to test if the system is working fine without having to actually play the missions.

@ flyawaynow do you mean in the family selection?
the only potential problem I see there is that there are a lot of variants that different roles

Mar 6 2014 Anchor

I'm curious about the Bird of Prey, what other similar airframes exist to qualify it as its own family?

MyHatismyFriend
MyHatismyFriend Synchronized Drowning Expert
Mar 6 2014 Anchor

There's two additional variants.

One is a canardised variant with combat capabilities, and the other is a horrific thing with afterburners and terrifying forward-swept wings tacked on

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Mar 6 2014 Anchor

MyHatismyFriend wrote:
One is a canardised variant with combat capabilities

The one with 2 engines instead of one?

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

Mar 7 2014 Anchor

timeSymmetry wrote:
@ flyawaynow do you mean in the family selection?
the only potential problem I see there is that there are a lot of variants that different roles


Yeah well we have a lot of planes already in general and keeping them all bunched in a list like that is an eyesore.

Either the system I just mentioned or the sorting system you've got in the Skirmish mode might be better.

Edited by: flyawaynow

MyHatismyFriend
MyHatismyFriend Synchronized Drowning Expert
Mar 7 2014 Anchor

Nergal01 wrote:
The one with 2 engines instead of one?


No sir, just one engine.

Mar 19 2014 Anchor

timeSymmetry wrote:
As for these units, the Streak Eagle and P-42, yes the challenges will be more focused on speed.
But for the F-117A, instead of the first mission be focused on use main weapon, it will have 2 challenges that explore the unit role. One will be to destroy a well protected base at night. (normal missions can also be used as challenges).


If these are meant to explore game mechanics, I'd suggest exposing players to the wonderful world of blowing helicopters out of the air with large payload bombs within their immediate vicinity. If there isn't any shrapnel directly impacting the target or the explosion doesn't directly consume the aircraft, the engines will most likely cut out from the shockwave.

Helicopters who are outside of ground-effect would probably be way too easy targets for the player; helicopters are in it would be more difficult to kill, but would be far more exposed to ground fire, and, well, bombs.

Edited by: Boogie_Van

--

Swing-Wing Crazy

Nergal01
Nergal01 I stopped supporting Vector Thrust. AMA.
Mar 27 2014 Anchor

-As for 'bomb the airliner' challenge, I'd say give it a highly-logically acceptable flavor text as description, like:
The airliner has been slowly taken over by a certain zombie infestation, and while you're the only unit available to *secretly* bring it down, but your AAMs went haywire for some reason plus you forgot to load your plane's gun, therefore you have no choice but to bomb the said airliner into oblivion before the zombie outbreak gets worse. Oh, and don't ask how the heck a zombie can fly a plane. Really

Challenge for NF-104:
'Last Resort' - Using NF-104, stop an incoming ICBM before it made its re-entry using a modified MRAAM, and outrun the said ICBM explosion.

--

anon wrote:

There are only two things in this world worse than Vector Thrust; Star Citizen and No Man's Sky

'anon' wrote: Now I shall use this 'Vector Thrust Threshold' to measure how awful your product is

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