Thank you, good to finally see some news about the update. With it, there are some immediate things I’m happy about and some immediate disappointments.
Things I’m happy about:
- Battles tab instead of World tab
- Battles tab being moved to right, where it’s easier and more instinctive to press
- Kingdoms getting their own tab
- Customizable menus!
- OFFERS BEING CLEARED OFF THE MAIN SCREEN
- Forgive my use of caps, but this is such a monumental change in making this game feel more like a game and less an ad spammy money maker
- Grid system for gear vault
- Gear score nice and prominent, easier navigation between gears, spells, and minions, set bonuses nice and visible
- Salvage changes
- Design of the new follower
- Addition of archive
- Home screen has both player and hero name now
Things I’m disappointed about:
Followers
The follower rework wasn’t mentioned at all, and that it’s no longer even in the roadmap.
Update 1.2 said:
The Follower Update has been moved to a later update, with some additional Kingdom updates brought forward. We wanted to make sure that we didn’t compromise on either of those updates, so we made the decision to split them up and give them the space, developer and design attention they needed.
So the follower update was promised to us, then it was split up and pushed back specifically so it could be given more attention. But then, nothing in this update, not even a mention? Many of us have been waiting patiently for it with great excitement for a very long time. So this is disappointing.
The new follower is also disappointing compared to what many of us theorized about. We hoped for a glyph crafter, or an element/effect reroller for weapons, or numerous other exciting things. So to have a simple buffer (while nice) is disappointing in comparison. It doesn’t fix any of the major issues players have with the game, which is what the new follower could have done. Also, I can see a buffer being most beneficial for new players who are underpowered, so to get a buffer follower so late in the game might be a bit hard to make work well.
Gear Screen
- The gear icons are so small now. This makes them hard to see and tap on.
- Why does your hero feature so prominently on the gear screen? It’s not like you can see your equipment equipped on yourself? It would have been better to have take away the space given to your hero and used it for bigger gear icons instead.
- Would be nice to have name of set under icon as well.
New Home Screen
I’m sadly not fond of the changes. I honestly didn’t find it cluttered before. It was nicely laid out and very usable. Now, it just seems very empty. What use does this menu even really have any more? It seems like a lot of its functionality was taken away.
Some dislikes:
- Gear being a tiny icon on the left side of the screen (too small and have to reach across the screen to tap it
- Swap Hero changed to icon instead of icon with text and being moved to top (liked it how it was before, felt nice and was functional)
- Quest Pass is a bit oddly located. Why is it pushed down from the top of the screen, leaving that gap? I think it would look a lot better flush against the top right of the screen.
- The text for the currencies is bigger, which is nice, but the old design for displaying them was prettier
- Absence of shortcuts to seasons and story battles
- Chests seems smaller?
- Smaller exp bar, that still lacks numbers. If it’s smaller, then there definitely needs to be the exp numbers to make up for it, because it’s just impossible to make an accurate estimate of how much exp you still need.
New Battles Tab
The tiles look nice, but they’re so colorful and have so much going on that it’s hard to focus on the text on them. Also, there’s too much important info on the same screen. It was nicer when things were divided up into their own tabs. The long season box to the left looks nice, but I’m not fond of all of the little squares. Also, everything should fit on one screen without having to scroll over, so that shows that there is too much on one screen.
One thing I’ve noticed about the overall design of this game: you seem to be trying to replicate mobile tiles like Windows does, and no. Just no. Please, those tiles are such an awful design, so please stop trying to copy them. You’re still doing a decent job with design, but the sooner you move away from the idea of the tiles, the easier of a time you’ll have coming up with a better, more unique design. One that is more functional and fits the game better.
New Hero
Was disappointed that the new female hero has so much skin showing. Her design seems like a throwback to the skimpy, sexualized outfits of the old days, which is disappointing after we got so many good but covering designs (female Necro is the only exception). I understand that the design for this class was supposed to be less covering to show off the muscles and tattoos, but there are ways to design outfits that show off muscle without being basically tiny boob armor and a loincloth. I know it’s too late to do anything about this class now, but hopefully an alt skin provides a more covering outfit, as I would like to play as the female class, being female, but don’t want to have to look at her skimpy outfit. Also, wish she had more glowing tattoos like the male version.
As a note though, I did appreciate how muscular she is, and her horns and color scheme are cool.
Conclusion
So, those are my preliminary thoughts on what we’ve been shown so far for this update. Really appreciate that the team is looking at all the feedback and taking it into account. More communication would definitely be appreciated (like the communication from the last day or two!). Just knowing you hear us and are working on things is often enough. Thanks for continuing to work hard on improving this game. It’s much appreciated by all the players
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(Ps, isn’t this update in the wrong section? Shouldn’t it be in the official news section? It would be easier to find there, so that’s why I wanted to mention it.)