Some Feedback on the Weapons Changes

[Vodor]

First off, some background: I've played the original PC port of this game quite a bit, and fancied myself a speedrunner of it for a while. With two quick playthroughs, I'm really surprised at how much new stuff this remaster brings to the table! I'm just gonna talk about weapons here though. On to it...

• Knife and Regular Arrows
  

  I haven't been able to get a mortal wound to drop yet. These are quite important in combination with all the Full Health tokens about. Not sure if it's bad luck or a missing feature.
  
  The Knife feels a lot slower than it used to, both on the startup and the backswing. If this change is intentional, I think it should be reverted.

• Explosive Shells and Tech Arrows
  

  These weapons now seem to behave more like the other explosive weapons. This is a pretty big buff. Especially so since this allows you to grab the Minigun in Level 2 and have it for the Longunter boss. However, I think this is a fine change for Tech Arrows. Explosive Shells, on the other hand, were already so strong and ubiquitous that I think this crowds out other niche weapons too much.

• Energy Weapons
  

  The Pulse Rifle doesn't fire with a quick tap anymore; it's as if it requires a bit of spinup, like the Minigun. I believe I saw this mentioned by someone else in the Bug Thread as well.
  
  The Alien Weapon seems about as pitiful as ever, especially now that Explosive Shells deal pinpoint-targeted instant area damage. I've yet to find a situation or enemy where it is more time/ammo efficient to use energy on this weapon instead of the awesome Pulse Rifle or even the Particle Accelerator. Especially for how late in the game this weapon is found (Level 6?), I think it could really use some tuning.

• The Quad Rocket Launcher
  

  Is it just me, or is this weapon doing way more damage now? I love it. I feel like it used to barely do the same damage as the grenade launcher when ALL 4 rockets hit. Now EACH rocket seems to be about the damage of a grenade, but they're still unreliable. So this weapon strongly holds a niche against large, high-health targets.
  
  This weapon also seems to be using a new ammo system: it holds the same total uses as before, but pickups now seem to grant more uses apiece. I think this weapon needed help, and I believe your changes put it in a good spot. Nice.

• The Chronoscepter
  

  In my Normal Difficulty playthrough, this thing essentially killed the Campaigner in its 3 shots. It's definitely doing way more damage than it used to. I'm torn on this, since meticulous players will be left with a pretty unsatisfying final boss fight. On the other hand, you have to endure pure hell to get the Level 4 Chronoscepter Piece and it was never worth it time-wise with its old damage. Tough call.

[Harry101UK]

Nice breakdown! I can confirm that Mortal Wounds still drop; I've picked up quite a lot of them. Sounds like you just got unlucky. =P

[Vodor]

Thanks!

I'm probably not getting Mortal Wounds because I'm hardly using the knife anymore. I have a much harder time with it now that it feels so slow. I have been using arrows though... damned luck ><

On a different note, I was going to talk about the Particle Accelerator (or Shockwave Weapon) in the OP, but I don't really have much to say about it. I think it could be quite good, but I haven't used it enough to know when it's good. Is there any particular time when you feel the need to pull the Particle Accelerator over the Pulse Rifle or the Alien Weapon?

[Antroid]

The particle accelerator seemed like a piece of crap. On my hard playthrough the lowest of the low human enemies required 2 shots from it (uncharged). I've seen no point in using the alien weapon either. The pulse rifle all the way!

Also, I think the rocket pickups need to be restored to the original state of things, where one rocket gave you one shot and not four separate shots. Because as things are in this version, most clusters of rocket pick-ups are awkward and annoying: you pick up one or two, filling up your ammo, and the remaining 3 are just there. This does not tend to happen with any other ammo type pickups.

However the power of the rocket launcher definitely seemed good. Useful for the giant robots.

[Vodor]

Fair enough. I wonder if the rocket pick-ups giving 4 shots was just a slight oversight by the devs - that'd make sense.

The Pulse Rifle is absolutely my favorite weapon in the game, but I still wish the other energy weapons were at least viable.

[Antroid]

Originally posted by Vodor:

The Pulse Rifle is absolutely my favorite weapon in the game, but I still wish the other energy weapons were at least viable.

Yeah. The other two energy weapons seem pretty useless. But as far as I know they were useless in the original version as well so IMO this doesn't need changing. I'd put authenticity above those kinds of fixes. And people who make custom levels will probably be able to "fix" those weapons for their levels. Or it could just be a mod. But IMO it shouldn't be touched in the base game.

[Silvus Sol]

Originally posted by Vodor:

Fair enough. I wonder if the rocket pick-ups giving 4 shots was just a slight oversight by the devs - that'd make sense.

The Pulse Rifle is absolutely my favorite weapon in the game, but I still wish the other energy weapons were at least viable.

Yeah they've always been more of "for fun" type weapons than actually efficient or effective weapons. Which works I suppose, but some slight buffage (and I mean slight) couldn't hurt either.

[SFJake]

The Alien Weapon is my most wanted buff. Its effect actually inspired various mod-weapons in other games, and it just sounds/feels fun.

It doesn't even have to be as powerful as the Plasma Rifle per ammo.

By the way, I've played this game through about 10 times in my life and I never heard (or saw) a mortal wound before. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥? Although I used to play on Hard excluisvely, even though I killed a lot of stuff wtih the knife..

[Vodor]

That makes me think then that mortal wounds simply don't drop on hard. I've been playing mostly hard and still have yet to see one.