Questionable replayability

[The Renderer]

So... this game is supposed to have a procedurally generated city (i.e. different every game) and procedurally generated missions. At least that's what a (possibly outdated?) trailer claimed.

But now I've seen several people play the game on Youtube and the city is always the exact same (with the only difference being faction placement) and the first mission is also always the exact same. Not talking about the tutorial here, btw. They didn't all play further so I can't compare other missions. It looked like the available contracts were also the exact same, not sure about that one, though.

Did they just get some kind of weird fixed-seed preview build or is this game not as random (and therefore replayable) as we've been lead to believe? It sure looks like they found out the whole random generation didn't work as well as they wanted and decided to simply scrap it. Hope that's not true.

I originally wanted to buy at release but this makes me want to wait a little to see whether it's as bad as it seems.

[SemtexMan47]

I noticed that too, but I think those are story missions. Could also be the fixed seed thing.

From developer videos they said the maps are supposed to be proc gen with some pre-designed elements mixed in.

[Wampbit]

I always thought multiplayer was the heart of frozen synapse. In terms of mission variation, even if the geometry is similar so long as there are squad difference the gameplay can be varied.

[PraiseYouAllMyLife]

I'd like some info on this as well. I definetly wont be buying if its not the sandbox/emergent game i had been hoping it would be

[holy-death]

The first mission is the same probably because it's a story mission, which is fixed.

I am expecting random contracts to be actually varied when it comes to enemy squad composition and objectives, even if locations themselves will stay the same.

[The Renderer]

Originally posted by holy-death:

I am expecting random contracts to be actually varied when it comes to enemy squad composition and objectives, even if locations themselves will stay the same.

That would not be acceptable (to me). Hope it's not working like that. I remember how bad XCOM was before Long War made it better with more randomization. Always the same old maps coming at you ad nauseam.

I could live with a non-random cityscape but random tactical missions are an essential feature. That's the meat of the game after all. Even Frozen Synapse 1 had random tactical missions. And let's be real, with simple graphics like these, it is quite trivial to generate random maps.

But let's not get too far ahead of ourselves, we don't know how it actually works yet. It might be fine.

On a more positive note, I've seen a new video from DasTactics and he seems to have gotten a different first mission. Unfortunately also on a tactical map I've already seen in a different video.

[holy-death]

Well, there seem to be A LOT of buildings in the city. So if each location is unique (or is a random seed, generated per campaign, like in Battle Brothers) this should provide map variety as well, provided missions can be randomly assigned to each "square" in the city (can't really tell how this works from the gameplays alone).

[DeLastOne]

The layout of the city is always the same. But the mission layout are randomized. you can check this beta review : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veFmrpiPQnM

[The Renderer]

Originally posted by DeLastOne:

The layout of the city is always the same. But the mission layout are randomized. you can check this beta review :

Thanks for the link. He only *says* they are randomized. And I would find it weird if they weren't so I tend to believe him. After having seen all these same missions in the other videos I am not 100% convinced yet. But, as others suggested, it probably is just because it is the first mission.

Shame about the city being always the same, though. Yes, it looks nicer than a randomly generated one usually would, but I'd rather have more variety. Even though it's not relevant to the gameplay in this case.

[PraiseYouAllMyLife]

The store page literally begins with: "Frozen Synapse 2 brings you classic tactical gameplay with a new twist: it's set within a vast procedurally generated city."

So is that just not true anymore?

[Lavenders2]

Originally posted by Homey Slice:

The store page literally begins with: "Frozen Synapse 2 brings you classic tactical gameplay with a new twist: it's set within a vast procedurally generated city."

So is that just not true anymore?

It is a bit misleading.

The city layout is definitely fixed. I uploaded two images from two different playthroughs (Northernlion's and Marbozir's) here: https://imgur.com/a/4x2DDHa
If you compare the two pics side by side you will notice similarities. The buildings and their locations are identical, even the corporate starting locations seem to be the same.

However, the actual content within those buildings (car locations, desks etc.) is probably generated procedurally, but kept consistent for each playthrough. If this is true, then the actual tactical layers will be procedurally generated. Since this was the case in FS1's campaign, I would say with 99% certainty it will be the case here.

[PraiseYouAllMyLife]

Originally posted by Lavenders2:

Originally posted by Homey Slice:

The store page literally begins with: "Frozen Synapse 2 brings you classic tactical gameplay with a new twist: it's set within a vast procedurally generated city."

So is that just not true anymore?

It is a bit misleading.

The city layout is definitely fixed. I uploaded two images from two different playthroughs (Northernlion's and Marbozir's) here: https://imgur.com/a/4x2DDHa
If you compare the two pics side by side you will notice similarities. The buildings and their locations are identical, even the corporate starting locations seem to be the same.

However, the actual content within those buildings (car locations, desks etc.) is probably generated procedurally, but kept consistent for each playthrough. If this is true, then the actual tactical layers will be procedurally generated. Since this was the case in FS1's campaign, I would say with 99% certainty it will be the case here.

This would be unfortunate, but acceptable

[VinylRabbit]

I believe the city layout is the same but each time a mission is generated it is procedurially generated. So each mission you do the layout of the mission will be a different layout with different elements. I am guessing it basically creates missions that are like the skirmish style missions in Frozen Synapse.

[VXV]

I don't understand why map generation is not there, I mean it was working in older versions, why get rid of it, it was actually the feature I was looking forward to.

[SemtexMan47]

Generating the city dynamically is one thing but getting the AI to navigate around it is another. Developers just ran out of time is my guess.

[Mick]

Originally posted by Wampbit:

I always thought multiplayer was the heart of frozen synapse. .

Ugh. Pass then.