Carrier Command Beta due out tommorow...
 

Its $22 bucks to preorder it now and get the beta in the meantime.....

One way to get beta testers...

https://store.bistudio.com/play-and-contribute

I admit - I want this game so bad I sprung for it..... God I hope it doesn't suck!

Let us know, if possible. Think quite a few around here are interested. :yep:

So did I, I played the absolute heck out of the original. This one is looking very good so far.

Its downloading now

A multi-years-long rumour - finally coming to a good end?! It must be 5 or 6 or more years since IU first osted a link to some news event saying that somebody, not even a company, was taking on redoing Carrier Command.

Let us know, CH. :salute:

VERY interested but not quite ready to spring for it... as I have my doubts.

Well I have managed to play it a bit. The current incarnation definitely has its bugs and issues. It does look very nice, and I see a lot of potential. One thing for sure is that the devs really seem to have tried to stay faithful as much as possible to the original, even down to the somewhat awkward controls ;)

It will be interesting to see where it goes from here. The beta is pretty limited, there are only a few islands to take and not all the equipment is present (like the hammerhead missiles).

OK I have played this for a little bit. Remember - its still beta.

Right now the beta has no tutorial, but it did come with a basic manual. Its easy enough to figure out how to do things, but that is only because I played the original. The first few missions in the campaign are set to be tutorial in nature.

Beta has no campaign, right now just a single, randomly generated 9 island map. You can modify how many islands you vs the AI control. I expect there will be a setting for number of neutral islands later.

The game LOOKS gorgeous. Now with that said, realize my standards are lower than most when it comes to graphics. I would say its very "Crysis" like regarding realisitic looks. It does suffer from some drawbacks, sight distance is not as high as I (or others) would like.

Interface is well designed. Controls are good, though you do have to fiddle with them initially to keep the mouse from seeming "heavy". Turn down the sensitivity (called horizontal/vertical resolution) and it becomes much crisper.

Gameplay - well now - this is where its at. This game FEELS like Carrier Command did back in the day, with a great look and lots more flexibility.
All islands have some defences, and you have to tackle each island with forethought to crack it. Your choices are "hack" it or destroy the command center and build anew - just like the original. However, to hack it you have to recon the island, find the various firewalls and take them out, or else the hack takes longer (which exposes your Walrus to greater fire - thus more likely to be destroyed before the hack completes). Want to just take out the Command Center? I remember in the original, a fully loaded A2A Manta could hit the CC with every missile, then kamikaze in and take out the CC. Nice trade at the time. Not so here. The CC is shielded - and yes - just like firewalls, you have to take out the shield generators if you want some decent chance to make the CC go boom. Ground units now fire at you (and you can fire from your Walrus at enemy Manta's), close air support is a necessary task unless you want to try and send your units in under AI control. Combat is basically a major step up, it takes some thinking, but only to minimize losses. I expect the tactical AI will mature some.

About the AI... it is a work in progress.... Tactically its a bit careless with its units right now. When it gets replacements (yes, until the CC is down it does get some replacements) - it throws them at you immediately - basically a hull and machine gun - no armor because the AI feels it HAS to stop you and doesn't take the time to properly equip its units. Yes - changing loadouts on a hull takes time. Static defenses are done well. mobile units tend to be used in semi-random ways. I can't seem to figure out how the AI decides to counter certain things - one time its a Manta doing CAS, others its a single walrus trying to get me in range of static defences, and others its 5 units coming over a hill or in the air or both to take me out.....

Strategically the AI does need some work. It seems to use a somewhat random choice for what island should be what type. Where common sense says "choke point" - it might put a factory instead of a defensive island. Things like that. I am fairly sure that is also being worked on. I have seen the AI attack islands where it has little reason to do so, because the island would not connect to its chain, nor would it break mine.

Defensive islands not only are tougher, but they actually help "connected" islands with their defenses - supposedly. Haven't been able to prove that yet. If so, its a nice touch. One great thing is that the island types can be changed remotely now. It takes time, but if you have a larger map that will come in great usefulness. A lot of the "I wish I could" from the original are now available in this game. That means a lot to gamers like me.

I have personally not encountered any hangs or crashes. Others have. Its still beta to be sure, but it doesn't FEEL like one most of the time, so it feels closer to an RC.

One final note. I sprang for the base purchase. The "upgraded" version only includes a soundtrack thing from the game and some other minor stuff... I am one who always turns off the music in a game - its a distraction. Suprisingly, I didn't with this game - and won't. The musical score is hauntingly beautiful, is tempo'd with the game, and just amazing. I am looking to upgrade my purchase if possible for the soundtrack - its that good.

A BIS game using the Arma engine that doesn't get trashed around for being insanely buggy? :DL

Now that's something...

Ok I couldn't resist I bought it... so far it is EXTREMELY hard. Not to say complicated or hard to understand I know what to do and where to go... but the units are very fragile and once your down a manta or two its like game over because resupply takes a LONG TIME and by then I've generally got no choice but to retreat to my stock pile island.

Also Carrier vs Carrier is just all out chaos and you NEVER win. You can't really control or direct anything while this battle royal is going on other then a single unit. (if you try to direct everyone they just sit there and die. and if you control the carrier NONE of the guns will fire at the other carrier.) so its pretty obvious you need to be in something else which means you have little effect on the actual battle as the enemy carrier shreds you with its massive weaponry.

The secondary guns do little damage - only the plasma is worth using against the carrier.

Against islands, your best friend in the demo is rockets - 3-5 rockets take out almost any target building. Add in they are good against airpads, etc - and you can use hit and run tactics to great advantage.

Use your carrier - put it in close to an area and watch it it knock enemy manta's out of the sky.

Going back 25 years I recall that this was exactly my description of the original program. :D

I wish they would implement two playing modes, one dedicated to the original as close as possible for those hardcore players wanting it to be like in the good ol' times, and an improved mode where the AI does assist to run several units simultaneously and to give the carrier an autonomous battle mode, at least partially.

I NEVER have won the game won 25 years ago, and never was able to defeat the enemy carrier. The game was great due to its design, not due to its balancing.

Skybird,

In this rendition you can do both - you can launch multiple units and have the attack, you can launch one and drive it yoursellf. You can set the carrier to passive (I think) or you can let it chew up anything that comes near, etc.

The AI is designed with some flexibility in mind it seems.

Yes the carrier will automatically devour anything that comes at it, IF your not actually steering it.

So like I said you essentially have to NOT control the carrier and instead pilot a walrus or Manta during a carrier fight which amounts to throwing stones at a steel giant armed to the teeth.

The ai is atleast somewhat competent although to be honest I hope it is improved on quite abit before actual release version. My walrus team always gets stuck in a ravine or on a wall. Also my mantas always bump into eachother unless I fly lead myself and have 3 wingmen in formation.

I've beaten the original several times. The trick I used to defeat the enemy carrier was to stay out of range and send suicide walruses armed with missiles, which would spam missile fire and ram the carrier (to figure out how to do the most damage vs a carrier I experimented using all the weapons on my own carrier). There was also an exploit where you could get unlimited equipment as well.

One thing I don't like about the new version now is that the surrounding sea away from the islands seem to be a dead area where you can't launch anything or attack from a distance. One of my main strategies in the original was to keep my carrier out at a distance and use mantas for recon and early assaults. I also don't like that you can't launch mantas while moving, and the UI is giving me trouble (in some ways i think the original's ui is better).

not launching while moving is dumb... real aircraft carriers do it all the time.

The walrus idea sounds good on paper but I'm pretty sure the defense drones would slaughter you... as they basically just latch onto your walrus and explode like a mine = insta-death.

Also it appears the AI rage quits anyways everytime I lose the game runs fine but when I have the upper hand and am about to win the game crashes.

It did work really well in the original, but i doubt it would work in the new version. But at least in this new version your units are AI controllable and can fight on their own

Actually, I have yet to see the enemy carrier deploy drones so far...

If you get under the guns, via walrus or aircraft, you can attack the enemy carrier with impunity - and it can do the same to you. The guns on the carriers cannot depress below the horizon. This has been listed as a bug. Also will allow the guns to be used for shore bombardment more.

Launching at speed should be allowed, but not recovery.

Oh, and the enemy carrier should not be able to go almost as fast as a manta either.... I found it once, some distance away, launched with a laser and started shooting its engines - it turned and RAN - over 150 on speed. The player's carrier is limited to less than half that. Not cool.

Strange because the enemy carrier ALWAYS has its drones out when I attack it. It always charges straight at me like we are playing chicken.

The easiest way to defeat it is simply to control your own plasma cannon and blast the enemies until its gone, once it is he is basically toothless.

This of course is a game of luck as if you lose your plasma cannon your dead.

Anyways he ALWAYS has his drones out and if I launch my walrus two of them are instantly killed as he has only two I suppose and they don't replenish or atleast not that I have seen.

Well there is no doubt that the enemy carrier AI is wonky - but considering its beta status, I am ok with that. Patch fixeses will be ongoing for a while as we get closer to release.

I am seeing a performance bug that I can repeat but don't know if anyone else is seeing it. After playing a while, the map screen (and menu screens) get laggy. First person screens show no lag.

I am running 8G of memory, and the game loads and takes about 1.2G - I tried turning up the priority on carrier.exe to high - that helped - but 5 minutes later it was back again. Mem usage was up a little, but not significantly. If I exit entirely and restart the game it works fine.

Thing is, this happens within 10 minutes of play time - every time. Either of you guys seen this?