Ugh. The last thing that would improve GSB is turning it into freaking plants vs zombies. A better solution would be a fully fleshed out (and optional) tutorial to walk the new players through the game, since the popup tips obviously aren’t working.
I hope that wasn’t a negative comment about plants VS zombies…
If this game becomes half as accessible and fun as that game then it will be selling millions.
Whatever you think about the game you can’t fault what it does.
Seconded – a good example of unlocking things at a reasonable speed is Defense Grid. First level = very minimal selection of stuff, second one you get another couple of towers which are significantly different from the basic ones, and by the fourth or fifth mission you’ve got everything unlocked, but have had a chance to find out about each new thing as you go. There’s then a whole bunch more missions which require different strategies to beat, but by that time I have a vague idea of what sorts of strategy are available to me.
As it is with GSB, I already get a lot of weapons right from the start – and because the first round of missions are beatable without needing to do anything other than pick different combinations of ‘tutorial fighter’ / ‘tutorial cruiser’ / etc, I haven’t had any need to deal with ship design, orders, range / priority / fleet positioning. So when it does come to the battles that I’ll lose, I don’t know which of the numerous possible options are the ones to try first.
I agree with this too. I also found that there were way too many options the first go around, but by the third mission, I understood what I was doing and was ready for the full meal deal. For a game with a strong story line, it makes sense to slowly build up the tech, making more powerful and varied options as the campaign progresses, but for a game that’s about gratuitous explosions, it’s nice to be gratuitous from the get-go, rather than painstakingly unlocking everything. And as far as challenges go, everything MUST be unlocked or it’s easy for people to create challenges that require top-level weapons.
For a tutorial, I suggest making about three missions. In the first mission, let the player use a single ship which they design themselves. Give them a limited set of weapons, engines, and other defenses, so that they can get a feel for the differences between options. For the next mission, have them design a fleet based around a few ships, though still keep the weapons limited, so that they get a feel for finding harmonies between ships. Lastly, give them everything and make a level that requires only a few, well thought-out ships. This tests their ability to find the right combos and everything, without getting into terribly large fleets.
One thing that is missing from this discussion so far is story. When you have an entertaining story where you want to find out what happens next, you tend to be less frustrated that you don’t have everything than you do that the new unlockable will help the task at hand. Example I would give are the homeworld series for instance. Especially in the first homeworld the story was a typical space opera: Underdog fights back, trials and tribulations ensue, you meet several different challenges that require new loadouts… and boom before you know it you are done and focusing on beating your pals with all the toys.
That said, homeworld and most other strategy games allow you to do multiplayer from the beginning with all available the equipment.
The problem with unlockables is you assume every player progresses at the same pace and learns the same way. They are a poor teaching tool at best. They are really more for stringing along the players who are motivated more by achievements than game play. However, when you start sacrificing your game play for unlockables, you are making your game worse. I think locking the races goes into this realm.
I agree with the people who say a tutorial is a much better player introduction tool. Particularly, I’ve found tutorials with voice-overs seem to work the best. Possibly include some basic challenge missions where you let the player experiment with what works on certain ship types.
Maybe lock everything down at the beginning (just level 1s, lasers and basic missiles) with something under options to just unlock it all so you can “cheat” your way to it all.
If everything is locked down and you basically got a new module for each battle, it would help encourage people to learn new ships and tactics every battle which would IMHO improve the game experience.
Homeworld is a superb example.
If the use of unlockables persists, I would loudly agitate in favour of truly awesome-beyond-belief gadgets to make the painful and unnecessary hassle worthwhile. I really dislike the locking paradigm. A research tree is out of the question for this game; it’s not why I’m here. Let’s not keep the candy jar on such a high shelf, please.
Alternatively, unlock nearly everything and keep the earliest missions in a firmly-bounded “trainer” mode with very limited selection of items. Outside of that, all items should be available except for as-of-yet-undreamt gratuitous awesomeness like the Point-Defense Laser Porcupine of Doom and the Frothing Graviton Vomit of Hades. 
How about having a series of fleets to fight that introduce new gear (that you have to learn to counter) and then as “salvage” you get their gear?
ooooh that is quite a cunning idea, especially if only a very specific, difficult ship to detsroy drops the loot 