This is one of the reasons I think we need something to mark the weapon spawn points even when they're currently waiting on respawn.
That's a pretty cool idea and would definitely be helpful for new players. (to e.g. show a ghost of a weapon ring when it's not there, and make it solid once it's respawned.) It'd be helpful to them and also mostly unintrusive to skilled players.
But I think explained myself badly, I don't think memorisation was the main problem for me as a skilled player, so I'm gonna reword this (I suck at explaining stuff, hence my lack of forum posts Internet-wide =P).
What I meant was that, more importantly, it was difficult to prioritise picking them up in the chaos of battle (so their locations are more out-of-your-mind most of the time). When you're half battling and half trying to equip yourself, deciding which weapon ring to go for is really difficult especially when you have no clue which of the 7+ weapons have spawned.
Actually, to expand on that further, in 2.0+ it's just harder to casually pick up a weapon while fighting. In 1.09.4, the cool thing was that picking up weapons just went with the flow; if you were fighting and you knew one was close by, you could pick it up without even taking your eyes off your opponent, and use it against them instantly. It was fun and fluid; I think this might be along the lines of what Ritz was explaining.
While this isn't fully in effect, you'll notice a lot of the 2.X stages intentionally have gimmicks instead of restricting weapon selection, such as Tidal Palace's tide mechanic or Infernal Cavern's hazards. Even the stages without such gimmicks intentionally mess with the variables somewhat, which causes some weapons to be better than others in different stages. Noxious Factory has a lot of rings and Desolate Twilight has very few. Some levels are cramped and bounce is really effective, and some aren't. The main purpose is to give players access to everything, but make the value of things differ based on the level. While this is a little bit more complicated than the previous system in how it provides variety, it provides a lot more depth.
I know I'm gonna convey this badly and I'm sorry if this is unconstructive criticism, but at least in my ring of players (most players on the M.S back in the day), I didn't know *anyone* who liked Inferno Cavern. Tidal Palace was okay, but had similar criticisms.
Traversal is really important, and fun. Traversal in SRB2 is cool because there can be more than one way to get somewhere--e.g. monitor-bouncing, precision platforming, taking the safe route, or the slow risky moving platform, going upside-down, all of that. Players like that stuff because they're in full control (minus maybe the moving platform, which was often one of the least fun routes to take). Not only that, but the more fun options in that list will make them look and feel like a fast, awesome, skilled, or incredibly lucky player. Risky jumps and monitor bouncing FTW!
But Inferno Cavern isn't like that. Traversing that level just means getting somewhere without getting hit by some lava flow, dancing flames, etc. You're fighting the level, instead of the other players. It's no fun and I hope I'm not alone here in thinking this. We don't want to be getting hit by the level, we want to be getting hit by the other players at most. The only time we deserve to be hit by the level is if we make a deliberate, choice-driven, risky move--and we mess up.
I'm not saying hazards are terrible in every case, but I am saying it distracts from the actual combat, and also that the player wants the choice. Hazards can work, but if there is a level which has one 'safe route' (but with more players likely to shoot you), and one 'hazard route' (one that takes skill to get through, but will probably have less opponents except for those determined to stop you), that level would be infinitely more fun than a level that is filled with hazards everywhere.
With Tidal Palace though, it's interesting. The lack of choice in when the water rises and stuff is annoying--and needing to get bubbles, or go to the one single area that's above water just to survive is a little annoying as well--but the level doesn't distract from the actual match as much. In fact, if two players have elemental shields, it's sometimes fun to fight them in underwater slow-mo and see who wins! So I have a mixed opinion on that level, I think other people do too; most people prefer the usual fast-paced combat, but Tidal Palace really isn't that bad as a unique level in the rotation.
Mystic said:
The problem with the combos [...]
I know this wasn't addressed to me but I was thinking, if the combos were theoretically limited to two maximum (there are ways to manage the problem of letting the player choose which ones to have, I'm sure of it), couldn't each combo be made into something that is effectively a unique weapon, but has balanced properties of the two weapons grabbed?
e.g. Scatter+Rail would act like a shotgun, spreading in a cone shape with maybe a 30-degree angle each way, but its range would be reduced to a few metres, or perhaps it'd keep its range but only fire a few scattered shots.
Automatic+Rail would act like a Rail Ring with just twice the refire rate, or something similarly balanced-but-not-entirely-OP.
Automatic+Bomb would throw normal automatic rings, but as a bonus, every half-second you'll release a bomb ring. This way you could use it just like you'd use a normal bomb ring--fire occasionally--or you can just keep firing away your favourite Auto rings, while enjoying a small explosive benefit.
Something like that would still feel fun since you can gain a little more power by collecting two types of rings, although this format would probably be better suited to levels that don't necessarily have all weapon rings. There are some problems with e.g. the player wanting Automatic to purely make them shoot super-rapidly (doesn't work well with the old Auto+Bomb), but for that the player could simply avoid picking them up.
Also, re: the Homing Ring, couldn't that theoretically be changed so that it flies at a higher speed, and changes trajectory more slowly? Sure, more skilled players might not want to pick that up because it doesn't hit as reliably as their own aim, but that's okay too--it's a weapon that newbies could use, since the ring's aim would still be better than their own.
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Sorry for the long post again, I've had thoughts about this stuff for a long time... and I really liked this game and really miss it. =P