HVS Reply to Corn's E-mail

I can't believe they replied so quickly

My e-mail to High Voltage:

I've been following The Conduit ever since the first trailer was shown at IGN. I love what you guys have been doing with the game, and I really think it could turn out to be something special.

Although this game looks phenomenal, I'm slightly concerned with how the grenades work. They seem like they're enjoyable to use, but it's possible they could end up being overpowered. The fact that the grenades go exactly where the reticule is pointed might turn out to be a problem, especially in the competitive space (clan wars, etc.).

I know you guys are not going to have any patches or updates for this game (maybe the sequel?), so this issue has to be addressed before the game comes out. How have the grenades been in your gameplay tests, and are you guys taking the precautions to make them balanced?

Thanks a lot for your time.

PS: Keep doing what you're doing. I know I'm excited to pick up the game come June 23.

High Voltage's reply, which took only about 12 hours:

Hi Rob,

Thanks for the email and for the support - we agree with you and feel we have something special on our hands...and can't wait to get The Conduit out into the world. We're very, very close!

In regards to your question, know that we spent a lot of time on our grenades, and think that we have a great system in having the grenades travel directly to the reticule and calculating the arc on its own. Grenades so often feel imprecise in games - or where they do give you a lot of precision, they're slower to deploy and are a much more deliberate weapon. While I suppose that the argument can be made that these are intentional decisions, the end result in my experience typically seems to be that players either simply stop using them, or that they become a secondary option. In The Conduit, we spent a lot of time making sure that grenades are very functional, and that each of the three types has a distinct usage. We wanted them to stand alongside our melee attack and ranged weapon attacks as a very viable option.

In regards to balancing, we spent a very long time on them, and from internal and external feedback, they've been extremely well received. They're not one-hit kills, have a relatively small blast radius, and aren't, I feel, cheap or overpowered. They're very accurate (provided you have a steady pointer hand ) and we've intentionally made them pretty central to gameplay. I think the best comparison to our grenades would be their implementation in Halo. You'll throw a lot of them...and have fun doing it. There's nothing quite as satisfying as banking a frag around a corner and getting a kill.

I hope I've addressed some of your concerns - I fully understand where you're coming from - but I'm pretty confident that you'll be pleased once you get your hands on the game. Please drop me a line once you've spent some time with our grenades and let me know what you think.

Thanks for the email!

Cheers,
Josh Olson
Producer
High Voltage Software


I love High Voltage.

Wow I am totally impressed with their feedback. I didn't get a reply but yours seems to answer mine as well. That is truly amazing that they replied and didn't make it a generic message. THAT right there is customer service!

A producer actually replied with a non automatic message, they really are going the distance for the fans, that is postively amazing. If the team is willing to do that much for the fansm then the Conduit is going be something special indeed. If I hard gotten that reply, I'd send a thank you message back for adressing the problem in such a quick fashion and with such detail.



I'M BUYING THIS!

I just now got my response. He answered all of my questions. This makes me love HVS even more.

Quote :

I was watching some videos for your soon to be released game "The Conduit" and I have a question concerning one of the weapons. I noticed that some of the grenades in the game seem to be thrown very fast and somewhat accurate. Though this is nice when playing against people, I was wondering if this is the same for all of the grenades. Is there other grenades that perhaps arc more when you throw them or do less damage. If you could answer these questions, I'd very much appreciate it
I look forward to purchasing The Conduit and supporting SEGA in the future.

There response

Quote :

Hi Nick,



Thanks for the email! Sorry for the late response but we’ve been a bit busy over here. J



I'm not sure what videos you were watching, but there is a delay when throwing grenades. You can’t spam throw them like crazy. What I think is unique about our grenades is that you don’t have to calculate the arc – you point where you want it to land and throw one (with a flick of the nunchuk in the default control scheme – though you can remap it if you want as well) and it will calculate the arc. You can get very accurate with them, and frags in particular are cool because they explode on the 2nd bounce, making them great for banking around corners. Along with the melee attack and the weapons, grenades are the third leg of our “combat stool” and we spent a lot of time on them to make sure they feel great. I’m confident that you’ll agree,



There are three grenade types in the game – the standard frag (at full health, you’ll need two grenades to kill someone, similar to Halo), the Drudge radiation grenade (which does damage over time and stick to whatever it hits), and the Trust flash grenade (which blinds the player and disrupts the radar in multiplayer games).



I hope I answered your questions – be sure to drop me a line after you’ve picked up the game and let me know what you think! We’re always looking for feedback – both what you liked and what you didn’t – so we can continue to get better!



Cheers,

Josh Olson

Producer

High Voltage Software