One of the most interesting things about

the new wave of space games is how they

are finally solving a major design

problem. But that's something we've all

experienced with many of the recent

games. Many of them promise a complex

game and you get fast distances, massive

scale, sensors and fleets, as well as

the fancy of course of commanding

warships. But when combat actually

begins, much of that complexity falls

away. For example, the ships might enter

range, weapons can activate, and you see

numbers start dropping. what should feel

like a tense battle, a tense encounter

becomes something much closer to, well,

a numbers driven game. Now, what makes

the latest Fallen Frontier combat update

so interesting is that it seems to be

moving away from exactly that problem.

So, most recently, the developers put

out a new update onto Steam about

Falling Frontier where they spoke in

depth about combat. And it seems that

combat's not going to begin with just

firing solutions or even with visual

contact. It begins with an element of

uncertainty, and I think that's a very

good start. I think that's pretty much

what we'd expect from games centered on

war. So, this works by at long range.

You may not fully know what you're

looking at. It's not necessarily an

enemy ship that's clearly in sight, and

instead you see contacts in the battle

space in the environment around you.

These signals might be incomplete,

incomplete returns on your radar. In

other words, partial information. But

this will gradually turn from ambiguity

into short knowledge. And that perhaps

more than anything else immediately

changes the nature of how you engage

with combat. So there's a lot to talk

about here. And in fact, Falling

Frontier is a highly anticipated game. I

know a lot of people cannot wait to see

this. So the more information we get

about it, the better. And it's good to

see that it is making progress. Also, if

you happen to enjoy videos like this and

you haven't done so already, please do

consider to subscribe in. Now, according

to the developer, Falling Frontiers,

Combat has indeed received some

substantial attention, and it shifted

away from what could perhaps be

considered a bit of an arcade style of

model towards something that's far more

simulated. So, to start with, there's a

lot of cosmetic elements to the combat

here. They got a lot of explosions, many

bits of ships falling apart and breaking

away and uh yeah, physical firing of all

the weapons, but all of that is just

cosmetic. There's also a lot of elements

in combat that are now structured or

structural. So, combat has been

described now as unfolding across four

distinct phases and all of these happen

in real time. And that means then rather

than just having a flat exchange, a flat

exchange of damage in your combat, the

battle overall starts to evolve. It's an

evolving encounter and one which with

each stage ultimately affects the next.

And with encounters working in such a

way, you might well expect that the

first phase will matter a huge amount.

And yes, it indeed does. So the opening

stage, the first phase is information

acquisition. And it's here that the

enemy may be active somewhere in the

area of operations where you're actually

engaged, but they're not necessarily yet

entirely invisible. They're not

necessarily visible in the game world

environment around you. Instead, you can

see objects outside of visual range, but

still within the navigational p plane

that are presented as LAR contacts, and

as they move closer, they start becoming

clearer until eventually you, as a

player, can properly identify what

you're seeing. Now, that might sound

like somewhat of a small detail, but it

does actually in fact change the tone of

combat and in quite an immediate way.

And that's because when a battle begins

with these uncertain contexts, rather

than having the perfect information,

what happens is quite interesting

because you're not just simply reacting.

Instead, you're having to interpret and

you're trying to understand what is even

out there, what state it might be in,

and how the battle space around you is

starting to take shape. And that's

something that's quite apparent in the

footage. And recognition itself

ultimately becomes part of the

engagement. I feel that this is where

Fallen Frontier really does start to

separate itself from the more uh shall

we say, conventional strategy combat

games out there. Now once you know what

you're facing, this is where the second

phase begins. And this is the missile

phase. So missiles, rockets, and

vertical launch systems, all of these

dominate the engagement. And really, the

purpose is simply to trade. Well,

actually, it's not about trading damage

at distance. There's a clear objective

here, and it's to break something

important before the enemy can reach

you. In short, don't view this part of

the combat as necessarily destroying the

enemy, but you want to degrade their

capabilities before they get into full

range. And as you might imagine, this

really changes the concept from being

hitting at the maximum amount of damage

possible, moved away from the idea of

these max numbers and instead trying to

get a few decisive hits onto the ship

and ultimately crippling a few of its

vital systems. So really, this is all

about shaping the rest of the battle. In

the footage, we get to see how a frigot

hides behind one of the asteroids whilst

painting and damaging another enemy. And

yes, some of those missiles actually

hit, but others are drawn away by decoy.

Others still are confused by the

asteroids in the area of operations, and

those ones fail to reach the target. So,

this is a really nice level of detail to

a game like this. And it also means that

the environment plays an important

factor in how the combat unfolds from

there. engagement moves on to mid-range

warfare, and it seems to be where the

combat system really begins to open up.

So, by this point, you know more about

the battle sphere. You know exactly,

well, you know pretty much exactly

what's going on, and you know about the

enemy's composition, you know what sort

of ship they've got, what weapons it's

got, perhaps a bit about the electronic

warfare or the defenses. In other words,

you really understand the shape of the

combat that you're getting into. And so,

this is where maneuvering starts to

become central. So ships in a falling

frontier at this point are now moving in

response to what could be considered the

developing tactical picture. In fact the

developer notes here they actually

mention that this phase is often where a

second major cell of uh weapons can be

launched and assuming the ship still has

that capability even because that may

have been knocked out. It's also a case

where people will make tactical

decisions such as remaining near

asteroid clusters to benefit from their

cover. maybe perhaps by confusing the

enemy missiles. It's also the point

where the main battle guns start to come

online and these are not necessarily

presented as perfectly accurate weapons

except I guess in the case of rail guns,

but they also add a new kind of pressure

to the fight. Now, at mid-range, combat

becomes less of a one-on-one activity.

And it's no longer just about the

longrange missile exchanges. Instead,

it's getting very close and very

dangerous here because the guns really

come to bear and that means maneuver and

cover start to play quite a big part as

well as do the support systems of your

ship. All of this needs to work

together. You go through this process

for quite a bit. Obviously, taking shots

and navigating and taking tactical

decisions until eventually you get to

the fourth and final phase, which is

described as looking at death in the

eye. And this is a close-range combat as

close as you're going to get. And this

is where broadsides come into play. So,

the ships here, they attempt to maneuver

into the blind spots of their opponents.

But even here, the game is attempting to

retain some sort of complexity. For

example, another vessel may already be

moved into position that covers exactly

the angle you're trying to attack. In

other words, the implication here seems

to be that close-range combat is not

just about having a neat jewel. It's

something more than that because it's

still part of the wider fleet

engagement. Because whilst all of these

different phases are going on, of

course, you're still a part of another

fleet and there's still other enemy

ships as well as friendly ships out

there. and some up might well be in

range. So yeah, it's pretty clear that

the developers have put a lot of time

and attention into how exactly your

battles are going to play out. Lot of

different dynamics going on here and

when you factor in that you can have

different modules on your ship. So maybe

you've got no electronic warfare for

example. Yeah, you can see how that

might play out. You're going to have to

make different tactical decisions. Let

me know your thoughts and feelings on

this update, this new information in the

comments section below. Thanks for

watching this video all the way through.

There is another one on the screen right

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