M.A.S.S. Builder – WIP: PvP Tuning Design – Steam News

As we’ve shown some tuning interface last week, a lot of questions regarding how they will work has been asked. We’d like to take this opportunity to explain and answer them here so enjoy the read!

And enjoy the read, I did. I’m glad they’re keeping the multiplayer interfaces simple in terms of their function.

Ace Combat Did It

This setup is actually fairly similar to what the developers of Ace Combat 7 did. Since AC7 has its own kind of parts tuning, they decided to have a PvE version for the campaign and free missions, and a PvP offshoot for multiplayer. Of course in AC7 it’s all just parts selection; it’s all one system. Instead of separating the parts into tabs AC7 just has multiplayer parts unavailable in PvE. It’s a bit clunky to look at, but it works. There’s not likely to be any confusion there.

M.A.S.S. Builder’s Take

As for M.A.S.S. Builder’s version of this, separating it by tabs looks and will probably feel a lot cleaner in practice. Not only will it keep some familiarity and make comparisons easier like Vermillion mentioned in that post, but it also makes navigation between PvE and PvP extremely quick. Change the tab and you’ve changed modes. Convenient~

Now, M.A.S.S. Builder has an issue with progression. Basically there doesn’t feel like there is any in a lot of cases. Since you play a lot of the same levels again and again to unlock parts and nodes rather than progressing the story or something similar to get them, there’s no endgame to speak of or aim for. We’re far from full release so that likely had to be the case.

Vermillion’s probably not going to go out of their way to address that, though. They mention right there in the post that nodes will start unlocked for multiplayer so people can jump right in and be competitive as long as they put in the work of setting up their nodes.

With a game like M.A.S.S. Builder, that’s probably for the best. It personally doesn’t bother me. (though the lack of a cutscene viewer certainly does) It’s not like Ace Combat 7’s multiplayer parts progression was all that interesting. The odd player in PvP tended to be so good at flying their planes that they could give people an 1,100mph paddling regardless of what combination of plane and parts the competition were using.

As for limitations, M.A.S.S. Builder’s multiplayer mode’s going to have a limit of 4 subunits for the engine, 4 for the OS, and 5 for Architecture (tech add-ons). That sounds pretty good. I’m looking forward to trying it out.

My M.A.S.S.

I’m still working on a few designs here and there. I’m trying to make something similar to a Gelgoog J, and another unit that I’ll eventually turn into the Bronze Bullet (a mech from my WIP Frame Ops series). The road’s going to be long and arduous for both, though. I’ll post more about them at some point.