I like bootstrapping bases, so campaigns are fun for me. And yes, I had fun!
My experience:
- I felt that the biters became extremely aggressive at endgame, but this is okay if difficulty is dynamic and properly scaled.
- I accidentally "skipped" the objectives asking to build circuits, ammo, and red science packs at some rate/minute. I already automated these, so the objectives cleared within a minute of appearing. This may have prevented me from stockpiling sufficient ammo before the onslaught began?
- My biggest mistakes were to not scale ammunition production and not automate ammunition feeding. I did not anticipate that many biters, and my turrets exhausted their supply very quick. I completed the scenario as my iron drills were being wiped out, so that would have been the end.
- The acceleration in biter quantity was very sharp. I felt that I did not have time to react.
- It is difficult to place items without the quickbar. Maybe I'm rusty, but I forgot that I could left-click a building, press E to close my inventory, and then left-click to place it. I was trying to place a building with my inventory still open.
- The temporary buildings (feeders, assemblers, etc) are weird in the way they change from "working and assisting the player" to "suddenly gone". Especially if a player investigates the feeder/assembler and takes a note of its function and purpose, but is forced to relearn the concept later.
- Compilatron rushing in to explain might already be a sufficent solution. The player will eventually figure it out.
- Pausing the game, focusing the player's camera on the feeder, and then exploding the feeder (fabricate a reason for this) might make it even more obvious.
- I felt that building the generators for electricity was not explained at all, but perhaps Compilatron would have helped me if I waited longer?
- The intro campaign is definitely headed in the right direction. I prefer the biter defense to the combat section in the old campaign (destroying the biter base was rather difficult back then).
- I think adding a second coal patch would make belt routing nicer. Perhaps in the northeast of the base near the copper. Without underground belts, it can be hard to make an organized base... can't cross belts!. However, I strongly agree with forbidding underground belts for reduced complexity.
- Do new players understand that More Labs = Faster research?