Souls games have optional target lock and in action games you design your camera around the way people play, you don't design combat around your camera, speaking as a game dev myself.
In the souls games most encounters have multiple opponents, and target locked camera works just fine. You only swing your weapon at one person at a time after all. If you have one of said games, you'll know that turning target lock off can be useful, but most of the time it is useful because you can always know that you are at least facing in the right direction, and you don't need to abstract in your head where your character will move.
I guarantee you the primary negative feedback everyone will have with this game is in the camera and the controls, just having a target lock system will allow people to play the way they want to play for the game they paid for. I think it should be included if anything for user-testing purposes, until then all the people who like this system are defending it and people like myself are contesting the rigidity from devs and the community.
There is a seeming unwillingness to test variants of the controls and camera system, or to let variants co-exist with what's there already, and I think that's a shame. Until it's been tried, it's just conjecture and assumption on the behalf of all of us (if it's been tried and failed already I take that back!)
*Rolls sword arm "time for some troll slaying".
Dear Mr. "Dev"
Ok let me address all your issues for you so it doesn't distract the devs from making an awesome game.
Like you said, in
Souls games, & in
3rd person action games. The souls series uses the genre defined third person action camera that is always stuck behind the player, Exanima is not a 3rd person action adventure. Maybe its because they added the space-button to move the camera behind the player, if they didnt people wouldnt complain that they cant use it. Maybe thats why other isometric RPG like Pillars use a fixed top down camera, and so no one cries "you need new camera and controls". Give them full rotation of camera and they want to stick it to your @$$.
The team at Bare Mettle have evolved the normal point and click gameplay of
ALL other isometric rpgs(I dare you to name 1 that doesn't use pre-canned moves) into a hybrid of isometric rpg and 3rd person adventure. They have made possible the dynamic action of a 3rd person adventure game in a more complex isometric RPG. What you are doing wrong is trying to play an isometric-rpg like a 3rd person adventure.
I have played this game since the beginning of April and I can say I am fully comfortable with the control scheme. I do not use space-bar at all, its true purpose which is what I use it for is in the dungeon in a narrow corridor where I would like to see down the corridor, and even at that I use the middle-mouse button most of the time to do quick iterations; I can fight with the camera in
any angle. You must first stop trying to make the game like you want it to play, they have already tested what you suggest and thrown it out the window as it
limits the new hybrid system.
Target lock is even worse, it is a handicap because todays shallow gamers cannot aim by themselves. It is also used because games want to make giant monsters and because their * camera system is limited so they use auto-lock to make it easier and for the combat to be more fluid. Try fighting in shadow of mordor but try to imagine the game without auto-lock, you wont see many enemies who are off-screen or at certain angles from you. The isometric camera solves this problem by allowing you to see all around you. The mouse cursor further improves this by acting as a
dynamic target-lock. So guess what there is target-lock of sorts, you simply don't know how to use it and vent because it doesnt work like your old toy; Your character always faces where your cursor is pointing relative to where your character is, imagine the cursor is where your characters eyes are looking, he even turns his bloody head to where the cursor is!!! what you are looking for is for him to be locked-on cuz u cant aim!!!
The movement controls are very simple, just simply not locked to the camera like most games. The controls
don't change depending where you are facing.
Combat Mode
W - Step Forward
S - Step Back
A - Strafe Left
D - Strafe Right
Exploration Mode *(note right mouse button is what you should be using for exploration mode, only use wasd in certain situations like if you would like to walk through a door and close it without stopping)
W - Step Forward
S - Step Back
A - Turn Left
D - Turn Right
What confuses you (you poor soul) is instead of the camera following your back, when you facing down,the controls become inverted to the camera, but that is a problem only because you are thinking of controls relative to the camera. I will be gentle about this because it was awkward at first but then when you actively think A will always move my character left, W forward..... actively stop thinking of it relative to the camera and before you know it it becomes natural, but without actively trying to unlearn bad habits, you will always have problems.
Also, anyone that paid for this game paid for a game that the
DEVs advertised and pitched, they arent our personal game-making monkeys. You dont go to a store buy a pair of timberland boots, then go back and tell them they should remake it with memory foam inside because adidas did it like that. Y U BUY? No youtube? cant read the descrptions and what the devs have said? Stop calling the devs and community rigid cuz we can see the awesomeness and evolution of gaming and you are simply stuck in your ways and want the same games like yesterday, but with Bare Mettles shiny physics, sry go ask Souls to make physics.
Everything you have complained about and said, all point to making the game easier because you are trying to make it play like what it is not. This is where your failure and frustration stem from. I will tell you something as a gamer since asteroids and atari. I have touched on game development, I studied games media in college, there is no game I cannot finish, if I stop playing its cuz I lose interest. I do not find games hard, on the contrary instead I mod it till the game cant run *cry skyrim. Ramping up the difficulty is stupid cuz all it does is increase stats to make it harder not smarter. Most of todays games are fast-food games, made fast by regurgitating what has already been done. COD 1 plays the same way as COD5, there are no new control schemes, its just changing clothes and some shiny new accessories. Most games only look better with a different story and theme but play almost identically. It seems society will forever not understand evolution till a generation later. I will post one of my favourite quotes
"The problem about smart mother******s, is they always sound like crazy mother******s to dumb mother******s"
The devs have said it many a time, Exanima is totally different, if you are not ready to step out of your box, or be ready to learn something new thats is...yes you guessed it, more complicated and advanced and even more precise than what you are used to then pls do not ruin it for others by asking them to dumb-it down.