Bay 12 Games Forum

I know it might be a way off, but one thing I'd like to see is research branches that close off other branches (or similar lasting decisions). So that if you go down on path, you can't go down another that game.
I've always felt these sort of choices add tons of replay-ability, and add a lot of character to your games as you've made a decision and helped shaped the future of your colony, rather than just unlocking everything each game.

I'm not sure how the best way to implement that lore wise would be, but I'd love to see it. I'd also like to see a 4x style research tree, with large branches that govern all aspects of colony life - I feel many RTS/strategy games shy away from proper research trees, and I feel it adds great depth.

Just some thoughts, but most of all, great work!

I hate to jump in on page 29 and say this, but uh, I thought it was going to be bad and hypebait, and it looks like it is. I saw a video of the driving, and good god... how are you supposed to take a game like this seriously when it's that easy to just smash your way through things with no consequences, finesse, skill, or depth whatsoever? Wasn't this supposed to be like, a stealth game?

Yeah, the more I play the more I get disillusioned with it. Most missions can be dealt with a lot more easily by just buying the best weapon you can and blasting everyone. Sticking to a stealth route is often more fun (using the environment to get kills/distract IS fun) but it just seems pointless when you can just overpower everyone with machine guns.

It's the kind of game that could have been modded into something beautiful (stealth made important, driving fixed, no 'big' guns etc.) but at the moment it's just GTA with a bit more environment use and a bit of stealth (and ubi would never open it up to modding).

If Driving was overhauled in a future patch/made less arcadey it'd improve it a lot - a controller might help, but it's still not a great experience.

It is a subjective issue, and I can certainly understand why people enjoy a more stripped down version - I just personally don't.
I agree that a lot of the mechanics aren't wonderful - hunger and item destruction definitely could have done with work - what annoys me though is how rapidly this is happening without mechanics to take the place of the ones taken out.

Playing the game now, I have a lot less to worry about (worry = enjoy in the dwarven sense) and so it's diminished my enjoyment. I believe a happy balance can be made, but it seems as though DCSS has gotten someone at the helm now who is rigorously pushing it in one direction without the balance from the 'other side'. I don't begrudge them this - some direction is better than none - but I just personally dislike it.

Why are we arguing again?

because of things like (from the dcss site):

• The special diets of centaurs (fast metabolism 1, herbivorous 1) and halflings (slow metabolism 1) have been removed.
• Vampires always get the full effect of all potions, can always mutate, and always get the full effect of all mutations.
• Corrosion affects all of your equipment, but only temporarily.
• Nemelex now only gifts decks of war and escape.

All these changes do is homogenize stuff and reduce functions for no other reason than that they take a bit of thought to play with. I enjoy that extra challenge of working with the fast yet vegetarian diet of centaurs, but now they just play exactly like a fast high elf. I don't find that fun at all.

 

Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion is great for a long, long LAN session and can fit up to 6 comfortably (I'm sure you can go higher, but above that and apparently it just grinds to a halt mid/late game). I've played it on a good laptop (i5 but integrated graphics) and it did alright, I'm sure older laptops could hack it with everything turned way down and on low res.
However, everyone really needs to know what they're doing before you start as it's got a moderate learning curve and it's way too much effort to try to teach/help people on the day.

Other than that, Artemis bridge simulator is fun for 5, although someone will probably have to do something a bit boring (comms). It's incredibly nerdy and not as particularly deep/complex as it could be (and lacking polish) but it's one of the few games where everyone can work closely together as one unit. There are tons of missions to choose from, but to get the most of it you really have to do the whole 'RP star trek' thing.

Wargame: Airland/Red dragon (airland for older comps) is good, but the learning curve is ridiculously steep and I think only the most hardcore of LAN parties would be able to deal with it. I've really tried to love it, but it's just way to difficult/complex and I always end up going back to World in Conflict (it's more user friendly cousin) as it's just so punishingly hard.

It's clear that Stone Soup's philosophy is completely opposed to whatever you want it to be, so in that case I'd suggest you just play one of the many roguelikes that have all these mechanics left in.

But it wasn't always this way. DCSS has always been about being a lean RL with none of the nethack style obfuscation and weirdness. That doesn't mean that it needs to turn into a tab+o-fest, and I believe that up until recently there was no where near the zeal in mechanic and content removal.

All I'm wanting to see is a little more thought put into improving mechanics rather than 'no this is frustrating, we must ditch it'. I'm really not one for holding back development by not taking chances, but I don't see removal of mechanics which have kept a game going strong for many, many years being a good idea.

Most people enjoy DCSS for it's tactical and strategic complexity, and I don't see any of the recent changes furthering those aspects.

I've done a lot of work with actual cybercriminals (not in collusion with, I might add) and it's amazing how many go painfully out of their way to pretend they're in some sort of 90's cyberpunk movie.

I buckled and got watch dogs even though I said I wouldn't. Any tips to make it more fun from the start (path ways/choices to choose, settings etc.)? Nothing too spoiler-y if you can help it though!

I'm not a huge fan of crowd funding campaigns, although I have supported them in the past and certainly would support this. If you did, I'd recommend asking for a smaller amount and having very concrete plans of what you're using the money for - these always seem to be the best received campaigns and it stops people feeling as though they might not be getting anything at the end of it.

My main problem with crowd funding in this instance is that you've said that you can afford to fund it yourself, and I'm not sure if people would be willing to pay for improvements (like sprites and stuff) when they don't know how good the base game is going to be. Maybe putting together a demo first would be best, and then showing exactly what you want to do afterwards.