Does the game punish you for not playing it?

[hawkhill]

I haven't gotten the game yet, but I'm interested in it, with how Kojima it is.
I am aware of all the walking and inventory management, but there's one thing I heard about that I'm not a fan of.
I heard that the game still goes on in the background when you're away from the game, like Fallout Shelter.
Would that make it drain resources, and/or bad things happen to your work while you're away? If so, I'm not sure I'd enjoy it.
I don't like games that punish you for going outside instead of spending all your time playing games.

[lieutenantkirtar]

Nothing eats your resources while the game is off. And as near as I can tell nothing bad happens while the game is off. The constantly on thing is that things you built can show up in other peoples games.

[ImHelping]

OP this is normally the sort of thing I am an obsessive baby over and was one of my own biggest fears for this game. But thankfully, it's not too bad unless you drop the game for days to a week at a time regularly.

The over time durability loss of structures is the ONLY form of soft "Resource loss", but proper structures are merely disabled until repaired rather than destroyed. Only things like ladders or ropes vanish entirely.

It is also VERY slow for most structures, more like a span of "Oh it's been a week and now that not popular online structure is about to turn off from rust (Until you feed it some materials/upgrade it). For most at least.


It is also, technically, easy to repair most things. You can also shove crystals into them in an emergency like if you are traveling through the mountains, forgot your PCC (item to create structures), and need to repair a power generator that has rusted through to recharge your robot legs in the middle of nowhere.

But "Just shove crystals into it" has less repair power than using the desired raw materials, but you can be a cheapskate and only repair something 1% to turn it back on if you won't need it again. And also upgrading a structure will fully repair it.

For example, one lv1 power generator I liked was about to rust through. So instead of repairing it I just shoved a single container of 400 metal into it to upgrade it to level 2. Upgraded structures also take less time to wear out.

Most structures are very easy to make it ti level 3. but the most popular one to spam in the late game is a real ballbuster.

Power generator: super easy to upgrade to level 3.
Timefall shelter (rain cover+free repair spray): ALSO super easy to make level 3.
So easy in fact, that the "worst" part is having to split the materials into two Large containers rather than a single Xtra Large barrel for each separate upgrade tier. (overkill on upgrade materials is eaten, with a warning prompt. Don't worry about it most of the time).

Ziplines: it takes two huge barrels to make level 2, and FIVE more barrels to make level 3. And chemicals are the most stingy material in the whole game to stockpile. (At times comically so. Plenty of ways to get more if you try. But rank 5 Capital Knot City for example, has a maximum capacity of chemicals of under 1,200. And it takes 240+,1440 to max a single zipline).

Endgame zipline networks are super worth it in the end, but good lord is it a real ballbuster if your game is filled only with the most worthless of "leads to nowhere now, won't lead to anywhere later" online placed ziplines you want to correct for a smooth destination loop.


It CAN be annoying, eventually. But it is in that odd area of "Merely annoying at worst unless you take a LONG break, or are taking your sweet time" which people will white knight overreact like the annoyance does not exist in the first place and point to the most popular online structures millions of people repair for you, rather than your favorite rain+power generator combo breaking down because nobody online fed into it.

Plus the vast majority of broken down structures will be things easily replaced fresh if you actually need or want them, thankfully. And only bridges, or personal underground bunkers, don't build a 100% intact structure just from your suitcase sized crafting machine.

Finally, it is at only it's most annoying if you want to rank up a bunch of stuff for cosmetics or literal stickers with the mountain region locations. If you just want to make it through the plot then you can focus on the Roboticist for max rank all terrain robot legs early on, then not give a single **** about anything in the lategame mountains except your quickest route back to the nearest main city.

Because most of the world, you'll be robot legs running or driving past even the most rusted out structures and not caring, because your personal upgrade improvements (or no longer having the minimum default rank motorcycles and trucks with garbage battery life) have made you more able to go without them.

[angmarets]

I was playing the game in the "Tuesday evening" "Thursday evening" "Whole saturday" regime, so regular gaps. Structures i built in the beginnig of the game STARTED to detoriate when I was already past the middle of the game. After they start to detoriate you have another enourmos amount of time until it's not functional and then another big amount of time until it's destroyed. The structures you build towards the end of the game are detoriating faster because of more aggresive environment but it's still not critical.

I got all of the achievements and i had to repair maybe 8 roads and upgrade 4 generators and 4 zipline posts and 1 bridge(pro gamer tip :) Never upgrade your structures immediatelly. Wait for them to start detoriate and then upgrade. That way you will both repair them and increase durability with same amount of materials. )

[MooP]

Like others said structures only decay when you play, sleeping in-game will make full day pass thus decay sooner.

[udoboy]

Structures decay whether or not you're playing, but then again, the cities also give you resources whether or not you play, to a point.
Ziplines: I've build up a zipline network in the Eastern region. it's a real bear, I'll tell you, but there are two deliveries that specifically have Chemicals: both start in Port Knot City, and you get one or 2 XL containers of chemicals as reward from the delivery. It takes 3 XL containers (480 kg each) to upgrade a zpline 2 > 3
so, every 6 hours you can upgrade one zipline.
After they are built, however, you don't need chemicals to keep them going. You can use chemicals, aloys, or as stated above chiral crystals to repair.

Finally, there are materials everywhere. Need metals? just scan and go pick up what you find. Need ceramics? go beat up some MULEs and steal their stash.

[ImHelping]

Yeah the whole reason Chemicals are a real bastard is how constrained they are compared to anything else, and the amount you can carry at once per barrel is the smallest. (Thank god next to nothing aside from zipline upgrades use it. So you don't care unless you are upgrading ziplines).

So even having a big stockpile of it across the world is a bastard to transport. Because you can only shove half as much of it into the back of a truck at a time to haul to the location closest to your zipline network.

This is why it's very tempting to just slum it with level 2 ziplines (which is also what upgrades the distance. lv3 is just a big durability buff).

Because if you want to upgrade ziplines to lv 2, you can carry enough materials to upgrade two ziplines on your back at once, (with enough room for a single medium package left in your backpack) Nice and smooth and feels like progress.

But if you want to upgrade a zipline to lv 3? hope you like backtracking back to your stockpile!

EDIT: Just to drive home the backtrackingness of chemicals vs "So that base can hold 9,999 metals max, literally. NICE"

Max rank with a location increases the max capacity of materials.

Most places still have under 1,000, or barely over 1,000, chemical capacity even at max rank...

The home base starting city at max rank for example has something like a max of 1,200 chemicals at once... And it takes 1,440 chemicals to make a zipline level 3. not including the chemicals used to make it level 2.

As such. This is why I started to shove most of my spare materials into containers at every visit. To prevent "I just delivered 3,000+ ceramics!... oh whoops the place can only hold 3,700 and it was already full" moments.

Do that and then you will REALLY be swimming in materials for a rainy day. Leave yourself with 1,000 materials (or nonstop for chemicals because there are places that have less than 600 max ranked up) for use and then shove any spare into barrels for private storage.

Then when you suddenly need 9,000+ metals for some huge project, you won't need to beat up mules or fish for missions. It will already be pre-stored across the land.

Also handy if you suddenly need to gear up like crazy. Just shove one of your spare barrels of 1,000 metals and 800 ceramics into the base and go hog wild building trucks, robot legs, three kinds of guns (Blood gun, bola gun, rubber bullets) and more.

My replay is going a LOT smoother because of this compared to PS4 launch.

[Xlackn]

tldr; no