I am going to complain about the video game.

[vladulenta]

Strap in gamers, I will proceed to now complain about this here video game. And I have pre-emptively prove my gamer cred before my complaints about this aforementioned video game get disowned on the basis of "skill issue". I just finished raising all my non-combat skills to 99. 100 days old account, 2164 skill level and 3 Signet Ring halves missed. I also spend more time on the wiki than is healthy and have just started a hardcore character. No DLCs bought.

With the preamble over, I will now proceed to complain about the video game. Children and women, please do avert your eyes.
I'll split this into two categories, technical problems, and design problems. I'll also try to bring to light issues that other people aren't talking about.
Technical problems:
There is still only one version of Melvor Idle: the browser version. The desktop and phone versions are just the browser game with a mini-browser bundled to run it. This gives rise to some pretty obvious problems when playing those versions.

• Need to be online to start the game. Which is very reasonable on a browser game. Obviously you'd be online anyway. But on a desktop or phone game it's just inconvenient. And crippling to people who can't access a stable connection. This helps anti-piracy, but making the game re-validate your purchase every 2+ weeks (like most DRM) would help just as much and the problem would be gone. Btw, you can remove your internet connection and play the browser version offline too, as long as you get past the validation phase. The truth is that this is just like this because people with no internet are considered a low priority. Because people who can't access digital data or always have stationary router nearby don't matter enough.
  
• Mods are re-downloaded every time you open the game. I've never seen a game that does this. But besides my subjective dislike of the practice, there is a real problem that arises from Melvor handling mods this way.
  
• Horrible indication of mods not working. The mod servers may not work for whatever reason. And as such, your mods won't be downloaded when you open the game. If this happens, you will not receive any warning. The only indication of this is the mod manager button on the title screen. I will bet most people don't know of it, because on both desktop and mobile version you need to scroll down to see it. It's next to the logout button. If any mods are not working, you will see a tiny exclamation mark over it. Which is great indication. Because if you don't see your mods aren't working and try to load a file:
  
• All mod data is deleted from saved file when mods not found. The game scrubs mods' saved data when it can't recognize those mods. I don't think I need to explain this in any more detail. If this happens, close the game, wait for mod manager to work and hope you have a cloud save to use instead. And talking about cloud saves:
  
• Only one Cloud save per save file. Give us more. Simple. Yes, it would double or triple the amount of data the server needs to hold, but a Melvor save file reaches at most 100 KB. Most cap out at 60. Going from about 20 GB for the cloud saves to 60 wouldn't be the end of the world. Come on, Malc. We know you can afford it.
  
• Game reloads when you press enter in the "enter custom amount" menu. Plz fix. Edit: they did. Yippie.

Need point out that because the game always needs to validate its connection on startup, there will come a point where Melvor Idle will become unplayable because the servers have shut down. Even if all the game data is literally on the local machine. Not a big problem when the game is still receiving support, but you know it will happen eventually.

Design problems:
Obviously more subjective. But I'll try to keep it on things I think most of people who play game would agree with. And I'll need more sentences to justify myself, don't bother reading everything. Seriosuly.

• 24 hour offline limit is unnecessary. It's farmville engagement garbage. Offline time bonuses are great because they're like engagement rubber bands. The longer you've forgotten about a game, the more goodies you're going to get when you get back on. Less so in Melvor than games with a single central currency like Cookie Clicker, but the point still stands. Having to try to log in once a day to not waste time is just unnecessary stress (even if it's only lategame where you would both want and have the resources to do one thing for a few days straight). Don't forget about the people who might not have internet once a day. In reality, I know why the limit is in place. The offline time calculator function fast forwards through all the calculations in a single batch, it doesn't save or work in steps. It fast forwards through the hours and keeps all the data of the calculations in ram, I'm guessing. If the time is too great, your memory runs out out and the game just crashes. You can see this happen if you use the "Unlimited Offline" mod and do something for a few weeks straight then come back. Without 16+GB of ram, you can't launch your save again. In reality this is a technical shortcoming disguised as an engagement mechanic. It could be fixed with a function that does the fast-forwarding in steps, saving between each step. And you could add a progress bar while the game is doing it instead of the "did it crash?" twenty seconds of nothing we get when we boot up now.
  
• Qol is sorely lacking. I can't play the game without the ETA mod, Skill Modifiers mod, QuickShards, Grouped Notifications, Do I have room?, Better Summoning Menu, Right Click to Sell, and even more. Playing Melvor without these would give me an Aneurysm. The mods are amazing, and they make the game so much better. Which is why I think their functionality should be part of the base game. More people would get a better game if they didn't have to hop on mod.io and distinguish which mods improve the game and which are cheating. Melvor could also integrate this functionality better than mods are currently doing, like showing ETA information on the title screen for each save. Or making some qol features upgrades you buy in the shop. Give me auto farming after I get 100% mastery or something. It seems adding new content is more important than polishing old content. Anyone remember Goblin Raid?
  
• Cape of Completion gives you increased mastery pool cap? You need 100% mastery in every action in the game to get it. And don't say "ToTH" because it was added years before ToTH was even announced. This is only a "problem" because it means we'll never get anything to make managing the mastery pool easier. Which is something a lot of players want, judging from the downloads of the "Mastery Pool Can Overflow" mod. I don't think it's a problem, but I understand why some do, It feels like a zeros sum mechanic. You're choosing what you don't want to lose. You either don't get the 95% bonus, or waste mastery xp while offline. This could be mediated by always micromanaging it, but that's very tiring. But it won't ever be changed now that the only item that interacts with it is the last one you get.
  
• Max level 120 is stupid. I would've been okay with 125. I would've been okay with 119. And I WOULD have been okay with 120, if the base game's max level was 100. But going from max 99 to max 120 is just poor optics. Yes, this is a "muh autism" level complaint, but max levels are there to be nice numbers.
  
• Township. I'll keep this brief since Township's already been overhauled once and it's still literally not done yet. (hope Township 2 releases along AoD). Additionally, people still complain about it. In short, the boxes break the game and make resource gathering skills into things you only do to max masteries. I'm not exaggerating when I say it would be balanced if all the boxes were made 100 times more expensive. As it is I can get hundreds of thousand of every resource in a week and never need to cut, mine, smelt, fish, cook, or brew again. Also remove buying coal because it invalidates both the mining and smithing capes. Give me a double yield scroll like for rune essence and let me buy rune essence instead because mining for it is as fun as passing kidney stones. Edit: They're now more balanced. Nice.
  I think the money you get for township is actually balanced though.
  
• Bigger capes are stupid. It makes the normal skillcapes irrelevant, and the skillcapes are one of the most recognizable pieces of iconography. Bigger, poofier capes are stupid, and they should have been different pieces of equipment. Like long gloves, or something else worn in the passive slot. Yes, this is an objective flaw with the design of the video game. I swear to you the fanbase is in agreement on this.

And that is my complaining about the video game being done. Children and women can now open their eyes and unplug their ears. And we can go back to usual steam forum activities: like discussing early game money making methods, throwing racial slurs at each other, and acting as tech support for cretins.

P.S. I didn't realize how long the list of complaints about the video game was before I made it. Sorry for that. I actually had to cut some of my DLC complaints so as to not make this read like a Grand Manifesto about the state of the game.
Don't take this the wrong way, I do love Melvor Idle. I think it's the best idle game on the market to date, if I didn't like it I'd have not taken the time to crap on it.

P.P.S. Admins I love you so please don't delete my post just because it's negative. Here is a steam emote to show that I am a friendly and reasonable gamer

[Valk]

Just to address a couple:
The reason the max level is 120 is unavoidable. The game is based on Runescape, and level 99 and 120 come from that.
The bigger capes do look pretty stupid, and the fact that, much like the rest of the QoL, you can't swap them out with the quick equip button is frankly obnoxious. At the same time though, much like the previous point, they come from Runescape. There are also plenty of times where keeping the 99 in all skills cape will outdo a 120 in a single skill cape, such as any of the combat capes,

All of the online stuff royally needs to go though for sure. Especially online only modding. I'm sure most players would much rather install a separate mod manager than have an integrated online-only one with no alternative. There are no actual online functions like leaderboards, co-op/pvp modes, or inventories that are connected to the internet to prevent cheating, so there's really no reason for the online login to exist outside of cloud saves (which you should be able to disable too.) Anti-piracy shouldn't be a reason for it either, because I don't think enough people want to pirate an idle game that also has a freeware version to warrant forcing online logins onto every player, ESPECIALLY when this is cross compatible with the mobile version. I am personally one of those people who has a phone that only has access to wifi, so if I go to somewhere without wifi, thanks to the 24 hour limit, bye bye progression.

And yeah, game desperately needs better QoL (and I'd also argue, better accessibility). With the amount of text and reading in the game, having the ability to increase font size even further than 130% (which is already hard to read in 4k) would be a godsend for some people. Same for UI scale.

[Voluntas]

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

The bigger capes do look pretty stupid, and the fact that, much like the rest of the QoL, you can't swap them out with the quick equip button is frankly obnoxious.

When you select an item in your inventory, you can go to the right side and find the gear tab to turn on/off that specific item in the quick equip for most of the skills.

This means you can turn off the 99 mastery capes from showing up in the side quick equip bar and turn on the 120 mastery capes to show up.

There is no drag and drop involved, just turning on and off switches.

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por Voluntas:

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

The bigger capes do look pretty stupid, and the fact that, much like the rest of the QoL, you can't swap them out with the quick equip button is frankly obnoxious.

When you select an item in your inventory, you can go to the right side and find the gear tab to turn on/off that specific item in the quick equip for most of the skills.

This means you can turn off the 99 mastery capes from showing up in the side quick equip bar and turn on the 120 mastery capes to show up.

I can't for the life of me figure out how to get this to work. The menu says to drag from bank, but the moment you move off the menu it hides it. This is precisely what is meant by poor QoL features. They're either unintuitive, not present/not functional, or more work than they should be for QoL

[Brewskie Guzzler]

Your whining about MODS ?? LOL The game has a very comprehensive alert system about what MoDS will do to your game.

Your whining is invalid.
\
Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Your whining about MODS ?? LOL The game has a very comprehensive alert system about what MoDS will do to your game.

Your whining is invalid.
\
Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

I'm sorry but what? The original poster is not whining about the existence of mods. They are whining about mods REQUIRING an online connection to a server which is extremely temperamental, resulting in the mods being completely disabled whenever said server decides it just doesn't want to work. At least try reading what they posted before trying to insult someone maybe?

[Brewskie Guzzler]

thatss complaining about mods, lol

[Brewskie Guzzler]

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Your whining about MODS ?? LOL The game has a very comprehensive alert system about what MoDS will do to your game.

Your whining is invalid.
\
Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

I'm sorry but what? The original poster is not whining about the existence of mods. They are whining about mods REQUIRING an online connection to a server which is extremely temperamental, resulting in the mods being completely disabled whenever said server decides it just doesn't want to work. At least try reading what they posted before trying to insult someone maybe?

I dont run mods , the game never glitches when i log in or save the files to my computer instead of using the cloud. Try it, that way why dont you.

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

I'm sorry but what? The original poster is not whining about the existence of mods. They are whining about mods REQUIRING an online connection to a server which is extremely temperamental, resulting in the mods being completely disabled whenever said server decides it just doesn't want to work. At least try reading what they posted before trying to insult someone maybe?

I dont run mods , the game never glitches when i log in or save the files to my computer instead of using the cloud. Try it, that way why dont you.

Let's put it another way for you
With the current system:
-If your internet connection goes down, you cannot use mods.
-If the mod software server goes down, you cannot use mods.
-If the mod server ever shuts down, then the game will no longer be able to use mods.
-If any of these things happen, you will have to re-do all of your mod related settings from scratch.
NONE of these things affect any other form of modding in games. They ONLY affect this game because it uses an absolutely horrific online modding system, with no ability to use offline mods. Regardless of whether you personally mod or not, this system only serves as a death sentence for modding.

It also does not matter if the game TELLS you that the mods are connected to the internet, because the problem isn't whether it tells you or not, its that it DOES require the internet. Offline/Singleplayer is basically the standard for modding, not this online nonsense.

[vladulenta]

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

I can't for the life of me figure out how to get this to work. The menu says to drag from bank, but the moment you move off the menu it hides it. This is precisely what is meant by poor QoL features. They're either unintuitive, not present/not functional, or more work than they should be for QoL

Click on bank. Click on any equippable item. Click on the gear icon on the right of the screen, next to the stats icon. It should have a "minibar settings" series of toggles. Toggle on for the skill(s) you want to quick equip the item for. (Capes are auto-toggled for their skills).
Now, go to that skill's page. Look for the tiny ribbon in the lower right corner. It may not even be unfurled yet, being a minuscule up arrow. This ribbon has all the very important skill information you can only normally see in the Completion Log. Pet indicator, and a way to quick summon Shard synergies. It also has a gear, where all your items toggled on for that skill will appear. Click them and they'll be auto equipped. Having a 4k monitor is probably why you'd never normally spot it.

And what do you mean obtuse? It only took me 3 months to figure this stuff out, plenty obvious.

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

Based take, honestly. But if the game wants to "support" modding and do all these mod contests they could make a system that won't just delete all your mod data with no warning, All I ask for is a "mods aren't loaded" popup.

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por vladulenta:

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

I can't for the life of me figure out how to get this to work. The menu says to drag from bank, but the moment you move off the menu it hides it. This is precisely what is meant by poor QoL features. They're either unintuitive, not present/not functional, or more work than they should be for QoL

Click on bank. Click on any equippable item. Click on the gear icon on the right of the screen, next to the stats icon. It should have a "minibar settings" series of toggles. Toggle on for the skill(s) you want to quick equip the item for. (Capes are auto-toggled for their skills).
Now, go to that skill's page. Look for the tiny ribbon in the lower right corner. It may not even be unfurled yet, being a minuscule up arrow. This ribbon has all the very important skill information you can only normally see in the Completion Log. Pet indicator, and a way to quick summon Shard synergies. It also has a gear, where all your items toggled on for that skill will appear. Click them and they'll be auto equipped. Having a 4k monitor is probably why you'd never normally spot it.

And what do you mean obtuse? It only took me 3 months to figure this stuff out, plenty obvious.

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

Based take, honestly. But if the game wants to "support" modding and do all these mod contests they could make a system that won't just delete all your mod data with no warning, All I ask for is a "mods aren't loaded" popup.

I'm so tempted to give you an award for that sarcasm lmao. It's so close to deserving it.

[Brewskie Guzzler]

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

Based take, honestly. But if the game wants to "support" modding and do all these mod contests they could make a system that won't just delete all your mod data with no warning, All I ask for is a "mods aren't loaded" popup. [/quote]

The game does not support modding, it tells you so in the Enable Mod Manger Check list that states, in particular check box number 2

O I understand that mods can alter the game and may cause unexpected or unwanted behavior.

1. I can read.
2. Im not an idiot for not understanding what i read
3. Read the disclamer for Modding
4. Ill help you unsderstand it, Its says I accept responsibility for which mods that YOU choose to install.

Acept the fact that mods dont work.

And keep future posts about Modding to the guidelines that YOU Accepted for allowing Mods in the first place.

You get what install when you change the base game.

Noob.

and im done with this conversation. Its mute.

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Play the game as intended, and go back to reddit where you came from

Based take, honestly. But if the game wants to "support" modding and do all these mod contests they could make a system that won't just delete all your mod data with no warning, All I ask for is a "mods aren't loaded" popup.

The game does not support modding, it tells you so in the Enable Mod Manger Check list that states, in particular check box number 2

O I understand that mods can alter the game and may cause unexpected or unwanted behavior.

1. I can read.
2. Im not an idiot for not understanding what i read
3. Read the disclamer for Modding
4. Ill help you unsderstand it, Its says I accept responsibility for which mods that YOU choose to install.

Acept the fact that mods dont work.

And keep future posts about Modding to the guidelines that YOU Accepted for allowing Mods in the first place.

You get what install when you change the base game.

Noob.

and im done with this conversation. Its mute. [/quote]
"I can read"
Immediately proceeds to show an inability to read the original post again by trying to force an argument about something completely unrelated to the original post.
Good job.

[Brewskie Guzzler]

no , he complained the

Escrito originalmente por Valk:

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

Based take, honestly. But if the game wants to "support" modding and do all these mod contests they could make a system that won't just delete all your mod data with no warning, All I ask for is a "mods aren't loaded" popup.

The game does not support modding, it tells you so in the Enable Mod Manger Check list that states, in particular check box number 2

O I understand that mods can alter the game and may cause unexpected or unwanted behavior.

1. I can read.
2. Im not an idiot for not understanding what i read
3. Read the disclamer for Modding
4. Ill help you unsderstand it, Its says I accept responsibility for which mods that YOU choose to install.

Acept the fact that mods dont work.

And keep future posts about Modding to the guidelines that YOU Accepted for allowing Mods in the first place.

You get what install when you change the base game.

Noob.

and im done with this conversation. Its mute.

"I can read"
Immediately proceeds to show an inability to read the original post again by trying to force an argument about something completely unrelated to the original post.
Good job. [/quote]


You Are an Idiot.

Original information about his complaint on mods. your seletive arguing is Mute.

Mods are re-downloaded every time you open the game. I've never seen a game that does this. But besides my subjective dislike of the practice, there is a real problem that arises from Melvor handling mods this way.
Horrible indication of mods not working. The mod servers may not work for whatever reason. And as such, your mods won't be downloaded when you open the game. If this happens, you will not receive any warning. The only indication of this is the mod manager button on the title screen. I will bet most people don't know of it, because on both desktop and mobile version you need to scroll down to see it. It's next to the logout button. If any mods are not working, you will see a tiny exclamation mark over it. Which is great indication. Because if you don't see your mods aren't working and try to load a file:
All mod data is deleted from saved file when mods not found. The game scrubs mods' saved data when it can't recognize those mods. I don't think I need to explain this in any more detail. If this happens, close the game, wait for mod manager to work and hope you have a cloud save to use instead. And talking about cloud saves:

[Brewskie Guzzler]

this guy is complaining about mods and your saying hes not, lol

[Valk]

Escrito originalmente por Brewskie Guzzler:

this guy is complaining about mods and your saying hes not, lol

I'm not saying that. I'm saying they're complaining about how the mods are forced online stuff, with barely functional servers, and tons of issues whenever the servers go down. You are saying that they're complaining about the mods as a whole, insisting that the mod "warning" says this.
IT DOES NOT.
The mod warning explains things like that it might corrupt your savefile, that it might ruin your experience or balancing, that it might be unstable, and so on.
This is COMPLETELY separate from how they are online-only mods. No other game that I can think of uses online-only mods. They all use client-side downloads. THIS is what the complaints are about.