Re-contamination Issue

[Disteerily]

I bought this game hoping it would be laid back and relaxing, only to find out nothing I do really matters and I have to babysit the whole map 24/7. Can the devs Please add an option in the settings to turn it on and off and give the players a choice?

I would rather play with recontamination off for the story, and then turn it back on post-game to let everything get dirty, then toggle it again so I can do another cleaning sweep of the map without recontamination worries. At least that way it feels more rewarding to me and less of a stressful chore.

[Mela]

I mean, it really isn't that severe. It only goes down by 1 or 2 percent every now and then. You don't need a constant 100% for ur loddles to be happy or to complete the game. I completed it in 3 hours and only went back a few times to keep my areas 100% healthy.

I only encountered goop re-contamination once, and it was just a few little bits in one spot. If you really have a problem, use those cleaning machine things.

[Disteerily]

It should still be the players choice, and it was noticeable to me because I take my time with games and put a chunk of -50 on the areas I did. Everyone plays games differently or for different reasons, and there's no right or wrong way to play a game as long as you're having fun. I play games to relax and de-stress. This was stressful to find this out, and I kinda wish I didn't buy the game since I didn't know this information beforehand. I still wish it was an option in the menu to turn it off and on.

[NappinYogi]

Are some people really still complaining about this?

It's the developers choice, contamination decreases the more you clear it and you have every kind of resource to help you clear it.

Contamination really isn't that bad, stop being so over dramatic.

[Disteerily]

Originally posted by Shireen:

Are some people really still complaining about this?

It's the developers choice, contamination decreases the more you clear it and you have every kind of resource to help you clear it.

Contamination really isn't that bad, stop being so over dramatic.

'If several people were complaining about it, it couldn't possibly be the devs choice that was the issue. No. It's the players that are the issue.' Go eat some dirt, as a customer that paid for a product with an important ""feature"" that wasn't labeled on the tin, I'm allowed to complain as much as I please.

[Disteerily]

It’s an accessibility issue for certain kinds of gamers - in my case clinical ocd - and should at the very least be an option in the accessibility settings.

[LittleWalker_NL]

i played the demo today and in the demo the recontamination is 999999x worse i had the only biome in the demo (i forgot the name) 100% and the goop kept coming back in the full game it is way better

[adeyke]

I'd have to agree with this. I can see the benefit of the recontamination system, since without it, trash becomes a finite resource and it might become impossible to craft toys. So it's good that they avoided that.

However, seeing the restored biomes deteriorate feels bad, and it renders the character's actions rather unsatisfying. In the end, they pack up and leave, supposedly having left the planet better off. However, it won't take long for contamination to get just as bad as it was before. Even in the time while I was playing, with everything still above 90%, I had to clean a loddle that had gotten recontaminated in its home.

Not all trash will reappear, and the crates and bags will be permanently gone. However, in the game's world, any trash can be quickly and easily be recycled into a useful form, so those can be seen more as resources to plunder, and the only lasting change is that the character is now in possession of those resources. I don't think that's how it was supposed to come across.

[LoddleDev]

We do understand the feedback about recontamination and we appreciate you all sharing your thoughts here!

Our original intent was to create a gameplay loop that's not just about cleaning things up, but also about maintaining the environment (similar to how one might periodically clean a fish tank). We also wanted to provide a reason to occasionally check on your loddles. Lastly, we wanted to avoid conveying a message that ocean cleanup is a "one and done" issue.

That being said, we are working on a system that'll allow you to gradually increase a biome's pollution resistance (up to 100% resistance) via in-game means, whether that be via introducing loddles that have the purifying ability or via some other new mechanics that we'll be adding in an update this year!

I should also mention that in one of our recent updates, we added the ability for Purifying loddles to clean other nearby loddles that have been recontaminated. Our idea is that by the time you've cleaned everything, the loddles are evolved enough to take care of the GUP-14 on their own using their abilities. The updates we're releasing this year should hopefully make that much clearer and easier to achieve!

[Disteerily]

Not gonna lie to you devvy, if your 'message' negatively impacts the enjoyment of the players, in that *several* people have to be like 'hey this sucks, I don't like this', you played yourself and it's bad design. Forcing a gameplay loop that players do not like for the sole purpose of artificially boosting hours, instead of letting the players decide 'hey this is fun, I'm going to play multiple times', is also bad design and just means your game cannot stand on it's own two feet. You should still implement an accessibility feature to turn it on and off regardless of the update.

[adeyke]

Having healthy loddles maintain their biomes would make the most thematic sense. That would let players feel good about leaving the planet to them. (If specific evolutions are required for that, the game would really benefit from a loddlepedia.)

Regarding the game's message, I understand your intentions, but overall, most of the game already goes against it. It's a very feel-good game. The whole premise of the game is that you, a single individual, are sent to fix the pollution of a planet, and you can do that in a few hours. All of pollution can be solved by just being next to it and zapping it. Your goal is to get each area to 100% before moving on to the next one, and this is very achievable. And when you're done, you celebrate and presumably move on to the next planet. It's fun and empowering, but none of that corresponds to real life.

It would be possible to make a game that conveys that true magnitude of effort required for ocean cleanup. But that then wouldn't be a game about zapping goo.

As for the fish tank analogy, I do think the structure of the game goes against that. I could see that working if the game were divided into days, So you might wake up, do your "chores" by fixing the contamination that happened overnight, and then have the rest of the day to explore or work on the next biome. This doesn't work well when the game is so short and continuous. You either try to keep everything topped up to 100% and don't make progress, or you make progress but have to just watch as things degrade. And in terms of incentives (in-game rewards, objectives, and Steam achievements), the latter wins out.

Just to be clear, I did play through and enjoy the game, but I would have enjoyed it more without the recontamination, especially in terms of the prospective future of the planet after leaving.

[LoddleDev]

Originally posted by adeyke:

Having healthy loddles maintain their biomes would make the most thematic sense. That would let players feel good about leaving the planet to them. (If specific evolutions are required for that, the game would really benefit from a loddlepedia.)

A Loddlepedia will be in our next update, which is coming somewhat soon!

[Psyringe]

Originally posted by Disteerily:

It should still be the players choice

It is (and should be) the choice of the creators of the game. They are creating the game, not you. Your choice, as a potential customer, is to either buy a game (if the developers' design choices line up with your preferences) or not (if they don't).

You're also, of course, completely free to voice any opinion as to how the game might be more enjoyable for you - as much as the devs are free to ignore such a request, if it doesn't align with their vision of the game.

Your main argument here seems to be that because some players disagree with a design decision, the game design has proven to be bad and should be changed. That is not a workable paradigm for game design in any way, because for most game design decisions in any game, you will find players who don't like them (and also players who do like them and would be unhappy if they get changed). So by your definition of how a game design can be "proven bad", no game will ever have good design. And by your definition of a solution (devs implementing what the complaining players want), no game can ever be "fixed", because there will always be players who disagree with the changes.

I'm crossing fingers that the devs' ideas of creating stable environments will increase your personal enjoyment. But I'd suggest toning the entitlement down a notch, and stopping to insinuate that some global rule of good game design would demand that the game needs to adhere to any group of people's personal preferences - just my two cents.

[NappinYogi]

Originally posted by Psyringe:

Originally posted by Disteerily:

It should still be the players choice

But I'd suggest toning the entitlement down a notch, and stopping to insinuate that some global rule of good game design would demand that the game needs to adhere to any group of people's personal preferences - just my two cents.

I couldn't agree more.

The entitlement in this thread is truly nauseating.

Giving an opinion is one thing, but suggesting a game developer is wrong designing their own game is ridiculous.

[Shining_Darkness]

Originally posted by Disteerily:

Not gonna lie to you devvy, if your 'message' negatively impacts the enjoyment of the players, in that *several* people have to be like 'hey this sucks, I don't like this', you played yourself and it's bad design. Forcing a gameplay loop that players do not like for the sole purpose of artificially boosting hours, instead of letting the players decide 'hey this is fun, I'm going to play multiple times', is also bad design and just means your game cannot stand on it's own two feet. You should still implement an accessibility feature to turn it on and off regardless of the update.

This is 100% a YOU problem.

Stop saying things like "players not not like" because no, not players are fine with it, a player (you) is not. Don't force your views stemming from your own ocd onto others. It is perfectly fine to dislike something but don't try to pretend like your opinion is the majority opinion, you don't speak for me.

You have ocd, you know you have ocd, why would you choose to play a cleanup game and then complain that the game, shocker, has you clean and maintain the clean level?

The fact the dev bothered to respond (with clarification and statement of plans for future updates) and your immediate response was essentially "that's not good enough, you're wrong" is all the reason I would need if I were a dev to just completely ignore your feedback because you are being impossible to please.

[Disteerily]

It is a me problem. It's also a problem many many other people have spoken up about, and those comments are easy to find, I'm not going to find them for you. I'm not your mother. No other cleaning game I'VE played punishes you for doing the objective, especially when the game doesn't tell you there are punishments on the store page. There is 0 reason to assume you'll be punished for following the main objective, yet it happens. And many people, including myself, did not like that. Your satisfaction does not render everyone elses criticism null and void. From a story perspective, to a gameplay mechanic perspective, to a personal satisfaction perspective; it doesn't matter because the end result was still the distaste of the same punishment.

I spent money on a product, I am unsatisfied, I am allowed to complain as I see fit, regardless if you want to hear it. You could choose not to respond to the discussion at all and let the thread die naturally, there is also 0 point in continuing to argue to try and drown out criticisms you do not agree with.

"Impossible to please" is also factually incorrect if you actually know how to read what I wrote, I suggested a simple menu toggle, which is easy to implement. It's in the second sentence of the main post of this thread if you cannot find it.