Arachnophobia

[fallenscion]

The most recent dev diary showcased giant spiders as one of the first encountered enemy types at around the 20-minute mark.

Is there any hope for an arachnophobia setting / mod? I'd love to introduce this game to my significant other, but she has severe arachnophobia (IE: Crippling panic attacks).

This is a huge barrier to entry for 90% of fantasy games that just love to include giant spiders as enemies anywhere & everywhere.

Also, since I know this will come up - yes she is seeking help, but that's an on-going process with less than a 40% lifelong success rate across all well-regarded forms of treatment.

[BlackNyasher]

Maybe someone could make a modification changing 3D model of spider to plushie spider or hamster (maybe even developers themself gonna make it)

[darkholyPL]

I think this is something that mods could take care of. I only know of one game, where the devs included an arachnophobia setting. It was that 'honey I shrunk the kids' like game, name escapes me atm, when you would run around a backyard in microscopic form.

[MattStriker]

Originally posted by darkholyPL:

I think this is something that mods could take care of. I only know of one game, where the devs included an arachnophobia setting. It was that 'honey I shrunk the kids' like game, name escapes me atm, when you would run around a backyard in microscopic form.

Mods can fix this but they shouldn't have to. Quite a few games release with settings like that these days, or add them in later.

[zeshoot]

I would suggest skip the game/wait for mod/mod it yourself.
What people gonna ask next? Can You please remove water from that boat simulator? My girl is afraid of it but wanna play the game?
Can You cut the sky and replace it with cave? My girl love to play flying sims but she has agoraphobia...
Seriously people...

[fallenscion]

Originally posted by BlackNyasher:

Maybe someone could make a modification changing 3D model of spider to plushie spider or hamster (maybe even developers themself gonna make it) :emocompy:

That is certainly always *a* solution, but it would need to be comprehensive to feel safe enough to play for her - and that kind of thing is always easier to do up-front than post-launch.

[darkholyPL]

Originally posted by MattStriker:

Originally posted by darkholyPL:

I think this is something that mods could take care of. I only know of one game, where the devs included an arachnophobia setting. It was that 'honey I shrunk the kids' like game, name escapes me atm, when you would run around a backyard in microscopic form.

Mods can fix this but they shouldn't have to. Quite a few games release with settings like that these days, or add them in later.

Well sure, but that is a small % of all people, that have this problem. As harsh as this is going to sound, it doesn't make much sense from a developers point of view to spend time and resources to include such a mode.
More people have some form of colourblindness for example, and still not very many games have colourblind options. Correct me if I'm wrong, but non of the AoW games do, for example.
So mods are probably a much more realistic way of dealing with the problem. I'm just being honest here, and you know I'm not wrong.

[fallenscion]

Originally posted by zeshoot:

I would suggest skip the game/wait for mod/mod it yourself.
What people gonna ask next? Can You please remove water from that boat simulator? My girl is afraid of it but wanna play the game?
Can You cut the sky and replace it with cave? My girl love to play flying sims but she has agoraphobia...
Seriously people...

If this game were called Age of Spiders: The Revenge of the Spider Queen - then you might have a point.

As it stands though, the inclusion of such a common phobia trigger in 90% of all fantasy gaming titles is just frustrating at a certain point. It's not like they are necessary to the genre, or like their exclusion would make the world somehow feel less vibrant or immersive.

Sure, I can skip the game, but the devs will likely be out at least one game purchase for every arachnophobe in their audience.

Put economically:

Age of Wonders Planetfall sold 154,000 units at an average price of ~$44 according to VG Insights.

Rates of Arachnophobia in the general US population range between 3% to 15%.

Let's take a very low estimate of 150,000 units being sold at a $40 lifetime average for AoW4 and assume that their potential target audience is only 4% phobic.

Of those, let's assume that only 1/4 would be moved to purchase by the lack of spiders.

That could increase total sales by 1,500 units, or $60,000.

For a toggle that would force the relevant assets to not load, or to be replaced by some other existing enemy/terrain set. (All spider instances instead load wolves, for example)

That estimate is also low because AOW3 sold much better than planetfall did, but it has had longer to build up to its lifetime sale numbers.

[darkholyPL]

Originally posted by fallenscion:

Put economically:

Age of Wonders Planetfall sold 154,000 units at an average price of ~$44 according to VG Insights.

Rates of Arachnophobia in the general US population range between 3% to 15%.

Let's take a very low estimate of 150,000 units being sold at a $40 lifetime average for AoW4 and assume that their potential target audience is only 4% phobic.

Of those, let's assume that only 1/4 would be moved to purchase by the lack of spiders.

That could increase total sales by 1,500 units, or $60,000.

I hate to be that guy, but your math if off.
First of, I'm not sure where you're getting the 15%. A quick google search gave me 3-6%.
But that's besides the point. Let's take the 4% you took.

That is the % of the US population. From that 4% you need to take away all those that are just flat out not gamers at all. So how much do you think are gamers? Let's be generous and say half of them, so that's already 2%.
Now, from that 2%, how many game on a platform that AoW4 will be coming out on? So no moblile, no Switch, no old gen ect. Again let's be generous and also say half.
So now we're at 1%.
From this 1%, how many are actually into 4x games? Not much let me tell you. Most will be into shooters, action adventure games, sports games like Fifa, NBA, NFL ect. 4x games are pretty niche in all honesty. But again, keeping up with the generous vibe, let's again say half.
That gives us 0,5%. Of those, you still need to consider how many are interested in AoW4 specifically.
But again let's be generous and say all of them! All of those into 4x will buy AoW4!
So using your math, that gives us 750 units, or 30 000$... as a best case scenario.
In honesty, if you stop being generous, it very well might just be 50 units.
It's a gamble is what I'm getting at, as far as 'is it worth it economically?' goes.

[zeshoot]

Originally posted by fallenscion:

As it stands though, the inclusion of such a common phobia trigger in 90% of all fantasy gaming titles is just frustrating at a certain point. It's not like they are necessary to the genre, or like their exclusion would make the world somehow feel less vibrant or immersive.

And that's my point even more proven. You just demand changes that gonna impact 90% (as you've called) fantasy titles, that nobody had any issue ever just cause some fraction of people have illness. Nobody's forcing them to play it/watch it/buying as a pet (spiders) but You gonna ask for exclusion of that piece of lore anyways.
No, go fetch some other hobby. Not everyone has to be a halo jumper, diver, snake whisperer. And not every game's played by everyone. I really hate today's snowflake demanding inclusivity culture.
Don't like the product - don't buy. And as Lad above stated - Your math is as weak as demands. What's next? We gonna see people with amputated legs lobbying for cancelling cycling games?

[Ultima546]

Arachnophobia is one of the most common phobias. Seems like a reasonable request for a toggle, if you ask me, and if you consider the math up above which estimated 4% loss of potential sales from not having it. It's not like it would be an especially resource-intensive fix either.

[TriumphJordi]

It's a fair piece of feedback. I'll bring it up with our Art team to see if there's anything we might be able to do.

[GrandMajora]

Originally posted by BlackNyasher:

Maybe someone could make a modification changing 3D model of spider to plushie spider or hamster (maybe even developers themself gonna make it) :emocompy:

No, I want to see a mod that turns them into Kumoko!

[Lame2Lame (Serpens)]

Originally posted by TriumphJordi:

It's a fair piece of feedback. I'll bring it up with our Art team to see if there's anything we might be able to do.

You could add a custom world trait that when chosen during the world creation, it prevents the appearance of spider mobs in that game.

That solutions seems pretty easy to implement in my opinion and is probably the option with the least hassle.

[BlackNyasher]

Originally posted by Lame2Lame (Serpens):

Originally posted by TriumphJordi:

It's a fair piece of feedback. I'll bring it up with our Art team to see if there's anything we might be able to do.

You could add a custom world trait that when chosen during the world creation, it prevents the appearance of spider mobs in that game.

That solutions seems pretty easy to implement in my opinion and is probably the option with the least hassle.

But how about spider summons, spider mounts and driders? The only optimal solution is to actually replace 3D models with something else

[GrandMajora]

Originally posted by BlackNyasher:

But how about spider summons, spider mounts and driders? The only optimal solution is to actually replace 3D models with something else

In addition to being able to customize normal mounts in the faction set up, there were also options in the Body Trait sections to give them special mounts as well. One of the options was Nightmare mounts, and the other option was some kind of spider, but I couldn't see the name because the dev's head was in the way.

It's likely there were others too, but they didn't scroll down far enough.