House building is unnecessary - change my mind

[juzbuffa]

House building is a feature added to the early access version that wasn't in the demo and to be honest, I'm not a fan of it as it doesn't feel like its fits in with the aesthetic of a single player oriented survival game set in the 16th century. It also makes some of the other building features carried over from the demo redundant such as fences (never built once in over 100 hours put into early access version), lamps (no need to light a lamp at all once you have a basic house with four walls and a roof, you get full protection from all elements plus a complete penalty reduction for using any machines at night while standing in your shack) or canopies. There's also no point in building a hut of leaves or anything other than a basic leaf bed as you can just put this in your house and again have full protection from the weather and pests. I understand why it was added as a lot of people like to create their own incredible structures but there are plenty of other games people can play if they want to do this. It wasn't a feature in the demo and it certainly wasn't a part of The Long Dark, another awesome single player survival game.

This leads me to another change from the demo to the early access version - sailing. Sailing in the demo could be utterly brutal sometimes, I remember once I got stuck in a random storm in the demo, my raft got smashed to pieces and I lost everything other than what I had equipped. There was no fast travel in the demo, you had to carefully prepare for your journey with hopefully enough food, water and repair kits on your raft in case you ran into random trouble. Now in early access, you can create docks for your vessel and fast travel between any dock or region with very little to worry about.

Maybe there were complaints that some elements from the demo were too hard but I never found that. I thought it could be challenging at times but it always seemed to fit within the time period the game is set in, it shouldn't be easy trying to survive being shipwrecked on an island with nothing but what you could grab from the ship before you jumped off.

I'd personally like to see some sort of hardcore difficulty mode which is more like the demo - no house building, no fast travel, random events while sailing, particularly between regions, that actually challenge the player. Maybe there can also be a sandbox mode for the content creators that want to build a massive mansion and decorate it with trophies.

[Cougarific]

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

I understand why it was added as a lot of people like to create their own incredible structures.

In my humble opinion ^this is the only reason to build a house in this game (so far).

From a serious survival standpoint the grotto is sufficient. It was my primary home through a Hard-difficulty playthrough in early access (May '23).

In The Long Dark you survive in existing structures most of the time. In Green Hell and The Forest there are no caves suitable for long-term survival (but you can build treehouses).

Age of Sail characters like Robinson Caruso, Cyrus Smith and the Swiss Family Robinson used natural features as starting points for their homes (caves for Caruso and Smith and a massive tree for the Robinsons).

So for now yeah - screenshots and YT videos are the only reason to build anything more elaborate than what nature already provides.

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

Sailing in the demo could be utterly brutal sometimes

I agree, sailing should be terrifying at first (which it isn't right now).

Surviving an expedition into new regions with no weather satellites or GPS should require a huge amount of skill (e.g. SAILING skill 3+) and luck.

In my humble opinion these ambitious developers should stick to their guns and make a truly brutal survival simulator.

There are dozens of survival-lite games on the market, but only a couple of hard-core survival simulators (*BOTH OF WHICH HAVE SOLD MILLIONS OF COPIES*).

[somedude]

I agree with all your points. Hate 'fast travel' in all other games too. And the self updating map.

Judging by the responses of the 'dev' in the update thread on the main page, they are oblivious to how this all looks to the people who played the demo and the early EA... or just cover their obvious attempt to go after the sandbox market even though they got our early adopter money. Look at the board, people already complain about 30 story "houses" not being enough LMAO, Robinson Crusoe... This is now officially Minecraft/Hotel Renovator or something.

I mean WHY did they do this dumbing down on ALL DIFFICULTY LEVELS??? animals attacks range, load weight carry, respawn timers, demolish, build times, houses, etc... etc... what' the point of the 'very hard' then? And don't start me on the freaking Fast travel, dumbing down of the mapping process, literally hundreds of different things of their own game they ruined

[psychedelic yeti]

Hello!

House building is a feature that is still under development. As you rightfully mentioned, we didn't have it in the demo, so it has only been tried by players for a month. We are constantly improving it, including creating new features and elements for it.

Building fences, lamps, and canopies is still a thing, even if you've built a house. You're sharing your own experience, but everyone has their own style of playing. I personally have lamps in my house and an area near the house with canopies and fences. Some players also don't stick to one place/house and have mini camps with huts of leaves around the Island of Hope and on other islands (this is especially true for those playing on hard levels of difficulty). So this is quite subjective. The variety of buildings is still better because it appeals to more players with different attitudes towards playing, and then you just decide for yourself whatever you prefer.

As for sailing, we also liked storms and we have this feature, so we're working on the best way to implement it back. We're also thinking of additional features for sailing, maybe streams and wind affecting the direction, etc.
Sailing on the map that was previously in the game wouldn't work in the long run. It may have seemed okay for several islands available in the demo, but not for the whole map with end-game content.

But I get your message in general (which has also been addressed by some other players) about keeping the game hardcore. We'll make some adjustments for the hard modes, and we're also thinking of customizable difficulty settings for the future. In the meantime, the game is still in Early Access, so certain balance tweaks are inevitable, but we're planning to stick to our initial ideas and core mechanics.

Not sure I managed to change your mind here, but I hope that our plans for the game have become a bit clearer. =)

[frillen]

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

House building is a feature added to the early access version that wasn't in the demo and to be honest, I'm not a fan of it as it doesn't feel like its fits in with the aesthetic of a single player oriented survival game set in the 16th century.

I really have to disagree with this...
It doesn't really matter which century a survival situation takes place in, mankind have always sought out to either escape a situation and make their stay as comfortable as possible, which also meant that if they had the resources for it, they would make the best possible shelter/house, it is simply human nature.

That was a bit about real life, however this game has launched with a house building system from release, so removing it or tone it down would most likely not be well received by the majority of players, they bought the game with these mechanics highlighted on the store page :)
I do however agree that even inside a house where you are sheltered from wind and rain, lights should mean something for your safety when working in darkness, don't know why this isn't a thing.

In the end house/base building is mostly a QoL thing in many games, it adds something to do for those that really care for it or just want to have reasons to continue playing once they have reached end content, no one says that you must build a house or craft everything, it is totally up to you how you want to play the game - Set your own survival rules for a playthrough :)

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

There's also no point in building a hut of leaves or anything other than a basic leaf bed as you can just put this in your house and again have full protection from the weather and pests. I understand why it was added as a lot of people like to create their own incredible structures but there are plenty of other games people can play if they want to do this. It wasn't a feature in the demo and it certainly wasn't a part of The Long Dark, another awesome single player survival game.

The better beds has in my opinion one huge advantage over the leaf bed which is better sleep, meaning you can replenish energy much faster.
The long Dark had some different advantages... There was almost always a usable bed in the many houses scattered around which meant you were mostly always close to a shelter from bad weather and a place to sleep.

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

This leads me to another change from the demo to the early access version - sailing. Sailing in the demo could be utterly brutal sometimes, I remember once I got stuck in a random storm in the demo, my raft got smashed to pieces and I lost everything other than what I had equipped. There was no fast travel in the demo, you had to carefully prepare for your journey with hopefully enough food, water and repair kits on your raft in case you ran into random trouble. Now in early access, you can create docks for your vessel and fast travel between any dock or region with very little to worry about.

Again I disagree a bit, the sailing in the demo while sometimes being able to put you in bad situation with for example storms, it simply wasn't an immersive and fun mechanic and felt completely out of place being a sort of top down "Turn-Based" point to point sailing simulation mechanic in a world where you play in a 3D first person environment.
I could understand it if you had to manually sail and navigate between regions.
I do however agree that fast travelling in games takes away from immersion, but it is often the most requested feature in any game where the travel distance is more than a few minutes and most likely many devs add it because many people are used to it and want.

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

Maybe there were complaints that some elements from the demo were too hard but I never found that. I thought it could be challenging at times but it always seemed to fit within the time period the game is set in, it shouldn't be easy trying to survive being shipwrecked on an island with nothing but what you could grab from the ship before you jumped off.

I've played the demo from the moment it was available and as far as I remember, it wasn't really so much the difficulty that was an issue, for most people at least, but more the fact that there were too many mechanics that didn't feel logical and more like some artificial difficulty to create a challenge, I highly agreed to this during the demo.
You can easily make a game difficult by requiring more time to do things(even than in real life), force players to drink a lake and eat several big animals a day just to not die from hunger and thirst + a lot of other things(grind) to slow you down, and while such things will make it more difficult, it also needs to feel logical and to some extent realistic.

Originally posted by juzbuffa:

I'd personally like to see some sort of hardcore difficulty mode which is more like the demo - no house building, no fast travel, random events while sailing, particularly between regions, that actually challenge the player. Maybe there can also be a sandbox mode for the content creators that want to build a massive mansion and decorate it with trophies.

Maybe they could do such a thing, but again they are a small indie company with not a lot of resources and money, they need to be careful on what and how they spend their money or they would risk suddenly running dry before the game is even finished ;)
Still I would love a special version, but already just the 2 of us have slightly different views on how that should be, this already show how difficult it would be for the devs to find common ground for everyone that wants an extra more challenging game mode :)

In the end there are lots of things that will make a game feel less challenging than it originally was...
Game development often progress and more options and features gets added to a game during development, this more than often makes a game become slightly easier than it was at ea launch when it was barebones.
Also worth mentioning is that many devs start out with more grind, harder mechanics and then slowly balance it down to where the majority of players want it to be.
A player base is more forgiving when devs lessen grind and difficulty than if they go the opposite way, so their starting point is often a bit more brutal than what they actually intended it to be.

And here is the elephant in the room...
The more you play a game, the more you get used to the mechanics, you learn where things are in the world, you learn what is important at different stages of a game, basically you become so familiar with everything that the innocence and lack knowledge about what to do will be forever gone for that game, it is a natural progression that I have noticed in every hardcore survival game, it will most likely become another day at the office.

The best possible challenge will almost always be at first early access release where the game isn't fully balanced, it still lacks a lot of features and you have no experience with the game, that is when you get the best challenge in the majority of Survival game, and yes even the Long Dark isn't much different, that game also became much less challenging the more you played it, and it got more features added during the development, it also became sort of a walk in the park for those that have had loads of playthroughs during its development :)

[DarkTails]

Originally posted by psychedelic yeti:

Hello!

House building is a feature that is still under development. As you rightfully mentioned, we didn't have it in the demo, so it has only been tried by players for a month. We are constantly improving it, including creating new features and elements for it.

I´m happy when you can delete Walls which wrong build without any issue or imaginary walls there holding throug this Walls

[Cougarific]

Originally posted by frillen:

they are a small indie company with not a lot of resources and money...

^This is really important to keep in mind, especially with such responsive devs.

People are gonna be asking "why doesn't the game have this feature or that feature like other games I play?"

Because this game costs $25, not $60 ... and is already better than many of the so-called triple-A titles on the market.

Feedback is super-important for a promising early access game, but people need to keep their expectations in line with what they paid for the game (and mature forum regulars can help with this).

[JimmyTheSaltyMelon]

+1 fast travel for the win

[DarkTails]

Originally posted by Cougarific:

Because this game costs $25, not $60 ... and is already better than many of the so-called triple-A titles on the market.

this is absolutly true

[WolfensRazor]

Why should I try to change your mind? Lol. I happen to like the house building in this game. It's simple yet very aesthetically pleasing. Currently I am turning my resort into a resource hub for the region in order to establish a Spanish settlement.

[Cronos69]

my english is very bad Look it is very simple , developers only need to do one thing , implement in game settings house building yes or no , put no , and any element in the house building game disappears , so you play your way, while others play the way they want,

[Cougarific]

Originally posted by Cronos69:

implement in game settings house building yes or no

I don't think that's a good use of the developers' limited time and resources.

The question is whether it's necessary from a survival standpoint - and if not, whether it should be and how to implement it efficiently from an early-access game development standpoint.

Build a resort if you like - build a theme park! But right now it's not *necessary* to build anything with four walls (other than for the associated Perk Point).

Perhaps there will be late-game machines that must be built indoors, but I doubt it.

Some kind of mild, short-term buff/debuff from sleeping indoors/outdoors might work... like a "Man, I'm so sick of sleeping in a cave" -5 HP debuff that takes a long time to trigger but gets worse over time and is removed by sleeping in something with walls and a roof.

[Helvy]

Overall I think the house building is smooth and well done! Not terribly buggy at all, sometimes some issues with roof placement when it says its intersection a piece and it shouldn't.

Angled roof segments etc would make house building more workable giving more options for design. Maybe upgraded panels for the house, ie planks for that more upmarket look.

[Gummario]

Originally posted by frillen:

I've played the demo from the moment it was available and as far as I remember, it wasn't really so much the difficulty that was an issue, for most people at least, but more the fact that there were too many mechanics that didn't feel logical and more like some artificial difficulty to create a challenge, I highly agreed to this during the demo.

Which those illogical mechanics were? Actually, I think all mechanics in the demo were like puzzle pieces logically coming together, because they clearly were a part of a single design document.

For instance, travelling on global map could take weeks without access to food, and that's exactly why there was a food dehydrator and smokehouse according to original design. I wonder how anybody could "logically" justify presence of food dehydration mechanic now, when there just aren't any places in the game where you are away from sources of fresh food for any prolonged periods of time.

Same with weight/clothes/equipment management. Not allowing player to run around with over 90 kg of stuff wasn't "an artificial difficulty", it was a logical and realistic limitation. Backpacks added more space (inventory slots) to carry stuff, but didn't magically made you x3 times stronger. Because that's exactly how backpacks work in real life. And that's why there were carts with limited volume and no weight limit. They were a logical concept complementing original inventory management design. Carts come with a box (limited volume), and move on a wheel (no need to carry weight inside), so everything was pretty logical, wasn't it? And no, carts with limited weight and infinite volume (the way they work now) is by no means logical or realistic.

All the logic in this game went down the drain after devs started discarding their original design ideas one by one.

As to houses, yes, they are completely useless, no arguing here.

[Aleks ♂]

Are you planning a Papuan presence on the islands? without them, then it turns out very boring.

[DragynDance]

It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't horribly buggy. If you build scaffolding to reach and construct the higher parts of your house, you're not allowed to remove it because it's considered support, even if there are other supports, leading to multi story buildings being absolutely useless, the whole construction system in general is poorly done and useless.