Hugely disappointed. Why would you cut so much content???

[Obiwan]

EDIT: Play Casual but use the hunger mod.

So yesterday I beat the ruin expecting the game to EXPLODE into a massive sprawling NG+ like Terraria.

I expected difficulty and loot to scale, all those racial armour sets to appear, the mech techs the flying techs, all the stuff I have seen and played with for 3 years now .... I expected the game to have so much at the outpost that I simply wouldn't have enough time.


I expected far too much.

What I do not understand is HOW MUCH stuff has been cut during early access and if it appears as DLC this will be the only game developed by CF that I will ever support.


This was supposed to kill Terraria in terms of content and scope and honestly the ONLY difference is that you have to fly to the biomes and there appears to be a stardew valley esk - farming game thrown in there for variety.


I jumped on Terraria lastnight only to find that it is 300x the game I last played and that it was offering EXACTLY what I had thought Starbound would after I complete it.


It is not that this is a bad game. It just is not the game I thought it was going to become.


This is a case where ignorance is bliss. People who have not taken part in the early access versions will have no idea what I am talking about and will be all the better for it. But having seen for myself now how much content has been cut and removed I am absolutely astounded this is considered 1.0 in comparison. I would never have thought the "rehauls" would come at such a heavy cost to content being cut.


Play the hell out of this and DO NOT play Casual ... the survival stuff is all about prolonging the end it really is. DO NOT play this casual unless you appreciate it will not last as long as you want it to.


They did add the exploration, they did at the colony stuff, they did somewhat variable progression options. But where are the industrial colonies I had to build to produce the goods to get further in the game??? where is the incentive to even bother making a colony ...


Deeply disappointed. Terraria 1.3 absolutely annihilates Starbound and I recall saying the opposite while Starbound was on the way.


Not much else to say.

[Rinny.]

i agree tbh

[Stone Cold Stavros Flatley]

To be honest i'm starting to notice things are missing that I used to enjoy playing around with... the Avian tech background blocks seem to be gone, unless their "high-tech" pyramids only spawn on "dangerous" desert worlds...

The biggest loss i've personally felt is that none of the enemy NPCs seem to drop anything but ~20 pixels now, which sucks when it comes to piecing together costume parts... :(

[Wolf]

I noticed small things they cut out but what else did they cut out? Is there a list?

[Kodaxmax]

Your drunk m8. Ive been doing a playthrough of this game every couple months since it was released in early access. Just in last 5 months alone the content has easily doubled.

The idea was to make terraria in space, not make a better version of terraria.

[JOJ650s]

I heard that more content updates are going to come later... so there is that.
Mod support is nice, but as for base game... I will leave that for you all to talk about.

[FlippantSausage]

Im trying not to be turned off by the fact it doesnt support my specific monitor resolution so i have to choose between windowed mode (ewwww) or having part of the screen cut off.

[Metro]

Content doubled? You can beat the game in about twenty hours and after that there's nothing to do other than the 'play house' crap like collect fossils, build a colony, tame pets or whatever. The problem with this game is that, unlike Terraria, it puts that secondary stuff first and character progression/bosses is a distant afterthought. In Terraria the focus is on the Metroidvania experience of improving your character, farming bosses, exploring dangerous areas for loot. Here you can get the best loot in crates safely walking through npc towns.

But hey, this is the game it seems most people wanted. A collection of mini-games and minecraft.

And to the people who say dumb stuff like 'but Terraria had 3+ years to develop more content;' please note Terraria didn't have an Early Access period that lasted 3+ years like Starbound. Chucklefu... had more than enough time to focus their game; they just choose to focus on the silly stuff and thought a shallow 'campaign' would cover the lack of depth.

[Obiwan]

Originally posted by kodaxmax:

Your drunk m8. Ive been doing a playthrough of this game every couple months since it was released in early access. Just in last 5 months alone the content has easily doubled.

The idea was to make terraria in space, not make a better version of terraria.

EDIT: how is this for a quote - We’ve got tons of mechs being produced by our artists. There will be at least 1 mech and 1 hoverbike per race.

Source: http://playstarbound.com/24th-may-progress/


OK well I musta been drinking some strong stuff because these are the things I vividly remember:


Racial weapons - Each race had racial weapons through ALL tiers and there was VASTLY more weapons to be built in the 3 variants of the replicator ... where are the plasma rifles??? the red orb ???

Mechs - Where are the mechs 2 of which were in and working .. previously found via high tech.

Flying - where are the various flight techs? Bubble? Boost?


I am aware you can augment the EPP to have gravity or light but previously you could have ALL of these ... where are the golden light emitting armour sets you could wear 1 piece of ???

The halogen takes up the back slot which is simply not feasible if you want the EPP ... why am i limited to 1 augment per when i used to be able to effectively have all the benefits???

Where are the scaling planets???


Why the hell would you make terraria in space and not better it??? do me a favour and get me whatever source you quoted that from.


There is a metric ton of content cut and the fact is I can find wiki pages showing that a) they existed and b) have been removed. That's for your benefit though because I wasn't drinking when I was playing with these items OVER A SODDING YEAR AGO!!!!

Here are some examples:

http://starbounder.org/Particle_Boost

http://starbounder.org/Mechs

[zakku]

Oh, so I'm not crazy then. I knew something was missing or off, but wasn't sure.

[11clock]

The problem is Early Access. What people don't seem to understand is that a game can change course throughout development. Also, a LOT of content originally planned is usually cut out for the sake of finishing the game in time. Every game does this, but you only really see it in largescale Early Access games.

I think the problem is that the developers at the start wanted to make a game that sounded like the "bestest game evar with everything awesome" but this isn't really feasible unless you have like hundreds of employees like Bethesda. Chucklefish was too ambitious with a game way too big for a small indie studio to make. As a result after a very lengthy development cycle they only came out with a game much smaller than originally planned.

I still love Starbound and think it is awesome, though. Despite the cut content it is still a massive game, although they made it too easy to skip 80% of the content and get right to the final boss. I have been looking into doing everything but farming and pets, and have sunk so much time into the game in only a few days. And I am still only in Tier 4!

[side]

I agree with everything the original poster said. I was ok with the slower early game changes as long as we still got the insane techs and fun endgame. But its all gone.

Pretty disappointing considering the game was fun when i bought it, and i would likely play that version again, but not this one.

Did i mention Novakids cannot craft melee weapons and there's no warning or notification when choosing one? I will go make several more posts about this topic.

[.defJAM]

I agree so much! thanks for that post

[Metro]

Chucklefish made out fine, financially. They got a big pile of money and spent it on offices (in London one of the most expensive places in the world to live/work), furnishings, and other stuff wholly unrelated to the production of the game. They also used some of it to set themselves up as a publisher to sustain themselves over the long run at the expense of the people who Kickstarted the game.

That's the problem with Kickstarter. There's no contractual obligation to perform. Had a publisher like Squeenix or 2K funded Starbound they could have demanded focus, results, and delivery of a product in a timely manner. As a Kickstarter backer/Early Access buyer you have zero leverage (short of a refund). They can (and actually did) tell you to eff off when you question their business decisions. The reason they finally managed to poop out 1.0 is because they hired a producer with experience who actually managed the team who were lying around watching their big screen televisions in their posh office and get to work. Still, the end result is lackluster at best.

[Fenix]

Originally posted by 11clock:

What people don't seem to understand is that a game can change course throughout development. Also, a LOT of content originally planned is usually cut out for the sake of finishing the game in time.

Yes, but in the situation you are describing the content that is cut from the final game is content which is either still in planning phases and don't have the time or resources to finish, or it is content that maybe isn't fully complete and too buggy for the final release.

They do NOT typically rip out content that was 100% already in the game fully functional and in working order...

[Obiwan]

EDIT: The post above me is from a Game developer and if SHE can see there is no excuse then honestly there is no need to read this massive reply I wrote.

Originally posted by 11clock:

The problem is Early Access. What people don't seem to understand is that a game can change course throughout development. Also, a LOT of content originally planned is usually cut out for the sake of finishing the game in time. Every game does this, but you only really see it in largescale Early Access games.

I think the problem is that the developers at the start wanted to make a game that sounded like the "bestest game evar with everything awesome" but this isn't really feasible unless you have like hundreds of employees like Bethesda. Chucklefish was too ambitious with a game way too big for a small indie studio to make. As a result after a very lengthy development cycle they only came out with a game much smaller than originally planned.

I still love Starbound and think it is awesome, though. Despite the cut content it is still a massive game, although they made it too easy to skip 80% of the content and get right to the final boss. I have been looking into doing everything but farming and pets, and have sunk so much time into the game in only a few days. And I am still only in Tier 4!

Yea first off I am not wet behind the ears and I know quite a bit on this topic so respect that while you are giving good info it is nothing new to me.

Second: Please show me an example of an early access game that has cut content to this degree.

The problem is NOT Early Access the problem is CF went from an indy dev to a whopping studio, to a publisher of DOZENS of games, to having its fingers in too many pies and quite frankly biting off more than they could chew as far as keeping the scope and vision of what Starbound was PROJECTED to be back in 2013/14 blogs.

It has NOTHING to do with Early Access ... infact on the subject why in the blue hell would you REMOVE content you have released for public consumption, QUOTED yourself saying is release day content AND actually bothered to implement to the point it was working PERFECTLY FINE!!!

I will tell you because they didn't have it for ALL the racial options. Only 4 of them that we know of ever actually were designed and only 2 were fully implemented.

Do not tell me this is Early Access, do not preach to me about the cycle of development and how everything I have seen is what I'd see. These builds were VETTED before they were released to us do not kid yourself for a second that anything but the nightly builds which did not happen for atleast a full year were any example of LIVE content.

This content was cut end of story and it's not cut as in it was prototype it was cut as in either DLC for later or because they had 6 races they simply could not be arsed doing it for all of them.


I really cannot believe you are this naive but it is clear you were a major fan so I wont contest you here. What I will say is that previously there was content for ALL the demographics and now there is a shallow hole.

I know alot of people will enjoy making a farm but damnit I will play Stardew Valley if I wanna do that, I know alot of people like the colony stuff but in Terraria 1.0 that had meaning ... you "incentivized" the people to come to your base and populate it .. what incentive does Starbound give you??? what benefits??? it is all just superficial "achievement" crap.

If I sound tenacious it is only because of your post which, I cannot stress enough is ABSOLUTELY right in terms of how things work and I appreciate you taking the time. But I actually know far more than the average Steam user as I spent 15 years doing what Chuckle do NONE of which excuse these omissions because this stuff was PAST prototype and testing these mechanics and options were IN THE GAME!!!

Why would you remove them??? because the freedom it gave the player meant that the superficial and arbitrary difficulty curve that is now considered the "progression" would be meaningless after the overhaul since the content would be skipped by players using these things.

It was a backwards arse decision from the get go ... by the time you finish the game you have done everything you can do progression wise JUST TO BE THE BOSS!!! yes I have heard a mod say he completed it in Iron gear .. great that is awesome but if I want that kind of experience I will play Dark Souls.

Point being that if its the case I am supposed to use my imagination to come up with new ways to play there needs to be enough sodding content to make it worthwhile doing.

I expected at the very least for the outpost to have new options ... nope nada.

Even the previous system where the techs were tied into the ship upgrades atleast meant there was a POINT to it all .... beyond stashing more chests for your 10k farming mats what actual need is there to upgrade the ship further ???? I got the 2nd upgrade and once I made the realisation I was getting no new techs I stopped ... there are 3 more I can do but NO reason whatsoever to do it.


If the argument is that this was all suck em and see stuff and that it was never definitely going to remain - well honestly if I make something, let people play it, see them jumping for joy at it the very LAST thing I would think to do is remove it all ....

If this creeps up as DLC at Xmas I will be joining the people berating CF on these forums. Maybe people thought the game has been so long coming it would have been abandoned by those who originally purchased and that no one would notice all this ... I dunno.

All I know is that the volume of content missing from 1.0 is on a level that I was compelled to post about it and given the fact I have been a developer myself the last thing I like to do is criticize other peoples work when I know what it takes BUT!!! and this is a huge but!!! beyond sheer laziness to complete what was started and knowing that this stuff was in 2 years ago - I cannot justify or excuse on CF's behalf a reason for this content to have been cut THAT is why I made this post.


Deeply disappointed.