Crane question....

[MizMeow1]

First let me just say that I enjoyed playing the Prologue and am looking forward to the game's release! As for my question.....

I have completed the second ship for a second time because I thought that I had made mistake with the crane the first time around. This time, though, everything seems to be alright except when it comes to the crane picking up the last part (the back end) of the ship. It says that all the connections are unlocked, but that the crane cannot reach the load. That seems odd as the crane is sitting right above it and it had no problem picking up the ship piece just next to it. There is nothing in the way except for the two ladders from the sides of the ship and the floating electrical box. (It's been kind of fun seeing parts of the ship that have fallen and are now floating in the air until you pick them up.) I don't know if I've missed something that is preventing the crane from picking up the last part of the ship or if this is just the way it is designed. TIA for any information on this or what I might have done incorrectly.

[mystickneon]

Love the crane!

All of the floor subframing needs to be sawed through and "bonked"; most, if not all of the loose stuff should be removed(sometimes it will pick it up with debris and sometimes not); and the module connectors need to be cut with the torch - even if they aren't connected to anything. Anything above the part in the air needs to be removed, also.

My most common error is forgetting to saw and bonk one of the subframes, as the smaller ones attached to the side of the hull don't spontaneously snap when removing the floor plates, and the back end has a few that are off by themselves, away from the bulk of the work that needs to be done on that section.

[DawidJ Community Management - GI]

To be able to pick up a part of the hull, you have to bonk (I love this word xD) everything what's on it. Unless there's a weird bug preventing you from doing that, the crane should be able to reach the load.
Also, make sure you don't stand on the craned element.

[MizMeow1]

Originally posted by DawidJ_GamesIncubator:

To be able to pick up a part of the hull, you have to bonk (I love this word xD) everything what's on it. Unless there's a weird bug preventing you from doing that, the crane should be able to reach the load.
Also, make sure you don't stand on the craned element.

Thanks for the reply. I was 99.9% sure that I had checked the ship a couple of times and couldn't find anything else keeping the crane from picking it up, but I went and checked again anyway after your reply. I walked all over the bottom of what is left of the ship (which is just that end part) to see if I had missed anything. I couldn't find anything that was left to disconnect or any broken piece of the ship on the floor that I had missed picking up. I also bonked (yes, it is a fun word!) all over what is left of the ship....both inside and out. I didn't find anything nor did the bonking make a different. When I choose the crane, the box at the bottom left says that everything is disconnected. However, when I do put the mouse on the ship, it does say that it is not unlocked. I realized, though, that I hadn't checked the top portion of that bottom floor that is left. I only went as far as to where you saw off on metal tube (sorry, I know that's not the correct term for it, but I'm at a loss right now for the correct term.) So, I don't know if it's a bug that's keeping the crane from picking up that last part of the ship or if there is something on the higher shelf type space in the back (again, sorry, the Fibro is bad today and effecting my cognitive abilities so I'm having issues coming up with the correct term). Anyway, that area is just a bit too high to jump on. Maybe more talented gamers than me can find a way to jump up there, but I'm not that talented. As I said, the ladders that are attached to the side of the ship are still there even though that part of the ship has been hauled off. That surprised me that they remained. I thought that they would go with that part of the ship since they were attached. Maybe that's a bug?? Anyway, I could climb them, but there are way too far away to reach what is left of the ship. I will go and order the ship again so that I can get to that area and see if I've missed something as it sounds like that is the case. I tried my best to see if I could see some light indicators of something that needed to be disconnected up there, but it is just a bit too high to be able to see and I think if I climbed the ladder to look that it would be just a bit too far away to see any of the light indicators from there (at least with my eyes). So, I'll give it another try and see if I still have this issue or not.

Thanks again for the reply!

[MizMeow1]

Originally posted by mystickneon:

Love the crane!

All of the floor subframing needs to be sawed through and "bonked"; most, if not all of the loose stuff should be removed(sometimes it will pick it up with debris and sometimes not); and the module connectors need to be cut with the torch - even if they aren't connected to anything. Anything above the part in the air needs to be removed, also.

My most common error is forgetting to saw and bonk one of the subframes, as the smaller ones attached to the side of the hull don't spontaneously snap when removing the floor plates, and the back end has a few that are off by themselves, away from the bulk of the work that needs to be done on that section.

Thanks for responding. I, too, love the crane. It is so satisfying to watch it haul off parts of the ship.

I've ordered the ship twice now. The first time I had missed a couple of the connections that needed the blow torch to disconnect. The second time, though, I tried to make sure that I didn't miss anything. As I mentioned in a reply to the Dev, I just went back in and I realized that there is that part at the end of the ship that is a bit higher up. I didn't look there as I didn't really realize there was space there. I thought what we could access mostly ended only as far back as to where we saw off the large yellow tube (sorry, the Fibro is acting up today and it is causing me to not be able to easily come up with correct terms for some things like this). When I click on the crane option, it does say that everything is disconnected, but it also says that it is not unlocked. So, I'm going to order the ship again and make sure to check that space before I get rid of the part of the ship with the ladder so I can actually reach that area. Hopefully, that will either show me what I've missed or let me know that this is just a bug. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it works this time since I feel like the job just isn't done with part of the ship left. :-)

Thanks again for responding and offering some help!

[MizMeow1]

I thought I'd pop back in. I just demolished the ship for the third time and I think that I narrowed down the problem. The problem is with what I called the shelf when I couldn't think of the right term for it before. I'm still not sure what you would call it, but I'm going to call it the sub-floor. When you demolish a deck, the floor and brackets (?) fall to the next lower deck except for the bottom deck and the back of the main deck. Then, those items fall onto the sub-floor. I noticed this when I demolished the ship the second time, but didn't give it much thought at the time and didn't even think about when I wrote the post. When you demolish one of the brackets, most of it falls onto the sub-floor. However, one part completely disappears. On my third try, that part that disappeared did fall onto the sub-floor of the bottom level. On my second try, though, I don't think that it did. Since anything is possible, it is possible that I missed that fallen piece. However, I did search that part of the ship 3-4 times as well as using the scanner. I don't think it was there on my second attempt at the ship. Anything is possible, though. That would explain why the game said that everything was disconnected but it was still unlocked. Anyway, on my third try, I was able to dismantle and haul off the whole ship.

Thanks for the replies!

[DawidJ Community Management - GI]

You're a persistent one. ^_^
Do you the game needs to explain a bit more what the player should do to use the crane on the hull without encountering such problems like yours?

[MizMeow1]

LOL Well, I do like to understand and correctly complete all tasks on certain games. It's generally on the games I really enjoy. On my first attempt on the ship, I could only haul off the middle of the ship, so it was clear that I had missed something/s. That's why I demolished the ship the second time. When I couldn't haul off the end of the ship on my second attempt, I asked about it here. I knew that I had thoroughly examined that part of the ship. In fact, I had gone over the floor several times looking for parts that had fallen onto it that I had missed. I couldn't find anything. Then I hauled off the rest of the ship, so I couldn't go check the floor for the 4th or 5th time because I couldn't reach that part anymore. I know this is a prologue, so that the game is still being worked on and I expect some bugs in it. I asked the question in case it was a bug, but also to find out if I was missing something. I only posted that last post because I narrowed down what the issue was, although I'm still not certain if it was a bug or if I missed part of that bracket that had disappeared on my last two attempts on the ship. It's a flip of a coin on that, I guess. Anyway, since I had asked the question, I just wanted to report what I had narrowed the problem down to in case anyone was interested. That's all. So, no, I'm not sure that more directions are needed to explain on what to use the crane on or how it works. The game didn't tell you, but a player learns that if anything that falls on it (from an above demolition) that that item cannot be picked up by the crane. That happens with several items in the ship. And, the game telling me that the last part of the ship that I couldn't haul off was still unlocked would make complete sense based on other things in the game. However, not being able to find a piece of bracket that had disappeared (meaning gone invisible) can lead to confusion or, at least, it did for me. More directions about the crane wouldn't have helped with that.

[mystickneon]

I did the other day experience an issue similar to what you experienced, but with the aft section; the circumstances were that I had cleared the section - and it was green, ready to be hauled off - but I decided to clear out everything for the whole hull... which would take some more time so I saved and came back to it the next day. On reloading, once everything was gone except the hull sections and the bugged electrical switch box, I craned out all of the hull sections, except the aft one which was now showing red. It was green the day before. I hopped up and looked for a problem, but couldn't find any.

I shrugged it off and just scrapped. The next one was just fine.