...so... what am I missing?

[Youthful Idealism]

Booted up the game several times, played for a while. It was repetetive, boring, confusing. The graphics were meh, the in-game writing was... atrocious.

If I've learned one thing, though, it's that a game doesn't get a loyal fanbase and many positive reviews by being so meh.

The problem must be with me.

So, what am I missing? What do I need to do to progress, to make the game interesting?

[drunk auntie]

I hate when people publish this stuff in a "serious" way. It's OBVIOS the problem is with you. A lot of people love the game (including me). I don't know, maybe too many AAA games made your eyes to only support next-gen graphics or something, and the history wasn't the best I must admit, but it was very fun and sometimes pretty ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ interesting.

[Youthful Idealism]

[selfquote]
If I've learned one thing, though, it's that a game doesn't get a loyal fanbase and many positive reviews by being so meh.

The problem must be with me.

So, what am I missing? What do I need to do to progress, to make the game interesting?
[/selfquote]

I shared my initial impression and then asked for help progressing to the interestint part. I did not make a final, declarative value judgement.

So, please help me. What am I missing? Is there a certain quest I need to complete, or a tutorial on some finer game mechanic I need to read, or what?

Honest question.

[The Valeyard]

@DIGITAL_GANGSTA: Youthful Idealism stated the problem must be with him, so I'm not sure where your cynical perspective of his post came from...

@Youthful Idealism: As much as I'd like to provide you with an absolutely objective answer, one look at my profile page will show you that I'm a 3089 fanboy... But here goes:-

The presentation of the quests is due to the story. You're a robot with an impulsive AI (with temporal distortion ability), and the quests are delivered in a transparent fashion; they have the barest of character/colour/theme/whatever due to the arbitrary nature of such information (in the eyes of the Overlord). Personally, I love the fact that they are presented in such a humble fashion.
The visuals are supposed to represent reality in an abstract form, to convey the cold, rigid, angular nature of object recognition software. Many people criticise the game's visual presentation, even when informed of the intent... "Things should be the way /I/ see them." and the like...
How far have you traveled from your landing point? The further out you go, the harder the challenge. Also, have you sought out the red X challenge? That's main quest-line stuff... which, if you set out to complete, would be achieved within a couple hours. The main appeal of 3089 is its sandbox nature.
As for the writing, again, be aware of the context; /who/ is supposed to have written those messages? And I mean which /in/-game entity wrote them; the Overlord, for example (without giving too much away), isn't exactly up-to-speed on social language constructs.

...If you are any more curious, feel free to send me a friend request. Who knows; we may end-up playing 2-player co-op... or you'll cease to be confused as to why you don't like it and move on. It's a win either way!

EDIT: I just remembered; you can also build structures (eventually). =)

[Gatherer Thompson]

After I played for a while I began to really enjoy pushing out into areas more dangerous than I could handle just to amp up the loot drop quality.. but.. if you die while trying to snipe stronger stuff you'll drop components of your own gear (and the odds of making it back to where you died are pretty low..)

I personally don't love or hate the graphics one way or the other, at this point :> Playing games from Atari on up has shown me that graphics are hardly ever "fun".. Lots of fun games are visually sad ;)

Also you're supposed to consume a massive dose of LSD every time you play (says so in the readme under the section on graphics..)

[The Valeyard]

...But it's written in pseudo-invisible ink, so you'll have to take some peyote cactus to see it.

[Youthful Idealism]

Originally posted by Zenefess:

@DIGITAL_GANGSTA: Youthful Idealism stated the problem must be with him, so I'm not sure where your cynical perspective of his post came from...

@Youthful Idealism: As much as I'd like to provide you with an absolutely objective answer, one look at my profile page will show you that I'm a 3089 fanboy... But here goes:-

The presentation of the quests is due to the story. You're a robot with an impulsive AI (with temporal distortion ability), and the quests are delivered in a transparent fashion; they have the barest of character/colour/theme/whatever due to the arbitrary nature of such information (in the eyes of the Overlord). Personally, I love the fact that they are presented in such a humble fashion.
The visuals are supposed to represent reality in an abstract form, to convey the cold, rigid, angular nature of object recognition software. Many people criticise the game's visual presentation, even when informed of the intent... "Things should be the way /I/ see them." and the like...
How far have you traveled from your landing point? The further out you go, the harder the challenge. Also, have you sought out the red X challenge? That's main quest-line stuff... which, if you set out to complete, would be achieved within a couple hours. The main appeal of 3089 is its sandbox nature.
As for the writing, again, be aware of the context; /who/ is supposed to have written those messages? And I mean which /in/-game entity wrote them; the Overlord, for example (without giving too much away), isn't exactly up-to-speed on social language constructs.

...If you are any more curious, feel free to send me a friend request. Who knows; we may end-up playing 2-player co-op... or you'll cease to be confused as to why you don't like it and move on. It's a win either way! :3089tank:

EDIT: I just remembered; you can also build structures (eventually). =)

I have not traveled very far from the landing point. I haven't beaten the first boss yet.

I probably should have been clearer: The storyline writing isn't bad, but the mission writing is often bad and downright confusing.

I am quite curious, I've seen a lot in reviews about the game's "depth", and am obviously totally missing it.

What time zone are you in? Perhaps playing with someone who knows what they're doing would be the most effective method for learning the game.

Is there some sort of in-game log where I can review previous pieces of storyline text?

Thanks.

[The Valeyard]

My zone is +10hrs GMT (Sydney, Australia), and am usually available between (my) 12pm to 12am... Full-time carer, so I'm usually home.

As for a log; I don't know. I usually just take a screenshot of each one.

As for the game having "depth"; well, I'm not too sure about that. The main-quest line is quite short, and once it's completed (with the possibility of 3 different endings I think) there's nothing else going on apart from participating in "side"-quests... or destroying every robot.

Still, that's why I like it; when I've grown tired of the attempts to have me emotionally invest in quests, I jump back into 3089.

Each time your character completes a red X challenge, more story/enemies/another area wil be unlocked.

I'm happy to be of assistance, Y.I..

[Mike]

Originally posted by Gatherer Thompson:

Also you're supposed to consume a massive dose of LSD every time you play (says so in the readme under the section on graphics..)

I have to ask, what readme are you talking about? The only one in my game files was a link to a Java library site (or something like that), and the pinned FAQ here said nothing of LSD. I'm very curious exactly what you're referring to. If it is indeed in an official game-related document, that'd be funny and awesome.

[Baron Von Kekatron]

Originally posted by Youthful Idealism:

Originally posted by Zenefess:

@DIGITAL_GANGSTA: Youthful Idealism stated the problem must be with him, so I'm not sure where your cynical perspective of his post came from...

@Youthful Idealism: As much as I'd like to provide you with an absolutely objective answer, one look at my profile page will show you that I'm a 3089 fanboy... But here goes:-

The presentation of the quests is due to the story. You're a robot with an impulsive AI (with temporal distortion ability), and the quests are delivered in a transparent fashion; they have the barest of character/colour/theme/whatever due to the arbitrary nature of such information (in the eyes of the Overlord). Personally, I love the fact that they are presented in such a humble fashion.
The visuals are supposed to represent reality in an abstract form, to convey the cold, rigid, angular nature of object recognition software. Many people criticise the game's visual presentation, even when informed of the intent... "Things should be the way /I/ see them." and the like...
How far have you traveled from your landing point? The further out you go, the harder the challenge. Also, have you sought out the red X challenge? That's main quest-line stuff... which, if you set out to complete, would be achieved within a couple hours. The main appeal of 3089 is its sandbox nature.
As for the writing, again, be aware of the context; /who/ is supposed to have written those messages? And I mean which /in/-game entity wrote them; the Overlord, for example (without giving too much away), isn't exactly up-to-speed on social language constructs.

...If you are any more curious, feel free to send me a friend request. Who knows; we may end-up playing 2-player co-op... or you'll cease to be confused as to why you don't like it and move on. It's a win either way! :3089tank:

EDIT: I just remembered; you can also build structures (eventually). =)

I have not traveled very far from the landing point. I haven't beaten the first boss yet.

I probably should have been clearer: The storyline writing isn't bad, but the mission writing is often bad and downright confusing.

I am quite curious, I've seen a lot in reviews about the game's "depth", and am obviously totally missing it.

What time zone are you in? Perhaps playing with someone who knows what they're doing would be the most effective method for learning the game.

Is there some sort of in-game log where I can review previous pieces of storyline text?

Thanks.

The mission writing sounds weird because its based on a system that generates quests, it's basically doing adlibs with objectives.

[M.D Geist]

Originally posted by Youthful Idealism:

Booted up the game several times, played for a while. It was repetetive, boring, confusing. The graphics were meh, the in-game writing was... atrocious.

If I've learned one thing, though, it's that a game doesn't get a loyal fanbase and many positive reviews by being so meh.

The problem must be with me.

So, what am I missing? What do I need to do to progress, to make the game interesting?

For me the first game 3079 was really enjoyable, I loved the effort and ideas that were put into that game. The opening sequence where you descend from the clouds to the planet in 3079 was an iconic gaming experience. I felt exactly what phroot was trying to create with that sequence and appreciated it a lot.

Yes, both games became somewhat repetitive because the game basically worked on the idea that as you explore and develop, the level of the enemies increased thus justifying your pursuit of better loot, etc. You have to like min-maxing loot, shooting/fighting enemies in an FPS setting, and doing so somewhat repeatedly with increased or varied challenges while optimizing your gear to meet increasing challenges.

I wish there were some added gameplay mechanics added to both 3079 and 3089 that gave the combat more interesting varitions, but overall both games were fun and I personally found 3079 to be ambitious and imaginative for a single developer.

I'm not going to put 3089 on the same level of expectation as a AAA developer with a huge team.

As far as 3089 goes, I do enjoy the combat to a certain degree, I enjoy the aspect of evading storms, and killing enemies and optimizing one's gear and weapons. The story is weird, the characters are weird, but in a compelling way that fits with the bizarre surrealist environments.

The combat is ok-to-good much of the time and I've been able to get a decent way into the game, I stop playing it for a while and come back. The concept of the game is interesting but the main attraction is loot optimization and testing your gear out against newer enemies and of course exploring.

It's somewhat exhilarating to go to strange far flung parts of the game world and test your gear out against newer enemies.

I feel like this might be somewhat lost on some gen-z audiences, but for me as a millennial gamer, 3089 has some decent features I appreciate in an indie game.