so 56% of players finish the prolouge..

[capricorn1971ad9]

but only 9.3% get the next acheivement.

which means that of the 56% that finish the prolouge, 1 out of 5 like it enough to continue from that point on, which means the reviews which look good really aren't that accurate at all.

the prolouge is about all i can stand as well.

the map is to big to find what you need first off.
first night came i had nothing at all.

[Nihil Reich]

yeah I'm not reading nor responding to your sensless drivel anymore.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by Nihil Reich:

yeah I'm not reading nor responding to your sensless drivel anymore.

made sense to me.
but whatever..

wasn't a discussion anyways really, my mind was already made up based upon what i had saw.

You just want others to think like you and you dislike it if they don't, and not considering if the world was full of you's you yourself would be bored as hell, and you would be.

[capricorn1971ad9]

and as far as what i said, look at what was said by the developers themselves:

”We’re not happy with how this turned out, as it seriously hurts the atmosphere when the player realises that death is merely an inconvenience and not something to be truly dreaded,” says Stachaszewski.

Kordas agrees, adding that forcing players to spend in-game time on going back for their gear interferes with the day-night cycle and messes up the story’s pacing. “It’s also associated with traversing the same fragment of the procedurally generated forest, which unfortunately is not that interesting and rich with secrets, alleys and unique places.

“The consequences, even those theoretically unpleasant for the player, should always be interesting. If the result does not block further progress but, for example, opens another interesting storyline, frustration should not be a problem. In the case of death, it is good to come up with a mechanism that always relies on the most powerful aspects of the game. It seems to me that we have made the biggest mistake there. Death does not intensify the atmosphere of terror, it does not cause interesting consequences, it is usually associated with the investment of time, of which there is never enough in the game. This sometimes leads to frustration or, even worse, boredom.”

just go to the storepage, select news and it is in an article a couple down from the top..

from here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/274520/allnews/

the "how killing permadeath" etc etc..

even the developers were unhappy with it.

[MazyRun]

The situation described in the OP regarding steam achievments is fairly standard. Steam gamers tend to own hundreds of games, a lot of them are more like games collectors rather than hardcore gamers. Games may sit in their library indefinitely (with either 0 hrs played or 1 hr played)..

..They may just hop from one title to the next, often no one particular game holds their attention. They may just invest small amounts of time in multiple different games just to have fun without ever really intending to 100% complete it.

I think this game appeals to hardcore gamers but it also has a lot of crossover appeal, it's hugely popular and highly rated for good reason. I've lost track of how many times I've completed and replayed this game, all its mechanics are great. This is probably the only game I've ever got 100% achievements for.

[Null Winter]

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

Originally posted by Nihil Reich:

yeah I'm not reading nor responding to your sensless drivel anymore.

made sense to me.
but whatever..

wasn't a discussion anyways really, my mind was already made up based upon what i had saw.

You just want others to think like you and you dislike it if they don't, and not considering if the world was full of you's you yourself would be bored as hell, and you would be.

Why do I feel like that's hilariously appropriate?

I had to remove the link you posted, as it could be mistaken as advertisement.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by MazyRun:

The situation described in the OP regarding steam achievments is fairly standard. Steam gamers tend to own hundreds of games, a lot of them are more like games collectors rather than hardcore gamers. Games may sit in their library indefinitely (with either 0 hrs played or 1 hr played)..

..They may just hop from one title to the next, often no one particular game holds their attention. They may just invest small amounts of time in multiple different games just to have fun without ever really intending to 100% complete it.

I think this game appeals to hardcore gamers but it also has a lot of crossover appeal, it's hugely popular and highly rated for good reason. I've lost track of how many times I've completed and replayed this game, all its mechanics are great. This is probably the only game I've ever got 100% achievements for.

maybe thats why you like it, but i gotta tell you, at 47 i have been playing computer games since the early 70's

from pong, to the commodore 64 and the atari 2600, i have owned a colecovision and a intellivision, i have owned every game system released up until the nintendo 64, i think as far as gaming, if you were "hardcore" in contrast to me, you would need to be my age at least.

as far as acheivements in a game, that doesn't make happiness, that makes neurosis and that is ALL it makes, i don't play games to "achieve" anything because it is a fantasy and isn't real so therefor any acheivement in it is a lack thereof in the real world.

as far as nothign holds their attention, cant say thats true, i play alot of dragons dogma, i like auto racing, all kinds of stuff, but not this.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by Null Winter:

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

made sense to me.
but whatever..

wasn't a discussion anyways really, my mind was already made up based upon what i had saw.

You just want others to think like you and you dislike it if they don't, and not considering if the world was full of you's you yourself would be bored as hell, and you would be.

Why do I feel like that's hilariously appropriate?

I had to remove the link you posted, as it could be mistaken as advertisement.

RE-Edit: oh, sorry, my bad, i forgot, the Diogenes link, yes, it was rather well in place..

I am a man of god, i live like a dog..

dio = god
genes = genetics of

diogenes = man of god

cyn = dog
cynic = doglike

diogenes the cynic, the man of god who lived like a dog.

the idol of homeless persons everywhere, the one we praise when we lift a middle finger, draw on a dollar bill, etc..

you know Alexander the great admited to Diogenes greatness by wishing to be him if he weren't born Alexander right?

[MazyRun]

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

if you were "hardcore" in contrast to me, you would need to be my age at least.

I'm also in my 40's but I don't think it's an age thing though. There are a great many players out there who are a lot younger/less experienced than us who are way more hardcore gamers than us.

I just think there are many different types of player who interpret game mechanics in different ways. We all have different levels of patience and varying levels of competence. We all have different pre-concieved ideas about what constitutes a good game.

I've been involved in playtesting quite a few early access games so I often rack up hundreds of hours in various games. As you could imagine I'm used to seeing various kinds of snap reviews for these games based on a players less than 2 hrs gameplay..

..Obviously it's quite difficult engaging in discussion with these players because it first requires them to actually play the game enough for them to.. a) understand the game themselves, and b) understand the opinions of the players who have a lot of experience in the game.

There are also groups of players who (no matter how old or experienced they are) always seem to misunderstand various aspects of game design (i.e, the things that make it 'a game'). Take RNG for example, if a player has a poor understanding of the role of randomness in games sometimes no amount of debating it with them helps the situation.

[Woudo]

Originally posted by Nihil Reich:

yeah I'm not reading nor responding to your sensless drivel anymore.

That's the winning move.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by MazyRun:

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

if you were "hardcore" in contrast to me, you would need to be my age at least.

I'm also in my 40's but I don't think it's an age thing though. There are a great many players out there who are a lot younger/less experienced than us who are way more hardcore gamers than us.

I just think there are many different types of player who interpret game mechanics in different ways. We all have different levels of patience and varying levels of competence. We all have different pre-concieved ideas about what constitutes a good game.

I've been involved in playtesting quite a few early access games so I often rack up hundreds of hours in various games. As you could imagine I'm used to seeing various kinds of snap reviews for these games based on a players less than 2 hrs gameplay..

..Obviously it's quite difficult engaging in discussion with these players because it first requires them to actually play the game enough for them to.. a) understand the game themselves, and b) understand the opinions of the players who have a lot of experience in the game.

There are also groups of players who (no matter how old or experienced they are) always seem to misunderstand various aspects of game design (i.e, the things that make it 'a game'). Take RNG for example, if a player has a poor understanding of the role of randomness in games sometimes no amount of debating it with them helps the situation.

umm, i gotta tell you.. i don't think a day has passed that i haven't played eletronic games since 1978.. if that isn't hardcore what is?

as far as the rest of it, did you read what the developers themselves said? it was a disapointment to them themselves..

what are the odds there will be a darkwoods 2?

5 years of work for a disappointment doesn't generally add to a longer time at the same you know.

as far as understanding the game it is pretty basic, but in my experience i got choked out right off the bat, the map size is a major contributer to that, it isn't terrible design, it is innovative, BUT.. it doesn't work as intended 100% of the time either because it is random.

the idea is great, but, not with time constraints the way they are.

the only game i have seen random work perfetly in was dungeonhack, which had TERRIBLE graphics, but 4 billion (yes BILLION) dungeons to explore with a total game file size of 28 MB, was really a incredible game, shame it looked so bad.

i stuck that one (Dungeonhack) on a android tablet and tried it a couple years ago, worked well except for the character editing screen, the buttons were to small to interact with.

when i was 7 I went to a school near Grissom AFB, we had computer lanbs and all back then, they taught us GW Basic in elementary school, i do understand what random number generation is and how it works.

say what you will, the numbers STILL speak for themselves.. if 56% finishes the prolouge, but less than 10% get the next acheivement you have a serious drop out rate issue.

I play alot of dragons dogma, almost 90% of the players get the first acheivement, over 80% get the next, over 60% finish the main game.. quite a difference ehh?

look at the math, it speaks for itself.

acheivements will show you the truth of the matter, once you have attained the first so you can see them anyways.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by Woudo:

Originally posted by Nihil Reich:

yeah I'm not reading nor responding to your sensless drivel anymore.

That's the winning move.

not really, it is the weaklings way, run from that which we don't understand and try to berate it, meanwhile making ourselves look worse than we try to make others appear.

Diogenes would be good for him really, hope he does look into him, cause you know, the highest pursuit of "humanity" (this means an "upright human being") is the pursuit of happiness, and that was Diogenes big thing. (see Aristotles book on ethics, book 1 chapter 4).

the poor kid is lost in his misery and doesn't even know it.

he has alot to thank Diogenes for in truth.. you know before Diogenes it was a CRIME to EAT in the market? if you went to buy food from the market and you were seen putting food into your mouth they would arrest you on the spot, so Diogenes said to himself "well, you know if we can't eat here i don't have to worry about messing up anyones appetite" and then he commenced to masterbate in the veiw of everyone present in the market, and then they came and chided him for it, and he told them "If I could only rub the hunger out of mankinds belly in such a manner" (meaning he would feed them his seed), and afterwards, rather than to have to watch Diogenes spank away they made it legal to eat in the market and illegal to masterbate in the marketplace.

so the next time you go to McDonalds, or Burger King or Starbucks or wherever, remember that without Diogenes defiling the marketplace in such a matter it would probably still be against the law to eat in the market so therefor those businesses wouldn't exist at all.

you know, the list of perons that have used Diogenes to gain fame is actually quite large, and Walt Disney himself was one of those BTW.

[MazyRun]

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

the numbers STILL speak for themselves.. if 56% finishes the prolouge, but less than 10% get the next acheivement you have a serious drop out rate issue.

I play alot of dragons dogma, almost 90% of the players get the first acheivement, over 80% get the next, over 60% finish the main game.. quite a difference ehh?

look at the math, it speaks for itself.

acheivements will show you the truth of the matter

I don't know, if anything global steam achievement charts only really shows us is how easy they are to unlock for certain games.

Steam achievements are very much an afterthought for game devs, it's just a feature for steam gamers. They pretty much have no relation to the actual game's level of difficulty or accessibility.

Darkwood steam acheivements seem to be aimed at rewarding players who reach key parts of game (which occur some way into the game). Other games will drop steam achievements for very simple 'accomplishments' (which took zero time/effort.. perhaps to try and incentivize or encourage the player).

I think the point that people have been trying to convey is that anyone who plays this game (or any game) for a decent amount of time becomes accustomed to the in-game world size/map size (after you've explored it a couple of times it's pretty small).

And after several playthroughs you notice that the RNG is actually pretty minimal, there's just enough to stop it feeling too linear and make it replayable.

The dev quotes are completely out of context, that was them being self critical of early design decisions which were fleshed out and made perfect along the way. It was a long early access period, I get the impression they are very confident in their final product (and rightly so). I think they are very aware that they ended up producing something special which resonated with a lot of people.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Originally posted by MazyRun:

Originally posted by capricorn1971ad9:

the numbers STILL speak for themselves.. if 56% finishes the prolouge, but less than 10% get the next acheivement you have a serious drop out rate issue.

I play alot of dragons dogma, almost 90% of the players get the first acheivement, over 80% get the next, over 60% finish the main game.. quite a difference ehh?

look at the math, it speaks for itself.

acheivements will show you the truth of the matter

I don't know, if anything global steam achievement charts only really shows us is how easy they are to unlock for certain games.

Steam achievements are very much an afterthought for game devs, it's just a feature for steam gamers. They pretty much have no relation to the actual game's level of difficulty or accessibility.

Darkwood steam acheivements seem to be aimed at rewarding players who reach key parts of game (which occur some way into the game). Other games will drop steam achievements for very simple 'accomplishments' (which took zero time/effort.. perhaps to try and incentivize or encourage the player).

I think the point that people have been trying to convey is that anyone who plays this game (or any game) for a decent amount of time becomes accustomed to the in-game world size/map size (after you've explored it a couple of times it's pretty small).

And after several playthroughs you notice that the RNG is actually pretty minimal, there's just enough to stop it feeling too linear and make it replayable.

The dev quotes are completely out of context, that was them being self critical of early design decisions which were fleshed out and made perfect along the way. It was a long early access period, I get the impression they are very confident in their final product (and rightly so). I think they are very aware that they ended up producing something special which resonated with a lot of people.

umm, but they (the devs) weren't really happy with the end result, after 5 years of designing it.
read the article closely, this was january it was written, last month, were they still in Dev at that time? no, that was hindsight, and recent.

the dragons dogma example shows quite clearly that people that play the game usually finish the main questline at least, the acheivements in darkwood show they stop playing after the prolouge.

simple deduction really, i don't understand why you don't see it when it is right there in front of you, click on global acheivements and consider it really, then look at dragons dogma and see what it shows, and heres the funniest part, if you play dragons dogma, the questline is terrible, it has some of the worst writing in videogame history, it should be considered a B-title, but like attack of the killer tomatoes or killer klowns from outerspace that B-rating made it even better in most cases, and retaining 60% of the players is a feat in itself in this day and age of A.D.D.

dragons dogma could have been so so much better, but everyone seems happy with it as it is..

if you have never tried it you should, it is a 3rd person shooter (again a weird thing to see successful) and a FRPG rolled up into one.

random generated games are hard to pull off right, even if it is just a single peice completely RNG, like bloodbowl. They either get diehard fans or diehard haters and no inbetween at all.

[capricorn1971ad9]

Mazy, have you considered your words in this thread: http://steamcommunity.com/app/274520/discussions/0/1693785035820486413/

because what i am describing is the absolute flip side of your words, proving that that does happen, and can right off the bat in the first playthrough.

(I am refering to post #8 btw)

MazyRun has Darkwood Jan 21 @ 9:31pm

Originally posted by varsityplayer:
The game has RNG but never to the point where it completely screws you.

MazyRun:
Good point. This is something I've found to be true in all well designed games.. the initial perception of some difficult games can be that certain aspects are uncontrollable but through the repetition of mistakes you learn there is a skill/discipline to managing the RNG of every situation.

I think one of the strong points of this game is it managed to buck the trend of throw-away horror games (one run and done) and make something with a bit of meat in it, with a great atmosphere and interesting mechanics that work best with a top down view.
Last edited by MazyRun; Jan 21 @ 10:50pm

according to the acheivements most do not even do the "One Run" your describing..
how do you explain that?

I think your basing all off of opinion and your experience and not the simple truth as it is for others, which in turn is blinding you to the simple math the acheivements show.

And lets be honest, if you can wander the WOODS all day long, and not even find a stick to defend yourself with, WTH are the woods made of? legos?

[a ham getting eaten by ants]

There is a lot of text here. Way too much for me to read trough. But I would like to say that the first time I played this I did not realise it was randomly generated. Meaning it worked pretty well, And its a survival game at heart of course the map is gonna be big with lots of stuff to see and experience. I hope you were not looking forward to a linear experience.