Why does it have to be soo hard to get started?

[gwapo2109]

This is extremely frustrating. I am a new player. The game doesnt seen to tell you how to do anything. For example, it tells you to find Sodium to repair your life support, it tells you how to find it, but not how to get it once you find it. I had to search the internet and look at a few forums before i found that you had to hold the E key. The game lets you know you need to repair something, but doesn't show you HOW.

At least this is as far as i can tell. i was just clicking around and eventually the suit was repaired, i found more Sodium and harvested it, but have no clue on to use it to further supply life support, so i died again, and again, and again.

Even the videos seem to miss this- i found a lot that tell you what you need to do, but not how to actually do it.

I dont really want to spend hours on the internet searching how to get in the ship either. There has got to be a guide that shows you HOW to do stuff, Can anyone point me in the right direction?

[maestro]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Zero Cents:

op does not understand how to use mouseover ... or read apparently

There is such a thing as information overload, especially when combined with anxiety and time limits.

Literally, one of the very first things the game shows you, is a meter on the bottom left of the screen that for some weird reason they decided to start it at ~30% full (assuming you are not doing a "skip the tutorial" start).

At 25% full, the AI goes "___ protection: falling" and the meter starts to flash.

Neat and useful effects to a player who knows what they're doing, but anxiety-inducing to someone who is trying to pay attention to all the stuff popping up on the screen telling them what to do.

It's easy to miss stuff when messages pop up on the screen for 3-5 seconds and then disappear when your mind is focused on other stuff.

I know I sounded a little snarky in my first response on this thread, but I thought about it for a bit and I can kinda see why some people have a little difficulty at first.

Heck, I myself end up with headaches when I play a new game for the first few hours because there's always so much to take in. I find myself getting lost or forgetting where stuff is in games that feature detailed maps and towns, for example.

This is because your mind is focused on other stuff and it's easy to just miss stuff or not think of "the obvious" like mousing over something when you're trying to process something else at the same time.

Some people are just better at it than others. This is why I think they could at least start you off with 75%+ hazard protection instead of 30%. That would at least give you more time to get acquainted with the mechanics of the game.

[UncreativelyNamed]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από maestro:

...This is why I think they could at least start you off with 75%+ hazard protection instead of 30%. That would at least give you more time to get acquainted with the mechanics of the game.

I don't understand why it doesn't start at 100%. I get that that would be too easy for people who've been around the block a few times, but the game, overall, is pretty relaxed, so I don't understand why there's a hectic start even on just the "Normal" setting. "Hectic" is not reflective of what the game is like as a whole. The "survival" aspect is very quickly minimal-to-nonexistent, at least on Normal or easier settings, and even on harder settings it's less of a survival game and more of an inventory management one. My point is that, IMO, the impression you get from the very beginning of the game doesn't match the rest of the game or the overall spirit of it.

I'm a newer player, started with the release of Interceptor, so I don't know if the start of a save was ever different. If it was, did people complain that it was too easy or something?

[Jaggid Edje]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από maestro:

There is such a thing as information overload, especially when combined with anxiety and time limits.

Literally, one of the very first things the game shows you, is a meter on the bottom left of the screen that for some weird reason they decided to start it at ~30% full (assuming you are not doing a "skip the tutorial" start).

At 25% full, the AI goes "___ protection: falling" and the meter starts to flash.

Neat and useful effects to a player who knows what they're doing, but anxiety-inducing to someone who is trying to pay attention to all the stuff popping up on the screen telling them what to do.

It's easy to miss stuff when messages pop up on the screen for 3-5 seconds and then disappear when your mind is focused on other stuff.

Pretty much exactly this.

My first experience with the game was many, many years ago at this point. But I remember it like it was yesterday.

I got spit out on a planet, with all my stuff broken and my hazard protection quickly going down. The screen was throwing out instructions in the bottom right corner much faster than I had time to actually read them AND figure out how to do it what it was telling me to do.

It's that second part, the figuring out how exactly to do what it was telling me to do that was time-consuming. I wasn't doing that as quickly as the instructions were wanting me to. Then the the instruction would vanish, to be replaced by some other message. And I got lost in the maze of navigating inventory and tech inventory screens (keep in mind those were seperate tabs back then).

All the while, my hazard protection continued draining, because the game does NOT pause when you have inventory open.

I was dead before I ever did figure out exactly how to get the first couple of things fixed and gather some sodium. And feeling rushed, and the anxiety of the hazard drain warning were a big factor in that.

Mind you, I started my very first game of NMS on Permadeath. So I had less time for all of this than a new player who was smart enough not to do that... But I came into the game with familiarity of survival/craft games, and for 99% of those, I absolutely can start a game on permadeath and not have to worry about dying in the first 5 minutes.

Long story short. I am, and always will be, sympathetic to new players to NMS that find the start just a little bit confusing and over-whelming. Because it can be.

[momopovich]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από maestro:

The menus in NMS do take a little getting used to, but once you learn them... they are very easy to use. Maybe not the most intuitive, but dang do they work and get crap done. I've never had a complaint about how the menus actually work even though it took a little to get used to them and get muscle memory down pat.

For YEARS, keybinds and submenus used to be heavily bugged. For example assigning a key to certain submenus like recharging the mining beam did not work at all, or it did work until you switched weapons. Using a keybind to summon the freighter in space used to crash my game.

I don't know exactly what works and what does not in the current update. Thing is you can never be sure if your keybinds will still work the next time you load your save.

Aside from bugs there are annoying issues with the design, like having to cycle weapons instead of being able to equip the weapon/utility beam you want instantly

[momopovich]

And yes the very begining of your first NMS save is the most challenging part because you likely have no idea where the environmental protection recharging menu is. You are likely to experiment with visual settings and trying to understand how multiplayer works (or rather, does not). And then you die from hazard.

Literally the only challenge in this game is learning about the recharging submenu. After that there is no real survival mechanics.

[ohiorice]

I personally do not like how the revised save file processes work. It was much, much better in the past. Oh, not because it made loading to get an S-Class item easier, just because it worked like you thought it ought to work.

My multi-hundreds of hours game save is of course my favorite save... practically a demi-god in that save.

Recharging: Sux to be honest. Especially when in space in combat and the shields are gone, you are about to die. Where do the shields display via the recharge menu? Varies between ships (at least mine) and strangely enough, the shields never the the first item selected for recharge.

Can't tell you how many times my warp drive's been recharged when I did not want to recharge it :-)

[Freeman71]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από gwapo2109:

This is extremely frustrating. I am a new player. The game doesnt seen to tell you how to do anything. For example, it tells you to find Sodium to repair your life support, it tells you how to find it, but not how to get it once you find it. I had to search the internet and look at a few forums before i found that you had to hold the E key. The game lets you know you need to repair something, but doesn't show you HOW.

At least this is as far as i can tell. i was just clicking around and eventually the suit was repaired, i found more Sodium and harvested it, but have no clue on to use it to further supply life support, so i died again, and again, and again.

Even the videos seem to miss this- i found a lot that tell you what you need to do, but not how to actually do it.

I dont really want to spend hours on the internet searching how to get in the ship either. There has got to be a guide that shows you HOW to do stuff, Can anyone point me in the right direction?

I feel your pain. and it would be confusing to a new player. As mentioned, just take your time and read everything it tells you. It can be confusing at times because this game loves to switch missions in your log. That part alone can be quite confusing to a new player, I know it screwed me up when I was first learning the game. If the current mission isn't selected you won't get prompts or way points until it is. Just take the game slow and have fun with it, there is no time limit. Once you have your suit repaired it's quite difficult to die on a world as resources are pretty much everywhere. Again just hit escape if you have to, as this pauses the time in a solo play experience. Then you can read the catalog help and in game help. Don't give up on this amazing game, it really is a work of art. I hope this helped a little, and may you soon see the stars Traveler!

[TheCr33pur]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από gwapo2109:

This is extremely frustrating. I am a new player. The game doesnt seen to tell you how to do anything. For example, it tells you to find Sodium to repair your life support, it tells you how to find it, but not how to get it once you find it. I had to search the internet and look at a few forums before i found that you had to hold the E key. The game lets you know you need to repair something, but doesn't show you HOW.

At least this is as far as i can tell. i was just clicking around and eventually the suit was repaired, i found more Sodium and harvested it, but have no clue on to use it to further supply life support, so i died again, and again, and again.

Even the videos seem to miss this- i found a lot that tell you what you need to do, but not how to actually do it.

I dont really want to spend hours on the internet searching how to get in the ship either. There has got to be a guide that shows you HOW to do stuff, Can anyone point me in the right direction?

It use to be much better than this, idk what they did to it. I was on survival mode and do okay, but now doing that, watch out for really strong pirates in space. You will be lucky if you can pull that off, i mean with this setup it was normal difficult and still really hard to do. Doesnt feel normal at all, its more extreme lol.

I tried get back into this several times, but i lost interest. There no way i playing on normal story game, it was too boring. But i did enjoy playing the survival mode back then, until they did this. I even tried lower the pirate strength or difficulties down to minimum and something still aint right.

One player told me, could be something in the data that hasnt been updated, i think he meant to uninstall, delete the folder and start all over. So idk what the hell going on in there.

[UncreativelyNamed]

With all this talk of this mode or that mode... This is why I love the custom mode. Granted, it doesn't help with the complicated menus and vague instructions, etc., but it does mean you can crank up (or down) different settings. Now that I have things figured out, I usually play with all the hardest settings except no permadeath (not interested), no predators (because I'm a super-softie and don't want to kill animals), standard on-foot combat (because I dislike that), and free base power generation (because I don't enjoy screwing around with that). To me, custom is the way to go.

Except as a brand-new noob. For that, I think the "Relaxed" setting is the way to go. That way, you have more time to figure out how to do things while still being required to do things so that you learn how to do things in case you want to play with more difficult settings later, whereas in "Creative" setting you don't have to learn anything. One can then progressively bump up the difficulty settings as one learns and becomes comfortable with the controls. That's what I did because I never assume that I'm going to understand a game just because I've played others that seem to be like it. Every game has its unique quirks, and I don't like feeling stressed as I learn them. That's not fun to me. I play games to chill and relax.

[Raven]

"Why does it have to be soo hard to get started?"

Whatever you do, do not get me started. Once started I am very hard to stop. So hard to stop in fact that I'm still going after first getting started.

[sosayweall]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από gwapo2109:

This is extremely frustrating. I am a new player. The game doesnt seen to tell you how to do anything. For example, it tells you to find Sodium to repair your life support, it tells you how to find it, but not how to get it once you find it. I had to search the internet and look at a few forums before i found that you had to hold the E key. The game lets you know you need to repair something, but doesn't show you HOW.

At least this is as far as i can tell. i was just clicking around and eventually the suit was repaired, i found more Sodium and harvested it, but have no clue on to use it to further supply life support, so i died again, and again, and again.

Even the videos seem to miss this- i found a lot that tell you what you need to do, but not how to actually do it.

I dont really want to spend hours on the internet searching how to get in the ship either. There has got to be a guide that shows you HOW to do stuff, Can anyone point me in the right direction?

here's some basic guides https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnUniUxmtsCO6_k5H7sg-PbjvfLDl0FMa

i have to continue this series but for anyone lost check it out

[UncreativelyNamed]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Peregrinus:

"Why does it have to be soo hard to get started?"

Whatever you do, do not get me started. Once started I am very hard to stop. So hard to stop in fact that I'm still going after first getting started.

🎶🎶 Don't stop me nooooow! 🎶🎶

[Sкiткj3ll]

I remember learning stuff quite fast once I actually sat down and read what the text on the screen was telling me? You know.. the encyclopedia and all that? Has that been removed in the 3 months or so since I started playing this game? xD

That said though... I do remember googling some stuff and watched a couple of videos on the more in depth systems, but as far as getting myself off the planet and surviving? That was quite easy. To each their own though.

[maestro]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από momopovich:

For YEARS, keybinds and submenus used to be heavily bugged. For example assigning a key to certain submenus like recharging the mining beam did not work at all, or it did work until you switched weapons. Using a keybind to summon the freighter in space used to crash my game.

I don't know exactly what works and what does not in the current update. Thing is you can never be sure if your keybinds will still work the next time you load your save.

Aside from bugs there are annoying issues with the design, like having to cycle weapons instead of being able to equip the weapon/utility beam you want instantly

I'm talking about the stock PC control scheme, as I never changed it even from when I first started playing, waaaay back years ago. I didn't start on launch, I started some time after NEXT I think. Not sure about that.

But, I just kept the UI and keybinds the same as they've always been and I've found them to be pretty much everything I could ask for.

But then I just use KB+Mouse, maybe someone with a controller, flight stick, etc might want to change some of it? /shrug I wouldn't know.

[Mr. Vakarian]

Honestly, I get what you mean. The game kind of takes a more "toss someone in the pool before they can swim" approach. The game tells you a few things, but there's a lack of guidance (A bit like Minecraft, but Minecraft has fewer things going on when you first spawn). IMO this is not a bad thing: I love to figure things out myself, and have always skipped any tutorial possible in games, but I can see how it could be a bit confusing for a newcomer.