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Happy New Year.
It's not that difficult to get going, but the game is also not really a "game". I got something much different than I expected.
This is a ship builder that pretends to have a reason for you to build said ship.
There's little to no interactive physics with the game world.
There's nothing to do other than grab some rag dolls and drag them back to hospitals.
Development, while really active, also seems aimless. The name of the game is Stormworks: Build and Rescue... but they have a space/ moon landing DLC... Couldn't tell you what they are spending their time on, but it sure isn't fleshing out the content.
If this all sounds negative, that's not the intention. I decided to keep the game, because it does have potential. Whether or not it will ever realize its potential remains to be seen.
If you're looking for an interactive physics sandbox. This isn't it. If you want battle simulations, this isn't it. If you want interesting, emergent experiences while doing missions and interacting with the game world, this isn't it.
But.. if you want to build really detailed ships with all kinds of features which serve no purpose, then this is the game for you.
You can actually do alot in this game, go fishing, go crabbing mine and trade oil, coal, and iron, deliver cargo/trailers, explore the map, treasure hunt for crates and clean up oil spills.
I'll take your word for it, and I'm happy to hear. Maybe I was being hyperbolic, but as someone who just got the game, that is essentially all it offers me. It's a very unwelcoming game that doesn't introduce itself in the best light.
It defaulted me to an island with a tractor and no road to drive it on. The missions are all the same. There's very little interaction between the player and the game world. Ships feel static and isolated from the rest of the world. No damage, no risk of sinking etc.
The only missions its given me are to go rescue someone from a burning ship and take them to a hospital.
I love the ocean physics. I love the concept of the ship building, even though I don't know how it works just yet, and I love the idea of complex rescue or other operations. All of these things are either non existent or obfuscated.
The building/testing side of the game is where its at. The learning curve is steep. Twice as hard if you hate math or meticulous testing/tweaking. Once you get the hang of it, the devs release an update that changes everything and it takes two weeks of independent testing or reading the forums to find the results of others tests to know what changed.
That part does interest me, but what is the point to building these ships if there's no use for them in the game? I'm a goal oriented person. Making a ship just to save it to file and never use it for anything doesn't strike me as fun.
Development seems all over the place. Hard to imagine this game is 1.0+. It feels like an Early Access title.
Development is all over the place. The Devs started with a great game with a full future ahead of it, then started catering to youtubers and community votes. A game that started around SAR vehicles started branching out. As an American, I'm firmly behind the weapons DLC as all I care to build are military vehicles. I know not all of the community agrees- but it was a DLC you didn't have to take part in to still reap the benefit of new parts (simply for looks, guns don't fire etc.) But then it expanded to Industrial and Space. Again, industrial was an okay premise, but the content was a large empty landmass and giant oil rig parts that don't help anybody out unless they're building an oil rig. Space is what screwed it as a mandatory update for everyone forced idiotic and inconsistent fluid and gas mechanics that broke half of the workshop, were poorly explained and were hotfixed and routinely screwed for about six months after space released. Space by the way, was EIGHTH on a community poll behind sails, fishing and other things that fit the theme of the game that the players wanted for years.
The art style attracts kids but the engineering side requires some hefty math and visual/spacial capability of an adult. Those who build usually spend hundreds of hours happily in editor building what they want. The kiddos who binge watch the youtubers want instant gratification and demand dumb stuff like space.
As for a goal, its fun to build something obnoxious and to your personal taste. perfect it and spawn it into a custom career. Use an OP work of art with perfect functionality and handling to go do the mannequin rescue missions. If you task yourself with something good and strive to perfect it you can spend a thousand hours in the game with ADHD starting more projects than you can ever finish, but happily hopping between them as you get brain waves and energy to finish part of them.
or you can just build slab sided doghouse shaped tub boats with clunky clutch and throttle levers on the bridge with an over-revving underpowered engine and no logical deck layout like 90% of the kids building on here...
Yeah, I love guns too. I wish they.. did something.. visually, meaningfully.. If only they had some use or purpose.
After about 10 hours, I uninstalled this game. I tried hard to find some sort of positive experience from it to no avail. It's a broken mess with a lot of undelivered promises on the store page.
The number of positive reviews is shocking to me. That the developers could consider this game a >1.0, and make space expansions in a game about simulating rescues despite the rest of the game being practically unplayable, is inexcusable. Normally, I could forgive developers for missteps because game development is hard. In this case, they have the skills but choose to not address any problems whatsoever.
Rarely have I witnessed a development team so out of touch with the game they're making.
I wish I could have returned it, but I truly believed it was one of those games I just had to spend time gaining familiarity. I found out too late that's not the case.
I'm actually much more enjoying the other game from Geometa, using the same engine: Carrier Command 2. You don't get to build anything, but it's an excellent mix of strategy, logistics, and action. I can only imagine how amazing it would be to have Stormworks construction with Carrier Command gameplay...
For a new player, the game can be a bit daunting. There's a ton of components, many of which can be pretty complex. Additionally, there have been some questionable design choices which can result in unexpected behaviors and solutions. But if you start simple and take your time to tinker and experiment, you'll pick up on things and feel more confident to take on more complex projects as time passes. Personally, I've found that process to be very rewarding.
You'll probably get stuck from time to time, but this discussion board and youtube can both be pretty great resources for learning from other players. I'd personally recommend checking out 454SS's channel. He's been a fantastic resource in my time with this game. His discord server's also pretty nice. There's lots of friendly people over there that'd be happy to lend a hand or just play together with.
But above all else, this is very much a self-motivated kind of game. I can't guarantee you'll stick with it, but if you do, there's so much to build and do and some really cool people to meet and learn from in the community. All said, welcome aboard and happy new year!
You can basically take two approaches to learning this game. Figuring it out on your own and/or researching workshop vehicles (with credit if you reupload an altered version of someone creation).
If a new player asked me what to do first id simply say make a functional engine at a land workbench, preferably a modular engine without any of the infinite resources available from creative. If you can make a running engine and understand the requirements you are basically 1/3 of the way to building anything you want.
Also microcontrollers are extremely powerful but the community has alot of smart people who have put them on the workshop for just about anything. Nothing is wrong with not making your own and if you are willing they are a great resource to learn how other people are doing things.
If you truly want to have a reason to play the game outside of building it is logistics. Make vehicles that allow you to either do missions/mining/fishing/transportation then use income from that to expand your fleet while sustaining yourself. Fuel management is the final boss of Stormworks.
P.S.
Personally I don't despawn vehicles unless I am upgrading them in some form so my gameplay style caters to a requirement to earn money.
P.P.S.
You can find a "scene" file in your saves folder in AppData>Roaming>Stormworks>saves folders you can alter alot of things to customize your save even futher. You can open it with notepad or w/e. You can do most of this with the creative menu if you choose to start that way.
The things to care about are at the top and it allows you to change what camera's are allowed along with how restrictive fast-travel / vehicle teleportation is. You can also do things like alter your money if you want to do a playthrough with initial equipment or turn on respawning. Or perhaps you want your vehicles to have icons on the map and not the player.