Anyone else expected more from the story? (spoiler)

[XIII]

So I did enjoy Raft, was a nice game and well worth the buy. But is it just me that felt the story started promising, but kinda devolved into meaninglessnes? Maybe I just read more into it then there was, but its just weird:

Like, at the start, the radio tower seems to set up so much mistery and interesting things, its very intriguing. Stuff like messages about gunshots in the distance are quite ominous.
The backstory and documents seem to dive into some interesting topics, about human hubris, environmental devastation and partisan politics even in the face of destruction. It feels like youre searching for some 'miracle' solution to save people from the sea, which almost asks for some subversion or twist.
Theres levels like the skyscraper, where people tried to build ever higher to escape the waves, until they just gave up. Youre following a trail of destruction left by some weird army guy. Horrible things happening on Tangaroa, one of the most promising concepts.
Like, theres some heavy themes in the background, even in late locations. Lots of conflict, desperation and failure.

But in reality, thats just increasingly pushed aside? The story developes and ends more like a saturady morning cartoon, and there really isnt anything deep or interesting left. The guy really is just a bargain bin comic book villain and wants a luxury apartment or whatever. Your "Utopia" is just... some wooden buildings attached to more skyscrapers? What was even the point of Varuna then? Apparently there was never a problem except for one angry swedish guy.


Anyway, is that just me, have I read too much into the story? Or was this always the way the game wanted to go? T

[T9]

"started promising, but kinda devolved into meaninglessnes?"
100 % lol

nice game but story is instantly forgetable haha

[Kathykins]

For a year and a half'ish I've been playing the story through many many times, reading notes, following the clues to next destination etc. It was interesting, and there is a lot of stuff going on between the lines. Funny and tragic at the same time. Final chapter comes along, one we have been waiting for, for a long, long time. And now there's this Olaf guy, or whatever, and nobody has any clue who he is, because the story is now completely different.

Raft is a story driven game, at least it is for me. It gives the game purpose and sense of direction. And I liked that. I've played and finished chapter 1+2 at least a dozen times. Now I don't even want to start a new save, because I was disappointed in how it ended. Not only with the "boss" fights, but also things I don't feel is a good fit for the game, like the parkour !@%&#. Simple jumping to get to where I need to go is fine. Simple puzzles to open doors or whatever, fine. Can't stand how short the Hazmat suit lasted. Constantly having to go put it on again sucked. I hated the "weight puzzle" and windmills. I can't do **** like that. My hand/eye coordination is terrible, and I have painful wrists. My reaction is utterly terrible.

The ending was extremely anti-climatic and disappointing. I had expected more from Utopia. A large, fruitful, beautiful island with lots of people working together for the greater good. Wooden huts slapped on the sides of skyscrapers isn't my idea of Utopia.

[Alaskan Glitch]

I was also disappointed with the story-line. It started off promising, following in the wake of failed attempts at surviving the water apocalypse. However, it quickly deteriorated after passing off the cause as just some impossible climate disaster without explanation.

There are places where the puzzles made sense, and other places (like the "weight puzzle" and windmills) where it made no sense. I also agree that the Hazmat suit duration was far too short for completing the fiddly puzzle required to advance. By the time you even figure out what is required you have already gone through at least one Hazmat suit.

The ending was not only anti-climatic and disappointing, it was also annoying. The developers just created a boss with acid for blood (for some unexplained reason) and give the player no defense against it, just to make it as annoying for the player as possible.

It also makes no sense to place the best blueprints, the ones players would find the most useful, at the very end of the story. Once the story has been completed, how many actually continue playing the game? What would be the point?

[XIII]

Originally posted by Kathykins:

For a year and a half'ish I've been playing the story through many many times, reading notes, following the clues to next destination etc. It was interesting, and there is a lot of stuff going on between the lines. Funny and tragic at the same time. Final chapter comes along, one we have been waiting for, for a long, long time. And now there's this Olaf guy, or whatever, and nobody has any clue who he is, because the story is now completely different.

Raft is a story driven game, at least it is for me. It gives the game purpose and sense of direction. And I liked that. I've played and finished chapter 1+2 at least a dozen times. Now I don't even want to start a new save, because I was disappointed in how it ended. Not only with the "boss" fights, but also things I don't feel is a good fit for the game, like the parkour !@%&#. Simple jumping to get to where I need to go is fine. Simple puzzles to open doors or whatever, fine. Can't stand how short the Hazmat suit lasted. Constantly having to go put it on again sucked. I hated the "weight puzzle" and windmills. I can't do **** like that. My hand/eye coordination is terrible, and I have painful wrists. My reaction is utterly terrible.

Man I get you. I want to play more Raft, maybe start a new save to just build something cool, but im dreading some of the worse story parts I gotta play for blueprints. Btw, I think the windmills just got broken hitboxes or so. Something just didnt work right.

Never played Early Access, but I did wonder if the story mustve changed during development or so. Like in the mid part. Sure Caravan island has you follow that boy who is a bit of quirky charachter, but the swedish dude is literally the reason everyone there died or fled, I think including the boys mother. Thats kinda horrible and is just never mentioned again.

The ending was extremely anti-climatic and disappointing. I had expected more from Utopia. A large, fruitful, beautiful island with lots of people working together for the greater good. Wooden huts slapped on the sides of skyscrapers isn't my idea of Utopia.

I also wondered if its some scifi solution, like an underwater city or space project. Almost like Tangaroa but with a twist. Like at the end I thought we could extract a reactor from temperance or so, which seemed like a more refined version of Tangaroas unreliable technology.

If you can just put a bunch of wodden structures on skyscrapers, then Varuna Point shouldve been a smaller Utopia. I dont even know how Utopia has higher buildings than Varuna. Or why growing food suddenly isnt a problem on Utopia.
And heck, just that reliance on pre-catastrophe structures makes it feel like we havent acchieved anything. Humans arent yet self-sustainable, but reliant on scraps from the past.

Well see if the DLC fixes anything. The game was still more than fun enough for me to play it, so Im gonna give that a try when it comes out. Im just disappointed about the missed potential.

[XIII]

Originally posted by Alaskan Glitch:

It also makes no sense to place the best blueprints, the ones players would find the most useful, at the very end of the story. Once the story has been completed, how many actually continue playing the game? What would be the point?

Tbh I dont even know the point of some of those lategame items, even if we go them earlier. A lot of the lategame blueprints are so expensive that they dont really make sense. Like the electric smelter was a big disappointment, I hoped it would "stack" ressources or so for mass smelting (like the advanced refinery), but it really just saves you wood. At which point you gotta wonder if you want to pay a ton of expensive ressource to save something you get for free from trees anyway.
And a scraphook or axe made of super rare material isnt even much of an improvement. Its easier to just maintain an arsenal of iron tools.

You do make good points, a lot about the end of the game didnt make much sense, even beside the story.

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

The decision to turn Vastagan from "rich boy brought too many ♥♥♥♥♥♥ and not enough useful people" to "I will raise an army of rabid mutants to lock all the peasants in a wooden box" did not even slightly help the story. The only parts that are memorable are the parts that are offensive to good taste and decency.


...the term for a woman who sells her body for money is censored. Wow.

[XIII]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

The decision to turn Vastagan from "rich boy brought too many ♥♥♥♥♥♥ and not enough useful people" to "I will raise an army of rabid mutants to lock all the peasants in a wooden box" did not even slightly help the story. The only parts that are memorable are the parts that are offensive to good taste and decency.


...the term for a woman who sells her body for money is censored. Wow.

Please tell more, was that changed? Because I did get some mixed messages from Vasagatan; I expected a mutiny or military rule causing conflict, so when it "just" ended up being mutant rats was a bit strange.

[Alaskan Glitch]

Originally posted by XIII:

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

The decision to turn Vastagan from "rich boy brought too many ♥♥♥♥♥♥ and not enough useful people" to "I will raise an army of rabid mutants to lock all the peasants in a wooden box" did not even slightly help the story. The only parts that are memorable are the parts that are offensive to good taste and decency.


...the term for a woman who sells her body for money is censored. Wow.

Please tell more, was that changed? Because I did get some mixed messages from Vasagatan; I expected a mutiny or military rule causing conflict, so when it "just" ended up being mutant rats was a bit strange.

The mutant rat storyline began at the same time as Olof, aboard the yacht. Then suddenly, without explanation, it became hyenas. I had already given up on the story by then. My only interest was in obtaining the blueprints and vending machine tokens.

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

The original story on Vastagan was that Olaf was an incompetent rich man who hired a captain and a skeleton crew and loaded the ship up with girls without useful skills beyond making Olaf happy. The captain became sick, supplies ran low, the mutant rats were mentioned a couple of times but were little more than just another reason to abandon ship. Olaf was never heard from again. There were no military aspects to the story AT ALL.

Caravan Island, the pigs were carrying salmonella. No hyenas were ever mentioned. No Olaf. The island was abandoned because they didn't have enough supplies to survive with so many sick.

Tangaroa was mostly just a lot less explicit. You could surmise that the Caravan Island refugees were part of the city's immediate problems, but the story was told from multiple perspectives that made it clear that the city population broke into factions that turned on each other over failing tech and dwindling food, rather than being a reaction to a military campaign.

[T9]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

The original story on Vastagan was that Olaf was an incompetent rich man who hired a captain and a skeleton crew and loaded the ship up with girls without useful skills beyond making Olaf happy. The captain became sick, supplies ran low, the mutant rats were mentioned a couple of times but were little more than just another reason to abandon ship. Olaf was never heard from again. There were no military aspects to the story AT ALL.

Caravan Island, the pigs were carrying salmonella. No hyenas were ever mentioned. No Olaf. The island was abandoned because they didn't have enough supplies to survive with so many sick.

Tangaroa was mostly just a lot less explicit. You could surmise that the Caravan Island refugees were part of the city's immediate problems, but the story was told from multiple perspectives that made it clear that the city population broke into factions that turned on each other over failing tech and dwindling food, rather than being a reaction to a military campaign.

Weren't there notes on caravan that mentioned "a man with animals" and some trouble etc

[Sparkiekong]

I played through early access. It was a bit disjointed back then... but there was always a bit of the "read between the lines" type stuff that made it ok. Like someone above said, there was some mystery. I kinda got the idea that I was looking for family or something along that nature.

So... when I replayed through the final release and didn't find anything more than a crazy dude who's breeding rabid animals... meh...

I don't really dislike it... but at the same time... I don't love it either. I think Olaf was added to give the story something to pull you along but he wasn't really interesting enough. It might make more sense if Olaf had captured someone we had a stake in. Someone we loved who we wanted to get back.

[XIII]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

The original story on Vastagan was that Olaf was an incompetent rich man who hired a captain and a skeleton crew and loaded the ship up with girls without useful skills beyond making Olaf happy. The captain became sick, supplies ran low, the mutant rats were mentioned a couple of times but were little more than just another reason to abandon ship. Olaf was never heard from again. There were no military aspects to the story AT ALL.

Caravan Island, the pigs were carrying salmonella. No hyenas were ever mentioned. No Olaf. The island was abandoned because they didn't have enough supplies to survive with so many sick.

Tangaroa was mostly just a lot less explicit. You could surmise that the Caravan Island refugees were part of the city's immediate problems, but the story was told from multiple perspectives that made it clear that the city population broke into factions that turned on each other over failing tech and dwindling food, rather than being a reaction to a military campaign.

Thanks! Those story bits seem to make more sense, and I expected some its threads to follow those lines.

I wonder why they changed so much of the story. Maybe they had written themselves into a corner and didnt know how to put everything together? Its peculiar after all, how the entire game is just backstory, except the last island of the third act?
Maybe making Olaf the big bad was just so you could at least resolve 'something' in the final location.
Or maybe they thought the game was too dark in tone? Not child friendly enough? Although they ended up making Olaf kill a lot of people for sure, they just didnt talk about it much.

[XIII]

Originally posted by Sparkiekong:

I played through early access. It was a bit disjointed back then... but there was always a bit of the "read between the lines" type stuff that made it ok. Like someone above said, there was some mystery. I kinda got the idea that I was looking for family or something along that nature.

So... when I replayed through the final release and didn't find anything more than a crazy dude who's breeding rabid animals... meh...

I don't really dislike it... but at the same time... I don't love it either. I think Olaf was added to give the story something to pull you along but he wasn't really interesting enough. It might make more sense if Olaf had captured someone we had a stake in. Someone we loved who we wanted to get back.

Maybe thats it. Devs wrote themselves into a corner and didnt know where to go, so they just made Olaf into a bad guy. The game also had the problem that the player charachter was never really established, so there wasnt much of a direct stake. We've just been some weirdo reading about other peoples lifes.

The final island is the only place where really something happens in regards to other people. Maybe its no surprised that it such a rushed mess.

Doesnt quite explain the tonal difference, though. How we went from a mystery, inter-human conflict and tragedy, to what we got in Utopia.

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

Originally posted by XIII:

I wonder why they changed so much of the story. Maybe they had written themselves into a corner and didnt know how to put everything together? Its peculiar after all, how the entire game is just backstory, except the last island of the third act?
Maybe making Olaf the big bad was just so you could at least resolve 'something' in the final location.
Or maybe they thought the game was too dark in tone? Not child friendly enough? Although they ended up making Olaf kill a lot of people for sure, they just didnt talk about it much.

Politics. The story was rewritten to deliver a critique about...I'm not sure if it's race or just class delivered in a racist way. The message was more important than telling a coherent story.

After you kill the hyena the fat white guy traps himself in an undignified position and you open a door to let out a large crowd of not-white people who immediately start talking about freedom while the fat white guy yells that they are not smart enough to govern themselves.

[Alaskan Glitch]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

Originally posted by XIII:

I wonder why they changed so much of the story. Maybe they had written themselves into a corner and didnt know how to put everything together? Its peculiar after all, how the entire game is just backstory, except the last island of the third act?
Maybe making Olaf the big bad was just so you could at least resolve 'something' in the final location.
Or maybe they thought the game was too dark in tone? Not child friendly enough? Although they ended up making Olaf kill a lot of people for sure, they just didnt talk about it much.

Politics. The story was rewritten to deliver a critique about...I'm not sure if it's race or just class delivered in a racist way. The message was more important than telling a coherent story.

After you kill the hyena the fat white guy traps himself in an undignified position and you open a door to let out a large crowd of not-white people who immediately start talking about freedom while the fat white guy yells that they are not smart enough to govern themselves.

Then the writers will be disappointed to discover that everyone is still locked up in my game. After the nuclear hyena took me out, I decided I wasn't strong enough or well enough equipped to take it out. So I left the story uncompleted.

I'm roaming around building up my raft, acquiring more resources, improving my reputation with the traders, while building better weapons, armor, and equipment. I never bothered collecting bees, or farming critters the first time through, so now I will.

Eventually I may complete the story line, but I am in no hurry. The hostages can rot in that shed for all I care.