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But it isn't nearly as RNG as it seems (see https://steamcommunity.com/app/718670/discussions/0/3837676019939547439/ ) and there is plenty of room to play sub-optimally once you understand the systems. So I would also strongly disagree with "the more you know about it the worse it gets."
Sure you have the Disasters. Those you can handle, but what about things (to be oblique) walking through the doorways of dreams? Those are heavily RNG and can hamper your progress. What about that specific element you just have to keep rolling for again and again and again? That's still RNG.
No my big problem is that for the amount of work the game asks it gives you no feeling of satisfaction in victory. The game just devolves into a loop of quashing timers and waiting until you can get that one element you know exists but you've just got to keep rolling for it. The game runs out of meaningful stuff to do. It does not stay remotely consistent. For a cult game the endgame should be nuts. Things should be going off the rails with the kind of power you can bring to bear once you know how to do it, and it does... for one second and then the game replaces the challenge you overcame with something that resists that challenge (hunters are the worst for this).
It's just a profoundly disappointing game.
For me and many others, it is a profoundly satisfying experience. It isn't for you, and that's fine. Weatherfactory have stated often that they make niche games, and a niche game is - by definition - not for everyone.
Games about learning to mitigate RNG aren't even a new or novel concept. Games like Bloodbowl built a huge fan following and basically the entire strategy is minimizing RNG in a game with way more (and way more punishing) RNG than CS.
You're allowed to dislike it. I only take issue with you saying it is these things when myself and a great many others (check out the rating on the store page) absolutely love this game. It is these things for you, which was my point.
No, it's not.
Rather it's disappointing to you. It's fine if you didn't like the game, but that doesn't make it objectively bad.
The game is aimed at Explorer type gamers, it's moody, atmospheric, abstract, lyrical, and it features a beautiful, stylized art set. The writing is like reading haiku poetry, it's minimalist, but each passage reveals untravelled worlds to the imagination.
You found the game-play boring. That's fine, you don't have to like the game. But do understand, you not liking it is a subjective issue, not an objective one.
You wrote all that but it is obviously his opinion. Did he claim otherwise?
This is the internet, so no, it's not (technically speaking) "obvious".
Yes, I too assume it's his opinion. But his post presents said opinion authoritatively. The language and phrasing he chose to use present his opinion as objective fact. He never actually states explicitly that he's offering an opinion.
I felt that my post was required specifically due to the lack of that explicit statement.
And yes, that is indeed my opinion.
I played the game for around 10 hours. While on the same time I had no fun, I was highly addicted, so much, that I saw no other way to protect myself than by deleting the game from my library. This was a very unique experience, I'm not vulnerable to addiction usually.
That's some years ago, but every few months there's this question popping in my head: "Why? What made me so really addicted? And why was the game so unsatisfying to me?" I still don't get the game fully out of my head, I still get sometimes these "you should play this game again, as soon as possible" thoughts.
I have a few theories
- the extremely user-unfriendly UI
- roguelike but with an extremely long runtime, and being able to lose all this progress by just a few mistakes
- being a lore-based game, but having extremely dominant and punishing game mechanics so the lore gets in the background
- a "fun" gameplay loop which is extremely repetitive
- being a game about experimentation while extremely punishing experimentation
... but nothing of this explains why I got addicted so deeply.
I think it's in the gameplay loop. So many task completions, so many random rewards for them (compare to "lootboxes"). Every single action I do gives me a little dopamine kick, no matter which action.
While on the same time the game feels - after I understood which strategy i need to use to not fail - like I'm just doing the same actions again and again and again, for its own sake, it feels purposeless. While on the same time I have a great fear of loss, cuz if I misclick the game is over, so many hours wasted.
And here's the clue. I think I'm doing all these tasks only to reach the ultimate goal, the end of the game. But the time until then feels "wasted". Like a factory worker, I do the same tasks again and again and again and again and again and...
What kept me going was probably the sunken cost fallacy, I can't let all this time and effort be in vain, lose all my progress by deleting the gam....
if I wouldn't have noticed that I've shown physical signs of addiction and forcefully stopped myself, I'd probably have played the game until the end too.
We have very different ideas of the internet. To avoid future pointless posts, you should assume that when someone gives a statement on whether or not they like something, it's an opinion. And how else should someone give their opinion besides authoritatively? Meekly? Aren't they in a position of expertise regarding their own opinion?
You seem like someone who re-reads their own posts.
In principle a game that doesn't tell you what to do is cool and interesting, issue is that if your someone that gets stuff on something the whole point of the game is now lost on you.
Coz the point is you will figure it out, uncover the mystery and learn how it all works. I haven't and it makes the game intensely frustrating, coz everything i do understand i have played for hours and hours and hours. And the stuff i dont feels like a brick wall.
The game is bad in this respect, no horrible terrible ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ infuriating, beacuse the only way to get past this the only way i can meaningful get over this hurdle is do go look up the answer. Which defeats the whole point.
All in all my exprenice with the game is that its ♥♥♥♥, probly only coz my brain is dumb but still felt ♥♥♥♥
No. I will not be doing that. This is a forum open to the public, within the constraints of the guidelines for the forums, I shall post what I deem to be necessary and desirable. I shall not be limiting myself to your ideas of what is appropriate for me to say and/or comment on. Thank you all the same.
When someone posts what is clearly their opinion and does so in what I interpret as presenting their subjective impressions as objective fact, I can, and will call them on that. I also happen to like the game, and when someone posts a negative review of it, I can and will contest that, again: In the manner I feel is appropriate.
And this would be an ad hominem attack. Imagine how impressed I am.
There are like 12 Rites in the game and only 3-4 of them have any use - and also the Rite Intercalate for victories. Every Rite that involves sacrificing anything permanent - completely ignored. And I *hate* that. Sacrificing loyal followers, important artifacts - this is incredibly evocative of the kinds of things this game is about, and you have no reason to ever do it. And I really, really want one. Give me something - *anything* that those Rites do that can't be gotten trivially elsewhere.
How many of the tools and ingredients have you actually used? I know the answer for myself, and its the Frangiclaive, the Mirrors, my Cults specific ones up to a certain point, and the Lantern/Forge/Winter ones for summoning. Sometimes. And I hate that I could do everything in the game like that. Give me something - *anything* to use those tools on that would meaningfully improve the game state.**
Expeditions become a boring uninteresting time sink the second you get your first summon - which can be before you get your first expedition. Even if the summon isn't useful for the expedition, it will still tank a failure if you manage your money right, thus failure is just a time-sink, and nothing else. And I hate that.
The Mansus is so cool, the first time I went in was genuinely awe-inspiring - and it's just a slot machine you put time into to get out SH Lore. Also Vak.
The investigators are pretty much just ignoreable. You have to get pretty unlucky or pretty reckless for your Heart Cultists not to just remove all your Notoriety before the evidence can begin piling up. And that's if you want to have fun. If you play it optimally and just wait it out the entire system can be ignored. You could also try mass murder, but why would you when all that does is make the game harder? There was an argument for it back when 10 Edge was 100 success, because you could work towards removing all the unique investigators and then remove the evidence mechanic from the game by chain murdering Douglas whenever he showed up, but it's too risky now,
Don-Don't even get me started on the enemy immortal. Finding out that the best way to deal with the primary mechanic of the Apostle Legacies was to ignore it broke my heart.
There's probably more, but I feel like I've gotten my point across? The game, post multiple DLCs and several content updates, still feels half-finished.
I love this game, but it has problems, and a lot of them.
*Well, I haven't done the romance ones. And I guess maybe those magically fix all the other problems of the game. I doubt it, but maybe. I'm still not going to do them.
**What about recruiting rivals? Well, I've never, ever had a rival. In fact, I'm just assuming you can use them as part of the aspect required. And that's also a problem.
You suggest that the people who read other people's posts should learn to just assume the intent of the writer - which is ridiculous by itself - however, the obviously better suggestion is what @Nakos was saying, which is that instead of the READER learning to make random assumptions, that the WRITER should instead how to learn to be more articulate and precise.
"This is a disapointing game that doesn't work or deliver" DOES NOT mean the same thing as "This game is disappointing to me because it didn't deliver what I want." Anyone that suggests we should allow misleading and imprecise language to continue has too low of standards and doesn't have opinions of value.
lol, come on
It looks like a point-and-click RPG or maybe a tabletop RPG, when it's nothing of the sort. If you come in expecting an RPG with plot development and big discoveries and epic battles and satisfying conclusions, you're going to be disappointed.
At a deep level, this game is really solitaire. A big, complex solitaire with a heavy dose of lore and everything on a timer, but it's basically solitaire. You're moving the cards around until everything clicks into place and you win the game.
And just like solitaire, the final conclusion can sometimes feel a little unsatisfying. The best moments in the game are when you can see your way clear to how you're going to win the game; but that can be mid-way through, with a whole lot of mechanical plays between then and when you actually get the win.
As has been said a million times in this forum, it isn't for everyone. This isn't a big AAA title which is trying to check the checkboxes for literally the entire gaming market. It's a niche game for a niche audience, and that niche audience is people with a lot of patience who like solitaire-like games and who like interesting lore and aren't bothered by the fact that there are no cutscenes and that not every key you find in the game has a perfect keyhole that it fits in. And that isn't going to be everyone.
I think this gets into my point about expectations. In a point-and-click RPG, every item has a purpose. Every Blue Key you find will 100% fit into a Blue Lock somewhere in the game, you just have to find it.
That isn't the case here, because this game is more about emergent gameplay than theme park gameplay. In emergent gameplay, the designers give the players a big set of tools and let the player figure things out, rather than guiding the player down a very specific path.
Emergent gameplay can feel frustrating when everything doesn't have a very specific, obvious purpose. But it can also be very satisfying when you figure out a new way to do things. This is one of the types of games where you can figure out a completely new way of doing something that the designers never thought about, and that's fine.
(As for items - in addition to summonings, I've used them as gifts for an unhappy romantic interest when I missed the romance check for whatever reason. They can also be gifted to boost stats on followers. And of course, they can be pawned for cash. Most of the time most of them will just gather dust, but occasionally they're useful, and that's fine, that's how these types of games work.)