Dialog - To Stop Time or Not to Stop Time?

[ChrisPharmD]

I'm sure this is a preference question, but I'm curious as to what others think.

I know basically nothing about this game except that there's a timed mechanic which was spoiled for me, though I'm not too upset because that intrigued me to try this game.

I'm the type of person who exhausts all dialog, talks to the same NPC over and over again to see if there's any new dialog. It's almost like I have an obsession with ensuring I read every dialog option no matter how insignificant it is to the overall experience of the game.

I see the default settings, and time is set to progress even during dialog. Do you think it hinders the play through of the game if I opt to stop time while talking to NPCs?

So, now imagine my blind play through of Cave Story missing all the secrets while at the same time thinking I'm such a genius to talk to each NPC multiple times. Somewhat ironic.

[Bobywan]

I recommend you to unable the pause option when reading and talking because there are a few locations where you might need the extra seconds you save this way and it doesn't break immersion.

Also, it's a good idea to talk to npc after you have experience new things, they will have new dialog options.
And one of the traveler will unlock the meditation ability when you talk to him after your first death, which allow you to restart the current cycle rather than waiting to die. This is just a new option in the escape menu.

[Perseus]

It certainly won't hinder your playthrough, but it will stop NPCs from having animations when talking to them, which can easily be a bit weird. There is one NPC for which it can be more practical to have that option enabled when talking to them, but you can decide whether to turn the option on or off at that point.
I would suggest to try with and without, see whether you prefer having character animations or gaining a few minutes that can sometimes be meaningful (but not that much in the long run, though).

Originally posted by Bobywan:

[...]

I feel like you're saying a bit too much here. Maybe throw in a few spoiler tags?

[Sammun Mak]

There are not many NPCs. Time progresses while talking to NPCs just for the sake of some small animations. Basically, the time you spent making this post is probably more time than you will spend talking to NPCs (okay that's probably not true, but it's comparable). So don't worry about it either way. Time stopping while reading is a lot more significant.

[ChrisPharmD]

Originally posted by Perseus:

It certainly won't hinder your playthrough, but it will stop NPCs from having animations when talking to them, which can easily be a bit weird. There is one NPC for which it can be more practical to have that option enabled when talking to them, but you can decide whether to turn the option on or off at that point.
I would suggest to try with and without, see whether you prefer having character animations or gaining a few minutes that can sometimes be meaningful (but not that much in the long run, though).

Originally posted by Bobywan:

[...]

I feel like you're saying a bit too much here. Maybe throw in a few spoiler tags?

SPOILERS

I think I see what you mean. I went to the Observatory, saw all of the cool displays, looked at the map for a little while, and finally grabbed the Launch Code. After seeing the stone which was described as "creepy" and then experiencing the cutscene, I went back to Hornfels, and he turned around in such a way that almost jump scared me. And his animation was locked in such an odd way that it was creepy as well.

The main problem is allowing time to pass while reading is that I feel like I'm studying, in a way. I'm trying to remember the names of all the characters, the names of the planets, what is special about each planet, and potential clues as to where to start after I launch. The game is so intriguing that I'm trying to build a gameplan for how to tackle this massive solar system (or potentially more?)

I'd say one of the more confusing parts of the game is your own home planet. There seems to be hints that you're going to visit different places that surround your village, but I'm not sure if I'm using the Scout tool properly. The slideshow at the beginning of the game seems somewhat counterintuitive because it challenges you to take a screenshot of your own village while at the same time not informing you if you were successful, leading me to think I'm not using the tool properly.

Since I know there is a time loop, does that begin as soon as you start the game and wake up? I've been trying to observe the sun to see if it's changing at all, but I don't see much. There are so many anomalies that show up in the sky and on the map that I'm wondering if there is something that would tell you how much time you have left before the time loop restarts.

As far as the characters, everybody in the village seems to simply accept that Feldspar is missing, but they don't seem to care much. Using your Signalscope, however, you can hear a harmonica playing on Dark Bramble. I would imagine that if I stumbled upon the instrument while aiming it randomly in the sky, I would expect Hornfels to have at least picked up on it long before I came along.

If I were to go anywhere, finding Feldspar would seem to be the most important mission given that he's unaccounted for and potentially assumed to be gone forever. Looking at that planet, however, makes me think traversing the landscape would be impossible with the fact that it's nearly broken into pieces.

And this is all before I even leave the ground. I'm not even sure I'll be able to fly the ship given that I sucked at flying the model. I can fly and land with it, but if I start to lose control, it's nearly a guaranteed reset. My skills at Zero-G are also pretty trash even though I did successfully complete the training.

My main thing is I'm wondering if the loop has begun and I've wasted a lot of time looking around the starting area of the game. I know this seems trivial since you would simply start over, but I don't deal well with being on a clock. From my understanding, people have actually quit the game over the clock, but it's really hard to tell. A part of me wants to wait in the village and watch the clock hit zero, and another part of me thinks I should go ahead and try to fly.

Surely, I'm thinking too much into it, but I do think the game is really interesting.

[ChrisPharmD]

Oh dang... after that comet passes by the sun, you can definitely see the sun expanding.

That's kinda cool if I'm seeing it correctly.

[ChrisPharmD]

Oh ya it blew up lol

[ChrisPharmD]

Okay, I tried to find Feldspar and ended up getting jump scared. That was insane. lol

Flying the ship is really fun. I just don't know how to land on a planet. I'll figure it out.

[Bobywan]

Use the autopilot to travel from a planet to another and the landing cam to land more easily.
The model ship is much harder to fly than the actual ship.
The loop starts the 1st time you see the statue vision and when you wake up after.
The village is kind of a tutorial to learn how to use the scout, the signalscope and zero G, but the planet is not only the village.

[ChrisPharmD]

Originally posted by Bobywan:

Use the autopilot to travel from a planet to another and the landing cam to land more easily.
The model ship is much harder to fly than the actual ship.
The loop starts the 1st time you see the statue vision and when you wake up after.
The village is kind of a tutorial to learn how to use the scout, the signalscope and zero G, but the planet is not only the village.

Yeah, the game is cool. I found the seed that was growing on your home planet which has the harmonica signal, which explains why the weird planet has the harmonica signal. I tried to fly to that planet to go inside of the seed to see if I could survive the sun blowing up, but an anglerfish found me before the time elapsed.

I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to be doing in there or how to navigate around without getting killed.

I did find a lot of the primal artifacts and read a lot of the dialog. I hate to admit it, but I find that primal life mystery not very interesting.

I did figure out how to knock the Observatory Map offline by finding the red glowing satellite and stopping it. But it took me forever to realize what it was since I couldn't interact with it. The only thing that made me think it was the map was that it literally said "Error: Map Offline" on the side of it.

I tried to watch the sun explode, but I was surprised to realize it was going to pull me in to my death instead.

I died to a black hole which turned into a white hole which somehow killed me.

I landed on the comet that passes by the sun and lost my ship in the process. That was kinda cool except I can't figure out what to do on it.

Flying and fixing your ship isn't as hard as I thought it would be. The only thing that I'm having trouble with his that my LS button doesn't target planets after awhile and I have to go into the options and reset it for it to work.

My major problem with the game is that I hate it when I do something, try to return to tell somebody, and there's nobody to tell. I would think dialog options about some of the stuff I've done would pop up since there are so many mysteries to solve. But I return all the way back to the village and it's frustrating that no new dialog options appear. That's probably the thing that sucks the most about this game.

But overall, a fun game!

[Bobywan]

The villagers don't have a lot of new dialogues indeed but the travelers have when you discover new stuff.
Your experience with the black hole is weird, but I'm not worried, you'll fall into it again eventually
As for the comet, I would just ask you: what is the comet made of ?

[ParasiteX]

Originally posted by ChrisPharmD:

I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to be doing in there

Hahaha, you will be asking yourself that a few times.😅 But that is also the fun part of the game trying to figure out what you're supposed to do.
A tip is to check the ship log regularly. As that helps you figure out what you've found out and give you an idea of where to head next to search for answers.

[Quillithe]

Originally posted by ChrisPharmD:

Flying and fixing your ship isn't as hard as I thought it would be. The only thing that I'm having trouble with his that my LS button doesn't target planets after awhile and I have to go into the options and reset it for it to work.

My major problem with the game is that I hate it when I do something, try to return to tell somebody, and there's nobody to tell. I would think dialog options about some of the stuff I've done would pop up since there are so many mysteries to solve. But I return all the way back to the village and it's frustrating that no new dialog options appear. That's probably the thing that sucks the most about this game.

But overall, a fun game!

That's a bug with the left stick - if you're near a mouse you can just use your mouse to lock on while still holding your controller. I thought they'd fixed that at some point after the DLC introduced the bug, but maybe not.

I do wish some more village conversations popped up, but they want to keep you very focused on the task I guess - once you leave there isn't much to do back there. I think you can only really comment on one or two things, so you could check back once you've explored all you can maybe. Since the game is so open there's quite a bit of quiet design trying to keep people from getting too pointlessly lost, even how low detail most of the planet surfaces are is intentional to keep them from being interesting where they shouldn't be.

[ChrisPharmD]

Originally posted by Bobywan:

The villagers don't have a lot of new dialogues indeed but the travelers have when you discover new stuff.
Your experience with the black hole is weird, but I'm not worried, you'll fall into it again eventually :Hearthian_Wink:
As for the comet, I would just ask you: what is the comet made of ?

It's made of ice. And I suppose the comet coming into contact with the sun would be similar to when water is thrown into lava?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDxOhfiFsuc

The only problem is that the sun produces so much heat that the comet would probably just melt and evaporate long before it could even come close to the sun.

But who knows?

[ChrisPharmD]

Originally posted by ParasiteX:

Originally posted by ChrisPharmD:

I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to be doing in there

Hahaha, you will be asking yourself that a few times.😅 But that is also the fun part of the game trying to figure out what you're supposed to do.
A tip is to check the ship log regularly. As that helps you figure out what you've found out and give you an idea of where to head next to search for answers.

Luckily, I'm not far enough into the game where I feel stuck yet, but I can see that happening. Sometimes, I pick up the puzzle pieces and wonder if I need to bring them with me or leave them. The game does actually allow for you to carry items to other planets, but since there's no inventory, it's frustrating to consider if it's a great idea for a puzzle or if I'm wasting my time holding on to a puzzle piece.

[ParasiteX]

There is only like one item in the entire game you need to bring with you on the ship, but i'll leave it up to you to figure out what that is.
Otherwise the remaining items will generally have something nearby you can slot it into to make it do something.