Final Thoughts

[Ktori]

OK, spoiler alerts for this whole post, I just want to get a few things off my chest before I put this one to bed.

THE GOOD:

I really enjoyed the puzzles. They were easier than a lot of previous Cyan games, but not so easy that it became boring. Call me a fake gamer girl if you want, but I actually don't like that feeling of being frustrated, banging your head against the same puzzle for hours. I'd much rather a puzzle be just hard enough that you stay engaged with it the whole time, and feel like you're making progress, rather than wandering through the world poking everything and hoping to find ANYTHING that might help you. I was rarely stuck and not tempted to give up and Google hints - which means I was absorbed in the world the whole time.

The machines and devices that ran the world were logical, and it was fun thinking through every piece of machinery and figuring out its purpose and how they all related to each other. I could suspend my disbelief and believe that these were real factories with real purposes (albeit with some strange design choices.)

The worlds were beautiful as always, though maybe not as much variety as I would have liked. But on the other hand, figuring out the ways that the worlds mirrored each other kept things interesting, and I liked the thought that I was exploring rarely-seen, hidden pockets of these worlds.

THE BAD:

There's no getting around it: the story was weak. We didn't get enough of the characters to really feel connected to them, and most of the actual storytelling was done via voiceover. And like, this is a puzzle game. One of the reason this style of puzzle/atmospheric storytelling works is because you're already in detective mode, so you're observing your environment for clues and coming to your own conclusions. I spent the whole game trying to investigate the scratches in the floor, observing the propaganda posters on the wall and trying to come to conclusions about who these people were and what the narrator was lying to me about. But in the end, the narrator wasn't lying, and I might as well have just done the puzzles and passively listened to the story as background noise.

Which is especially disappointing when you think that the whole premise of the game is that this lady is supposed to be leading you through the world so you'll learn to be a better person and not repeat your mistakes. But... I went through the world, and I learned very little outside of what the lady was telling me. I saw the propaganda posters and thought, "Well, a happy society wouldn't need this much propaganda to keep people in line." But I didn't need to come to that conclusion - the lady was point blank telling me in my ear that they were lied to and exploited.

I dumped sulphuric acid into the sea and thought, "What a sad, ecologically destructive society". But then it turned out that we were on a space ship and I wasn't destroying a planet at all. What was I supposed to be learning by being led through this world? Why would "Turner" be changed by this experience? I wasn't outraged for the poor Keepers or filled with hatred for Turner. Like, it's a bad society, but the Swan looked like a nice place to live. They got time to rest and hang out, had hobbies, books, etc... Lots of people on Earth have it way worse than the Keepers do. So I wasn't exactly seething with rage by what I saw. I don't see Turner being changed by going through this world more than he would by just listening to the audio and having a good think.

What really needed to happen was to give us enough environmental cues and lore to really, really hate Turner by the end of the game. Just go really dark with it. Then the revelation would hold more weight. And then, we needed to actually be given a choice. Even a small, symbolic choice like a single switch to turn would allow us to have agency over the ending, and confirm that yes, Turner did change as a result of what we did over the course of the game. But instead it's kind of left unanswered?

CONCLUSION: I enjoyed the game. I'm not sorry I bought it. But it felt a little unfinished, and I wonder how much havoc the pandemic created in the studio. It felt like the game had ambitions that it just wasn't able to live up to, either because of budget or some other reason. But still, a good time, I just know they can do better.

[wander]

[SPOILERS AHEAD] I appreciated this commentary! I found much of the story incomplete. The Keepers seemed to have no distinct identities, and there was nothing much to see in their "rooms." Would have been nice to get some back story on some of them. Imagine if they all had different hobbies, or their rooms were decorated differently. Everyone seemed to be reading human anatomy books, for some reason? I suspect it was corner-cutting on the devs part--focusing more on the "awe" of the larger rooms, not thinking about the smaller spaces or the lore of the characters. I was perplexed by the story as well. Like, the "final crew" is supposed to arrive in order for the ship to finally go to the new planet. Except they don't--the final crew never arrived, it was only a re-awakened Keeper, the once-evil Turner with all his memories erased. Since he was a keeper, he (a.k.a. us, the player), shouldn't have been able to "turn on" the ship at all. If someone could explain that bit to me, that would be great. Side note: it seems a bit short-sighted of Marie Curie et al. to assume they'd be able to assemble a final crew long after their own deaths and then shoot them into space to meet up with the ship. Would have made much more sense to have the crew of astronauts also "sleep," no? And where were the astronauts? Where were their skeletons, I wonder?

[Ktori]

Yeah, there were definitely a few plot holes like that. I was confused by the propaganda - the books with the story about the "bad keeper" who wanted "more." Like, who wrote this and why? Was it the original creators of the space ship? If so, then it could not have been about Turner, so what's the point? Was it the narrator, after everybody was in stasis? But why create propaganda when everybody is already in stasis, what's the point? It couldn't have been Turner, why would he create a cautionary tale about how bad he himself was?

Also, why train Turner at all? If the suspended animation technology resets your memory anyway, why not choose a different Keeper, one who you already know to be good and trustworthy, and just tell them the truth?

It has the bones of an interesting story, but it feels like it could use another couple passes.

[praestant8]

As everyone who thinks beyond the buggy state of the game has observed, Firmament is simply unfinished. Yes it's playable, has some remarkable vistas, hint of a story for intrigue... but it is like an empty stage waiting to be filled with (against the desire of the in game propaganda) MORE! Actually, now that I think of it, the game's propaganda feels condescendingly gas-lighty, I want and expected "more" from this game.

[Jay30mcr]

To me in the simplest terms and because of the names involved in the Firmament Initiative it was 3 realms run by a communist regime where everyone worked for the greater good, or so they are told, then the Arrivals came and it became Capitalist and destroyed itself as the lead disruptor was like Caligula demanding everything and giving nothing back which obviously made the keepers question why they were even doing it.

So not true capitalism but crony capitalism where all serve one or a small group of people and are left with the breadcrumbs.

And yes it does feel like they phoned in the lore and just relied on one young woman to basically tell you everything which was a good way to keep the game moving but in terms of written lore and depth I think I only read 2 books and 2 checklists!

In fact I have a feeling Rand Miller wanted more than just 3 realms but given the budget and time it just wasn't doable. When you compare this to Obduction or many of the Myst games you actually finished feeling like everything that needed to be told was and you didn't feel like it was rushed.

This just has that didn't have time and needed wrapping up before it got interesting vibe.

[MartyS]

I played through again after the patch and got more of the narration this time.

I did not see any capitalist vs. communist ideas, it was a simple case of people brainwashed (literally) so they could be used as maintenance drones for centuries. Poorly chosen "Arrivals" showed up to prepare for the end of the mission and simply went power crazy with all the keepers treating them like gods. The narrator knew the ship would only recognize one of the arrivals at the end so wiped his mind and tricked him (us) into doing what they were supposed to do when they showed up in the first place.

Only plot hole to me was the standard bad science fiction plot of astronauts that are supposed to be highly trained and screened to be psychologically sound show up and act like horrible people and or idiots right away.

[[ZSU] Dave247]

Originally posted by Ktori:

I dumped sulphuric acid into the sea and thought, "What a sad, ecologically destructive society". But then it turned out that we were on a space ship and I wasn't destroying a planet at all.

I know it looked confusing at first, but you weren't dumping the acid directly into the sea, it was being fed into the battery farm which was directly below, which would have been obviously separated from the rest of the ocean. The change in acid also increased the power output, hence why you had to go back and redo the puzzle again to turn the power back on into a different configuration.

The rest I agree with though, I enjoyed the puzzles as I love pure mechanical puzzle box style puzzles, where you just fiddle with machinery, switches and the like to make cool things happen. The story itself was a let down and left a number of hoes and questions. Like I thought that Turner was one of the arrivals that for some reason chose to play god instead of doing what they were supposed to, but then what happened to the other crew? Were they also all placed in stasis in those futuristic looking pods near the end, which is never touched on at all?

[Veni Vidi Vodka]

I just wanna throw my two cents in. The ending gives more background to Turner and he's simply unfit for the position.
The few printouts detail that Turner is mentally unfit for a leadership role and won it into a lottery. Then the mission almost went all to the dumpster because of that.
The entire backstory of this game is hinged on an illogical plot device.

[joridiculous]

Pretty weak they try to summon up the lore by 3 clip boards and barely readable news paper and two small handwritten "diary" entries (one at the start and one at the end).

The narration was hopeless. First of all i only had narration at the very start, then it came back when i was in the "greenhouse". Didn't even know it was supposed to be more narrated until i read it here on steam.
Not that i payed much attention to the very poorly read/spoken words (sounds like one of the dev's kid stuttering the words out). And the subtitles was barely visible.

The game looks good. And that's about it. Puzzles was from ok to stupid illogical annoying pos.
The bugs drags the game right down. QA.. LOL. Saw some friends did the "testing". Guess they didn't want to hurt someones feelings and told them everything is fine.

[Jay30mcr]

Originally posted by MartyS:

I did not see any capitalist vs. communist ideas, it was a simple case of people brainwashed (literally) so they could be used as maintenance drones for centuries.

What else would you call that? Even the names involved in the Initiative should've been a hint at how those clowns wanted Society to run. Karl Marx was also involved if you read the 1911 Newspaper at the end.

[Gargaj]

Originally posted by ZSU Dave247:

I know it looked confusing at first, but you weren't dumping the acid directly into the sea, it was being fed into the battery farm which was directly below, which would have been obviously separated from the rest of the ocean.

It wasn't separated WELL though, if you walk around the island you can see the discoloration of the water all around the shore.

[Gargaj]

Originally posted by Jay30mcr:

And yes it does feel like they phoned in the lore and just relied on one young woman to basically tell you everything which was a good way to keep the game moving but in terms of written lore and depth I think I only read 2 books and 2 checklists!

I gotta say, the end credits telling you that most of the lore was AI-generated was a bit disheartening, but at least it explained why the flavortext was so... flavorless?

(Also, considering that the public AI tools that are capable of doing this only showed up ~6 months ago... for a 4 year dev cycle, that feels... a bit late?)

[Ktori]

Originally posted by Gargaj:

Originally posted by ZSU Dave247:

I know it looked confusing at first, but you weren't dumping the acid directly into the sea, it was being fed into the battery farm which was directly below, which would have been obviously separated from the rest of the ocean.

It wasn't separated WELL though, if you walk around the island you can see the discoloration of the water all around the shore.

Yeah, you could clearly see the red fluid seeping out into the water around it. If the designers wanted the pollution to be contained from the ecosystem it would have been easy to put in some sort of clearly defined tub or bowl. And the art style of that world clearly invoked dirtiness and pollution.

If those puzzles were placed on a real planet, one that contained some sort of ecosystem, it would clearly signal pollution and environmental degradation. And the book in the Swan did invoke those themes as well, "Where will this "more" come from?" IE, callously using up natural resources, which has been a theme in a few other Cyan games too.

But in the end, it was just a pod designed deliberately for that purpose, no ecosystem was being ruined and everything was functioning exactly as planned. So it kinda laid a bunch of thematic groundwork and then threw it all out again at the end.

[jojon]

So, anybody who liked the main conceit might enjoy Lord of Light, by Roger Zelazny.

...except, by recommending the book on those terms, I am inherently giving away what it so gradually builds up toward, ruining it for a new reader -- just as anyone who knows it, would have Firmament spoiled, by hearing it brought up in such context (hence the spoiler tag ...although, this is spoiler *thread*, so...). :P

For that matter: If one have a soft spot for the the whole concept of linking books and an infinitude of possible worlds to go to, Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber series leans heavily on its take on those ideas. :7

[Jay30mcr]

Anyone who enjoyed Myst type games who played this and felt underwhelmed try the game created by a Myst fan as its a really good attempt from a single coder.

Called Quern - Undying Thoughts. I'm guessing most Myst fans have already played this.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/512790/Quern__Undying_Thoughts/

[joridiculous]

Quern.. Kind of ok. A tad to much make it difficult for sake of making it difficult. But it looks and plays nice :)
If you need to exercise your nugget: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709550/Schizm_Mysterious_Journey/

notoriously difficult, not just the puzzles but getting to run larger than a stamp :P