My impressions of R34

[Blacktail]

After what felt like a decade of waiting, I FINALLY got to play R34, and visit Saardan. I have mixed opinions about the content added by this new expansion. Here's my takeaways, based on my experience.


1: Saardan doesn't appear on the map table in The Unnamed. It's a minor oversight, but a little disappointing all the same.

2: I visited the Idiot's Pole trading post, and found that they sell all sorts of interesting loot... but don't buy anything, and charge in Guild Drakes. It's so painfully difficult to get Guild Drakes, that I don't even bother with this trading post. Unless I can sell items for Guild Drakes, they'll accept Pieces of Drake, or there's a way to convert Guild Drakes into Pieces of Drake in a later update, I won't really have any use for the Idiot's Pole.

3: There's a lot of new characters in Port Grey, none of whom are interested in "intimacy" --- when this is literally what the game is about. For a city allegedly so heavily populated by "free spirits", they don't seem to put-out.

4: The innkeeper has almost no gossip, no quests, and no intimacy option. The room she rents-out is apparently owned by the player forever after one payment, which feels like an exploit.

5: I played Blackjack with Yaas, which was actually pretty cool. Simple things like this can give games a lot more depth. More minigames, please!

6: There's another Frigate in port, and a small 1-mast trading vessel under construction. I never caught the names of these ships, nor their captains in dialogue with the local NPCs (or if I did, I don't remember). I hope to see more ships in more places in future releases.

7: There's a region on the map called "The Thorns", but there's nothing there. The thorn tree forest is more than a kilometer to the north of it.

8: The ruins found near the center of the eastern island are the only marked location besides Port Grey I was able to find on that landmass. These aren't ancient ruins, either; they're the same architecture as the buildings in Port Grey, so they're a modern ruin. Modern ruins are always an interesting find, but I haven't seen any ancient ruins anywhere in Saardan.

9: There's a tiny settlement located atop the cliffs in the central western end of the eastern landmass, but there's no way to enter the buildings, there's no loot, no NPCs, no usable bed to sleep on, and it isn't a marked location. Previews of Saardan implied there was a ferry the player could take here to cross to the western landmass, but that's not the case; there's a ferry on the beach below, but it's deserted and inoperable. A sign dangling above the sealed entrance depicts a horseshoe, but there's no horses anywhere on Saardan (or anywhere else in the whole game, for that matter).

10: With no ferry across the channel that cuts the eastern and western landmasses of Saardan apart, I had to swim across. It took me more than an HOUR to grope my way north --- and then along the north coast --- before I was able to find a cliffside with just the right surfaces to glitch my way up to the top. This experience was *not* fun. More beaches are needed on Saardan, especially the western landmass on the eastern side.

11: I found the northern oasis settlement, referred to as a marked location only as "camp". I can't fault it for it's lack of content, as the entire western half is still a WIP area, but I wasn't pleased to see that the water texture of the oasis was fake; it's just dry ground that you can walk on top of.

12: I discovered the hard way that 90% of the entire island is Faax territory. See that little wisp of dust over there? Walk into it and you'll fall into a Faax nest. The way they're described, they sound like Felkin, Venandis, or something similar. I've seen enough things on e621 to expect something yiffy to happen, but... no. Instead, you'll be treated to an unskippable cutscene, at the end of which you'll be back in Port Grey. Miss one wisp of dust while walking in the dark? Back to Port Grey. Try to thread the needle between two of them? Back to Port Grey. Just crested the top of a hill after an agonizingly long climb? Back to Port Grey. Expect a rocky ridge to be free of sand-dwelling critters? Back to Port Grey. A tranquilized Wild Bred passed-out on top of a sus-looking patch of sand? Back to Port Grey. Didn't notice that little fold in the terrain before you walked into it? Back to Port Grey. Trying to take-in the scenery? Back to Port Grey. Trying to have any fun out in the desert? Back to Port Grey. Forgot to quicksave every couple of minutes, no matter where you are on the island? BACK TO PORT GREY, BUSTER. Exploring all the other islands is always a fun and relaxing experience, but Faaxes have made exploring Saardan frustrating and stressful. There's almost nothing out there, and yet I'm still punished for trying to leave town.

13: The biggest letdown of all is that Saardan has the same musical score as the title screen. So does Skiia... and Iskaii. Why does Kizan get it's own music, but not any of the other islands?


I know Saardan is still a work in progress, but after 3 years of work on it, I expected more. Hopefully, the next update will address these issues, and we won't have to wait another 8 months.

[Ruffleneck]

Heya! Thank you very much for the feedback <3 I'll reply to them below ^^

1) Oops, yeah, definitely forgot about that one! Thanks <3

2) The reason for the Idiot's Pillar is more to basically cycle through all sorts of items, but primarily rare or harder to get stuff that is spiced within. They're definitely not a regular store to visit, but something you can go check in case they have something you've missed from the loot pools

3) Yeah, our focus was more on the small acts. We're adding written acts to Grey Port in the next build (and some other locations with NPCs too) ^^

4) That's definitely an oversight. Thank you!

5-6) <3

7) I'll have to check that one later. Added to list!

8) Yush, the eastern side is basically "Scraven" part of the island, so largely modern ^^

9) Yeah, there's still areas that we're expanding on the eastern side too. The horseshoe has a reason behind it (namely caravans, mounts, etc), but it's true it doesn't make too much sense as is ^^

10-11) There's intentionally a darkened veil and a dev note over the western side of the map, the ferry kinda is part of it too

12) Yeah, it is a bit too hostile at the moment and I do definitely think there needs to be more ways of evading it (at least for now). I generally try not to add temporary solutions to stuff, but in this case I do think I should have ^^

13) Sadly we haven't been able to commission more music from our composer as of late, hence reusing existing tracks elsewhere. The plan is definitely to get more unique tracks for other islands too ^^

Saardan didn't take 3 years to make, it kinda had to make way for other things along the way. We originally planned to make Saardan as the "next island", but then we wanted to do Iskaai first because we wanted unique space for hares and lyvfolk. Saardan was also originally intended to be a smallish desert + savannah mix and the hyena island, but we decided to make it a pure desert and a big island (because big deserts are amazing) and give the hyena's a proper island later ^^

[Blacktail]

Originally posted by Ruffleneck:

Heya! Thank you very much for the feedback <3 I'll reply to them below ^^

Wow, I never expected a reply from the developer, especially not this soon --- thanks!

I'm sorry to hear that the deal with the composer fell through; maybe hire a new one? I'm also intrigued about the Hyaeve homeland. Maybe a tropical badlands biome?

I also have a few ideas about some gimmicks engaging gameplay elements[i/] that might be usable to deal with the Faax pits. I'll post those ideas in a new thread.

[Ruffleneck]

(not sure why this quote broke completely, but it's reply to your above message)

I'm mostly active on Discord, where I can reached basically whenever, but I do read here semi-daily approximately <3

Oh it didn't fall through, they're just super busy at the moment ^^

The hyave homeland will basically be a savannah on top of a mountain, kinda like inverse Kizan. Tropical badlands biome do sound like fun tho, now that I googled some examples of it. Noted for future for sure though :3