Bittersweet Roadmap Anyone?

[boshmi]

With this new roadmap the devs have given us, (http://hinterlandgames.com/the-long-dark/roadmap/) I think I may be alone in saying that things are somewhat bittersweet when I read this.
The roadmap adds a great many things that I was really looking forward to, but also adds a few things that have ruined survival games for me in the past. I felt like maybe I could go over a few of these things to see if anyone agrees with me, or if everyone thinks I'm crazy.

Things I'm Worried About -

Wellbeing system - Yeah, I know I've talked about this before in my wishlist about how I would like to see a "Content" affliction, but I just wanted this as something that improves sleep, similarly to the way tea does. The way it's put here implies some "bar" similar to the way that hunger or cold works. The lack of this was something I loved about the game, because I forced me to think about it myself. By which I mean, in a really long hibernation game, I, the player, would actually stop and think; what is the point of all this? More than a few times I drove me to commit suicide, and left a far deeper emotional experience than games like "Don't Starve" have given me through a meter telling me how sane my character is.

Steam Trading cards - I'm actually alright with this one, as long as it dosen't turn into a bloodthirsty cuthroat and downright stupid market anywhere resembling Cancer Strike Global Orgy. (Excuse the French, I really hate that game) I just don't want people pay 250$ for a golden rifle or something stupid like that. A market similar to that of the "Total War" series, where you can trade cards, but nothing else, would be much more favorable.

Research items - Little bit iffy about this one. If it turns into something like Rust does, with research benches, then no, don't even go there. If it adds a button that says "read book" in the book action bar, and then gives you +10 firemaking skill or whatever, then, yes do it.

Revolver - I'm not worried about the revolver so much as the implications of it. I've seen it happen with "Unturned" before, though Unturned was already pretty far gone. The game was still pretty tactical and involving, but Nelson adds a rocket launcher, and suddenly everyone's demanding Helicopters and Tanks and Stingers and god-knows-what, and Nelson was forced to add it in, so now Unturned is just a game of "Who has the biggest gun?" and "Who gets a helicopter first?" I don't want the revolver to be added, and then people begin demanding an Ak-47 to gun down wolves with.

Simple Shelter Building - Took me a while to decide if I liked this or not. I'd say yes but limit it A LOT. Nothing even remotely large, stick to snow-holes and lean-tos. Anything larger than that will become a pen*s.

Knowledge system - Isn't this in the game already...?

Crafting for safehouse customization - If this means you can draw on the walls of your home - no, people are going to draw pen*ses. If this means you can build your own fort - no, people are going to build giant pen*ses. If this means you can build your own items to put in your safehouse - no, people are going to build pen*ses. Crafting structures are the ruin of all survival games. Rust? Can't walk 20m on a server without finding a giant pen*s. DayZ? Less common, but still camps with pen*ses. Don't Starve? Eventually everyone is compelled to build a giant pen*s. If these are the things you are thinking of doing, please, Please, PLEASE just DON'T. I don't want to see this happen to one of my favorite games.

Crafting for clothing customization - Similarly, people will just draw pen*ses on all their clothes. Either that or something ridiculous like cannabis leaves, or pornographic images, so just don't.

Gunsmithing and ammunition crafting - I cannot stress how much this must be done right. Don't let us build our own guns. That WILL BE the ruin of this game, I 100% GUARANTEE it. It would kill all the feeling of survival stone dead. Don't let us draw on our guns, for the same reason as Clothing and Safehouse customization. You must make it VERY HARD to find gunpowder and shell casings, DON'T let us smelt them, DO let us pick up ejected shell casings. This is probably the one I am most worried about. No one except for highly trained individuals can build a gun from scratch, LEAST OF ALL in a survival situation with very limited resources. Please, I'm begging you, don't.

Horse - The canoe I'm okay with. The horse could just be a buggy mess that's really hard to use, annihilates the immersion with a survivalist world, and pretty far fetched as well. The canoe can work if done well. IF DONE WELL. In fact, I'm exited for a DONE WELL version of the canoe. Paddling downstream before the river freezes over.

All those negative things out of the way, that is not to say I'm unexcited for the things that this roadmap promises. Things like Moose, Cougars, The Axe, Canoe, Long traveling, and most of all, SEASONS, are things that have me absoloutley jumping up and down on the spot because of the features and mechanics they bring. Migrating south for the winter, paddling along with the salmon run in spring, watching herds of moose thunder across the plains, and trekking across the frigid wilderness just make me so exited I can't wait. Not to mention the pretty awesome map of bear island the devs have handed out. There are so many things I'm exited for that I would like to discuss, but there just isn't enough time.
Thank you for reading my very long post.

[Fuarian]

Crafting for shelter customization: Probably like craft up a makeshift bench or chair using reclaimed wood. Make a shelf or something. Not anything too serious.

 

Crafting for clothing customization: Probably like add extra cloth for extra warmth. Yet again probably nothing extremely visual.

[Patrick Carlson]

Thanks for your post and your thoughts here boshmi. I would just firstly say that when you look at the Roadmap--a list of potential features--imagine how the team that made the game as it exists today would implement them. It's all largely the same designers, artists and programmers that have made what we're all playing right now. 

And the Roadmap is indeed a "living" document. There will be iteration and testing within the community as we look at these features. There may even be a few surprises that you didn't expect.

As always, we're happy to hear your feedback as we move forward.

 

[boshmi]

2 minutes ago, Patrick Carlson said:

Thanks for your post and your thoughts here boshmi. I would just firstly say that when you look at the Roadmap--a list of potential features--imagine how the team that made the game as it exists today would implement them. It's all largely the same designers, artists and programmers that have made what we're all playing right now. 

And the Roadmap is indeed a "living" document. There will be iteration and testing within the community as we look at these features. There may even be a few surprises that you didn't expect.

As always, we're happy to hear your feedback as we move forward.

 

Thank you for your reply. It great to hear that the roadmap is a living document. This means that I have even more things to hop around the room with excitement to. It'll be interesting to see how they handle some of the great features as well as the ones I'm a little iffy about.

[Schneidox]

I have to say, I'm extremely excited to see what happens next week with the update... Day 140 and I have a boring routine down, so something to mix it up and make me worry about dying again is going to be awesome 

[starfighter441]

  From the OP:

Revolver - I'm not worried about the revolver so much as the implications of it. I've seen it happen with "Unturned" before, though Unturned was already pretty far gone. The game was still pretty tactical and involving, but Nelson adds a rocket launcher, and suddenly everyone's demanding Helicopters and Tanks and Stingers and god-knows-what, and Nelson was forced to add it in, so now Unturned is just a game of "Who has the biggest gun?" and "Who gets a helicopter first?" I don't want the revolver to be added, and then people begin demanding an Ak-47 to gun down wolves with.

Indeed, I'd far rather see a .22 rifle introduced myself ( with ammo being somewhat more abundant than the .303) or if it must be a pistol then a .22 woodsman.  Something where I think " do I feel lucky?"...

[vancopower]

Well I totally support you about custom crafting let's keep it real no drawing no object building except what is necessary, so the people can't make jokes out of it. However you are wrong for couple of things:

Shelter building should be more than just a hole and leaves, I'm sure you watched Bear grylz build shelters all the time hell I think I could build some of them myself also if the survivor is a pilot you can bet that he knows how to.

Gunsmithing and ammunition crafting  - Yes it can be done, especially for shotgun shells and it's easy I have witnessed it: all you need is some paper, gunpowder, lead balls, and some tool to press it, Pliers to close it and empty shell off course. With all that in mind the process is still dangerous and some of the shells might go off, and blow itself which will render it unusable, it can also damage your fingers I've seen that happen too. Also about crafting guns well there are some people that know how to make flintlocks from scratch so maybe NPC could teach the survivor, and have it as a skill. 

Horse - will be needed since the game will have seasons which is AWSOOOME, and imagine how rewarding it will be riding in the spring   I'm kidding the real reason is off course the world will become much bigger and I am guessing that the survivor will need to move from one part of the world all the way to the other well walking it will take forever, and canoe will not work in the winter so what is the other option a car maybe no horse will be much nicer.

Revolver- Since there will be NPC's in the game and there will be some bad ones I guess we need fast weapon to take them down. You can't expect us to shoot them with arrows  flare, and slow hunting riffle yes? AK-47 why not  ??? You think that they don't use it in Canada guess again since there is no PvP you can be safe from the whos gun the bigger gun issue. Rocket launcher well that is where I draw the line no need for things to become messy. Guns are always what people will stockpile in times of any crisis since they are power and security in fact it is strange all those bunkers and no guns in them. 

All in all don't get me wrong I am with you keep it as real as possible let the people who are not serious about this game draw their P's somewhere else cheers

[hauteecolerider]

9 minutes ago, vancopower said:

Revolver- Since there will be NPC's in the game and there will be some bad ones I guess we need fast weapon to take them down. You can't expect us to shoot them with arrows  flare, and slow hunting riffle yes? AK-47 why not  ??? You think that they don't use it in Canada guess again since there is no PvP you can be safe from the whos gun the bigger gun issue. Rocket launcher well that is where I draw the line no need for things to become messy. Guns are always what people will stockpile in times of any crisis since they are power and security in fact it is strange all those bunkers and no guns in them. 

That's kinda what I was thinking regarding the revolver. It's not useful against wildlife, unless it's the two-legged variety . . . 

[vancopower]

1 minute ago, hauteecolerider said:

That's kinda what I was thinking regarding the revolver. It's not useful against wildlife, unless it's the two-legged variety . . . 

Admit that you are itching to shoot some bad NPC's yes? me too and loot them. corpse looting is king of boring now I almost never do it but when you take NPC down you will want to see what you traded for your precious bullets

[boshmi]

4 hours ago, hauteecolerider said:

That's kinda what I was thinking regarding the revolver. It's not useful against wildlife, unless it's the two-legged variety . . . 

 

4 hours ago, vancopower said:

Shelter building should be more than just a hole and leaves

Gunsmithing and ammunition crafting  - Also about crafting guns well there are some people that know how to make flintlocks from scratch so maybe NPC could teach the survivor, and have it as a skill. 

Horse - will be needed since the game will have seasons which is AWSOOOME, and imagine how rewarding it will be riding in the spring   I'm kidding the real reason is off course the world will become much bigger and I am guessing that the survivor will need to move from one part of the world all the way to the other well walking it will take forever, and canoe will not work in the winter so what is the other option a car maybe no horse will be much nicer.

Revolver- Since there will be NPC's in the game and there will be some bad ones I guess we need fast weapon to take them down. You can't expect us to shoot them with arrows  flare, and slow hunting riffle yes? AK-47 why not  ??? You think that they don't use it in Canada guess again since there is no PvP you can be safe from the whos gun the bigger gun issue.

All in all don't get me wrong I am with you keep it as real as possible let the people who are not serious about this game draw their P's somewhere else cheers

 

7 hours ago, starfighter441 said:

 Indeed, I'd far rather see a .22 rifle introduced myself ( with ammo being somewhat more abundant than the .303) or if it must be a pistol then a .22 woodsman.  Something where I think " do I feel lucky?"...

First off, thanks for the fantastic comments all, it really makes me happy to have people who are willing to discuss things with me.
Second off, sorry for the mega-quote

To hauteecolerider and vancopower (about guns) - Yeah, I guess that's what the appeal is. I wasn't really thinking about NPCs so much as animals, but even so I'd prefer we didn't get more conventional weapons. I just think it screws with the atmosphere of the game, and I'm worried it might take away the sense of solitude, and envelopment within nature, as you make the transition from terrified civilian to hardcore wilderness survivor. Even the flare gun made me feel a bit like the game was going in the wrong direction (Let's be honest here, I've never had major trouble with bears, I think you should have been kept as un-defendable-against, if that makes sense). I'm sorry, but it's really difficult to explain how I feel about this, and I'm not quite sure how. I guess this game has always been about surviving the elements, and I just don't think assault rifles (semi-automatic or fully automatic), however feasible, can contribute that much to the game and it's feeling. To vancopower specifically, having craftable flintlocks, even after being taught the skill removes the importance and rarity of rifles. Personally, I believe that rifles are fine for mid to long range engagements, and if we just have a revolver for close range, it should be fine. Like I said, it's the implications I dislike. I'm not saying guns ruin games, but I am saying that this game is the wrong game to put lots of guns in.

To vancopower - Thank you firstly for your highly constructive reply, you made me look into things a little deeper, and it's always good to hear people's options. On what you said about shelter building, when I say lean-to, I don't mean a stick up against a tree. Something like that, but free standing and well filled in. I guess there could be stages that the shelter could be in- like, we'd have completely made of sticks, then sticks and waterproofing (leaves/tinder plugs) and then fully sealed, (waterproofed, fire-hole, decent space, etc.). I just think that if you give free reign on building, you will 100% get d*ck statues. It needs to be limited, and at least semi-realistic. (I can't erect a good size hut in even three days, especially when freezing and with limited resources.) Something like this would be my ideal version of this feature -

As for snow holes, these would be something I would really like to see. Most northern tribes (UK/B.C/Canada/Greenland/Tasmania/etc) used snow holes and if the devs add a tundra map (which I really really hope they do - just imagine it, tundra stretching out as far as you can see, a herd of moose thundering across it) Snow holes will be invaluable when there are no sticks or trees around.
As for the Horse, I just don't like the idea of bringing it everywhere with me as a living, breathing animal, to feed, and care for, as well as the dodgy mechanics that could take place (minecraft-esque training techniques and mounting). It just doesn't seem like the right game to put horses in. Like I said, even canoes could have some dodgy mechanics that I wouldn't like (stranded deep-esque paddling), however with the canoe you would be limited to streams and lakes, which could make for some really interesting maps and scenarios. Especially with the seasons (OHMYGHOOD I CAN'T WAIT AS WELL). Think Brian's Hunt but you get to be Brian. Imagine that you're heading North, doing something, and you're canoeing upriver, it's autumn, and the salmon run is ending, little orange fish whisking past, you stop to fish for a moment, but then keep on, because you've got to reach the northern mountains before the river freezes over. You reach a dead end in the river, and bring the canoe onshore. You tie a rope around the bow, leaving supplies in her hatch, and then continue your journey north, dragging your mobile home behind you. I'm in love with this idea, and the canoe has only expanded my horizons.
Again, thanks for the feedback, and it's nice to meet someone else who feels about how badly things are ruined by gamers' obsessions with p*nises. It's also nice to meet someone exited for seasons, because I've been in love with the idea since desolation point update. (The idea of long-distance travel sparked the thought)

To starfighter441 - A .22 could be interesting. Personally I was thinking we could have different bolt-action type rifles, all ~.303, so we could have a Mosin-Nagant type rifle (more durable), as well as a Mauser type (higher muzzle velocity/more round variation), and a Lee-Enfield type (dodgier than Mauser and Nagant, but more common), creating more variety. Plus I really like Mosin-Nagant rifles. (See profile pic)

[piratepete5]

On 2016-04-05 at 4:03 PM, boshmi said:

Revolver - I'm not worried about the revolver so much as the implications of it. I've seen it happen with "Unturned" before, though Unturned was already pretty far gone. The game was still pretty tactical and involving, but Nelson adds a rocket launcher, and suddenly everyone's demanding Helicopters and Tanks and Stingers and god-knows-what, and Nelson was forced to add it in, so now Unturned is just a game of "Who has the biggest gun?" and "Who gets a helicopter first?" I don't want the revolver to be added, and then people begin demanding an Ak-47 to gun down wolves with.

 

I mean, the team can just refuse to add anymore weapons after the revolver, I agree with you about the adding a whole bunch of weapons thing, we don't want to become like stranded deep, if anyone still plays that.

[boshmi]

46 minutes ago, piratepete5 said:

I mean, the team can just refuse to add anymore weapons after the revolver.

The issue is that maybe they do want to add more weapons after the revolver. That's what I'm worried about. Also, I played stranded deep on launch, and regret it so hard you have no idea.

[Boston123]

In actuality:

A .38 Special (which is most likely what we are getting, as .38 Special is the most common revolver caliber worldwide) is perfectly acceptable for self-defense against wolves. 

http://forums.outdoorsdirectory.com/showthread.php/94632-Wolf-defense-handgun-suggestions-and-advice-needed

.38 Special would also be perfectly acceptable, with proper shot placement, vs human targets.

As for the hunting rifle: you people do realize that the Hunting Rifle is most likely a WW1-WW2 surplus military rifle? That thing would kill someone dead, no problems. .303 is a BIG bullet

As for the bow: with proper arrow placement, a bow is directly as lethal as a firearm, make no mistake. An arrow to the upper torso will kill you within 60 seconds or so.

[boshmi]

46 minutes ago, Boston123 said:

In actuality:

A .38 Special (which is most likely what we are getting, as .38 Special is the most common revolver caliber worldwide) is perfectly acceptable for self-defense against wolves. 

http://forums.outdoorsdirectory.com/showthread.php/94632-Wolf-defense-handgun-suggestions-and-advice-needed

.38 Special would also be perfectly acceptable, with proper shot placement, vs human targets.

As for the hunting rifle: you people do realize that the Hunting Rifle is most likely a WW1-WW2 surplus military rifle? That thing would kill someone dead, no problems. .303 is a BIG bullet

As for the bow: with proper arrow placement, a bow is directly as lethal as a firearm, make no mistake. An arrow to the upper torso will kill you within 60 seconds or so.

That's kinda what I meant. There's no need to break the atmosphere and feel of the game with fancy guns, when a good old Karabiner works just as well!

 

[Dirmagnos]

I really dont see a big deal with gunsmithing, as ammo-wise, not weapon-wise.

I wouldnt be using any improvised firearms anyway, purpose of the game is to survive, not to kill yourself in extremely stupid way. And making ammo, even if we get a gun press, for an inexperienced person is rather difficult and tedious process. Most people who yell that its gamebreaking forget one two simple thing - it all takes time, a lot(you have to dig up that casing, that will melt thru snow, then you have to dig out a bullet out of the corpse; then you have to actually find some gunpowder, or make some, depending on how deep this feature will be, then theres whole reassembly thing, etc), and secondly you need 2 crucial components, aside of casing and bullet, that you may not even find, already mentioned gunpowder and primer, something that people tend to forger entirely. Bullets can get mangled and need to be recast, without any guarantee for a perfect shape. Casings can get mangled as well, rendering them useless. Gunpowder can have a score of various problems. And primers come in limited quantities and making improvised one requires a lot of skill. And thats an easy part, presuming that we will get ammo crafting station(not just ammo press but whole thing).

Unless were talking arcade-style ammo making, and game shows no signs moving in that direction, making ammo could be actually the most difficult process in game to date.

[hauteecolerider]

12 hours ago, boshmi said:

To hauteecolerider and vancopower (about guns) - Yeah, I guess that's what the appeal is. I wasn't really thinking about NPCs so much as animals, but even so I'd prefer we didn't get more conventional weapons. I just think it screws with the atmosphere of the game, and I'm worried it might take away the sense of solitude, and envelopment within nature, as you make the transition from terrified civilian to hardcore wilderness survivor. Even the flare gun made me feel a bit like the game was going in the wrong direction (Let's be honest here, I've never had major trouble with bears, I think you should have been kept as un-defendable-against, if that makes sense). I'm sorry, but it's really difficult to explain how I feel about this, and I'm not quite sure how. I guess this game has always been about surviving the elements, and I just don't think assault rifles (semi-automatic or fully automatic), however feasible, can contribute that much to the game and it's feeling. To vancopower specifically, having craftable flintlocks, even after being taught the skill removes the importance and rarity of rifles. Personally, I believe that rifles are fine for mid to long range engagements, and if we just have a revolver for close range, it should be fine. Like I said, it's the implications I dislike. I'm not saying guns ruin games, but I am saying that this game is the wrong game to put lots of guns in.

This. I just fail to see how adding a revolver to the game would improve the game. That said, I'm sure Hinterland has thought this through very well and have a clear idea of how to implement this into the game. Everything I've seen so far in the past month of playing this game tells me that they have a clear vision and they frequently ask themselves this question: "Does this element support the vision?" For every yes answer to this question, I suspect there are a thousand no answers. And the no simply does not get included in the game.

[boshmi]

3 hours ago, hauteecolerider said:

This. I just fail to see how adding a revolver to the game would improve the game. That said, I'm sure Hinterland has thought this through very well and have a clear idea of how to implement this into the game.

I agree so much with you you have no idea. Just like Patrick said at the start of this thread, the roadmap is a live document and the people who are going to implement these features are the same people who have made the game as great as it already is.

5 hours ago, Dirmagnos said:

Making ammo, even if we get a gun press, for an inexperienced person is rather difficult and tedious process. Most people who yell that its gamebreaking forget one two simple thing - it all takes time, a lot(you have to dig up that casing, that will melt thru snow, then you have to dig out a bullet out of the corpse; then you have to actually find some gunpowder, or make some, depending on how deep this feature will be, then theres whole reassembly thing, etc), and secondly you need 2 crucial components, aside of casing and bullet, that you may not even find, already mentioned gunpowder and primer, something that people tend to forger entirely. Bullets can get mangled and need to be recast, without any guarantee for a perfect shape. Casings can get mangled as well, rendering them useless. Gunpowder can have a score of various problems. And primers come in limited quantities and making improvised one requires a lot of skill. And thats an easy part, presuming that we will get ammo crafting station(not just ammo press but whole thing).

I'm not bothered about ammo so much as guns. Ammo can be hard to make, but I don't think it would ruin the game and it's balance. On the other hand, guns could make the game a little unbalanced. Even if it takes days to craft one, how many materials can you really need? If I'm correct I remember the repair cost for rifles in Desolation point to be 1x fir firewood and 2x scrap metal, and that was not much work to collect. Gun presses could make this even more op, meaning that you only need to have scrap melted down. I just dislike the idea of guns becoming plentiful and easy-to-make (think Rust's waterpipe shotgun), and I want them to stay as a rare, man-made only tool, which makes you go "YES!" when you find it.

Sorry for the dodgily short responses, I'm kind of in a hurry. Thanks for responding btws

[vancopower]

12 hours ago, Dirmagnos said:

I really dont see a big deal with gunsmithing, as ammo-wise, not weapon-wise.

I wouldnt be using any improvised firearms anyway, purpose of the game is to survive, not to kill yourself in extremely stupid way. And making ammo, even if we get a gun press, for an inexperienced person is rather difficult and tedious process. Most people who yell that its gamebreaking forget one two simple thing - it all takes time, a lot(you have to dig up that casing, that will melt thru snow, then you have to dig out a bullet out of the corpse; then you have to actually find some gunpowder, or make some, depending on how deep this feature will be, then theres whole reassembly thing, etc), and secondly you need 2 crucial components, aside of casing and bullet, that you may not even find, already mentioned gunpowder and primer, something that people tend to forger entirely. Bullets can get mangled and need to be recast, without any guarantee for a perfect shape. Casings can get mangled as well, rendering them useless. Gunpowder can have a score of various problems. And primers come in limited quantities and making improvised one requires a lot of skill. And thats an easy part, presuming that we will get ammo crafting station(not just ammo press but whole thing).

Unless were talking arcade-style ammo making, and game shows no signs moving in that direction, making ammo could be actually the most difficult process in game to date.

You are forgetting shotgun shell which as I mentioned many times now are easy to make and I've seen it done many times. Also there is the flintlock guns which some people can actually make like adventurous historians who want to understand more of that type of period in human history maybe? And yes making bullets is hard but not impossible, given the correct tools people can make all kinds of weapons that's what we are actually good at as a species and that's how the prehistoric men have survived the ice age. So if we made tools 100.000 years ago what is stopping the modern man to recreate what he knows already that it exists. There ware other human like species on earth which evolved but they all died out in the ice age because they could not build a fire and make hunting tools, to sum up shotgun shells are best bet for crafting ammo but flintlock guns are plausible too modern ammunition well it will just take bigger machines and know how, unless the survivor finds a factory for ammo making and a book to read crafting modern bullets is out of the question.

[Scyzara]

7 hours ago, vancopower said:

 There ware other human like species on earth which evolved but they all died out in the ice age because they could not build a fire and make hunting tools, to sum up shotgun shells are best bet for crafting ammo but flintlock guns are plausible too modern ammunition well it will just take bigger machines and know how, unless the survivor finds a factory for ammo making and a book to read crafting modern bullets is out of the question.

The first part of your sentence is simply not true. Neanderthals and Denisovans were both capable of building and maintaining fires and creating a large variety of tools, ranging from flint knives, axes, spears and leatherworking tools to various decorative trinkets and even seaworthy small boats. They were capable of speech (presumably even complex language) and performed cultural activities like rituals including body paintings and burial rites. Overall, their cultural and technological level wasn't much inferior (if inferior at all) to that of sapiens back in the middle paleolithic days 300.000-30.000 B.C.

It isn't known what exactly caused Neanderthals and Denisovans to die out, but their extinction dates usually correlate (more or less +/- a few ten thousand years) with the arrival of sapiens in their respective territories. Maybe sapiens actively killed (or enslaved) them on purpose, maybe our ancestors simply competed with them for food or brought along diseases that Neanderthal and Denisovan immune systems were'nt able to deal with. Most likely the other human species "died out" due to a combination of all three or even more factors. (I'm using exclamation marks because they didn't die out entirely but rather got integrated - at least to some extent - into the sapiens' genome. Their distinct genotypes, phenotypes and cultures are gone, but at least a little part of them lives on within us.)

Just wanted to clarify that the other human species (just as a sidenote: even the term "species" is very debatable given the knowledge we gained in the last 5 years through advanced NGS technology and paleogenetics) didn't die out because they were too stupid to build a fire during the ice age or something. That's as far away from the truth as you can get.

 

18 hours ago, hauteecolerider said:

This. I just fail to see how adding a revolver to the game would improve the game. That said, I'm sure Hinterland has thought this through very well and have a clear idea of how to implement this into the game. Everything I've seen so far in the past month of playing this game tells me that they have a clear vision and they frequently ask themselves this question: "Does this element support the vision?" For every yes answer to this question, I suspect there are a thousand no answers. And the no simply does not get included in the game.

Completely agree to this statement. I can't imagine much benefit from a revolver myself atm (the bow doesn't add very much for me personally either, it's just another lethal ranged weapon with slightly different mechanics for me), but I believe fairness demands to give Hinterlands the chance to show us their implementation of new items before we start to complain about them in advance. They've often come up with excellent and surprising solutions in the past and I'm very confident they'll add revolvers in a way that makes sense both for their overall vision and gameplay-wise.

[boshmi]

2 hours ago, Scyzara said:

Completely agree to this statement. I can't imagine much benefit from a revolver myself atm (the bow doesn't add very much for me personally either, it's just another lethal ranged weapon with slightly different mechanics for me), but I believe fairness demands to give Hinterlands the chance to show us their implementation of new items before we start to complain about them in advance. They've often come up with excellent and surprising solutions in the past and I'm very confident they'll add revolvers in a way that makes sense both for their overall vision and gameplay-wise.

I'll second that a second time :), like I said, it isn't the revolver but it's implications.

8 hours ago, vancopower said:

You are forgetting shotgun shell which as I mentioned many times now are easy to make and I've seen it done many times. Also there is the flintlock guns which some people can actually make like adventurous historians who want to understand more of that type of period in human history maybe?

Yeah, but I think the idea of "tons o' guns" doesn't work well in the context of this game. If it's a craftable gun, even a primitive one, it can be easily acquired and reproduced through crafting, which I think could ruin the atmosphere and ideas of the game at the current moment (I'm just repeating myself now), ideas like; finite resources, you won't live forever, etc, just kinda get thrown out the window when you can chuck together a killing machine in ~30 hours of crafting. It ruins the games ideas and doesn't add any new ones to make up for it.

[Schneidox]

I suspect the revolver's value will be in animal attacks. The effective range on the rifle is pretty short imo, so I believe a revolver would be all but useless anywhere past 30 meters. 

I think it's going to come in handy when fluffy or one of his goons jumps tries to rip your face off. A quick shot with the revolver from point blank range should neutralize him immediately. 

[vancopower]

3 hours ago, Scyzara said:

The first part of your sentence is simply not true. Neanderthals and Denisovans were both capable of building and maintaining fires and creating a large variety of tools, ranging from flint knives, axes, spears and leatherworking tools to various decorative trinkets and even seaworthy small boats. They were capable of speech (presumably even complex language) and performed cultural activities like rituals including body paintings and burial rites. Overall, their cultural and technological level wasn't much inferior (if inferior at all) to that of sapiens back in the middle paleolithic days 300.000-30.000 B.C.

It isn't known what exactly caused Neanderthals and Denisovans to die out, but their extinction dates usually correlate (more or less +/- a few ten thousand years) with the arrival of sapiens in their respective territories. Maybe sapiens actively killed (or enslaved) them on purpose, maybe our ancestors simply competed with them for food or brought along diseases that Neanderthal and Denisovan immune systems were'nt able to deal with. Most likely the other human species "died out" due to a combination of all three or even more factors. (I'm using exclamation marks because they didn't die out entirely but rather got integrated - at least to some extent - into the sapiens' genome. Their distinct genotypes, phenotypes and cultures are gone, but at least a little part of them lives on within us.)

Just wanted to clarify that the other human species (just as a sidenote: even the term "species" is very debatable given the knowledge we gained in the last 5 years through advanced NGS technology and paleogenetics) didn't die out because they were too stupid to build a fire during the ice age or something. That's as far away from the truth as you can get.

 

Completely agree to this statement. I can't imagine much benefit from a revolver myself atm (the bow doesn't add very much for me personally either, it's just another lethal ranged weapon with slightly different mechanics for me), but I believe fairness demands to give Hinterlands the chance to show us their implementation of new items before we start to complain about them in advance. They've often come up with excellent and surprising solutions in the past and I'm very confident they'll add revolvers in a way that makes sense both for their overall vision and gameplay-wise.

I watched yesterday on the discovery channel they say that the only reason that they did not survive was the ice age, our ancestors however ware closer to the hot areas and they adapted by using tools, tamed wolves and used furs to protect themselves from the cold. I am not an historian but that's what the discovery channel presented. Maybe the main reason was that they ware on good location but still my point was that it is in our gene to make tools and weapons right ? not to give a history lesson

[Ohbal]

On 5/4/2016 at 1:03 AM, boshmi said:

With this new roadmap the devs have given us, (http://hinterlandgames.com/the-long-dark/roadmap/) I think I may be alone in saying that things are somewhat bittersweet when I read this.
The roadmap adds a great many things that I was really looking forward to, but also adds a few things that have ruined survival games for me in the past. I felt like maybe I could go over a few of these things to see if anyone agrees with me, or if everyone thinks I'm crazy.

Even if none would agree, it wouldn't mean you are crazy 

Quote

Things I'm Worried About -

Wellbeing system - Yeah, I know I've talked about this before in my wishlist about how I would like to see a "Content" affliction, but I just wanted this as something that improves sleep, similarly to the way tea does. The way it's put here implies some "bar" similar to the way that hunger or cold works. The lack of this was something I loved about the game, because I forced me to think about it myself. By which I mean, in a really long hibernation game, I, the player, would actually stop and think; what is the point of all this? More than a few times I drove me to commit suicide, and left a far deeper emotional experience than games like "Don't Starve" have given me through a meter telling me how sane my character is.

I understand your fears, but I trust Hinterland will find a way to do this better than other survival games. While it adds a "gamey" element, I see no other way to implement a way to aim at reducing the use of most exloits, like hybernation but not just this one. For me the better approach to a wellbeing system will be a gentle one, you should be able to note both the possitive and the negative effects, but it shouldn't be game-breaking unless in extreme circunstances (living on 500cal for a month, for example, or 4 hypotermias in a row).  

Quote

Steam Trading cards - I'm actually alright with this one, as long as it dosen't turn into a bloodthirsty cuthroat and downright stupid market anywhere resembling Cancer Strike Global Orgy. (Excuse the French, I really hate that game) I just don't want people pay 250$ for a golden rifle or something stupid like that. A market similar to that of the "Total War" series, where you can trade cards, but nothing else, would be much more favorable.

Don't really care about this. This is not a competitive game, so I don't care what the rest of you are doing (no disrespect intended xD). If some players like to collect things and hinterland can make extra $ for it, I don't see any problem with it. 

Quote

Research items - Little bit iffy about this one. If it turns into something like Rust does, with research benches, then no, don't even go there. If it adds a button that says "read book" in the book action bar, and then gives you +10 firemaking skill or whatever, then, yes do it.

I wouldn't mind a recipe approach. How does a pilot know how to make a rabbit snare? or a wolf coat? or a bow? I personally would need to find some instructions or would expend an insane amount of hours trying to figure out myself which trees should I use, how much time should I cure them, what should I use for arrows, etc. 

Quote

Revolver - I'm not worried about the revolver so much as the implications of it. I've seen it happen with "Unturned" before, though Unturned was already pretty far gone. The game was still pretty tactical and involving, but Nelson adds a rocket launcher, and suddenly everyone's demanding Helicopters and Tanks and Stingers and god-knows-what, and Nelson was forced to add it in, so now Unturned is just a game of "Who has the biggest gun?" and "Who gets a helicopter first?" I don't want the revolver to be added, and then people begin demanding an Ak-47 to gun down wolves with.

I'm on the boat of not seeing the added value of the revolver in this game. I don't mind if this weapon thingie stops there though. 

Quote

Simple Shelter Building - Took me a while to decide if I liked this or not. I'd say yes but limit it A LOT. Nothing even remotely large, stick to snow-holes and lean-tos. Anything larger than that will become a pen*s.

Crafting for safehouse customization - If this means you can draw on the walls of your home - no, people are going to draw pen*ses. If this means you can build your own fort - no, people are going to build giant pen*ses. If this means you can build your own items to put in your safehouse - no, people are going to build pen*ses. Crafting structures are the ruin of all survival games. Rust? Can't walk 20m on a server without finding a giant pen*s. DayZ? Less common, but still camps with pen*ses. Don't Starve? Eventually everyone is compelled to build a giant pen*s. If these are the things you are thinking of doing, please, Please, PLEASE just DON'T. I don't want to see this happen to one of my favorite games.

Crafting for clothing customization - Similarly, people will just draw pen*ses on all their clothes. Either that or something ridiculous like cannabis leaves, or pornographic images, so just don't.

First of all, I'm glad I'm not playing MP games as much as I did before... ha ha, the world has been filled up with e-penis it seems. Lol! Anyway, I wouldn't be too worried about it in TLD. As I said in the steam card answer, I'm not in other-player's games, so I don't mind what they do in theirs. If they enjoy sleeping in a giant-penis shape shelter, well, let them enjoy it!

I'm all up for the small shelter addition, as I'd really like the game to offer maps with literally no shelters. No caves, no cabins, no huts, no nothing. You vs Mother nature. This gameplay woulnd't be possible without this skill. 

Quote

Gunsmithing and ammunition crafting - I cannot stress how much this must be done right. Don't let us build our own guns. That WILL BE the ruin of this game, I 100% GUARANTEE it. It would kill all the feeling of survival stone dead. Don't let us draw on our guns, for the same reason as Clothing and Safehouse customization. You must make it VERY HARD to find gunpowder and shell casings, DON'T let us smelt them, DO let us pick up ejected shell casings. This is probably the one I am most worried about. No one except for highly trained individuals can build a gun from scratch, LEAST OF ALL in a survival situation with very limited resources. Please, I'm begging you, don't.

I completely agree here. Ammo being so scarce is what makes those bullets so valuable. This is another feature that needs to be implemented very gently

Quote

Horse - The canoe I'm okay with. The horse could just be a buggy mess that's really hard to use, annihilates the immersion with a survivalist world, and pretty far fetched as well. The canoe can work if done well. IF DONE WELL. In fact, I'm exited for a DONE WELL version of the canoe. Paddling downstream before the river freezes over.

Let's see how the horse works. What I'm worried the most about the horse... is how badly they are usually animated and controlled in games. The only decent one is Red Dead Redemption (Shadow of the Colossus did a great effort as well). A lot of effort would go to the mechanics of the horse to make it right (and if you can't do it right, then better don't do it at all), not sure if it would be worth it.

IF done right, you would have a travel compation, which is something super-inmersive for some people (myself included). A companion that helps, but that can also die! This would add a lot of emotion to the game as well.  

Quote

All those negative things out of the way, that is not to say I'm unexcited for the things that this roadmap promises. Things like Moose, Cougars, The Axe, Canoe, Long traveling, and most of all, SEASONS, are things that have me absoloutley jumping up and down on the spot because of the features and mechanics they bring. Migrating south for the winter, paddling along with the salmon run in spring, watching herds of moose thunder across the plains, and trekking across the frigid wilderness just make me so exited I can't wait. Not to mention the pretty awesome map of bear island the devs have handed out. There are so many things I'm exited for that I would like to discuss, but there just isn't enough time.
Thank you for reading my very long post.

Lovely picture you draw there of your future travels. Hope the game gets to that point! 

Great post, sorry for the super-quote

[Dirmagnos]

11 hours ago, vancopower said:

So if we made tools 100.000 years ago what is stopping the modern man to recreate what he knows already that it exists. There ware other human like species on earth which evolved but they all died out in the ice age because they could not build a fire and make hunting tools, to sum up shotgun shells are best bet for crafting ammo but flintlock guns are plausible too modern ammunition well it will just take bigger machines and know how, unless the survivor finds a factory for ammo making and a book to read crafting modern bullets is out of the question.

We made tools and weapons throughout our whole history, but modern man simply lacks experience to do it, since those techniques evolved over generations and were often kept secret from all but few chosen ones. And even now many of them remain mystery, how ancient craftsmen managed to craft tools of superior quality with primitive technologies available to them. Nowdays average person wouldnt know how to make gunpowder, water filters or relatively new penicillin, that are actually not that hard to make. We simply dont need that knowledge in our everyday life.

And Discovery Channel as source of information is as viable as wikipedia. They had their fair share of nonsense published.

[vancopower]

6 minutes ago, Dirmagnos said:

We made tools and weapons throughout our whole history, but modern man simply lacks experience to do it, since those techniques evolved over generations and were often kept secret from all but few chosen ones. And even now many of them remain mystery, how ancient craftsmen managed to craft tools of superior quality with primitive technologies available to them. Nowdays average person wouldnt know how to make gunpowder, water filters or relatively new penicillin, that are actually not that hard to make. We simply dont need that knowledge in our everyday life.

And Discovery Channel as source of information is as viable as wikipedia. They had their fair share of nonsense published.

There you go with your strange words again: Chosen few like the Illuminati ? what are you talking about ?  ancient craftsmen? There are few Turkish  villages in my country that they still craft tools mostly axes, and horseshoes and yes I am talking about today 2016. I don't know in what country you live in but I am sure that there are still people that can craft tools, heck my grandfather used to make axes all the time. I have a neighbor that has a metal workshop and bangs with some hammer from 6:30 AM to 12:00 he makes tools for Gypsies he is the last well I guess you can call him blacksmith in town and still works. So if you want to unravel the mystery of tool making come to my place I will introduce you to my neighbor he will tell you all about "the secret of steel"   . Gunpowder it is not so hard to make too however it is dangerous and you'll have to have at least knowledge of  basic chemistry.  Water filters are even easier to make, there is so much reusable material it won't fit in the game. You should watch some of the youtube's that SteveP posted while back you'll see how a man makes arrows out of glass flint and other stuff it is very interesting.