My own Long Dark: Experiences and requests/suggestions

[Sandra]

Hello,

I am Sandra from Germany and I would like to share my experiences with „The Long Dark“. Since the german forum does not seem well-attended, I will try to put my issues, questions and suggestions in English, but you’ll have to excuse mistakes in grammar or spelling because my English is far from being perfect.

At first I want to apologize if I mention things that have been mentioned before. I really like the game and I want to help the developers with my opinion but there is so much feedback that I might easily have missed some posts.

I just managed to survive 52 days (yeah!) and my bedroll is down to 6% condition and although I have a sewing kit and cloth I can’t repair it. It’s not in the list of items when I choose “Repair” in the Survival Menu. So soon I won’t be able to sleep outside. Not that I like sleeping outside but sometimes I have to. Since a lot of items can be repaired I think the bedroll should be one of it.

I know the loot is random but in one sandbox I found a rifle and three munition packs, in one sandbox only one munition set. In one sandbox I didn’t even find a rifle and all I could do was stalking wolfs until they caught a deer and then scare them off with a flare or – when I run out of flares – fight with them to steal their prey (that was mean I know but I had no choice). I think this differences are a little too big. I know, reality is unfair, too – sometimes you’re lucky, sometimes you’re not. But I think a game should not be as unfair as life is.;-)

In my opinion some things should not expire or expire much slower than they do. In real life I don’t use cardboard matches very often. But when I need one, the matches I took with me in a pub 10 years ago work perfectly fine. And the ones I found 50 days ago in the long dark are almost “broken”.

If it is possible it would be a nice touch when the player would have to carry dead persons outside before sleeping in a house so that he/she won’t get sick sooner or later because of the rotting corpse.

I think the player should not notice food poisoning immediately. I am no doctor but I think after eating something bad, it takes a few hours before you’re feeling sick. It would be more realistic and could avoid savegame abuse.

Talking of savegames: It's fine with me to restart after dying in the sandbox but I hope that the story mode will not overwrite the savegame on player’s death. Call me a sissy if you like but playing all story parts again, listening to all dialogs a dozen times and watching the same video sequences over and over again. That would be too much and would make an exciting game boring soon. So please, in the story mode: at least one save game slot that is not overwritten when you die. Please!

Please don’t misunderstand this list. As I mentioned I like this game a lot and I really hope, the developers will have lots of success with “The Long Dark”. May it make them rich and happy. ;-)

[Trandor]

Hi Sandra, welcome to the forum and congratulations on your 52 day run! First things first, I just read your text and I did not notice any mistakes whatsoever, so maybe your english is not perfect, but it is very good to say the least.

Since the main story mode seems to be divided into episodes, I think you don't need to worry about your savegame being entirely lost, or if it is, I suppose it will not be hours and hours of gameplay you need to play again.

The randomness of the sandbox -to me at least - increases the replay value, since if every sandbox had approximately the same loot, I would not play it more than a couple of times. Now there is always room to get somewhat "better loot".

And about the german section of the forum: Vielleicht solltest du das mal ändern, mittlerweile gibt es bestimmt einige Deutschsprachige hier, also starte doch mal nen Thread da unten und wir schauen was passiert. ^^

[elloco999]

And about the german section of the forum: Vielleicht solltest du das mal ändern, mittlerweile gibt es bestimmt einige Deutschsprachige hier, also starte doch mal nen Thread da unten und wir schauen was passiert. ^^

Well, it never hurts to try

And of course congratulations on you 52 day run! That's twice as long as my longest so far.

[Sandra]

Thanks for your replies. Maybe I'll start a thread in the german forum.

The randomness of the sandbox -to me at least - increases the replay value, since if every sandbox had approximately the same loot, I would not play it more than a couple of times. Now there is always room to get somewhat "better loot".

You have point there. Starting a new sandbox is exciting. Where will I start? Will I be close to a building? Am I save there?

It's like christmas - only with less food

To me it is okay, if the rifle or the munition is not in the same place as it was in the sandbox but I personally think it should be somewhere in every sandbox. Okay, maybe in that on sandbox I mentioned I just didn't find it. But I am sure I looked everywhere.

Or the prepper's cache: It's very cool that it is always somewhere else, but it would also be cool if you could find a hint where to find it. For example a crumbled note in the Camp Office or a rotten map near the Derailment that (vaguely) shows the position the prepper's cache has in the current sandbox. So that everybody has a chance to find it without dying while searching it.

But I know that not everything is possibly and this is an Alpha which is already very entertaining. I am sure I will like the release version with or without a rifle. I mean,hey, I can still stalk wolves and steal their food,can't I?

Oh, and thank you both for the congratulation. I am very proud of myself since I died 4 times before after a few days. 3 times I died of stupidity: burning myself to death, bleeding out while harvesting a wolf, starving in my sleep. One time I died having no clue why, while foraging wood.

[elloco999]

A christmas with less food. And less decorations. And less lights... At least it's a white christmas!

Eventually (hopefully with the next update) fishing and trapping will also be implemented. So you will be less depended on the rifle and won't have to resort to fighting wolves off their kills when your flares run out.

As far as I know there are 3 confirmed locations where you can find the rifle and 1 possible location. Although one of those locations is in one of the bunkers.

[spoil]1. Trappers homestead

2. The dam

3. The bunker near the Camp Office (if the bunker happens to spawn here in your game) where you can find 2 rifles.

4. Not confirmed but the lookout tower has a gun rack, so it's possible the rifle spawns there as well.[/spoil]

It's possible the rifle spawns in all locations in one game (I had one game where I found 4 rifles, 2 in the bunker), and I think it's possible the rifle doesn't spawn in any location in another game.

[Sandra]

Yes, I wondered about the gun rack in the Forestry lookout too. It's my fifth run and I never found a rifle there. Actually, the four times I found a gun, it was in Trapper's Homestead.

Fishing and trapping would be cool. Didn't they say the next update would include a new way to get food? I really hope for fishing. Let's hear it for Canadian Sushi!