Option to disable permadeath in custom survival mode

[Darstig Lorn]

There are naysayers to this idea, but they can alway leave permadeath on.  I have a busy life with 4 kids, and  losing a game that I have worked on for a week, because a kid stubbed a toe, adds an unnecessary bitterness to playing this game.

Hoping for more from this promising game,

Darstig Lorn, an old guy of 40 years.

[EricTheGreat12]

That’s the point of this game: to work so hard to get where you are now; losing is a part of the experience that hurts but that adds so much more intensity to the game. 

 

Sorry, but having the option to turn on/off permadeth is ridiculous and will kill the game. Thank you for bringing the idea to the table, but it won’t be happening 

[Darstig Lorn]

5 minutes ago, EricTheGreat12 said:

That’s the point of this game: to work so hard to get where you are now; losing is a part of the experience that hurts but that adds so much more intensity to the game. 

 

Sorry, but having the option to turn on/off permadeth is ridiculous and will kill the game. Thank you for bringing the idea to the table, but it won’t be happening 

I respectfully disagree.  A perfect example of keeping the intensity going while also avoiding permadeath is Alien:  Isolation.  In that case the saves can only be done in certain locations.  The alien is rumbling above and below you, and it can be a while before you can find a save point.  The feeling of fright and danger is just as intense in that game.

Additionally, the story mode has what I am talking about, and that hasn't ruined the game.  I would argue, it has only made it better.

Ultimately, this is only an issue on consoles.  On the PC, you can simply archive your save data, and you are good to go.  So all I am asking for is to have the same ability to avoid permadeath as PC players do.

[Khan_Drichthyes]

I know how it goes with kids.  I just press the Esc button and it pauses the game until I can get back to it.

[EricTheGreat12]

1 minute ago, Darstig Lorn said:

I respectfully disagree.  A perfect example of keeping the intensity going while also avoiding permadeath is Alien:  Isolation.  In that case the saves can only be done in certain locations.  The alien is rumbling above and below you, and it can be a while before you can find a save point.  The feeling of fright and danger is just as intense in that game.

Having played Alien Isolation, it's a completely different experience from the Long Dark's Survival mode: you have to follow a story, and you are expected to die many times in order to learn different strategies and restart at a certain checkpoint vs. The Long Dark Survival Mode, where the point is to know how long you will survive. Alien Isolation is definitely scarier than the Long Dark, but the Long Dark is not trying to be scary. Every game of the Long Dark is trying to test how long you can go; if you implement saving, the game becomes easier and you could live longer- a lot of players have done approximately 100 days, if you implement save games it becomes too easy and players can abuse the system.

Nonetheless, my hat's off to you: usually, newcomers on these forums tend to be very unopen to discussion and it can lead to hostility. I apologize for what seemed a hostile answer to your initial post on my part, but I hope that you continue to participate here on the forums.

[TerribleSurvivor]

It has been stated by the developers already that permadeath will always be part of survival mode. Survival mode isn´t really about living infinitly but about delaying the one inevitable aspect of life -> death. If you had the option to disable permadeath it would be against the spirit of the game.

Select the following text if you want a possible work-around for the permadeath problem. (I made the text invisible so people who do not want to know how to do it wont get spoiled)

But if you are really annoyed by the fact that you die permanently there is the option to create a copy of your savefile (assuming you are using Windows):

In your explorer navigate to the following path "%localappdata%/hinterland/TheLongDark" (without quotes) and pick the corresponding savefile. Create a copy of it and store it wherever you want. Just keep in mind that this copy wont be updated by the game thus you will need to update the file manually. Of course i cannot guarantee that it works (Perhaps the devs have implemented a save file validation which will render your copy useless. You need to try it yourself).

I hope i was able to help!

[Darstig Lorn]

41 minutes ago, TerribleSurvivor said:

It has been stated by the developers already that permadeath will always be part of survival mode. Survival mode isn´t really about living infinitly but about delaying the one inevitable aspect of life -> death. If you had the option to disable permadeath it would be against the spirit of the game.

Unfortunately, your listed fix is only for PC.  This doesn't help XBOX users.

The irritating thing about this sentiment (not irritated with you); is that the purists insist on everyone who uses an XBOX to buck-up and stop complaining about the survival mode.  When the only people who are forced to  play permadeath in survival mode are the XBOX users.  XBOX does not allow the archiving of save data, while PS4 and PC do by the very nature of their file systems.

If a purist is to be consistent about permadeath in survival mode, then the save data should only be available by the game connecting to a hinterlands server to retrieve that data, and upon death, that save is deleted from the server.

The idea that permadeath is essential to the game is already not true by virtue of the PC and PS4 users.

[TerribleSurvivor]

Hmm, I didnt account for the possibility of you using XBox so yeah that renders my work-around useless.

Unfortunately, as you pointed out, XBox is a very jailed and restrictively usable device thus you need to kinda deal with it

But i think in the majority of times when you need to interrupt your game session bcs of family affairs pausing the game should serve you well as pointed out above.

The only time you cant pause the game is when being attacked (not stalked) by an animal but those engagements aren´t lasting long... Well it really depends on what kind of emergency needs your attention in this moment.

For all intends and purposes i would say that you are right. The Long Dark should have an option to enable some kind of "kid mode" (how fitting ) that disables permadeath and lets you load the save from the last checkpoint to make the game more family friendly. Perhaps even suitable for younger children who just wanna have some fun without having to watch their progress going south every time they die. "Kid mode" of course would lock you out of any sort of competitive play like survival ladder or gaining achievements (You might get a notification that you would have earned it without kid mode) because of obvious reasons. But I don't think that you are playing the game in a competitve way so that shouldn't bother you too much.

Being able to disable permadeath is no deadly sin to me. Those "purists" that insist on playing hardcore just need to make sure it is enabled.

 

1 hour ago, Darstig Lorn said:

If a purist is to be consistent about permadeath in survival mode, then the save data should only be available by the game connecting to a hinterlands server to retrieve that data, and upon death, that save is deleted from the server.

That would be a terryfying amount of money going down the drain for hinterland just to satisfy some special players haha i dont think that this is going to happen any day soon ^^