What is the 1 thing you dislike most in The Long Dark?


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  • 2 weeks later...

Without wanting to sound too negative....

Pretty well most of the gameplay.

Don't get me wrong I adore this game, it's a beautiful and challenging experience. I've only recently played the game again, after many many updates, and I had a grueling 3 day outdoors survival experience where I constantly expected to die, only to find a new (outdoor only) area with enough stuff to tide me over, until I stumbled into a farm house at %10 condition with my last flare being used to fend off a wolf and bear as I stumbled to it. Amazing. And the visuals and sound are gorgeous.

 

But there's such a huge disconnect for the gameplay mechanics and themes of the game. Naturally there's so many limitations for any gameplay system, but a good deal of my time was taken up with trying to raise my body heat by a fire, balanced with taking a burning torch to start ANOTHER fire from sticks near some firewood to chop that firewood without freezing and so on. In reality I'd just drag that branch over to my fire and feed it. Or use the axe I had on the shed I was sheltered in. Or the fact my boots wearing out in 3 days... Elements such as these really detract from the immersive survival theme of the game by destroying any common sense solution that would be practical. As I said, I realise that the "gameyness" is simply how it has to be, but it really makes me sad. For me a romp through the game is a beautiful thing, as I discover new areas and survive by the seat of my pants, but a lot of the gameplay systems have to be simply endured instead of adored...

 

Maybe with some more tweaks to certain gameplay systems (being able to do more than one activity at once, such as craft while waiting for food to cook) I'll find it more immersive. I almost sort of prefer the old "tell don't show" system where you would forage for firewood from a special screen.

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This is tough, I love the game and it has huge potential, which I why I have a plethora of criticisms.  

If I had to choose one thing it would be the over abundance of wildlife, I like the balance on Stalker, except that there are sooo many wolves.  I don't know Canada at all, but I'll bet if you spend a day walking around in the woods you wouldn't come across 15 wolves and 10 deer. 

I'd like finding and hunting deer to be a challenge taking maybe a couple of days, and wolves should be rare enough to be a surprise rather than an inevitability.

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Too much loot in stalker
Condition recovers way too fast
Drop decoy -> bow shot at point blank makes wolves too easy
Level 5 cooking is overpowered (parasite risk gone)

Make stalker harder please! After day 60 we're basically invincible.

EDIT: More fish please, lots more species!
 

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On 7/12/2016 at 10:26 AM, WalleyeGuy83 said:

Too much loot in stalker
Condition recovers way too fast
Drop decoy -> bow shot at point blank makes wolves too easy
Level 5 cooking is overpowered (parasite risk gone)

Make stalker harder please! After day 60 we're basically invincible.

EDIT: More fish please, lots more species!
 

Actually I think stalker is a reasonable step up from voyager.  However I could get behind having a 4th even hard difficulty (so long as hard =/= more wolves).

I think one thing that would make the longer game harder all round would be a serious nerf for the crafted clothing.  Its just too good, weather which is the major challenge in the game becomes almost trivial in a full set of skins.

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16 minutes ago, Docterrok said:

No way to decorate house. 

Defiantly agree with this, it would be a way to make everything in sandbox start to feel like its working towards an achievement that you design yourself. just please not in a Fall Out 4 kind of way!

My only niggling bugbear at the moment is the movement, especially not being able to clamber fences or step up a few inches of snow.

Terrain traversing needs smoothing out

Will still be playing this game for days

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44 minutes ago, fearofspam said:

I hate only being 2 feet tall...

Looking eye to "eye" with a cat tail while you harvest it...

Looking up at the banister/railing on stairs...

I don't understand that at all.

That's the only thing I really dislike too from this great game

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10 hours ago, WalleyeGuy83 said:

@RuruwawaReally simple autohotkey line to create a toggleable key


f:: Send, % "{w " ( (toggle:=!toggle) ? "down" : "up" ) "}"

F key will toggle the W key as if you're holding it, replace "f" with whatever key you want.

Thanks for the tip -- I truly appreciate it.

But to me one mark of truly great software is that it doesn't need other software bolted-on to perform basic functions.  If AutoHotkey really is a requirement to get the game to provide basic accessibility, then it should be bundled with the game.  This thread is about feedback to Hinterland. and this is truly the one thing I find most deficient in The Long Dark.

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No compass.

I only have about 60 hours in the game, but I could already write a wall-o-text with about four dozen items that are in close competition to number 1. Here are 10 more not counting the compass.

I have a whetstone that used to belong to my father. It's worn, but it has been in use for over 50 years. Kitchen knives, chisels, scissors, hatchets, pruning shears, etc. Unless you have a gorilla pounding on a whetstone with a hammer, the cheapest one from Walmart* should last at least 1000 uses.

Hotkey to drop sticks for pathfinding.

Not able to add sticks to a fire while melting/boiling water.

Have I mentioned this before? No compass, I'm amazed only one other person has mentioned it yet.

Not being able to consume hot food to replace lost heat.

Everything degrades too quickly. It breaks immersion and seems like a forced mechanic to make the game challenging.

Running doesn't generate more heat. The clothes you wear to the office would keep a marathoner warm at 2 degree C. You should just about die from heat stroke running in full clothing that includes set of hand made fur items.

Stamina doesn't seem to improve with use. I am about 50 game days into my current sandbox. Running my stamina bar down twice a day should have doubled the distance I can run.

Stamina runs down too fast. Early humans supposedly ran down deer to exhaustion. Again, forced mechanic.

I will swear that i have already mentioned no compass. It's not too hard to get turned around in a blizzard in real life, but it's even easier on the computer.

No map. Given no map, there should be a way to draw my own map in the journal.

Even at 90% success for lighting a stick, it can go out before you have a chance to add more fuel. Ought to be able to add more tinder for a higher success.

 

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I guess I need more of the story of the physics/mechanics behind the "disaster," :D

I'm doing better now that it seems like dropped sticks are almost as persistent as the trees, and there is a limitless supply of them. If only Hansel and Gretel were so lucky...

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 7/18/2016 at 1:23 AM, terryt3535 said:

Running doesn't generate more heat.

Actually it does. It is like +1 modifier when walking and +1 more when running I think. But you rather would not notice it easily. But try to run for not less then 1/4 of stamina bar and you will see that temperature bonus even for some time after you stop!

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