Sherri

Ralph dropped this on Twitter. 😍 So excited for a new, large indoor location to explore!

I don't really think that the OP's concern is one that has to exist if you know how to adjust settings. There is Pilgrim difficulty to help newbies get used to the game. I myself started on Pilgrim and completed story mode that way. It was never an off-putting level of difficulty - in fact too easy. I later re-did story mode on a harder difficulty. So the early punishing difficulty is something you very much do not have to suffer. After some warm up on Pilgrim, even Voyager is not too hard. Later in the game yes, you get equipped and skilled and the game gets easier... however, I have watched YouTubers like @Hadrianplay on near-Interloper difficulty and by not obsessing about min-maxing everything, he has a really exciting level of challenge and it's not easy to reach 100 days. I feel like this is only a problem for people not willing to tweak the difficulty for their needs, or players who are on several hundred day runs and are getting bored because it feels too easy... but really they have just completed getting the bulk of the enjoyment from the game. Might just be time to move on to another game, or try the challenge modes, or just wait for the next Story chapter. I don't know any games that don't have that peak where you have mastered the game so it's now very easy. Real life brings constant challenges and growth forever... but wanting that from a game... is a lot to ask. How would a game prevent you from reaching a state of mastery? Add more content endlessly? Come on. *shrug* At the same time if a game was made so you can NEVER master - hooo boy that would be unsatifying to me. Or it would be like a creative sandbox game like Minecraft - about making cool stuff not 'mastering' skills and challenges. Honestly it's like game devs can never win. Make it too hard - players complain. Make it too easy - players complain. Allow very in-depth difficulty customising - players still not happy. I've never seen a game with such detailed difficulty customising as TLD. The problem is that there are very few core mechanics: stay warm, feed yourself, avoid getting lost, avoid aggressive wildlife. Once you master those, there isn't more to it. True of most games though. Literally the only thing I would change is allow achievements and badge progress on Custom difficulty. I am at the point of Voyager being much too easy but I don't like the volume of wolves in Stalker. I want to do Stalker with fewer wolves - but MOST of my drive to play is to continue my progress on badges and achievements. So I'm kinda stuck.

If your difficulty setting isn't so high that it's too cold, the Mountaineer's Hut at the foot of TWM is excellent for long term. - Tons of wood and sticks and birch bark close by. - Deer close by, rabbits, and a bear comes within reach sometimes. - Fishing hut. - Few wolves that are easily avoided. - Has a workbench (!).

I never quarter predators because I want to leave a tiny bit of meat on the carcass to make it take longer for it to respawn. Other than that, I play it by how the weather is, what condition I'm in, and how desperate I am for guts and skins. Quartering causes the meat to lose condition quickly while sitting in those bags. So that's also a factor.

I get what you're saying here. I agree that using online maps changes the nature of the game. But whether that is a good or bad thing is subjective. I like maps, because as a parent with limited leisure time... wandering around lost is not how I want to spend that time. Does it change the original intention of the devs? Sure does. But I can't imagine anyone being upset that someone is enjoying their art in their own way - they are still, enjoying that art. I like how the charcoal maps are kind of inaccurate. If I tried to make a map of my own town which I know well... it would be very hard indeed. But really... a town like this would have maps in every home and glovebox.... so I just pretend that the ones I get online are from a glovebox somewhere!

I see this is a month old, but I'd like to chime in. First, I commiserate. The Great Bear combat is my least favourite part of Wintermute. It's tough to get the hang of, and the mauling which you can't skip is disturbing. I found myself quickly muting and looking away when it happened. Once, one of my kids snuck in behind me and I didn't know, when a mauling happened and was petrified in fear. I had to quickly turn off my monitor. A skip option after the first one would be nice. However, after watching a few YouTube tutorials and a lot of trial and error, I eventually defeated him. I'm going through a second playthrough on medium difficulty (first time was on easy)... and knowing what to do made the bear much easier this time. @GwynrenI hope you persevered through the bear section. Let this be your motivation - Episode 3 was my favourite by miles. You play as Astrid and I felt like I was really accomplishing something during that episode - it was very rewarding. Well worth getting past that damn bear!

LOL

I don't think a game should have to scream at you for every possible danger, keeping an eye on these risks is THE challenge of the game. However, @UpUpAway95has a great idea here. Allowing survival play with saves... _or_ a permadeath option would be cool. I'd definitely choose to have saves because with 3 kids and life being crazy I have zero desire to lose hours of play due to a silly mistake.

Well... I can toss my printed maps now. lol

I was initially meh about Survival mode... but give it a try. The open world freedom to make your own story, is a full game itself. While you wait for the complete story.

I'm now at pennies per hour played but there was no "I've received so much value I feel almost embarrassed for buying it on sale" option. 🤣

If any thought to new wildlife is in the works (hinted in the survey) let my vote be for some type of bird. I have enough four-legged 'friends' on the ground, it would be cool to be forced to look up more & put those gorgeous trees to more use. (I want to shoot those crows lol.)

This is so wonderful. Every line of this update is full of good news, interesting details & exciting teasers, I am super jazzed about episode 4! Thank you so much for this update & your hard work. And for such an open peek at how the studio works, some of the decisions you all are tossing around & what goes into making this game. The sales numbers are awesome & inspiring. And omg Blackrock looks incredible.

One thing I love about Wintermute is having a purpose to my gameplay. Survival is fun but I often feel a bit aimless. And once I've explored all regions I rarely know what to do with myself. I confess, Wintermute is my fav part of this game and the story of what on earth happened to the world has me hooked. I'm a lost in the wilderness / shipwrecked / Robinson Crusoe type of fan so this story is right up my alley.

So, I'm replaying story mode because the first time I did it on Pilgrim it quickly became too easy. And you can't change difficulty between episodes. When the final two chapters come out, I don't want the game being too easy to detract from that. Anyway... the first time I played, I was new to the game. Playing without map knowledge was a real challenge. Now, with several hundred hours into Survival, replaying the story feels fresh again because now I know the maps and having a story and quests to follow is extremely fun. I haven't seen a single bear other than The Bear... I wonder if Wintermute has no other bears? 🧐 Anyone else tackle Wintermute more than once and notice anything different the second time around?

Funny that people don't seem to have such a feeling of entitlement over how the big movie studios who make the blockbusters we love spend their money and resources. Something about the interactivity and investment players get into games seems to translate to a misconception of investment in the company. These are the same folks with hundreds or thousands of hours played who leave horrible reviews on Steam. Enjoy media for what you can get from it, then look to the infinite other options out there, rather than getting in a twist about some perceived beef with the game or studio.

This x 100. I've never doubted for a second that Hinterland will deliver on their promises. More than any other game I've played... Hinterland is forthright with their players and unwilling to compromise their ethics and vision. Thank you Raphael and Admin for the excellent info, exciting hints for the future and reassurance for those who need it.

@starlinI really like your post here and agree fully with your points about fans developing an unhealthy need for constant attention. For a small company this can result in a HUGE burden. Those of us who use this forum look for updates here. But don't forget there are also the Steam Forums, Twitter, Facebook, etc communities that revolve around this and other games. How much time, & energy must a studio spend on giving news, feedback, attention to all these different communities? A huge company like Blizzard can have an entire paid department whose job it is to engage players on all these platforms... a smaller studio doesn't have the manpower to do so. And players getting angry because there isn't a steady IV drip of updates/news is burdensome and unreasonable. I personally don't engage in player communities almost at all. This TLD forum is the first and only I've been involved in for many, many years. And even then just to pop in and see what's new. My post was targeted at the players who bemoan the lack of updates and offered one possible theory. Just to say, don't freak out folks, there could be business reasons for delays and those would be legit reasons (ie, they aren't betraying original promises, there's more to it than just "where's my game, what's taking so long boohoo"). In fact I was originally posting as a reply on the Milton Mailbag thread specifically to a user upset that the Mailbag had not yet been replaced, then moved it here. Where I disagree is the idea that my post was anything like defamation or harm. To say "Hey I love your game, if income stream is an issue, I and many others would happily give you more money for small things," is not a negative post. Heck I'd like that kind of post targeted at my own company and game. LOL. I started off by offering one possible reason for slow updates... and evolved into daydreaming about paying for more awesome TLD stuff. This is very different than spreading rumors. I also was very sure to post this (now debunked) theory here on official forums where official responses can be made... rather than whispering about it in non-official communities like fan groups on Facebook or whatever where a theory could grow without being seen by Hinterland official people. I am well aware that these are official, moderated forums - I actually prefer official communities like these because nonsense and false info is less likely to be there. I was bitten by false rumors of HalfLife 2 Episode 3 ... many many years ago... I prefer my info straight from the source after that fiasco.

I want to clarify... I didn't mean this as a criticism in any way. This is my favourite game of the last ... hm almost decade... I just get bothered by the impatience and complaints and wanted to offer one possible theory. The long and the short is that I feel like I somehow got this game for a steal (Steam Summer Sale) and wasn't expecting to get so much fun out of it. Just wanted to offer an opinion that more paid "stuff" would not be out of line and I'd be happy to invest more money in TLD *if* money was a possible roadblock. Since @Raphael van Lieropassures us that money is not an issue... I rest assured.

Oh I'm not asking these Qs. I'm happy to wait. And I know progress is being made. I just see a lot of impatience. lol

Lots of players questioning things like: Where is episode 4&5? Why don't they answer the Mailbag anymore and they haven't replaced it yet. Why no news when we were promised news? My business-person perspective on this, is that Hinterland might have had to drop their devs to part-time or layed people off, but not wanted to make this widely known. The pandemic made in-person working a no-go and added a lot of personal strain on employees esp. if they have children. Hinterland AFAIK has no other games on market. Long Dark... while AMAZING, peaked its sales long ago I'd assume. And is probably just providing a trickle of income now - usually spurned by sales. But games sold on sale earn less profit. I can't fathom how you pay several developers, designers, voice actors, motion capture people, Ralph and any other managers, testers, etc... on the trickle of income from a popular yet several years old game. The market for people who love open world, peaceful, survival games must be pretty close to saturated. They are located in Victoria and Vancouver, BC... two of the most expensive places in Canada so salaries must be competitive aka high. They do a lot of donating... which is cool, but costs more $. They don't sell addons and no longer sell swag. If they had to switch folks to part-time or lay people off... I wouldn't be surprised or upset. It happens. But it's also not a surprise if they want to keep it on the down low so there isn't a freak out of people crying for episodes 4 & 5. That would hurt any potential future sales. I can't for the life of me figure out why they don't make a bunch of 'semi-official' sandbox level packs and release them as paid expansions. They don't have to be QUITE as huge and detailed as regular levels, but they would keep sandbox players interested in fresh content and generate more income. Once you have a cool game engine that people love playing in... adding level packs should in theory be easy-ish. Heck, I'd pay for some of these. They could be in a new survival mode "Beyond Great Bear" and give you other real and made up environments to explore in. They could make it so these levels don't connect to the main Great Bear levels, so that the 'real' survival mode is kept pure. Maybe disable achievements in these levels. The only restriction is they have to be cold regions of course. But that doesn't HAVE to mean snowy Canada. Since Ash Canyon introduced those awesome rope bridges... imagine a whole level set in the tops of great redwood trees with networks of bridges and ropes. Or a whole level of ice caverns. An entire level of densely packed forest like the birch area in PV. A crowded town like a full map of Milton. A large indoor complex. Etc. Heck, I know this is unpopular... but I would PAY for episodes 4 & 5. At this point I have played so many hours of this game and bought it on sale... my entertainment value is a few cents per hour played. I feel like I owe them more money. I would have bought swag if it was still available. LOL. Even a $5 addon with a pack of unique clothing items would be neat. There is a reason so many game studios monetize the heck out of their games, running a game studio is expensive. I get wanting to not be like the other greedy, crunch-loving, pay-to-win, 500 cosmetic items to buy.... type of game companies... but you do need to be a little bit greedy in monetizing your amazing work, if you want to stay healthy as a company. You don't have to be jerks about it, it can be done WELL to benefit both players and company. Even a Patreon or another Kickstarter is better than NOT getting the final episodes. I want to give them more $ but have no way to do so. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Just my 2-cents. EDIT: Did the math... I've now gotten under 5 cents per hour of entertainment value from this game. Currently the CHEAPEST form of entertainment available to me beyond reading free books. HAHA. Holy smokes Hinterland. Sell some expansions.

I've upgraded the Seamoth to 300m and started exploring the glowing mushroom cave. Very exciting!

I definitely have to look away. The sound effects are brutal too.

I think I'm still going to wait on playing TLD until another patch comes out. Too many issues still happening.

One pod was located x distance from the rear of the ship. So I went over to the engines to drop a waypoint and I got chomped by a reaper and almost destroyed my seamoth. LOL. I haven't gone close to there again... but I almost have to board the ship soon because I now have the tools to explore inside. I have a location to visit that is apparently 500m deep and I'm trying to figure out how to get that deep. Pretty damn fun... and a lot of tension when exploring!