klei An Open Letter to Klei

[MondayNight]

2 hours ago, maciu67 said:

*basically some Terraria + Darkest Dungeon clone*

Frankly those proposals aren't very creative. As per summary, you desire more-or-less a clone of Terraria and Darkest Dungeon in DST context. Needless to say Klei wouldn't do that, as on repeated occasions they prided themselves on trying to be ingenious in their designs. Also what you lay down, a hefty amount wouldn't even amp-up the difficulty for advanced players: most "pro" players don't use tents (except for some decorative purposes), spoiling time isn't really an issue as you find things to eat in practically every biome - Forest and Cave shards alike, a plethora of Krampi means Sacks - and tons of MM - for everyone (not to mention you can easily tank 3 Krampi with Football Helmets and Wood Armor alone), "Rare Items" actually translates to you taking your proverbial sweet time, and do stuff at a slower (and maybe convenient) pace, "Collector Punishment" for wood actually brings more Living Wood and so on.

And a lot of players complained in past that DST bosses are solely "dmg sponges" for their high HP pool; thus rising HP of mobs... hmm.

 

As a preliminary conclusion, the only things those suggestions prove to me is... Klei shouldn't take indeed at face value most player approaches and proposals dancing on these forums.

 

Also you do understand you can't amp-up difficulty in general ad infinitum - unless you actually want a Battle Arena that from start everyone knows it can't be defeated - and thus pointless to play.. maybe only for some sadomasochists and "bragging rights" "try-hards". Sooner or later a definitive plateau is reached. Atm some of us realistically want only this plateau be raised by some measures of survival intensity in late-game - so that world in general would feel more dynamic, organic, evolving ..alive; be it more (2-3) obligatory bosses, more attack patterns for mobs in certain conditions, more weather/season "meat on the bones" (haze, chills, tornadoes etc) and so on. More horrory Lovecraftian insanity, more... well, a world that evolves with the player. But not "constantly evolving" 'cause most likely that's impossible. Again, unless you know, right from start of the game - a sandbox mind you - your adventure ends in certain death no matter what. What point there be for a game that can't be "beaten"?!

 

PS: I've mentioned this in recent times, but regarding "obligatory threat coming periodically/RNGishly for you and your base" - a lot if not most "pro" players, in case of dog waves after day 100 for example, just... disconnect when the warning is played, in pubs. Pretty funny, sometimes even.. hypocritical dare I say *wink*

[Scrimbles]

1 minute ago, GenomeSquirrel said:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fXP4_2qRHng

Those words don’t even show up there. I was sold on spooky.

 

I should also add that yes, I do want some spooky aswell.

Shame the new shadow pieces and fuelweaver are optional boss content.

 

I guess the fuelweaver is an evolution of the ancient guardian, but still.

[-Variant]

1 hour ago, Ogrecakes said:

I should also add that yes, I do want some spooky aswell.

I tried to not bring this up in my previous post, but this. Seriously, I miss the roots of Don't Starve.

They haven't strayed too far, but when I saw the Moon creatures I done laid an egg at that moment.
I want them to continue with that, I love where they're going with the Horror mobs and the Salt pillars, all that stuff is what I love and miss.

[Theukon-dos]

12 minutes ago, GenomeSquirrel said:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fXP4_2qRHng

Those words don’t even show up there. I was sold on spooky.

 

 

Even if it wasn't in the trailer, it's none the less a major part of the game's advertising. And the Sandbox aspect I've seen mentioned is never even mentioned on either page, with the only word of it being in user-defined tags.

 

though at the very least, it seems that they're remembering there spooky roots with the horror hounds and moonrock pengulls.

[MondayNight]

"Uncompromising wilderness survival" can mean a lot-and-different kind of things for different people.

What for some may be challenging conditions, for others can be tedious and annoying, yet for another bunch can be certain death.

Subjective phrasing and interpretation.

[maciu67]

16 minutes ago, x0VERSUS1y said:

I'm so angry!

Calm Down you are going to explode. These are just suggestions

[MondayNight]

2 minutes ago, maciu67 said:

Calm Down you are going to explode. These are just suggestions

Lol. I am relaxed af.. not to mention tipsy atm

[00petar00]

5 hours ago, Mrklli said:

That's pretty much the change I'd like to have. Once you've played through the first year it's quite easy to survive everything the game will throw at you unless you deliberately go look for trouble. You already have all the basic resources and everything is fine. The longer you play the more boring it gets. Sure, one option is to scale up everything to make it harder but it would probably be something like the increased difficulty larger hound waves provide and imo that's just irritating. I think there are already enough trivial and repetitive tasks to complete and making the game more challenging by making those tasks harder/slower/more frequent wouldn't make the game more fun to play.

You could always go kill every mob the game has to offer and call that a challenge. I've tried that and, yeah it's fun, but I don't really see a point in repeating it over and over again just because killing the bee queen is such a blast. For me it's not. There is a ton of things I could do if I wanted to but I survive just fine if I don't do them and doing them is a pain in the butt with all the preparation needed and all you get from it is a couple of fancy items you don't really need. I'd be much happier if defeating the bosses would actually open new possibilities such as new biomes to explore, not just a recipe for a fire pit that won't really produce light but is still cool cuz you don't have to fuel it.

It's cool we have caves and the lunar islands but it would be even cooler if we had more "advanced areas" like them, unlocked by completing something like winning a boss fight or finding a rare artifact etc. It would give some objectives and a motivation for me to go out and do stuff I currently won't do because I don't think the profit I'd gain is worth it. Also it wouldn't affect the new players still learning how to survive dst.

I would love a mechanics similar to Hamlet's Aporkalypse: you'll trigger a nightmarish event by not doing in time something to prevent it. So it would be upto the player if they want to go hc and gain something amazing from it or just prevent the event and continue to play casually. I also enjoyed the Metheus puzzle and it'd be great if in the future we could get something like it. The more easter eggs and hidden things we have, the better it gets!

I don't really wish for new content or changes in difficulty levels as much as I wish for better reasons to do new things.

Obviously all players would want a progression system as it gets boring when you are at a point where you can't die unless you make a massive mistake.

Problem with what you said is that killing bosses is useless, especially since you mentioned bee queen that drops one of the best items, recipe to wrap and royal honey. If you don't see how useful this is, i don't know what else to say to you, being able to keep food from spoiling permanently allows you to craft healing food in excess  without thinking it'll go to waste if you don't use it, having stacks upon stacks of pierogi for example. 

Which boss doesn't drop anything that useful? the new ocean boss Malbatross but i think they'll change the drops for  him,Antlion and Toadstool

Im all for them introducing some new drops for these, especially Toadstool but all the other bosses have their uses.

Weatherpain can be used to farm nightmare fuel and for fuelweaver, just mentioning so you don't say i forgot about moose goose, it is actually useful to farm.

Killing bee queen once for the recipe is a must if you are considering playing for a while, its not that hard to kill especially considering you can use t he new Woodie to clear the bees or you can stick to wolfgang and pan flutes or easier methods like Wickerbottom and Winona.

Dragonfly is really useful to kill over and over, until you have a lot of gems for construction amulets and deconstruction staffs, permanent thulecite and everything else you can craft out of them. Scales can be used for armor too once you don't know what to do with how many you have.

I actually think that some content like thulecite/ancient station could be locked behind fuelweaver to make people actually fight him and to have some sort of progression,after killing him they  could make it like terraria and turn up the difficulty for players. 

New biomes or locations being locked behind bosses is an interesting idea.

[NSAiswatchingus]

5 hours ago, Ogrecakes said:

"Dont starve is an uncompromising wilderness survival game full of science and magic".

You can want whatever you want, but this quote is right there on the steam page, and on the main menu.

The game IS supposed to be what that quote says, otherwise they should just delete it.

I think they should change it to something different than Don't Starve's description. If I recall, there was a time where Klei's position was that multiplayer Don't Starve wasn't possible. When they made it possible and released it, I don't think they foresaw exactly how most people would be playing this new version of their game. The social aspect has really dominated the survival aspect over the years which is just a natural path the general community took once "Togetherness" was an option. It became less about the solo conquering bragging rights of the original and more about having fun adventures with friends and strangers yet to become friends. 

It's obviously not uncompromising. There's a Rollback button RIGHT THERE in the menu. It was apparent from day 1 that DST would be something different. 

4 hours ago, Theukon-dos said:

I guess they don't explicitly say THIS game is uncompromising. Only that its predecessor is. 

Edit: It IS said in game on the title screen. 

[Brago-sama]

Ya'll know this is a game right. Where is this angst coming from.

I say well all just boot up a game and have fun (or maybe another game since some of ya'll seem vexed and absolutely fixated on fine tuning this game)

[Butt Pillow]

4 minutes ago, Brago-sama said:

Ya'll know this is a game right. Where is this angst coming from.

I say well all just boot up a game and have fun (or maybe another game since some of ya'll seem vexed and absolutely fixated on fine tuning this game)

When you love something, it's only natural to want to see it succeed and become its best form. However, getting into wordy bouts over the wording of a sales pitch for the vague approximation of a product... Oy vey! 

[Brago-sama]

1 minute ago, Butt Pillow said:

When you love something, it's only natural to want to see it succeed and become its best form. However, getting into wordy bouts over the wording of a sales pitch for the vague approximation of a product... Oy vey! 

I'm ok with voicing opinions on new content and what you like and didn't  like about it but some of ya'll seem to be raising your blood pressure over it.

 

[Petit Citron]

1 minute ago, Butt Pillow said:

When you love something, it's only natural to want to see it succeed and become its best form.

Oh sorry, I missread "When you love something, you get selfish to the point you want the game to be made exactly what you want it to and call it what The Don't Starve Community needs."

Because the border between those two is sometimes blurred

[Butt Pillow]

1 minute ago, Petit Citron said:

Oh sorry, I missread "When you love something, you get selfish to the point you want the game to be made exactly what you want it to and call it what The Don't Starve Community needs."

Because the border between those two is sometimes blurred

I'm ultimately trying to be optimistic here! My ribs can only take so much!  Do not bruise me any further you fiend! 

Spoiler

Not quite sure how much longer this thread can go on in any state. It does not appear to be heading in any good directions at current rates. 

 

[Crimson Chin]

4 minutes ago, Petit Citron said:

Oh sorry, I missread "When you love something, you get selfish to the point you want the game to be made exactly what you want it to and call it what The Don't Starve Community needs."

Because the border between those two is sometimes blurred

 How is this selfish though? People are merely leaving suggestions, nothing more. Klei can take and ignore what they want, trust me they do ignore. If anything, I'd say these players are being generous! Taking time from their day to stop by here and say what they believe would be the best for the game. Do you know how much people just get sick of something and then just refund or stop playing? Nobody.. has to suggest anything at all, but then how would Klei know what route to go?

Feedback, in any form really, is a good thing in my eyes. Look, I get some people don't always leave it in the most polite way, but that's how things are, even then there is probably SOMETHING you can take from it. Everyone's opinion should be valued.

[JoeW]

1 hour ago, NSAiswatchingus said:

I guess they don't explicitly say THIS game is uncompromising. Only that its predecessor is. 

It does say it in game - technically that's an oversight on our part. 

Very early on we let people know that if multiplayer were ever to come DS, it could not be the same as how it was designed as a single player experience, so we did avoid the "uncompromising" message when we first started on DST. We were very resistant to bringing multiplayer for this reason. A lot what is being discussed is very much aligned with why we were resisting multiplayer in DS to begin with. 

ANR was added to the game to address the differences in how the game is played in multiplayer. Of course, we then saw complaints that people couldn't play it solo. So adjustments have been made there as well. Obviously we're not going to make everybody happy at all times, but be aware that we're always looking at feedback and considering how we're going change the game going forward. But - we're also committed to our current plans of Return of Them, New Characters and Character refreshes. We're not going to be done working on DST any time soon. 

All that being said. The team is aware of the feedback and we're always watching the forums. But I do have to ask that people keep it calm and constructive. Realize that we're always watching feedback and we're very aware that not everybody shares the same opinions. However, we're interested in all perspectives, even if we don't agree with them. So there isn't a lot of sense in fighting over perspectives, and you should share and respect each others opinions even if you disagree and help with the signal to noise ratio a bit. 

Thanks.  

[GenomeSquirrel]

2 minutes ago, Butt Pillow said:

When you love something, it's only natural to want to see it succeed and become its best form. However, getting into wordy bouts over the wording of a sales pitch for the vague approximation of a product... Oy vey! 

The morale of the sales pitch discussion is that different tastes led different people to buy the game. Surely people would expect updates to enhance what brought them to the game in the first place; yet conflict is born because the game carries several flavors. Because Klei, like everyone else, can only do one thing at a time, a good number of people will be unsatisfied.

#Empathy

[Butt Pillow]

7 minutes ago, GenomeSquirrel said:

The morale of the sales pitch discussion is that different tastes led different people to buy the game. Surely people would expect updates to enhance what brought them to the game in the first place; yet conflict is born because the game carries several flavors. Because Klei, like everyone else, can only do one thing at a time, a good number of people will be unsatisfied.

#Empathy

I suppose I just find the sales pitch focus to be a tad weird, as I started the game solely due to the fact I saw videos of Worxtox/Wormword and thought "oh, they're adorable" rather than whatever the game was actually about. I came to the game for the monsters and I was left quite pleased in that regard. I am but a creature of aesthetics at my core. 

Well, that and I come from a history of having multiple years burnt into TF2, another very social game of a similar nature. So when I started playing I felt very 'at home' despite it being a different experience gameplay wise. Which is why DST is for me a superior experience strictly DS, but I don't find fault for people enjoying it for the pure gameplay aspect. (Nor do I think wanting to refine, and expand upon the core gameplay loop to be a bad thing either. I would just like it to be done in a manner that accounts for those that solo beequeen, and those that just like fluffy little critters.)

[Mike23Ua]

21 minutes ago, JoeW said:

It does say it in game - technically that's an oversight on our part. 

Very early on we let people know that if multiplayer were ever to come DS, it could not be the same as how it was designed as a single player experience, so we did avoid the "uncompromising" message when we first started on DST. We were very resistant to bringing multiplayer for this reason. A lot what is being discussed is very much aligned with why we were resisting multiplayer in DS to begin with. 

ANR was added to the game to address the differences in how the game is played in multiplayer. Of course, we then saw complaints that people couldn't play it solo. So adjustments have been made there as well. Obviously we're not going to make everybody happy at all times, but be aware that we're always looking at feedback and considering how we're going change the game going forward. But - we're also committed to our current plans of Return of Them, New Characters and Character refreshes. We're not going to be done working on DST any time soon. 

All that being said. The team is aware of the feedback and we're always watching the forums. But I do have to ask that people keep it calm and constructive. Realize that we're always watching feedback and we're very aware that not everybody shares the same opinions. However, we're interested in all perspectives, even if we don't agree with them. So there isn't a lot of sense in fighting over perspectives, and you should share and respect each others opinions even if you disagree and help with the signal to noise ratio a bit. 

Thanks.  

Hey man I play A LOT of different games varying across multiple genres, I understand that DS was originally a hardcore wilderness survival sim and that DST is a little more forgiving in that nature.. but I also understand you even toned down the original DS game to further appeal to casual players. As proven here:

https://dontstarve.fandom.com/wiki/Don't_Starve:_Pocket_Edition

 

under “No Sweat Mode”

But I also have played enough games to know that compromises can be made to appeal to both types of audiences (the brutally hardcore & the ones who may can do hardcore... but have friends they would rather play with casually.) 

the most recent game I’ve played with this kind of set up was State of Decay 2.. even I hated how extremely easy that game was when it first launched- a few updates later they released difficulty options that could be toggled, for SOD 2 these difficulty options made some pretty drastic changes to the core gameplay itself (for example on normal mode zombies didn’t deal as much damage and show up on the mini map, vehicles on the map were always in good condition and had plenty of gas, resources were plentiful and easy to find, now let’s flip the switch and turn on Nightmare Mode the first thing that was changed is that vehicles were hard as hell to come by and if you found one it was totaled, needed repair kits to fix up and almost always completely out of gas, Zombies were changed to the hardest blood plagued variants which could seriously injure or even kill you in 2-3 hits and the mini map was completely disabled to warn players of them being nearby, and the worlds map resources were few and far between to simulate that almost all locations had already been looted by another group of survivors)

 

It was essentially the same game- but it allowed the game to cater towards both casuals and the unforgiving hardcore.

Ive noticed that in Don’t Starve Together that before I host a world there are filters that can be toggled to pick more or less of certain gameplay elements or toggle them on/off completely so if any game could be catered to satisfy to both casuals and the extremely hardcore- it’s this one.

[FreyaMaluk]

I understand your concerns @Canisand I see where you are coming from but there some things to consider. 

1. DST is not supposed to be Dark Souls. Never was, never will. With that said I think some OPTIONS should be available: Hardcore mode and difficulty increase overtime. These all OPTIONAL. 

For the base game in general I think some attack patterns from bosses and mobs should be reworked to add a bit of RNG. Nothing crazy but adding some variation to keep you on your feet. 

More HP and speed for bosses the more people are fighting, independent from people in the server. I think this is one point makes the game feel overly ez when playing with others. 

Some random mobs joining the hound attacks or adding more kinds of hounds to give a bit more of RNG and test the player's flexibility 

2. Elitism in DST is already a thing and propelling it won't make the game better. Betas should remain open no matter what. Even if I sometimes don't agree when people complaint about "noobish" stuff is not my place to silence them. Everyone should have a voice and Klei is the only one that should have the power to select comments and feedback. Not other players by speaking for all the player base. 

Also consider that not all "veterans" can't speak English and many don't even care about posting in the forums. 

[Szczuku]

4 minutes ago, FreyaMaluk said:

DST is not supposed to be Dark Souls. Never was, never will. With that said I think some OPTIONS should be available: Hardcore mode and difficulty increase overtime. These all OPTIONAL

Why do people always jump into conclusion that whenever dificulty is mentioned the OP surely wants Klei to add "you die if you make a mistake" mechanic. Maybe by "adding forced content" the guy simply wants Klei to add something that you'd actually seek out to get. Cuz so far RoT's only added content that feeds into itself, decorations and "already existing tools 2.0". The only thing that I'd consider desirable is the Salt Box

[FreyaMaluk]

4 minutes ago, Szczuku said:

Why do people always jump into conclusion that whenever dificulty is mentioned the OP surely wants Klei to add "you die if you make a mistake" mechanic. Maybe by "adding forced content" the guy simply wants Klei to add something that you'd actually seek out to get. Cuz so far RoT's only added content that feeds into itself, decorations and "already existing tools 2.0". The only thing that I'd consider desirable is the Salt Box

TL DR? 

I explained my point in the subsequent paragraph. 

I agree DST needs a revamp on difficulty over time. my point was how the difficulty change is being framed in OP. 

[sinisterrkid]

On 17/09/2019 at 5:13 PM, Canis said:

makes people that main characters like Wendy fearful as they don't want a complete reimagine of the character

Literally any significant change is bound to have complaints. I don't know if you remember or was around for this, but for a time ANY change on the interface of sites like YouTube or Facebook generated huge waves of rage and complaints. It stopped when people realized how quickly they could get used to the new. People just don't like change.

If way in the beginning, the first time people were playing the game, it already started with this new Woodie, and then this year Klei came out saying "guys, we're reworking the characters to be more simplistic, we're removing 2 of Woodie's transformations", how do you imagine people would react? Not you, because you're already biased in an opinion, but seriously, how do you think the community would react if it was the other way around? Basically imagine if Klei decided to remove 2/3 of Wickerbottom's books, saying: "Wickerbottom was supposed to be only the Animals specialist, not a jack of all trades. From now on she just has Birds of The World and On Tentacles"

It would basically just revert this quote down below. That quote is just a justification of a feeling of discomfort:

On 17/09/2019 at 5:13 PM, Canis said:

He is no longer "The Lumberjack" but now "The Canadian" that's a jack-of-all-trades character, which isn't exactly why Woodie mains picked him up in the first place.

 

People.

Just don't.

Like.

Change.

 

 

[Scrimbles]

2 hours ago, NSAiswatchingus said:

I think they should change it to something different than Don't Starve's description. If I recall, there was a time where Klei's position was that multiplayer Don't Starve wasn't possible. When they made it possible and released it, I don't think they foresaw exactly how most people would be playing this new version of their game. The social aspect has really dominated the survival aspect over the years which is just a natural path the general community took once "Togetherness" was an option. It became less about the solo conquering bragging rights of the original and more about having fun adventures with friends and strangers yet to become friends. 

It's obviously not uncompromising. There's a Rollback button RIGHT THERE in the menu. It was apparent from day 1 that DST would be something different. 

I guess they don't explicitly say THIS game is uncompromising. Only that its predecessor is. 

When you start DST up on the very first screen it has the same tag line.

[NSAiswatchingus]

1 minute ago, Ogrecakes said:

When you start DST up on the very first screen it has the same tag line.

Yupp. 

It's there.