More content does not equal better game

[Swiyss]

6 hours ago, Uedo said:

They need to conclude the story, they had plenty of opportunity to do so instead of random content updates

I feel like Klei doesn't wanna spoil their game's story, it would be way to easy to simply tell everyone everything. At the same time, I would love some concrete lore, but it isn't their style. Klei prefer puzzles and mysteries to be found on it's own. The story IS there, we just gotta dig it up from the ground.

6 hours ago, Uedo said:

Yeah same; The story isn't a story anymore it's a constant dreary theme, nothing feels driven by purpose. Characters lack motivation and purpose, they seemingly drift from one thing to the other - like the player.

That is not true. Imagine how hard it is to add quotes everytime you add an item. The lore is built-in so much that it would be almost too easy to simply "tell the player everything". It is also a good way to keep the community engaged.

[-Nick-]

I think a update focusing on cooking would be nice. Keep it similair to the crockpot system. Dont change things too much. Mostly a rebalance of things. 

[Mike23Ua]

19 minutes ago, arubaro said:

The world im playing currently has like 2 years old and anything retrofitted looks broken and works totally in the intended way. The only "broken" thing i ever experienced with retrofitting is when they added the grotto and they put it in an "island" accesible via wormhole

You are spreading misinformation once again

I would appreciate it if you had all the facts before accusing me of spreading misinformation.

This isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me, and I can promise you it won’t be the last.

Why? because retro-fitting new content into existing worlds doesn’t EVER go over as smoothly as it would just creating new worlds where content generated properly.

If your on PC this problem wouldn’t even bother you because you can just admin command and move it over a bit so it’s on land- PS4, Xbox & Nintendo players don’t get that luxury.

Furthermore: I’d really love to see what happened to players long stand 50’000+ day worlds when they did something like ADD THE OCEAN TO THE GAME.

I think I prove my point.  

[arubaro]

11 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

I would appreciate it if you had all the facts before accusing me of spreading misinformation.

This isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me, and I can promise you it won’t be the last.

Why? because retro-fitting new content into existing worlds doesn’t EVER go over as smoothly as it would just creating new worlds where content generated properly.

If your on PC this problem wouldn’t even bother you because you can just admin command and move it over a bit so it’s on land- PS4, Xbox & Nintendo players don’t get that luxury.

Furthermore: I’d really love to see what happened to players long stand 50’000+ day worlds when they did something like ADD THE OCEAN TO THE GAME.

I think I prove my point.  

And you are sure that this cant happend in a fresh world? Because im tired of seeing screenshots of moon island being merged with main land biomed while, when they added the ocean, my old world i was playing got the island perfectly placed

You proved nothing

 

Edit. And anyway, the effort to retrofit content is worth when they update the game so often to sell skins because, if not, people would need to create new worlds monthly instead of experiencing it in their favourite save files. People would wait months before playing so they could experience multiple updates. Not everybody likes to experience new worlds over and over and over

Klei already feared lowering the update rate for a reason, not retrofitting will make more harm than good and, since neither of us knows coding we dont know how hard is to actually do it. Might be a nightmare or something done in few minutes 

Edited February 28 by arubaro

[mykenception]

2 hours ago, arubaro said:

And you are sure that this cant happend in a fresh world? Because im tired of seeing screenshots of moon island being merged with main land biomed while, when they added the ocean, my old world i was playing got the island perfectly placed

You proved nothing

 

Edit. And anyway, the effort to retrofit content is worth when they update the game so often to sell skins because, if not, people would need to create new worlds monthly instead of experiencing it in their favourite save files. People would wait months before playing so they could experience multiple updates. Not everybody likes to experience new worlds over and over and over

Klei already feared lowering the update rate for a reason, not retrofitting will make more harm than good and, since neither of us knows coding we dont know how hard is to actually do it. Might be a nightmare or something done in few minutes 

Mike leans more on spending less time in each worlds without much attachments on em, so I can understand him not considering players wanting to keep worlds and just want em to make new ones which is his playstyle

tho, generations can get scuffed no matter what so I mostly agree with your point there

[goatt]

Did you also enjoy the ocean fishing? Just curious.

[Antynomity]

8 hours ago, Mr Giggio said:

Look, I do agree with ya. For example some biomes could use an improvement. But u can improve, adding.

 

Like for example, spyglasses would solve a bunch of ocean problems in DST. It's adding an item to make the actual content more organic.

 

I would love to see more life in swamp and deserts. Scorpions for example. Sand. Like, more than just tentacles/mosquitoes/merms that u avoid while grabbing reeds till u have your farm from Moon quay. So ye, +1, but giving the heads up that adding can also improve

New fruits would be awesome cuz right now figs and bananas has their own recipes and stuff like fruit medley could use more sources to be useful again

I'm sorry man but I completely disagree with the spyglass thing, it would be a band-aid solution to the fact ocean exploration is slow, empty, boring and heavily rng dependant.

I wouldn't mind a spyglass but I have always wanted the ocean itself to be good first instead of adding items like the Bootleg Getaway as patches over the sinking ship of the entire ocean experience.

[Uedo]

16 hours ago, Swiyss said:

That is not true. Imagine how hard it is to add quotes everytime you add an item. The lore is built-in so much that it would be almost too easy to simply "tell the player everything". It is also a good way to keep the community engaged.

Ah sorry, I didn't think i'd have to clarify - 'Yeah same; I FEEL The story isn't a story anymore it's a constant dreary theme, I FEEL nothing feels driven by purpose.I FEEL Characters lack motivation and purpose, I FEEL they seemingly drift from one thing to the other -  like the player.

16 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

I would appreciate it if you had all the facts before accusing me of spreading misinformation.

This isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me, and I can promise you it won’t be the last.

Why? because retro-fitting new content into existing worlds doesn’t EVER go over as smoothly as it would just creating new worlds where content generated properly.

If your on PC this problem wouldn’t even bother you because you can just admin command and move it over a bit so it’s on land- PS4, Xbox & Nintendo players don’t get that luxury.

Furthermore: I’d really love to see what happened to players long stand 50’000+ day worlds when they did something like ADD THE OCEAN TO THE GAME.

I think I prove my point.  

@arubaroNah, he's telling the truth. I don't think Mike ever really lies to anyone, he a pretty nice dude - I remember issues like this popping up, I had one inaccessible due to how it spawned (it was on the ocean but kinda touching land) ... these were bugs though, I think they fixed it, so it defo wasnt intended. Mike is right though, If it spawned before they fixed the bug, as far as I can tell you're stuck with however it initially spawned. 

In regards to Mike - It'd just be an expansion of tiles you can move on, I don't think adding an additional ocean will change much. If you mean did it change when they added sailing? Maybe? But not in the way you're thinking, I don't think people have much issue with some of the worst hazards the game gives you - you just adapt and continue

[Swiyss]

This bug happened to me once, with 0 server mods. It was a donut world with the lunar island connected to main land. Literally every single structure was at the edge of the map.

[Mr Giggio]

On 2/28/2024 at 3:48 AM, Antynomity said:

I'm sorry man but I completely disagree with the spyglass thing, it would be a band-aid solution to the fact ocean exploration is slow, empty, boring and heavily rng dependant.

so what bud? How to solve? :T Cuz we kinda dont have a solution at the moment and at this point Im just desperate. Yesterday I lost a day 21 Pearl cuz didnt find cookie cutters and they were JUST A COUPLE TITLES far from where I sailed throught. Its so frustrating. That item could solve this for sure.

[kehun]

On 2/27/2024 at 8:14 PM, kehun said:

I would love to see stuff like: New Setpieces, Little updates for biomes, New trees, plants, maybe some new berrie type? 

Thanks Klei!

[Mike23Ua]

On 2/28/2024 at 10:40 AM, Uedo said:

Ah sorry, I didn't think i'd have to clarify - 'Yeah same; I FEEL The story isn't a story anymore it's a constant dreary theme, I FEEL nothing feels driven by purpose.I FEEL Characters lack motivation and purpose, I FEEL they seemingly drift from one thing to the other -  like the player.

@arubaroNah, he's telling the truth. I don't think Mike ever really lies to anyone, he a pretty nice dude - I remember issues like this popping up, I had one inaccessible due to how it spawned (it was on the ocean but kinda touching land) ... these were bugs though, I think they fixed it, so it defo wasnt intended. Mike is right though, If it spawned before they fixed the bug, as far as I can tell you're stuck with however it initially spawned. 

In regards to Mike - It'd just be an expansion of tiles you can move on, I don't think adding an additional ocean will change much. If you mean did it change when they added sailing? Maybe? But not in the way you're thinking, I don't think people have much issue with some of the worst hazards the game gives you - you just adapt and continue

What I meant in my post is that the ocean in DST when it is generated properly- is meant to also include rivers and streams that go through biomes.

And since I never had a 50’000 day old world that existed before the ocean was added to the game (does anyone still have one? Be honest..)

I don’t know what a world that randomly had an ocean added to it would look like.

Did it break apart the players world to properly spawn the biomes and lakes? Did it only make the ocean AROUND the land mass (meaning there aren’t any rivers, streams or lakes)

The TL:DR of my entire point is that in order for the lakes, rivers and streams to be generated properly like Klei intended, the game has to completely disregard you, your base… and all the work you’ve put into it.

I would actually like for someone to go grab several screen shots of several long-lasting worlds that existed before the ocean existed, and compare that side by side with worlds that were generated after the ocean was added.

Because I’m honestly curious just how much trying to retro-fit new content into existing game saves is hurting the game.

AND I have this sneaking suspicion that when the Xbox version had its crashing spree glitch making everyone Re-agree to the games EULA & TOS that deleted all their game saves- This bug was due to something new that was added that wouldn’t (or couldn’t..) retro-fit properly.

I’d love clarification from the games developers on rather I’m right or wrong here.

Because I truly feel like trying to add new content AROUND what’s already there into existing worlds, causes more problems then it would if that content was considered FIRST and then everything else was generated afterward.

(see above rivers, lakes & streams example)

[grm9]

22 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

meaning there aren’t any rivers, streams or lakes

they existed even in DS, the world didn't have all biomes connect to each other fully with no gaps in between any biomes

22 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

Because I’m honestly curious just how much trying to retro-fit new content into existing game saves is hurting the game

just admit that you hate megabasing

Edited March 1 by grm9

[Uedo]

2 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

What I meant in my post is that the ocean in DST when it is generated properly- is meant to also include rivers and streams that go through biomes.

And since I never had a 50’000 day old world that existed before the ocean was added to the game (does anyone still have one? Be honest..)

I don’t know what a world that randomly had an ocean added to it would look like.

Did it break apart the players world to properly spawn the biomes and lakes? Did it only make the ocean AROUND the land mass (meaning there aren’t any rivers, streams or lakes)

The TL:DR of my entire point is that in order for the lakes, rivers and streams to be generated properly like Klei intended, the game has to completely disregard you, your base… and all the work you’ve put into it.

I would actually like for someone to go grab several screen shots of several long-lasting worlds that existed before the ocean existed, and compare that side by side with worlds that were generated after the ocean was added.

Because I’m honestly curious just how much trying to retro-fit new content into existing game saves is hurting the game.

AND I have this sneaking suspicion that when the Xbox version had its crashing spree glitch making everyone Re-agree to the games EULA & TOS that deleted all their game saves- This bug was due to something new that was added that wouldn’t (or couldn’t..) retro-fit properly.

I’d love clarification from the games developers on rather I’m right or wrong here.

Because I truly feel like trying to add new content AROUND what’s already there into existing worlds, causes more problems then it would if that content was considered FIRST and then everything else was generated afterward.

(see above rivers, lakes & streams example)

In my post - I spoke about how I felt about the story.

I followed that by talking about how you were correct, sometimes retro-fitting can and/or did place things strangely.

I followed that by talking about how expanding the ocean would be done in a similar way, most likely. I also provided feedback that when the ocean became sailable it did not really have any major impact on bases (I didn't talk about how it increased basing out at sea, I didn't think i'd need to as, obviously, the sea didn't really exist before the made it exist :s).

In regards to the above, If i'm honest i'm finding it a little hard to follow what you're exactly talking about and where I do feel confident in what you're saying, i'm not sure how we got here (in terms of conversation) nor how it's really connected to what we were talking about. 

To address the points that arn't connected, in my opinion, retro-fitting is designed to fit new content into older worlds, they obviously would like it to not destroy your base - I believe there are checks to try to ensure it DOESN'T spawn on your base (unless it's implicit, i guess). However, nothing is perfect and it's prone to issues and, truthfully, is a bit clunky - but it's designed as a quick-fix (a very good one for what it does imo) to a big issue. I wouldn't think as someone who likes to reset worlds, like yourself, that you would feel so strongly about this.

Edit: I think I get what you're asking actually, When the ocean was changed - it didn't require retrofitting as it replaced space that wasn't occupied. (If my memory serves me right)

Edit 2: Sorry, I understand more of what you mean - When you say  'Because I truly feel like trying to add new content AROUND what’s already there into existing worlds, causes more problems then it would if that content was considered FIRST and then everything else was generated afterward.'. I think you've got your wires crossed a little bit. This how a fresh generation works, what do you mean generate? Content can't be put in first if you're retro-fitting, retro-fitting is literally putting content (world-gen content etc) on to something that has ALREADY generated - you're talking about regular world-gen, which the games has and functions this way.

Edited March 1 by Uedo

[arubaro]

2 hours ago, kehun said:

Thanks Klei!

I love the new set piece. I wish we get more random set pieces like the old weather traps, tall birds, basalt pighouse, guarded resources, etc plus making them more common (some of them have 1/1000 chances of appearing...) but if klei keeps adding these cool "forced to spawn" set pieces filling the empty biomes i will be happy too

[kehun]

8 minutes ago, arubaro said:

I love the new set piece. I wish we get more random set pieces like the old weather traps, tall birds, basalt pighouse, guarded resources, etc plus making them more common (some of them have 1/1000 chances of appearing...) but if klei keeps adding these cool "forced to spawn" set pieces filling the empty biomes i will be happy too

 I agree

 

Edited March 1 by kehun

[Cassielu]

2 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

What I meant in my post is that the ocean in DST when it is generated properly- is meant to also include rivers and streams that go through biomes.

And since I never had a 50’000 day old world that existed before the ocean was added to the game (does anyone still have one? Be honest..)

I have an world from 2017 and its land part has not changed at all when update relased.

The river was in the game long before that, it's basically one of the oldest things in the game, but back then it just existed like the ocean as a boundary dividing different biomes. ocean update is simply taking advantage of this part of the space that has never been used.

[Maxil20]

2 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

Because I truly feel like trying to add new content AROUND what’s already there into existing worlds, causes more problems then it would if that content was considered FIRST and then everything else was generated afterward.

I feel like this is a bit of a really silly take. Klei has always been considerate of worlds, both old and new. It’s been that way since the start of A New Reign with retrofitting it’s content, which was 7-8 years ago.

The ocean isn’t really that difficult to retrofit as you would think. It simply took the “void” tiles around the oceanless map and turned them into proper ocean tiles, while retrofitting a giant lunar island “setpiece”. If anything, the new content was more changing to new worlds because the lunar island’s generation practically always forces 2 distinct landmass shapes indicating where it is due to how the worldgen system works.

[Copyafriend]

3 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

don’t know what a world that randomly had an ocean added to it would look like.

It looks like a normal world, the ocean worked around the normal map generation, not the other way around

3 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

Because I’m honestly curious just how much trying to retro-fit new content into existing game saves is hurting the game.

AND I have this sneaking suspicion that when the Xbox version had its crashing spree glitch making everyone Re-agree to the games EULA & TOS that deleted all their game saves- This bug was due to something new that was added that wouldn’t (or couldn’t..) retro-fit properly.

I’d love clarification from the games developers on rather I’m right or wrong here.

Because I truly feel like trying to add new content AROUND what’s already there into existing worlds, causes more problems then it would if that content was considered FIRST and then everything else was generated afterward.

What on earth are you on about?

 

like genuinely what is the point of you complaining about retrofitting when it does nothing to affect you as a player who restarts often. 
 

and that bug MIGHT have something to do with retrofitting. but if all your saves corrupted simultaneously that sounds like a major glitch. Whether it was caused by attempting to retrofit or not, it was caused by a mistake bu the developers, tryint to pin the blame on retrofitting is silly, it was caused by the developers on accident because they made a mistake. 
 

But it sounds to me like you’re trying to blame retrofitting on why content is lower quality?

am i right about that?

 

because content is always made first ignoring everything else, then they consider how to retrofit it.

honestly it would be a terrible business practice to not at leadt try to retrofit games. Its only a little extra work making an algorithm that trys to find a spot where it both belongs and is empty of important structures. 
heck they probably have a premade algorithm that they just plug the parameters into. “At least 50 tiles from mainland, needs 100 tiles of space, needs to be in the deep ocean”, delete any blank sea stack: in the way.”

then test it to see if they get retrofitted in reasonably well.

it isnt that hard and it lets people continue playing their old saves

I’m sure they’d rather have it and it maybe be slightly buggy than to just ignore the fact that people with old saves exist like you’re suggesting.

 

honestly your rant is a combination of a strange sort of selfishness and also a complete misunderstanding of how any of this works

 

Edited March 1 by Copyafriend

[Mike23Ua]

2 hours ago, grm9 said:

they existed even in DS, the world didn't have all biomes connect to each other fully with no gaps in between any biomes

just admit that you hate megabasing

I don’t hate mega-basing nearly as much as you tend to think that I do, the only thing that I truly hate about it is that the games new content has to be designed to cater to these out-dated concepts.

And I shouldn’t need to explain that, but I will…

A long time ago (when Ark survival evolved was in preview access) I played that game EXCLUSIVELY by living on a boat, I built me this enormous pirate ship/house, and I would pillage the lands and return out to sea with my treasures.. 

This worked, and no Dino or human could harm me.. until they randomly one day out of the blue decided to add a gigantic Dino to the ocean who’s only purpose, who’s only design- Was to chase after, target, and destroy boats.

Want a Minecraft example?

A long time ago those night stalker (swooping bat things) did not exist in Minecraft, and the player could survive the night by just building a one column block of dirt all the way up into the skies to avoid monster attacks, Then one day these bats were added Thats only design, their only purpose is to swoop down from the skies and knock the player backwards, in the above one block tower scenario- It meant off your safe sky pillar to a death by falling.

So now you’re asking what is my point?

My point is that the way we play our games, as well as what the games ask of us and expect us to do- Change over time.

The only time that this is NOT true is if the game doesn’t get any updates and remains unchanged.

But that’s not the world we live in anymore, you can’t just go buy a Ps2 game or a N64 cartridge and the game you bought remains unchanged (for better or worse)

Nope we live in a Digital age where games can be updated at any time.

(State of Decay 2 recently got an update for Curveballs- These are in a TL:DR- Random map modifiers that change the behavior of the world or it’s zombies..)

So obviously anyone who played SoD 2 before the curveballs had a vastly different gameplay experience from those who started playing after.

Same thing with DST, only DST has a feature that all the above mentioned games do not have:

The majority of DSTs content can be toggled on or off, don’t like dealing with a specific mob? You can literally remove it from spawning.

Hate the new Season 2 Tornadoes for spring coming in a future content update? You can toggle them off or lessen their effect.

When it comes to most other games the changes done to those games are permanent and you adapt to playing with those new changes.

But DST literally has a ton of settings and toggles to I guess you can say “Opt Into” Content you like/don’t like.

As much as people seem to hate wildfires, there’s a world toggle to have them happen more frequently for people who just want that.

And that’s really this games bread & butter- it can be as easy or as hard as you toggle it to be.

But designing new content, around outdated concepts is only serving to hurt the game.

The ocean is boring because Klei refuses to split the main continent up into shipwrecked like archipelagos for whatever reason…

And I’m willing to bet that one of the biggest reasons is retrofitting & mega-base worlds.

But from my perspective I saw them taking DS farming and change that to RWYS farming, anyone who had a world with the old DS Farms still has those old farms, but all newer worlds have the RWYS farm system & the DS farms are obsolete.

So my question- why can’t newly created worlds be split into archipelagos so building a boat and setting sail has a more impactful experience on your survival then just being optional content crammed away in some obscure corners of the sea?

[Copyafriend]

7 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

I don’t hate mega-basing nearly as much as you tend to think that I do, the only thing that I truly hate about it is that the games new content has to be designed to cater to these out-dated concepts.

And I shouldn’t need to explain that, but I will…

Wrong. Just flat wrong.

8 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

A long time ago (when Ark survival evolved was in preview access) I played that game EXCLUSIVELY by living on a boat, I built me this enormous pirate ship/house, and I would pillage the lands and return out to sea with my treasures.. 

This worked, and no Dino or human could harm me.. until they randomly one day out of the blue decided to add a gigantic Dino to the ocean who’s only purpose, who’s only design- Was to chase after, target, and destroy boats.

Want a Minecraft example?

A long time ago those night stalker (swooping bat things) did not exist in Minecraft, and the player could survive the night by just building a one column block of dirt all the way up into the skies to avoid monster attacks, Then one day these bats were added Thats only design, their only purpose is to swoop down from the skies and knock the player backwards, in the above one block tower scenario- It meant off your safe sky pillar to a death by falling.

Neither of these examples support what you’re saying, though they support an unstated ongoing “i hate megabasing” narrative, neither of these have to do with retrofitting (in fact both games employ retrofitting but i guess you’re not talking about that as it would hurt your point),

 

but they do have something to do with forcing players out of their comfort zones.

Something that has nothing to do with retrofitting, separate discussion altogether.

11 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

But designing new content, around outdated concepts is only serving to hurt the game

What content specifically? And you always develop new content with old content in mind, netherite is added and requires diamond tools, the dinosaurs who chase boats are made with forcing people on boats into danger etc etc.

weird point that doesnt make sense but okay.

12 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

The ocean is boring because Klei refuses to split the main continent up into shipwrecked like archipelagos for whatever reason…

Because they presumably dont want to?

because its a game shifting update that transitions us from a more reign of giants themed experience to a more shipwrecked themef experience during a time where the general consensus is that boating is unpopular.

its a risky move, i like it, i want them to do it, but it IS risky asf.

 

14 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

And I’m willing to bet that one of the biggest reasons is retrofitting & mega-base worlds

But this conclusion makes no sense.

You CANT retrofit worlds like this at all, so they just wouldnt even try.

 

if archipelago became the standard then the old map style would be a world gen choice, and nothing would change at all. They would continue retrofitting old gen style worlds by plopping new islands into it.

 

it isnt holding them back at all, they’re probably (very reasonably) more concerned about backlash and player enjoyment. Or maybe they just dont want to do it.

17 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

why can’t newly created worlds be split into archipelagos so building a boat and setting sail has a more impactful experience on your survival then just being optional content crammed away in some obscure corners of the sea?

They can?

nothing is stopping klei from doing this, they just apparently dont want to or havent gotten to that update yet. 
 

 

mike, your complaints have nothing to do with retrofitting and everything to do with whining about megabases, drop it dude. Your stance makes no sense.

[Uedo]

54 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

I don’t hate mega-basing nearly as much as you tend to think that I do, the only thing that I truly hate about it is that the games new content has to be designed to cater to these out-dated concepts.

And I shouldn’t need to explain that, but I will…

A long time ago (when Ark survival evolved was in preview access) I played that game EXCLUSIVELY by living on a boat, I built me this enormous pirate ship/house, and I would pillage the lands and return out to sea with my treasures.. 

This worked, and no Dino or human could harm me.. until they randomly one day out of the blue decided to add a gigantic Dino to the ocean who’s only purpose, who’s only design- Was to chase after, target, and destroy boats.

Want a Minecraft example?

A long time ago those night stalker (swooping bat things) did not exist in Minecraft, and the player could survive the night by just building a one column block of dirt all the way up into the skies to avoid monster attacks, Then one day these bats were added Thats only design, their only purpose is to swoop down from the skies and knock the player backwards, in the above one block tower scenario- It meant off your safe sky pillar to a death by falling.

So now you’re asking what is my point?

My point is that the way we play our games, as well as what the games ask of us and expect us to do- Change over time.

The only time that this is NOT true is if the game doesn’t get any updates and remains unchanged.

But that’s not the world we live in anymore, you can’t just go buy a Ps2 game or a N64 cartridge and the game you bought remains unchanged (for better or worse)

Nope we live in a Digital age where games can be updated at any time.

(State of Decay 2 recently got an update for Curveballs- These are in a TL:DR- Random map modifiers that change the behavior of the world or it’s zombies..)

So obviously anyone who played SoD 2 before the curveballs had a vastly different gameplay experience from those who started playing after.

Same thing with DST, only DST has a feature that all the above mentioned games do not have:

The majority of DSTs content can be toggled on or off, don’t like dealing with a specific mob? You can literally remove it from spawning.

Hate the new Season 2 Tornadoes for spring coming in a future content update? You can toggle them off or lessen their effect.

When it comes to most other games the changes done to those games are permanent and you adapt to playing with those new changes.

But DST literally has a ton of settings and toggles to I guess you can say “Opt Into” Content you like/don’t like.

As much as people seem to hate wildfires, there’s a world toggle to have them happen more frequently for people who just want that.

And that’s really this games bread & butter- it can be as easy or as hard as you toggle it to be.

But designing new content, around outdated concepts is only serving to hurt the game.

The ocean is boring because Klei refuses to split the main continent up into shipwrecked like archipelagos for whatever reason…

And I’m willing to bet that one of the biggest reasons is retrofitting & mega-base worlds.

But from my perspective I saw them taking DS farming and change that to RWYS farming, anyone who had a world with the old DS Farms still has those old farms, but all newer worlds have the RWYS farm system & the DS farms are obsolete.

So my question- why can’t newly created worlds be split into archipelagos so building a boat and setting sail has a more impactful experience on your survival then just being optional content crammed away in some obscure corners of the sea?

I think I finally understand what you're asking for - a lot of what you raise have a shared point. Can I ask, do you want a god mode for consoles? It seems like you prefer to face enemies when you would like to, but still have space for safety to do some base stuff? I feel you want combat to not feel like you're cheesing it, you want a challenge - but at your own pace? I wonder if that's why you want the Slanty Shanty in DST, which i'm really not opposed to at all. Sometimes I also like the downtime to complete stuff/do some things at my own leisure without threats interrupting me, so a Slanty Shanty is something i'd potentially use.

You know there's no judgement at all in wanting a preference, we're all different, it's fine. But sometimes I truly don't know why you don't just toggle your settings?

You should get a PC if possible, you can use mods and have that experience immediately - A direct answer to 'why can’t newly created worlds be split into archipelagos so building a boat and setting sail has a more impactful experience on your survival then just being optional content crammed away in some obscure corners of the sea?' I'm sure they can, but they're not and may not, so use a mod.