[Poll] On Puzzles

[GetNerfedOn]

One of the things that was a big part of solo DST was the addition of puzzles nearly in every update. Small things in every trailer that kept the community on its toes and teasers for every next update down the line.

The last puzzles we've had in particular were Cyclum and Metheus, both made for DST and the only ones to feature skin rewards. Since then we haven't had a single puzzle.

Then in the DST 2020 Roadmap we were told:



and admittedly I've been hung up over the statement telling us to get back into scrutinizing things. Especially given that the last time a puzzle was mentioned in capacity by Klei, it was in the Axiom Visus Trailer, where upon looking at the source code i found:

and i've since fallen into puzzle torpor.

I think the puzzles really did add some atmosphere to how DST's lore/world was built; granted, I do acknowledge it if people aren't so interested in that manner of cryptic storytelling, or think Klei should better spend their time and resources on skill trees and whatnot. 

That aside, do you guys feel similarly? Feel free to vote and discuss in the comments!

[Auth]

Disregard this post, I make a better one lower down in the thread

[Evelo]

ARGs are some of the worst experiences in my opinion. It is only truly fun for the tiniest sliver of the population who are both intelligent enough, and care enough to put the effort into solving them.

[Falkenpelz]

Yes yes yes, that would be so wonderful! I don't need any reward for that other than finding out something interesting or lore relevant through a puzzle.

[GetNerfedOn]

2 hours ago, Auth said:

Please add neutral answers to your poll ("don't care") as I'd love more puzzles but don't really mind if they're incentivized with skins (but don't necessarily want to say I'm against it either)

The lack of neutral answer is intentional in this particular poll; however, if i had a quarter for when people were bothered that there were no neutral options i'd have two quarters. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice. 

I'm still thinking it over, but for now I won't be editing the poll yet.

[Maxposting]

i still believe there's like 2 whole args we all missed and nothing can disprove it

[Jakepeng99]

Thats a funny easteregg.

[NPCMaxwell]

I would /like/ to help solving them, but I can promise I likely won't DO so, since I am focused on other stuff instead and get too stressed for this kind of "community has a sort of competition on who gets further" . But I sure love to READ about the puzzles afterwards like i used to do over the years since the William Carter puzzle (still my favourite addition to a video game EVER)

[Aquaticbutter7]

Honestly, I would love a new puzzle even though I wouldn't be one of the people solving it, just because I wasn't in the fandom when they were recent and it's cool to see when there's something big happening in a community.

[GetNerfedOn]

7 hours ago, Maxposting said:

i still believe there's like 2 whole args we all missed and nothing can disprove it

who wouldn't be paranoid at this point they've hidden charlie interactions with winona and maxwell in the character quotes too now that i recall

[Echsrick]

i dit not enjoy them, and thats from someone that has the metheus cane....i would not even consider them as a puzzle but more so a trial and error....wich....i dont know is like not the point of the puzzle to do trial and error...."click these random flowers" "get a friend and do......weird shadow thingy....and then go ingame that SOMEHOW these shadow thingy translate into...ingame items....somehow..................yea....." i realy want to know how anyone had figured that out...data mining? because probably 90% of the people that dit this "puzzle" used a guide anyways

[DegenerateFurry]

It's more exciting if they're rare.

[GenomeSquirrel]

I do not enjoy Klei's types of puzzles, too much brute forcing solutions.

[Kaioh]

No to all of the above. Puzzles are awful, especially Cyclum and Metheus

[Auth]

Very disheartening to see some people's vitriolic responses to the idea of puzzles. Though it's understandable, looks like a lot of it is actually because of the skin rewards and the fact that the puzzles we have are so old.

The puzzles, especially the classic ones like the William Carter puzzles, were something of beauty. They added an entire new feeling to the way lore was presented.

I guess the best way I can quickly summarize it is to compare the puzzles to the lore videos- The puzzles were a slow, paced out, deliberate way to show lore and reveal things, and demanded widespread community discussion because most importantly, the puzzles were not designed to be solvable by a single person. They were designed to get the entire community together, with contributions and speculations coming from all over. Even if you didn't have the smarts to figure out the next piece or clue, you could still let your imagination run wild with speculation or theories as to what could be coming next or where a good place to look was. The forums would very nearly light on fire from the excitement of needing to know what was going to come next!

Compared to the trailers, which just drop the lore on you all at once, and their element of mystery doesn't come from crypticness, it comes from just being vague. Things don't really feel like a reveal, they just feel like "Well there's another thing happening"

It's the difference between discovering something and just being told something.

It's very easy to see where those who dislike the puzzles are coming from. When you're not around during those times where the community is in the midst of figuring it out, it does feel like you're really just tripping and stumbling into something that people seemingly smarter than you solved through magic or brute force. With the skins, it's now an annoying, gatekeeping series of .jpgs you have to click around on while cross-referencing with a guide in order to get some basic skins. It is unfortunate that new players have missed these feelings. They have no idea what it's like, and from the looks of things, no idea how they went.

However, I think that actually goes to show how important the puzzles were to be a part of, and their importance in why they should be brought back.

It felt like people were genuinely discovering new languages and how to translate them. Like we were discovering entire new worlds and treasure troves of information. There was an overwhelming sense of camaraderie, even with those who weren't able to directly contribute. It brought the community together. Even if you couldn't solve a part, there were hundreds of others eager to help you.

These weren't just ARGs for the sake of ARGs either, they were there for lore. Revealing it in a truly cryptic and mysterious manner. You have to understand, all the current theories and speculation about the game's lore that you can so easily read on the wiki are only possible to see now because of the puzzles.

Instead of a parse 1-2 threads of people discussing "hey I wonder if the thing in that video implies this" there were whole swaths of threads for MONTHS after the conclusions speculating on the very fine specifics and details of the lore pulled out of a few images. It left tons of room for the imagination and for theory crafting, rather than just leaving you sitting there waiting for the next video to drop to hopefully flesh out the aspect of the world you want to see more of. Instead of waiting for answers, it felt like you were making them.

Talking about the game was fun. It was fun to be right, yes, but it was fun to be wrong, too. That's what's missing from the discussion now, when all the puzzles are long solved, all the answers have been sitting there, gathering dust, being nothing more than "Well, yeah, of course. That's what it says so that's what it is." I don't think I got a single answer right or helped causes at all during the puzzles I was here for, but damn if I wasn't buzzing at the edge of my seat every day of the week while people were figuring it out.

So, I guess I wouldn't actually include skins in future puzzles. They seem to be putting a pressure and expectation on players who weren't present for them but still want the goods, giving them a weird, shafted experience and relationship with them. Keep them as something where those who truly want them and truly want to know more lore will be rewarded enough with what they provide.

[fabin]

i'd LOVE some more puzzles here and there once/twice a year. i mean, i wouldn't be able to contribute solving anything about them (i'm not the best with args), but i loved watching from a distance people make progress on previous puzzles, and slowly uncovering more about what they were about. most recent experience i had with this type of arg was about the reveal of some things about risk of rain 2's survivors of the void dlc, through some sort of cryptic terminal with a password, and it was fun just seeing people tryna decode stuff

i mean, one of my core memories with this game is just watching some random videos about the san francisco earthquake arg, with the reign of giants trailer music playing in the background (or the zipper-mouth maxwell one. that one left me spooked for a while). args are just fun even if you're not actively contributing, i feel

[GenomeSquirrel]

7 hours ago, Auth said:

the puzzles were not designed to be solvable by a single person.

This is fundamentally an awful approach, replacing problem solving with tedious brute forcing, most attempts fail, clues are from failing ad nauseam, guess then fail then guess then fail. While sharing that a hypothetical 6th option needs to be a goat may give some a rush of excitement, it belies that the puzzle is all filler, constructed foremost to waste time, with deduction only being possible after the wasted time, as the goat wasn't chosen from clues, dozens of things were tried first, then you get an indication that goat is correct. I've enjoyed puzzle books since I was a child, and still enjoy puzzles today, but these "puzzles" are drudgery for people with too much time to waste.

I'm also disgusted that a Metheus type of puzzle has a timer, and I hope they added it for stability.

 

 

[Echsrick]

i dont even remember how i dit the metheus puzzle...besides using a guide that is wich even then i had to trial and error that because something was somehow wrong still