[Essay] We need more buffs. To the world.

[FluffyBun]

Frankly speaking, the world is very boring. There just isn't much going for it, and the monotony of Don't Starve worlds has been a consistent issue plaguing the game ever since the start of Don't Starve.

Don't Starve's biomes, for the most part, are not that interesting to truly consider. While things like the Swamp, Pig King, Oasis Desert, and Moonstone Forest are relatively important, other things, such as normal forests, extra deciduous, forest terminating in rocky, and so on are more or less padding.

This issue is even worse in the Caves. In the Caves, you only really need to consider the Blue Mushroom, Ruins, and Grotto biomes. There's a lot of "wasted space" going about which essentially wastes the player's time, and insufficiently rewards exploration.

The Ocean is the worst offender. There is, well, essentially a whole lot of nothing. Lunar bridge can be found without sailing, Pearl and Monkey being the only other notable biomes.

That's just the worldgen, though. Let's go to gameplay loops.

Is there any reason to base in the ocean? The ocean is pretty inhospitable and rather unrewarding, and even when griefer protection is taken into account, ocean bases simply import lots of land-based things. That is to say, the ocean simply does not provide.

Part 1: Addressing the problems of Don't Starve's emptiness

Don't starve's game design was originally designed to be "inhospitable" and "depressing". However, a depressing environment concurrently running for 10 years is simply untenable. It worked in the original, singleplayer Don't Starve because the original, singleplayer Don't Starve is not supposed to be a particularly long-form game - it was designed to kick you down and creep you out. You were Wilson, a nobody in an empty world, with only the trees, the cows, and the pigs to keep you company.

Don't Starve Together, on the other hand, is a completely different game. With 6-12 players in public servers, the game essentially easily approaches a "solved" state by the 11th day, with only "luxuries" remaining. Due to the general emptiness of the world, players are incentivised to essentially only have one base - which is good for interactions, but results in economies of scale producing far more than is required to win (see: Wickerbottom, Maxwell).

Essentially, Wickerbottom and Maxwell are not overpowered. The rest of the game is underpowered. Factory farming characters are, in any society, stronger with greater economies of scale. As the population increases, specialization is incentivized, and individuals capable of doing one thing very well will naturally be in-demand.

Walter, conversely, is not underpowered. The game is underpowered, Walter is fine. It's just that he wasn't exactly made for Don't Starve - well, he was made for Don't Starve, if Don't Starve actually lived up to the developer's ideal of disincentivizing base-sitting and actually encouraged exploration. However, Don't Starve has never, not once, not ever, encouraged exploration beyond finding out where all the key locations in the map are by the 11th day.

The developers hated trees and walls because they allow the player to essentially squat in base, but today? Today, everyone is squatting in base. Why are they squatting in base? Well, until MacTusk respawns, there just isn't a whole lot to do. The average player will park his buttocks in the base, do absolutely nothing but eat food and/or use "Horticulture: Abridged" 10 times, and then, like clockwork, go to MacTusk to hunt down four tusks every 2.5 days exactly in order to alleviate his boredom.

Characters like Walter suffers the most from this game design. He wants to go out and explore, but there is nothing to explore. I mean, so what if you find a track? Koalephants aren't exactly the most valuable thing in existence.

Part 2: Suggestions for encouraging exploration

Don't Starve has two concurrent problems: resource scarcity due to timers, and a lack of things to do. Let's say you have 12 people, and they killed Dragonfly, Bee Queen, and both Werepigs on cooldown. Now what? There's nothing left to do. I mean, are you going to stick the star staff in the Selene socket every moonstorm night, just to farm more pig skins? I have no clue. Meanwhile, we are still waiting for the next Dreadstone Outcrop, that was cleared the past day, essentially the moment the cooldown ticked over.

There isn't really anything to do in between beelining for objectives off-cooldown.

I think, to solve this problem, players should be able to just re-explore various biomes in order to get special resources. It would fit in with the theme of the game, and would encourage exploration.

Say you kill Dragonfly, but you want more gems. Maybe, while Dragonfly is dead, you can explore the Dragonfly Desert for some rare flowers? Perhaps, a few Dragonlings can come out to bite you. Perchance a Dragon's Den would mystically materialize into the Constant, where you can brave the dangers to loot its contents?

Or, perhaps, when the Nightmare Werepig is defeated, the Dread essence maintaining his prison will dissipate, forming little shadelings and lesser outcrops which you can discover throughout the Caves

Bit by bit, the world offers up its bounty, equal in danger and lucre. Adventure awaits only for the bold and brave, with the shut-ins missing out on the rewards.

Players always seem to lack this, or that, typically after certain biomes have been cleared and stripped bare - or perhaps after they killed a boss, and don't feel like doing it again (or waiting). Developers want players to go outside their base. The solution here, is hence pretty simple: just dangle little gems in front of the player's noses.

So why not simply dangle adventure in front of them for players to brave? Players only want to do something if they feel they will be rewarded for doing it, and 1 little dragonflower-harvesting spree, with some little dragonlings could possibly reward the player with a Yellow, or a Green. Besides, it inherently makes the world more dangerous, which makes the "difficulty" nuts on this forum happy.

The funny part is, Klei already knows how to make people run around the map. They did it fairly well in the Depths Worm year event.

Part 2.5: Winona

Winona has this problem in that caches are time-locked, not space-locked. Making cache timers and shadow traces Voronoi-locked rewards Winonas who run around the map, which helps go against the "base-sitting" playstyle.

Part 3: The Rifts: an absolute incoherent mess

Klei is capable of creating interesting content for the player...and then abandoning it later. As if the DST world was an instanced dungeon to be discarded upon leveling up.

The Archives is one of these contents. DST's Archives are an interesting piece of content with useful resources throughout the game (Living Logs), have good art, good atmosphere, and fits in nicely with the story Klei is trying to tell.

Compare and contrast this to the nonsense known as "The Lunar Questline, Post-Rift". "Here's a rift and some annoying plants and crystal rain, here's some armored bosses, and here's a big WARBOT". When Klei told me the world would irreversibly change, well, I didn't see much in the way of "changes", only "annoyances".

One would expect the rifts to actually, you know, change the world a little more than annoying the player and spawning 1-2 different things.

Edited June 2, 2025 by FluffyBun

[AliceShiki]

First of all... I have no idea why this topic's title is talking about buffs when the topic's opening post says nothing about buffs.

With that said...

1 hour ago, FluffyBun said:

Don't starve's game design was originally designed to be "inhospitable" and "depressing". However, a depressing environment concurrently running for 10 years is simply untenable.

The fact the player count is still incredibly high after 10 years shows that it's anything but untenable... It's working and it's making Klei money. There's no way they'll change that.

1 hour ago, FluffyBun said:

With 6-12 players in public servers

I'm pretty sure the player cap is 6 normally, and only 4 on Switch. Going above that requires mods IIRC, so... Not really a logical assumption to assume 6~12 players.

It makes more sense to assume 1~6 players instead.

[FluffyBun]

31 minutes ago, AliceShiki said:

The fact the player count is still incredibly high after 10 years shows that it's anything but untenable... It's working and it's making Klei money. There's no way they'll change that.

It's working now because Klei did a very good job during the "Return of Them" update line, adding points of interest throughout the world (partially fixing the problem) and followed it up with Skill Spotlight, another series of updates which did a good job by improving the power of certain under-differentiated characters like Willow and Walter. Skill Spotlight, by the way, runs the high risk of essentially blocking off Klei's ability to balance characters using other means, which could result in problematic situations where Maxwell without a skill tree is basically comparable to Willow with a skill tree - something we have to wait to see how Klei handles it.

The current updates are "here's a boss, here's like one quarter of a post-game". This game still has major problems, and the goodwill Klei built up during "Return of Them" is going to drain pretty quickly if their idea of a "post-CC" endgame is you grinding in a world which is basically the same for a boss.

WARBOT does not have the support infrastructure required to set up a good payoff, unlike Crab King, which has the entire Pearl quest line which sets everything up for that "final" fight. Dreadstone Outcrops do not have the support infrastructure required to establish themselves as a menacing "threat". Acid rain and ickers do not have the support infrastructure required to make the player brave those dangers. Lurking shadows are really annoying to deal with in any multiplayer context, due to the "fins" being capable of instantly fragging players who are not the intended target, and, of course, nobody really wants to revisit the "more dangerous" ruins - at least consistently.

Klei's current ideas are simply half-baked. They aren't bad. They are simply a main course without side courses, or side courses without the main course. Things like Ickers, who people usually hate, can be turned into a well-loved addition if they are accompanied by something worthwhile to risk being eaten by them.

Edited June 1, 2025 by FluffyBun

[AliceShiki]

2 hours ago, FluffyBun said:

The current updates are "here's a boss, here's like one quarter of a post-game". This game still has major problems, and the goodwill Klei built up during "Return of Them" is going to drain pretty quickly if their idea of a "post-CC" endgame is you grinding in a world which is basically the same for a boss.

No, the update is, "Here's Geometric Placement and better controller support, and we're planning on adding Gesture Wheel too... Also, we're progressing the Moon Questline a bit more."

Player goodwill is only going up as they're improving controller support and giving Geometric Placement to Consoles. Gesture Wheel is just the cherry on top of the cake.

The boss is whatever. We just have the first stages of the fight, so not much to comment on it other than the Pearl Moving stuff.

... Also, saying that things are working "now" for Klei is disingenuous. It has been working for 10 years. It is not "now", it's a clear sign that people love the current direction of the game.

Edited June 1, 2025 by AliceShiki

[ZeRoboButler]

I won't say that I like literally everything klei does, but reading this it does feel more of a "could be better" post with somewhat misleading title. There is a point to be made that the rift content is a step in the right direction because of the fact that the players actions have directly affected the world they play in. I think that the suggestion of the raid style bosses defeat changing the world or space they inhabit after their death is a phenomenal idea that would make a player both see and feel the influence of their actions beyond an item drop.

And for some people, it could incentivize people who don't care for bosses to at least try to engage with it, or it could be a opportunity for more "modular" boss design where in if you defeat a particular boss you could see specific changes to that environment. 

obviously Crabking had an effect on the game, where his "pick your battle" design is starting to spread to other content such as the beta's new boss (still largely incomplete). If it could be executed well, the idea of boss aftermath could be a great idea with a lot of fun gameplay and visually appealing potential.

[FluffyBun]

31 minutes ago, ZeRoboButler said:

I won't say that I like literally everything klei does, but reading this it does feel more of a "could be better" post with somewhat misleading title. There is a point to be made that the rift content is a step in the right direction because of the fact that the players actions have directly affected the world they play in. I think that the suggestion of the raid style bosses defeat changing the world or space they inhabit after their death is a phenomenal idea that would make a player both see and feel the influence of their actions beyond an item drop.

Exactly. People complain about rifts, great depths worms, ickers, brightshades, and so on, but I think they are missing the point.

The point is that these "new content" sucks because Klei don't want to properly build support structures around the new content.

There is fundamentally nothing wrong with anything Klei has added into the game during the entire "From Beyond" questline. The problem is that Klei added them one at a time, and once it's added, Klei don't seem to think how this new piece of content interact with literally the rest of the game.

Even Crab King is fine. The so-called "easiest option" nonsense can be sidestepped simply by making different variations of Crab King produce different rewards. People on here who complain about "content X", "the new boss", etc. don't really get what DST is missing.

DST isn't flawed in the stuff they add, they are flawed in the stuff they don't add. The current bunch of things that constitute "post-rift content" simply does not

1 - Capture the scale of the two eldritch powers leaking into the world

2 - Capture the increase in difficulty the world has to offer.

  

6 hours ago, AliceShiki said:

The boss is whatever. We just have the first stages of the fight, so not much to comment on it other than the Pearl Moving stuff.

... Also, saying that things are working "now" for Klei is disingenuous. It has been working for 10 years. It is not "now", it's a clear sign that people love the current direction of the game.

Imagine Crab King without Pearl, either without Lunar, Lunar Island without Grotto, Archives without Grotto, Atrium without Ruins, Shadow Pieces without Ruins or Atrium - from original DST, the overworld without adventure mode, the overworld without Maxwell, Maxwell without the ARG puzzles, the Ruins without the ARG puzzles, or the Ruins without Adventure mode, etc. etc.

DST built itself very well as a series of interconnected content, and Don't Starve traditionally has environmental storytelling done quite well (when they want to, otherwise, they will tell a story which they wanted to tell 10 years ago, but isn't really what they are trying to tell now, simply because the world is bigger, more well-understood, and multiplayer). This new boss simply don't have anything around to really justify it - a problem even worse than Armored Bearger, a "big" boss with only one equivalent "lesser" mob: the Brightshade.

On top of that, the "post rift" content is fundamentally a "chore" to play with, in that they annoy the player but do not exactly intrigue the player. The theme behind it is supposed to be two great "sealed" powers being slowly unleashed into the world, and the world don't really reflect that. You can see it a little bit in brightshades and shard rain, but you can't see it when the world is not actively trying to grief you.

Worst part is, in the trailers, Klei know full well what their audience wants. They want to help Wagstaff with bits and bops before the big reveal, explore the new caves for extra things before running from a Greater Depths Worm, observe the slow creep of Charlie's influence (roses) over the Constant, get a sense of what hides behind the curtains before it pops out. They want to be absolutely horrified by the slow encroachment of the two powers over their familiar playing field, etc. etc. "Change" is the theme of Don't Starve Together, exemplified even by the lore - the deity "Alter", who goes against "The Constant" - not just the name of the DST world, but also a sort of sobering tragedy the developers were trying to tell with the original game. 

  

6 hours ago, AliceShiki said:

Also, we're progressing the Moon Questline a bit more."

The "Moon Questline" had skipped a few beats.

A story typically goes for "Exposition, Rising Action, Climax, Falling Action", but Klei seemed to have skipped "Exposition" - in here, the slow altering of the world after rifts are turned on, and "Rising Action" - a small sense of what Wagstaff is building before the big W.A.R.B.O.T reveal.

DST recently actually has multiple problems with "lack of things that are not climaxes". The [new or freshly-returning] player isn't exactly been shown what goes on between WARBOT and Armored Bearger, or even Armored Bearger and Rifts (except Brightshades) - which directly reduces the "oompf" the "big reveals" give you.

In fiction, there is this thing called "the Snowflake Method", where the basic plot points are jotted down and then later expanded. Klei, right now, isn't exactly doing the "expansion", but we have all the "basic plot points" - "here's a rift, here's Armored Bearger, here's WARBOT".

Edited June 1, 2025 by FluffyBun

[AliceShiki]

3 hours ago, FluffyBun said:

The "Moon Questline" had skipped a few beats.

A story typically goes for "Exposition, Rising Action, Climax, Falling Action", but Klei seemed to have skipped "Exposition" - in here, the slow altering of the world after rifts are turned on, and "Rising Action" - a small sense of what Wagstaff is building before the big W.A.R.B.O.T reveal.

DST recently actually has multiple problems with "lack of things that are not climaxes". The [new or freshly-returning] player isn't exactly been shown what goes on between WARBOT and Armored Bearger, or even Armored Bearger and Rifts (except Brightshades) - which directly reduces the "oompf" the "big reveals" give you.

In fiction, there is this thing called "the Snowflake Method", where the basic plot points are jotted down and then later expanded. Klei, right now, isn't exactly doing the "expansion", but we have all the "basic plot points" - "here's a rift, here's Armored Bearger, here's WARBOT".

Game as a service don't follow the most basic story writing ideas for very obvious reasons. It's a completely different system.

Especially in a game like DST where the story is just small background fluff and mostly irrelevant to the experience.

Snowflake method is just one way of planning a story. Some people like it, some people throw it in the trash, it's pointless to bring it up when trying to look at a product that is being actively developed for 10 years... In the first place, I can guarantee you that there isn't a single series in the world that has been developed for over 10 years that has had careful planning about what it was going to entail from the start. Properly planned stories don't last 10 years.

[Wawchik]

This being called and essay but suddenly ending without any actual suggestions is weird 

[xDarkSoul18x]

I mean I love the game to death which is why I will criticize and say the content and patches recently have been. . .Weird? Out of order? Like they're just throwing 10 things at a wall and finding what sticks. I think it needs to be more linear in the future. I also agree a lot on the biome's situation. The recent updates have been nice, but the game just needs to hold up and give the world a nice little TLC update, preferably after they wrap up the current situation.

The geometry placement on consoles is a start! Stuff like that. Let us use all our hat skins on any hat, craft able tombstones/pillars (That have skins), universal backpack skins (Let me make my insulated pack a koalefant!) just little touches and QOL updates are very needed IMO. The world is the main character for me and it's not that it's "Lacking" it's just once I rummage the ruins I have NO reason to go back. Once I find the pig king I have NO reason to go back unless I need gold. etc etc. Hopefully after the trees and this arch they can give the game a nice facelift, and not just for end game content. 

[Crazy Gorilla]

On 6/1/2025 at 11:53 AM, FluffyBun said:

This new boss simply don't have anything around to really justify it - a problem even worse than Armored Bearger, a "big" boss with only one equivalent "lesser" mob: the Brightshade.

I do agree that the new boss isnt really well explained on why wagstaff made this big killer robot or anything but also its very clearly early developement so it could be better later.

As for Armored Bearger and Brightshades, what exactly do you mean they are "unjustified. "In what way is an enemy like armored bearger any less justified than regular bearger? In gameplay, it succeeds at the "scaling" in difficulty, providing a harder version of the seasonal enemies with better loot and quest progression, and story wise, armored bearger has a better explanation than normal bearger, we know gestalts have a tendency to try and inhabit and mutate its host, and these new rifts gestalts are seen to be more powerful and and slowly trying to take over the land and are capable of taking over hosts like corpses, small creates, plants and machines. Meanwhile normal bearger is just some boss that comes every autumn to take your food and fight you. Correct me if im wrong but I dont think beargers existance is ever explained, we dont know where it comes from, if its a species, or if its just somehow reviving. Even if it is explained and I just dont know the lore or something I still dont see what makes rift bosses not justified enough.

I dont have too much else to add to the discussion, I do agree that dst should get some more survival and exploration based content, but I dont think its that barren and theres plenty to do, if youre sitting around at base all day and only really doing the bare minimum to survive and sitting around for mactusk to come back you're choosing to do that, theres plenty of stuff you can do in the meantime. Dst gives you the agency to play in whatever way you want, if you decide to sit there as wicker spamming her gardening books and killing mactusk you can do that, but the majority of players are not doing that. If you want to pretty up your base, you can do that, if you want to kill bosses, you can do that, you can explore, survive gather resources, garden, etc. If you're bored with the game that's fine, its normal, but this game is not lacking content.

Could it be better? Certainly

Will it be perfect? Never

Edited June 2, 2025 by Crazy Gorilla

[gaymime]

On 6/1/2025 at 5:44 AM, FluffyBun said:

Frankly speaking, the world is very boring. There just isn't much going for it, and the monotony of Don't Starve worlds has been a consistent issue plaguing the game ever since the start of Don't Starve.

statements like these always make me feel fairly certain that the person making them is incurious. may i ask how many of the world settings you have tried? how many worlds have you created/played where you maxed out one or two of the mobs, of the resources, of the world-events? how many worlds have you made/played where you've turned off key mobs/resources and tried to survive hobbled? have you tried lights-out? winter-only? no-repopulation? nothing-world? maximal-world? pvp?

 

also since you are clearly playing with mods may i ask if you've tried any mods to expand on what the world offers? they have lots of stuff to expand farming, to adding new resources, to adding new characters(and making old ones playable)

[gaymime]

1 minute ago, Wraif said:

May I ask in a genuine manner if you are surprised?

i know this is going to make me sound like a rube but; yes? i really am surprised, like often when this happens. a fair number of the people doing it seem genuinely invested in the game but usually also don't really interact with much of it. as someone who is of a personality type where he likes to root & rummage around in all parts of things he loves i can't really get around people having the same level of passion without actually looking at more than the surface of things

 

it isnt just ds/t either, this happens a LOT in game forums

[gaymime]

6 minutes ago, Wraif said:

Or forums in general; I swear, these kind of sites are cursed.

cursed by the narrow-sightedness of human desire? XD i can get behind that sentiment, haha. i cant say it was much different for street fighter, stardew or yugioh and those are all wildly different genres from ds

[FluffyBun]

21 hours ago, gaymime said:

statements like these always make me feel fairly certain that the person making them is incurious. may i ask how many of the world settings you have tried?

There is a difference between splashing paint on the canvas to produce an interesting, abstract piece, and using art fundamentals but neglecting half of it to produce a subpar representational piece.

The provision of endless colours for the palette does not change the disappointing painting they are obviously not exactly trying to paint.

I am also not complaining about difficulty or availability of resources, but rather how the world goes about distributing them, how it ties in to the general themes of the update.

22 hours ago, Crazy Gorilla said:

"In what way is an enemy like armored bearger any less justified than regular bearger?

Regular Bearger is wildlife. The Reign of Giants update, as well as the general tendency of things to go after you is foreshadowed by Maxwell (the teaser), and Hounds, culminating in some Deerclops being sent after you. All of which adds to the malevolent characterization of Maxwell. Despite what you might think, Don't Starve's Giants are in fact a "climax" to Maxwell's threats launched at the player - leading up to the next arc of Adventure Mode.

Armored Bearger is the culmination of lunar energies reaching a zenith, being capable of even possessing the most ferocious of wildlife. For a power like that, one might expect more things to be corrupted, and more visibly, too.

Alter is supposed to be strong. The rifts are supposed to be corrupting. However, they just, err, dump a funny blue bearger and some annoying plants plus some rain, I guess. It's like Lunar Rift was supposed to have 3 times the amount of content while only having a tiny fraction of it.

Klei can drop some funny moon things from the sky or something, to change up how a biome looks and feels, but for whatever reason they don't. In other words, they promised rifts would be epic, but rifts are just annoying and meh.

To put it simply, Wurt's swamp sticks are more rift-y than the actual rifts.

Edited June 3, 2025 by FluffyBun

[Crazy Gorilla]

18 minutes ago, FluffyBun said:

Regular Bearger is wildlife. The Reign of Giants update, as well as the general tendency of things to go after you is foreshadowed by Maxwell (the teaser), and Hounds, culminating in some Deerclops being sent after you. All of which adds to the malevolent characterization of Maxwell. Despite what you might think, Don't Starve's Giants are in fact a "climax" to Maxwell's threats launched at the player - leading up to the next arc of Adventure Mode.

Armored Bearger is the culmination of lunar energies reaching a zenith, being capable of even possessing the most ferocious of wildlife. For a power like that, one might expect more things to be corrupted, and more visibly, too.

Alter is supposed to be strong. The rifts are supposed to be corrupting. However, they just, err, dump a funny blue bearger and some annoying plants plus some rain, I guess. It's like Lunar Rift was supposed to have 3 times the amount of content while only having a tiny fraction of it.

Klei can drop some funny moon things from the sky or something, to change up how a biome looks and feels, but for whatever reason they don't.

Just to be clear, I dont have any issue with regular bearger, I was just using it as a comparison. But yes if your argument is that rift content is lacking in content compared to its scope, I agree. The world could definitely feel different and I hope as time goes on they keep expanding on it. Currently not enough things get corrupted or feel that much different and more survival and exploration elements would be great.

With that being said its strange that you complain about wanting more rift mutations and world events yet also complain about the current ones. Maybe I fail to understand what you mean when you say that bearger is not justified, to me it seems like you are saying he simply has no reason to exist, even though I think bearger supports the idea of a building climax just fine and works well as a fight. I am not defending the idea that rifts dont need any more work, I just thought it was strange that you said he was unjustified. 

[FluffyBun]

8 minutes ago, Crazy Gorilla said:

also complain about the current ones

My complaint is very specific.

Say I put Reworked Maxwell in a game with nothing but dust, the void, and Them.

it would be quite a horrid addition.

Now, I put Reworked Maxwell in DST.

Suddenly, it's the best update ever.

Armored Bearger is basically the same.

I used the normal Maxwell => Hounds => Deer => Others as an example, to illustrate that Armored Bearger is more like Rifts => Brightshades + Rain => ? => ? => Suddenly, an Armored Bearger => ? => There should be something here. I mean, 6 Enlightened Shards? => W.A.R.B.O.T

For, say, Ruins, we have Caves => Ruins => Ruins Loot, concurrently, finding Shadow Pieces ([Exposition: Charlie things] => Exploration => Random Heads => Bring random heads to statue => Payoff!). Ruins + Pieces? AFW. Mystery solved.

For Singleplayer Ruins, it's even more connected. Maxwell => Obviously a shadow mage => Insanity => Caves => Ruins => Shadow Magic? What's this?

DST update lines have good flow, until this rift thing.

Edited June 3, 2025 by FluffyBun

[Crazy Gorilla]

I see, yeah I have to agree that the "flow" currently sucks, at least the requirement of needing to farm enlightened shards is dumb and brightshades are pretty annoying. I still think armored bearger and the other lunar mutations are good editions though. Also the crystal rain isnt really part of the "flow", its more of a survival challenge (even if its not a good one).

Edited June 3, 2025 by Crazy Gorilla

[gaymime]

5 hours ago, FluffyBun said:

There is a difference between splashing paint on the canvas to produce an interesting, abstract piece, and using art fundamentals but neglecting half of it to produce a subpar representational piece.

The provision of endless colours for the palette does not change the disappointing painting they are obviously not exactly trying to paint.

I am also not complaining about difficulty or availability of resources, but rather how the world goes about distributing them, how it ties in to the general themes of the update.

to continue the analogy that sounds like you are disappointed they are drawing a forest because you wanted an ocean painting and you are refusing to paint anything yourself on principal but somehow want that ocean painting and you want it yesterday......

 

if you dont like what is being made for you and you dont like the pacing or order it is being made but also you refuse to use the resources provided to make anything for yourself in the interim then the only correct solution is for you to go play something else. you arent happy and it sounds like you aren't going to become happy. games are supposed to give you something you desire and this game isnt doing that for you. assuredly later you can check back in but right now all you seem to be getting from it is resentment

Edited June 3, 2025 by gaymime

[FluffyBun]

5 hours ago, gaymime said:

to continue the analogy that sounds like you are disappointed they are drawing a forest because you wanted an ocean painting and you are refusing to paint anything yourself on principal but somehow want that ocean painting and you want it yesterday......

We know what Klei is trying to paint because they literally spell out basically their whole design process every single time they are about to do a big thing.

We know they want exploration because the beta for the original Don't Starve always had the problem of players turtling and developers trying to fix that over and over again.

We know the devs want to produce an epic story because they have been hyping up shadow and lunar for basically forever.

We know the devs are rushing this because they described this particular update as "tying up the lunar rifts"

Edited June 4, 2025 by FluffyBun

[gaymime]

20 hours ago, FluffyBun said:

We know they want exploration because the beta for the original Don't Starve always had the problem of players turtling and developers trying to fix that over and over again.

We know the devs are rushing this because they described this particular update as "tying up the lunar rifts"

i'm not sure what you mean with the first statement here since i have seen lots of people do the same thing i do of only staying for a little while in their games and only having one, maybe two worlds where they linger. but i have only been part of the community for around five years or so and only started watching people play the game a year before that, maybe they "fixed" it 6-7 years ago and i am just not seeing any of what you are saying?

 

eeeehhh...finishing parts of a thing is not the same as rushing. i think i disagree with the interpretation

[Draggofroot]

On 6/3/2025 at 9:53 AM, FluffyBun said:

Klei can drop some funny moon things from the sky or something, to change up how a biome looks and feels, but for whatever reason they don't. In other words, they promised rifts would be epic, but rifts are just annoying and meh.

To put it simply, Wurt's swamp sticks are more rift-y than the actual rifts.

Not to point any fingers, but I think it's so they don't anger the megabasers that refuse to not turn on rifts

[FluffyBun]

4 hours ago, gaymime said:

i'm not sure what you mean with the first statement here since i have seen lots of people do the same thing i do of only staying for a little while in their games and only having one, maybe two worlds where they linger. but i have only been part of the community for around five years or so and only started watching people play the game a year before that, maybe they "fixed" it 6-7 years ago and i am just not seeing any of what you are saying?

singleplayer don't starve's beta is basically the playerbase squatting in base and devs trying their hardest to make the player go outside. i think for singleplayer, they fixed it, then it's back with a vengeance in multiplayer.

4 hours ago, gaymime said:

eeeehhh...finishing parts of a thing is not the same as rushing. i think i disagree with the interpretation

Okay, this "WARBOT" thing is supposed to wrap up the "Lunar Rift" part of the story.

So we have this super moon deity, who is capable of mutating entire regions, creating new plants, etc. Yet when the rift opens, all we get are some mobs?

3 hours ago, Draggofroot said:

Not to point any fingers, but I think it's so they don't anger the megabasers that refuse to not turn on rifts

It is ridiculously easy to bypass megabaser concerns. Just set like 5 points/biome for every "corruption" center, then try to select the one far from any player structures. If megabasers don't respect the 5 points, it's their own fault.