Looking out for all styles of players

[Tallaaron76]

First off I should comment that I am not sure how this subject matter will come across and I totally expect that. As a semi casual player, I am finding myself falling within the middle ground between wanting to jump into this game whole hardheartedly, or back off and be casual. So this prompted me to look at things in a different way and I think somethings should be discussed. 

*Before I even get into this, I also fully understand and admit that I am at times guilty of some of the concerns I will present here in this post. So I am not pointing out fingers but presenting them as reminders and hopefully something we can discuss.*

 

Being a video gamer since... Well, lets just say an Apple 2E... For those of you who do not know the computer, it had a boot disk. Yep... No hard drive, this was many, many, many moons before that idea came about for personal computers. I have watched how the gaming community as a whole has grown and changed over the last 30+ years. By far, games are held up by what is considered "the casual gamer". These are the gamer's that like to play the games, but either do not have the hardcore interest as some of us have in this game or others like myself, they just do not have the time to do it as much as they wished.

While implementing some of these designs as the game progresses, the staggering amount of complexity is slowly pushing away the casual gamer because if you do not jump into this game hardcore, then you will end up quickly get frustrated by this game. It happens, it is more common then we like to admit to at times, but I think there might be easy ways to add to the design early on like now, but that will also help the casual gamer to get an easier handle on things. 

Am I talking or asking for a tutorial? No. I am looking at other options to give players an easier in to the game as a whole. There is a lot here to learn, and sometimes just giving the newer players an extra in, it can not only help us as a community but also the game as a whole.

 

So here are some of my options that I think might help, and I would love to hear your thoughts on this stuff. Please try to be productive and constructive, I know some of this may frustrate some of your more hardcore gamer's. Please keep it in mind that these are small things to help casual gamer's so the game has more players and more chances of extra fun things coming out due to shared interest.

1).  Research Options (Or research woes for some)

      I think we should look at other games to get an easy and quick way to understand what elements work together. To keep this simple, I will provide an example. "If I research up to the Steam Power option early on as a casual gamer, I have no idea that there are other tech info I need before going there... I get frustrated and then things get iffy (depending on player interest, this could be a loss of a gamer or a restart).  So my option is to highlight tech that you need to research when selecting an item. So if I selected the Steam Power, the other tech I would need for it would turn bright red for those not researched yet. This allows simplicity and a nice boost to the casual gamer to get a handle on an already complex game.

2).  Food Woes (Or when are we dying of hunger and when?)

      Once again, I am trying to keep things simple and easy for both implementation but also for the player. We should have a rough value in cycles of how long the food should last (if it does not rot). This could be added by a simple extra to the bar saying you need farms or possibly on the side of the calorie count. Maybe something like... "Cal 20,000 (10 Cycles)" Make sure the simple math is (dupes / Cal Intake) = Cycle count" or something as simple. Not much of a code change except to the UI but it would help a lot of people understand quickly how soon they need to get things up and running.

 

Now I could keep going on and on with different extras to add, but I felt this would be a great option to start a conversation. All these ideas came from using the KISS system (or Keep It Simple Stupid) so keep things as simple and clean as possible. Plus all the ideas I have provided could easily be turned off for older players. 

What are your thoughts? Let's talk about this please. 

 

[DraconicSiege]

I defiantly agree with you that this game is hard to get into. As you where mentioning with the research, there are so many other techs you need to utilize the one tech you might be going for.  In my opinion, the tech tree could use a restructure to make the game feel like it has more direction and a series of sequential steps in order to progress the technology of your base.  I find myself waiting till I have over half the tech tree researched before I really start creating my base. This would pose a big issue with someone jumping in for the first time. They would probably research a new tech, build it, and then realize they can't properly utilize it without some other tech they don't have yet. This isn't a problem for experienced players because we know what techs to go for first and which ones work well together.

[Master Miner]

Not every game is for everyone.
A good game needs many challenges and it has to be hard to master, because little effort => little satisfaction. A good game also needs key aspects that relate to RL problems. Naturally, it will attract people who have affinities for the chosen key aspects.
Not every game is for every age. I guess ONI is somewhere a 14+ game.

I'm attracted to ONI because I like thermodynamics, exploring, mining, building machines and systems, organizing and optimizing. And all together, i like intellectual, logical challenges ... if they are not too easy.

I've had 5 failures before I was able to build a sustainable base / system. I agree that it is not easy to find needed information, so I've searched on various sites on the internet and here in the forum for the missing pieces. This didn't frustrate me too much, as i knew in advance that the game is in development. I've accepted the problems, as well as the changes of rules during the game, as additional challenges.

I guess that the game will be too hard for people who are just after pastime and do not want to turn on too many gray cells while playing. Also for people who are not interested in thermodynamics. But the game needs those aspects to be distinguished among plenty of other games.

("Would you like me to show you a game?" "Oh, well, only If I don't need to think. If it's 'shoot them all', then it's good.")

Perhaps adding a simple warning at the start of the game would help: "This game is not easy. Expect to fail and learn from failures."

Adding hints and links that make the player's learning process smoother is for sure welcome.