Straight Dope Message Board

[Battle Pope]

Originally Posted by Martini Enfield

I saw that, and a lot of people are very upset about it too, if we were reading the same subreddit.

Funnily enough it doesn't really worry me too much - I suspect it will get added in at some point anyway.

Makes me kind of happy actually. If I want to be griefed by some random idiot I happen to bump into I'll keep playing The Division 151

[Merneith]

No - I think Minecraft and Terraria have demonstrated that for some people, building a home base is the game. It would be good to have the option. 152

[Jragon]

Originally Posted by Merneith

No - I think Minecraft and Terraria have demonstrated that for some people, building a home base is the game. It would be good to have the option.

Well, yes. And in Minecraft, Terreria, Starbound, and Space Engineers I build elaborate home bases with elaborate showy decorations, unnecessary greenhouses, animal pastures, and lava waterfalls. No Man's Sky is very different from those games, the entire way the game and its reward system is structured is antithetical to having a singular place to return to. 153

[galen ubal]

Originally Posted by Jragon

Well, yes. And in Minecraft, Terreria, Starbound, and Space Engineers I build elaborate home bases with elaborate showy decorations, unnecessary greenhouses, animal pastures, and lava waterfalls. No Man's Sky is very different from those games, the entire way the game and its reward system is structured is antithetical to having a singular place to return to.

I disagree; at least in my case. I like the idea of setting up a home base on some interesting world I'd discovered - Ubaltopia, on the Planet Galena. 154

[Johnny Bravo]

So this article from a couple weeks ago says that large enough changes will be saved to the game's servers. That gives me a certain amount of hope, though the info is vague. 155

[Onomatopoeia]

Being very unlikely to meet another player because of the vastness of the galaxy is a far, far different thing than not being able to meet another player at all regardless how hard one tries. Limited multiplayer my ass. Uploading information about a discovery or named item into a database is not multiplayer, especially if no one can other than you can ever experience it.

With each new piece of information that comes out about the game, it seems less and less likely I will bother, which is disappointing as i have been looking forward to NMS for quite some time now. 156

[control-z]

I'm right on the fence of buying this. For $30 I would have already bought it. But I suspect as awesome as the planets and exploration will be at first, the gameplay will get old quick.

I'm trying not to see/read too many spoilers, but I would like to know how multiplayer will be. 157

[SenorBeef]

There's essentially no multiplayer. It ranges somewhere between they lied and there's no multiplayer at all, or you might have a 1% chance of encounter another human being but likely not recognizing them form every hundred hours of gameplay. 158

[Kinthalis]

Well, we've still got Civ VI guys, am I right?! 159

[RickJay]

This was the only game that could possibly distract me from my laserlike focus on Civ VI.

I was going to hold off anyway; a game of this ambition will be buggier than an anthill, so may as well wait six to eight months and play the version that works, at which point hopefully it'll also have more features. 160

[Jragon]

No multiplayer, nothing "essentially" about it

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthre...#post213089454

I packet captured my PS4. When the servers are online, no player movement data is sent to servers, either in space or planet side. It simply doesn't transmit where you are, or any world sharing information.

It does transmit your Discovers, and a diary of planets you have visited. I imagine that is for the Easter eggs.

Also, if you press 'OPTIONS' it pauses the entire game world, including AI (watch creatures and ships stop) and *time*. Planets stop moving and time stops passing when in OPTIONS. This is *not* a multiplayer game

161

[RandMcnally]

Originally Posted by Kinthalis

Well, we've still got Civ VI guys, am I right?!

Maybe Civ VI can take my focus off Rimworld and Heroes of the Storm.

Oh yeah, and the new Pokemon game (not Go. That bored the crap out of me). 162

[Martini Enfield]

Originally Posted by Kinthalis

Well, we've still got Civ VI guys, am I right?!

I have it on very good authority that Civ VI will be very good, particularly if you liked Civ V.

More immediately, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is out in fortnight or so too. 163

[RandMcnally]

Remember though: Civ usually isn't that great on release (at least that's what I hear. I enjoyed vanilla Civ V). 164

[Arrogance Ex Machina]

Originally Posted by RandMcnally

Remember though: Civ usually isn't that great on release (at least that's what I hear. I enjoyed vanilla Civ V).

That's just silly folk wisdom. It might be good or it might not be good but I'm going to read reviews instead of relying on such "rules". I enjoyed Civ V on release a lot more than I liked Civ4 with all expansions for example and given Civ VI isn't going back to stacks of doom I have high hopes for it. 165

[Kinthalis]

Originally Posted by RandMcnally

Remember though: Civ usually isn't that great on release (at least that's what I hear. I enjoyed vanilla Civ V).

That's usually (but not always) because the first iteration on a new numbered civ tends to focus on a main set of mechanics and leaves everything that was added in expansions in the previous version behind. This ends up feeling sparse compared to the meatier gameplay of the previous. It looks like this time, every mechanic in Civ V post DLC will be in here, and the new mechanics look pretty good - specifically the new politics system and the city districts system looks a lot deeper than in civ V.

Anyway, sorry for derailing! Back to NMS.

One of my fave reviewers on youtube: ACG says it's a wait for a sale: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ASL8WAd8kg

Surprisingly, yesterday I was hearing Giant Bomb personality Jeff Gerstman praising the game. Was not expecting that. Though he was only a few planets and a few hours in at the time. i want to see what he says next week. 166

[SenorBeef]

There's something that seems a little suspicious to me going on with metacritic. They have 28 or so reviews catalogued (with blurbs and links to them), but only two of them are actually scored. One has a 50, one a 70, and the rest are essentially pending to be awarded a score.

Usually metacritic adds the score as it adds the review, so having 20+ reviews that haven't added their score to the metarating is something I haven't seen before.

It makes me wonder if Sony paid them to deliberately wait on declaring/adding up the scores so that the game would be stuck in unscored (minimum 4 reviews) rather than posting a metacritic rating. Otherwise what's the hold up? 167

[RickJay]

Originally Posted by Arrogance Ex Machina

That's just silly folk wisdom. It might be good or it might not be good but I'm going to read reviews instead of relying on such "rules". I enjoyed Civ V on release a lot more than I liked Civ4 with all expansions for example and given Civ VI isn't going back to stacks of doom I have high hopes for it.

Yeah, I'd have to agree. Once I started playing Civ V, I was done with Civ IV. It was and is a much, much better game. The expansions are mostly improvements, but it was fine out of the box.

The "Civ sucks when it comes out" thing is I think based on some actual facts:

1. Civ III was advertised as being a multiplayer game, and then shortly before release that was removed and Firaxis was a bit sullen about admitting they'd promised it and then removed it. It had other bugs too, and, weirdly, lacked features the previously released "Alpha Centauri" had.

2. Civ IV was extremely uncooperative with a stunningly high percentage of video cards on release, and was effectively unplayable for many consumers.

3. In all three of the last releases, the game HAS been dramatically altered by subsequent upgrades. The perception of the consumer is therefore, naturally, that what they paid $60 for was not in fact a complete product. My recollection is that Civ V worked out of the box and was a fine game, so that's great. But then I had to keep paying to get updates and civilizations. That lends to the perception it wasn't finished at release, and people resent pay-to-play DLC.

This is relevant to No Man's Sky because it seems like all games are like this now, and it can't help their sales. Surely I'm not the only person who now doesn't want to buy the game at its initial price because I'm convinced it'll be unfinished. 168

[Kinthalis]

I think the game has a fantastic base as it stands, which only promises to get better.

I think Sony getting involved might be good for their short term gains, but I don't think it will be a good thing long term. I think Spore and No Man's Sky is going to go hand in hand in a lot of people's discussions about the game.

I think if it had come out on Early access, it would have still been a pretty big deal and the narrative around it would have been VERY different. 169

[Raza]

Sadly, no Steam pre-loading:

Originally Posted by official site

Steam – The game will be available to download from Friday 6PM BST [UK]/1PM EST [US]/ 10AM PST [US] / 7PM CEST, please note: Pre-loads are unavailable.

From: http://www.no-mans-sky.com/support/ as of the time of posting. 170

[Frylock]

Originally Posted by SenorBeef

There's something that seems a little suspicious to me going on with metacritic. They have 28 or so reviews catalogued (with blurbs and links to them), but only two of them are actually scored. One has a 50, one a 70, and the rest are essentially pending to be awarded a score.

Usually metacritic adds the score as it adds the review, so having 20+ reviews that haven't added their score to the metarating is something I haven't seen before.

It makes me wonder if Sony paid them to deliberately wait on declaring/adding up the scores so that the game would be stuck in unscored (minimum 4 reviews) rather than posting a metacritic rating. Otherwise what's the hold up?

I see this quite often. It's because review copies were released late. Notice most of the unscored articles say they are not final reviews.

Sent from my XT1031 using Tapatalk 171

[Lightnin']

Originally Posted by SenorBeef

There's something that seems a little suspicious to me going on with metacritic. They have 28 or so reviews catalogued (with blurbs and links to them), but only two of them are actually scored. One has a 50, one a 70, and the rest are essentially pending to be awarded a score.

Usually metacritic adds the score as it adds the review, so having 20+ reviews that haven't added their score to the metarating is something I haven't seen before.

It makes me wonder if Sony paid them to deliberately wait on declaring/adding up the scores so that the game would be stuck in unscored (minimum 4 reviews) rather than posting a metacritic rating. Otherwise what's the hold up?

When the game was released on PS4, the user scores were brigaded by 4channers who were morally offended that the game didn't have PvP. I wonder if that has something to do with it? 172

[Martini Enfield]

Originally Posted by SenorBeef

There's something that seems a little suspicious to me going on with metacritic. They have 28 or so reviews catalogued (with blurbs and links to them), but only two of them are actually scored. One has a 50, one a 70, and the rest are essentially pending to be awarded a score.

Usually metacritic adds the score as it adds the review, so having 20+ reviews that haven't added their score to the metarating is something I haven't seen before.

It makes me wonder if Sony paid them to deliberately wait on declaring/adding up the scores so that the game would be stuck in unscored (minimum 4 reviews) rather than posting a metacritic rating. Otherwise what's the hold up?

A lot of the reviews I'm aware of are "Game In Progress", so there's no score attached because the reviewer hasn't "finished" the game, or hasn't seen enough of it to feel confident attaching a score to it yet.

Reviewers that did snag pre-release copies only got them a day or two before launch, and two days isn't enough time to do a comprehensive review of something as ambitious as No Man's Sky. Also bear in mind the PC version isn't out yet and there were, to the best of my knowledge, no pre-release review copies of the PC version made available.

There's also a trend in reviewing away from scores, given people's tendencies to skip the review, go straight to the score, then onto the comments section to rage and call the reviewer names for giving the game the "wrong" score - especially given than 7.7 is now often taken to mean "a perfectly acceptable game" and only getting better from there, and anything less than that is seen as "bad" or "terrible" etc as the score lowers.

In theory, a 5 or 6 should be "OK but not great, unless you like this sort of thing in which case it might be worth it on sale" 7-8 should be "pretty good and definitely worth checking out" and 9-10 should be "Shut up and give the publisher your money", with a anything below 5 being "Not worth it/avoid".

As I think anyone with an interest in the gaming industry knows though, it doesn't work like that, sadly. 173

[Chronos]

Quoth RickJay:

2. Civ IV was extremely uncooperative with a stunningly high percentage of video cards on release, and was effectively unplayable for many consumers.

As either an example or an addendum to this, when the Mac version came out, the system requirements were ludicrously high, comparable to the most system-intensive real-time games. I'm not even sure if they ever actually fixed that, or if they just waited for the state-of-the-art to catch up. 174

[RandMcnally]

Videos of what's at the center of the galaxy have been uploaded to YouTube.

Spoilers start at 14:30 175

[SenorBeef]

Not that youtube comments are ever worthwhile, but the amount of rage vs blind fanboy defense on this one is pretty extreme. It's either something you will defend to the death no matter the flaws, or the game raped your mother and killed your puppy.

I almost feel sorry for the guys trying to make a unique little indie game and then they got swept up by the Sony hype machine and expectations became crazy, but on the other hand, they can cry themselves into their scrooge mcduck vaults. 176

[Skywatcher]

Played a bit on my lunch hour. The planet it put me on looks great but a bit weird. More on that later.

You start out by waking up from a crashed spaceship. Which, of course, is damaged and in need of repair so you have to go find the necessary elements (iron, zinc, and something that begins with "H") to get off the planet. You have a scanner to help with finding elements but that is also damaged and in need of repair. Need carbon for that.

Here's where the weirdness comes in: the elements do not look like what one would expect. Some, like small carbon deposits, resemble plants. Small iron deposits resemble oysters on the half shell; large ones look somewhat like dried out saguaro cacti. The one which starts with "H" bears a strong resemblance to 2001's monoliths.

In addition to the scanner, you have a laser drill. This is not needed for the smallest deposits, those can be broken via melee attack. Some elements, such as iron, take more mining power than others. The drill will need to be refueled at some point; plutonium is best for this but others, like carbon, will do in a pinch. 177

[Ike Witt]

I'm reading about lots of crashes and terrible frame rates no matter what the settings are at or hardware you are running.

Waiting 6 months may be the best bet for this game, but considering how long it has been in the media, it should have been better at launch. 178

[Rick Kitchen]

Every planet's element bearing items are different, so one person's experiences will be different from other people's. 179

[Skywatcher]

Originally Posted by Rick Kitchen

Every planet's element bearing items are different, so one person's experiences will be different from other people's.

Some other planet would have monoliths of gold? 180

[Rick Kitchen]

Yes, I've seen YouTube videos with giant monoliths of gold. 181

[levdrakon]

Sounds like Metroid Prime. Oh, you have to get your equipment back and do some exploring and fighting. Great, every world you visit is unique and cool.

NMS has a quintillion planets that are all the same but with different color schemes and nothing in particular to do but blast out some caves.

They're right that it is an exploration game you could spend the rest of your (real) life exploring, but it doesn't sound like there is anything worth $60 to explore. Geez, at least in Farmville I can customize my farm. Is this game on Facebook? 'Cause it sounds like it should be, with some more "social" added in. 182

[amanset]

So yes. About that whole "PC ports even if considered bad are still better than the console" thing.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...-well-on-steam

And now that the PC version has been out for about two hours, much of that goodwill has soured as a majority of players are bumping up against a host of technical issues rendering the game unplayable in its current state.

Of course, it's hard to form a complete verdict on a game of No Man's Sky's magnitude in only an hour or two, but it only takes a few minutes to suss out whether the product is even playable on your PC. For many of these players, it wasn't.

"10 FPS on a GTX 980? No Man's Lag. DO NOT BUY" added Steam user Robo Hobo.

"Crashes on open every time. gg" thelordvalor stated.

Many more reported that the game would simply crash upon starting up.

183

[Kinthalis]

Originally Posted by amanset

So yes. About that whole "PC ports even if considered bad are still better than the console" thing.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...-well-on-steam

Well, it's not ALWAYS the case, just 99% of the time. As mentioned, the only time this has been true that I can recall is Batman. Meanwhile, Just Cause 3 crashes on PS4, the latest tell tale game is a mess (not super great on PC either), and even this game hitches, crashes and sports a FOV that actually made my friend want to throw up watching a live stream of it! Rocket league dropped frames like crazy on release, and the list goes on. I know you really want the narrative to go the other way her,e but the facts just aren't going your way. Sorry. These days the issues aren't platform related, but developer related, and the chances of a console gamer having serious issues with a game are more or less about the same. It's just that PC gamers are loud when the game isn't up to PC standards. If a game drops to 25 FPS here and there - your average console gamer will go meh (though fo course some will, rightfully, complain too), but most PC gamers would find that unacceptable.

Meantime, I don't know why Hello Games just didn't hold back the PC version for another couple of weeks if it wasn't ready.

Although it seems like it's more than a few technical issues. Turning off frame caps (which default to 30, why??) and turning on AF + Vscyn outside the game, seems to cure most of the issues people are having.

But the UI functions exactly like the consoles! A UI that is essentially a MOUSE UI for a gamepad functions exactly the same when using a mouse complete with having to hold down the mouse button and waiting for a stupid circle to fill in order to select something. That clumsy shit is fine for the handicap of a gamepad, but not for a mouse and keybaord.

I guess you cna play with a gamepad, and I'm guessing most people are doing that, but still! 184

[Kinthalis]

Really don't understand. This game is moving massive numbers on PC with over 200k concurrent users.

It just doesn't make sense for them to have a shoddy release like this. 185

[RandMcnally]

Originally Posted by Kinthalis

Really don't understand. This game is moving massive numbers on PC with over 200k concurrent users.

It just doesn't make sense for them to have a shoddy release like this.

Why wouldn't they? It seems to be working. 186

[SenorBeef]

220k numbers on day 1 is crazy (and I'm not sure if that's peak). GTA 5 peaked around 360k concurrent users, and it was a great, polished, hyped game from a beloved developer in one of the most popular game series of all time.

Granted, it came out a long time ago, but I don't think Skyrim ever hit more than 200k concurrent users.

Yet this little indie game from a 15 man dev studio with no track record with mediocre reviews that was overhyped to all fuck that had a $60 pricetag is one of the biggest launches ever.

This is going to be studied in marketing schools for years to come as a way to sell everyone on hype. 187

[Kinthalis]

Originally Posted by RandMcnally

Why wouldn't they? It seems to be working.

It shouldn't!

Damn it.

On the flip side, THIS is why you need to put your game on PC. Never take a console exclusive deal indies. Never. 188

[SenorBeef]

They did put their game on PC. The only "console exclusiveness" about it is that Sony paid them not to put it on Xbox. They're just in over their heads because they're just a 15 man dev team that hasn't done anything significant before now.

I went from "sounds cool, I'm interested, but sure does sound overhyped to me" to actually being angry at its success. Why in the world does this game, which even by people who like the game basically admit it's a niche indie game, have one of the biggest launches ever on steam? If this was a $20 indie game and got 30,000 people on launch day, I'd totally understand. It'd be like a Terrraria/Starbound/Kerbal type of hit. Which is about where it should be.

But instead it launches at $60 and outsells a polished, complete, broad-appeal game from a developer with a great track record and probably best game of the year Witcher 3. This is even after 3 days out on another platform where it's proven itself to be, at best, not everything it was cracked up to be with a lot of warning signs. Where it gets metacritic ratings in the 60s. And yet people rushed to preorder/buy day one. Why in the fuck?

I can only understand this as a masterful case in marketing and hype because nothing else about this adds up.

There are a lot of people who are deeply emotionally invested in this game. If you go to review sites or forums discussing it, they come out and have a cult-like dedication to how it's the most amazing thing ever and if you don't agree then you just don't get it, and the developer did everything they promised, and there are no flaws. The fanboyism is extreme.

Very, very strange, this whole ordeal. I think in a couple of weeks about 80% of the people who bought it are going to realize it really isn't a gamechanger, it's not gonna blow their mind, it's not going to have great depth or great replayability, and they're going to regret preordering the damn thing for $60. The 10-20% of hardened fanboys will fight to the death over it. What a weird situation this whole thing is, and it makes me sad how much people are taken in by hype.

Many tens of millions of dollars could've been spread over dozens or hundreds of other niche indy games this year instead of all being focused into this one. 189

[SenorBeef]

Also, 44% positive reviews on steam over the first 10,000 reviews, which is extremely low - you have to be a complete pile of shit to get below that, and it's that low despite all the cultists upvoting it regardless of the quality. 190

[MichaelEmouse]

I wonder how many reimbursements will be demanded by unsatisfied players. It's looking like NMS will be the new Spore.



In terms of high-level programming, how did they go about creating so much? Yes, procedural generation but more specifically than that? Were there other methods they used?

The consensus seems to be that the procedural generation wears thin after a while. Other games like Spelunky, Minecraft and Door Kickers (to a lesser extent) have managed it quite well. What differentiates them in terms of their methods and outcomes? 191

[smiling bandit]

Originally Posted by MichaelEmouse

In terms of high-level programming, how did they go about creating so much? Yes, procedural generation but more specifically than that? Were there other methods they used?

Almost certainly not; based on the sheer quantity of terrain, almost the only thing possible generation mechanism is procedural. The creatures, plants, and structures, and stuff sound like pre-made bits dropped into place as needed.

The consensus seems to be that the procedural generation wears thin after a while. Other games like Spelunky, Minecraft and Door Kickers (to a lesser extent) have managed it quite well. What differentiates them in terms of their methods and outcomes?

The randomness in those is made to facilitate specific gameplay, and so that the player can't know the next level in advance, even if they played before. Adapting to that level's particular configuration, whether through reflexes, planning, smart item use, or other skill is the game. But the randomness*itself isn't the point, nor is it just to have ten thousand dungeons for its own sake. It's to challenge the player. Additionally, all the procedural-generated worlds I've seen are either heavily simplified like Minecraft or 2d. This gives them a lot of flexibility to insert fun rules and interesting challenges, rather than focus on making it look good. The one exception is Fuel, which has a massive sprawling world - but Fuel has no interaction with that world except by driving around the surface.

*I originally typed in randommess. Seems apt. 192

[Jragon]

Game Maker's Toolkit has a good article on how Spelunky's level generator works:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uqk5Zf0tw3o 193

[Jragon]

Article = video, of course 194

[Skywatcher]

Originally Posted by levdrakon

Sounds like Metroid Prime. Oh, you have to get your equipment back and do some exploring and fighting. Great, every world you visit is unique and cool.

NMS has a quintillion planets that are all the same but with different color schemes and nothing in particular to do but blast out some caves.

One can follow a storyline if so desired. 195

[smiling bandit]

Originally Posted by Skywatcher

One can follow a storyline if so desired.

This is true, but everyone who has mentioned it basically said it's barely worth noticing. 196

[Richard Pearse]

Originally Posted by SenorBeef

I went from "sounds cool, I'm interested, but sure does sound overhyped to me" to actually being angry at its success. Why in the world does this game, which even by people who like the game basically admit it's a niche indie game, have one of the biggest launches ever on steam? If this was a $20 indie game and got 30,000 people on launch day, I'd totally understand. It'd be like a Terrraria/Starbound/Kerbal type of hit. Which is about where it should be.

Not sure why you'd be angry, I mean how it does it affect you?

As for me, I've never pre-ordered a game but I pre-ordered this because I thought the concept sounded cool and I was in a bit of a gaming slump at the time. Maybe there were just lots and lots of people who thought the concept sounded cool. The difference between that and something like The Witcher is that The Witcher is a known quantity. The Witcher 3 was a sequel to a game that some people like and some don't. That automatically excludes a large number of gamers from ordering it because they already know they aren't interested. NMS had a cool sounding concept to pique gamer's interest and little enough actual detail that gamers would fill in the blanks with wishful thinking.

If this ends up being a disaster for Hello Games then I think they can blame Sony for jumping on it and themselves for not seeing the adverse affect the hype would ultimately have. 197

[Frylock]

Originally Posted by levdrakon

NMS has a quintillion planets that are all the same but with different color schemes

Anyone wondering about buying the game, whatever other info you look at please disregard Levrakon's comment above, as it is not even close to being true.

The variety in this game is amazing. Certainly there are some things you run into more than once from planet to planet. But much more is different from world to world than is the same. The dimensions of variation involve things like topography, amounts of vegetation and fauna, density of "ground vegetation" (grasses etc) -- which, btw, is not always uniform across the entire surface of the planet -- amount and arrangement of bodies of water/land, color (yes of course), shapes of mineral outcroppings, animal and plant forms, weather characteristics (a very very simple weather model but it _does_ vary from world to world), ground textures (and planets have more than one, forming "regions" of a sort, though they're too small to really come across as "biomes"), cave depth, complexity and frequency, concentration of various resources.

That's what I can think of, I am sure there are other dimensions of variation as well.

Hell, it's hard to explain this but just the topographical variation--the sheer variety in _shapes of horizons_ I've encountered in my own gameplay and watching others' streams, kind of evokes a reaction from me. And that's just one variation dimension.

Levdrakon and others who say what he said above are really selling the game short. 198

[Frylock]

Originally Posted by MichaelEmouse

IIt's looking like NMS will be the new Spore.

I knew Spore. Spore was a game of mine. This, sir, is no Spore.

(See my prior post for elaboration.) 199

[Frylock]

Originally Posted by SenorBeef

Very, very strange, this whole ordeal. I think in a couple of weeks about 80% of the people who bought it are going to realize it really isn't a gamechanger, it's not gonna blow their mind, it's not going to have great depth or great replayability, and they're going to regret preordering the damn thing for $60. The 10-20% of hardened fanboys will fight to the death over it. What a weird situation this whole thing is, and it makes me sad how much people are taken in by hype.

Those who enjoy the game for what it is have understood from the beginning that the game will not have depth in its gameplay mechanics. That's not where this game is at. It is a casual, "chill" game. A way to pass some time enjoyably.

I really don't understand why anyone ever expected the game to be other than that. I followed all the ads, heard all the same interviews as everyone else, and somehow, I came away with an accurate expectation of what this game would be like, while somehow, many others came away with really bizarre, exaggerated expectations for it.

(And that's not to mention the weird over-reactions people are having to things like the lack of multiplayer. Hello Games has been a bit back and forth on that, absolutely, but it should have been a huge clue to anyone who wasn't sure that not one single bit about multiplayer was included in even a single trailer for the game--and in the last few months Hello Games has consistently stated that there will be no direct interaction between players in the game. Okay, so maybe some people missed all that but the huge, incredibly angry reactions some people have had really puzzle me. How is it even a big deal? I don't get this.) 200