I understand why people may not vibe with this game, as it has tons of interactions and features it just expects you to either find for yourself or to just know. However, I feel as though most of these arguments are either not an entirely valid criticism, the game being close to but not specifically what you wanted, or a lack of considering the fact that its not just in early access, but that its in public *alpha*. That said, you do have valid points, so Ill go over my opinions.
1) This is partially valid, partially not. As far as direct asset rips go, you are 100% right, but uninformed. It has been previously established that ripped source assets are only in to help keep the game in a playable state for alpha, and that there are plans to replace all of those, such as in the case of several sound files within the last few updates. As far as certain elements, like the focus on the crowbar item and the overall physics, its intentionally there to emulate the feel of source games, which is a key point here because the game is *not* trying to sell itself as a completely serious title. It uses this jank and the wackiness of most encounters to separate the horror out into manageable doses, and I think emulating the source engine was a good choice for something to emulate.
2) Understandable complaint as far as item interaction goes, the game needs to do a better job teaching about hotkeys. Makes the game way easier. I can see how the movement controls may throw people off, but I think its more of a preference thing. As far as most other things, especially with the recent update, I personally feel they handled it well, though I think the old keypad system was better.
3) Many people have already mentioned sv.target, even if its in unnecessarily condescending ways for certain people. Despite this, I really dont like this complaint anyways. All the satellites are either along or perfectly between the cardinal directions of main base. I can honestly say Ive almost *never* used road signs for finding satellites, and any problem Ive had was purely my own skill issue. You could say that its unclear where each is, but after a few in game days you begin to recognize where everything is relative to each other.
4) Devs already said they dont want multiplayer, though I agree with your assessment with co-op. 2 player mode would definitely improve the game's replayibility(?) just through proxy of making the long wait times more bearable. That said, I dont agree with the idea that the map is too large. If you're getting that impression, you need to get farther along progressing your signal processing and/or use the ATV to save time. The game takes a fucking *while* to complete, so you're not really gonna *not* have time to explore the entire map. You probably should be familiar with a majority of the map by your first 2 in game weeks honestly.
5) 100% agree, you can turn off a majority of the restrictions in the settings by hitting the E tab, which brings you to experimental settings. I turn off everything relating to food as well as physics damage, just because it turns crashing your ATV from a funny, occasionally annoying event into an unnecessary punishment for something you arent always at fault for.
6) This point is, in all honestly, either completely misinformed, delusional, or both. This game is *NOT* Signal Simulator, and invoking the name as though it means something is like saying Halo is bad because it isnt Call of Duty. VotV is *also* a carefully designed, thoughtfully made passion project, but one that is, from the start, decidedly *NOT* intended to be Signal Simulator. It has its own ambitions, and this can be clearly seen with everything they already crammed into the regular game. If whats at the surface level of the base game isnt enough for you to see this you can instead look at the secrets and easter eggs that can get so convoluted their existence rivals those of whats found in the Battlefield games. Theres even an entire fucking ARG built into the tutorial. All of this is to say, either you're too wrapped up in the idea of "Signal Simulator 2" that you cant actually recognize VotV for *its* own passions, or you simply dont know enough about the game to be able to make this kind of statement in the first place. Sorry if I took a turn into being an asshole here, but it genuinely infuriates me seeing people take a platform that they can use to make actual criticisms and instead make some generalized buzzword slop and slap it on here without even providing and *example* of what they're talking about, which is what this specific point was.
7) The trash and grime is supposed to be something to pass the time with, but as someone mentioned before you can put the trash in an item box. You can even sell it for thousands of points if you get all the trash, its actually quite insane tbh. I personally dont like it either, but thats because every time you do a new save you have to clean it up again, and I make new saves all the time. I also believe that the trashbag roll should cost as much as 12 points, as much as the price of the trash bags individually, the game doesnt need economical strategy based around the cost effectiveness of cleaning up trash. As far as criticizing the treatment of the place, though, the lore and overall design of the facility makes it clear that this facility has been a death trap for decades, so it goes abandoned for long periods of time because its just not worth the risk of operating and losing personnel. The organization you work for seems to be on a shoestring budget, which is why they gambled with running the facility themselves.
IMMEDIATE EDIT: Apparently, I was wrong about one detail. The game isnt in Alpha, its in Pre-Alpha.
