The desktop version is bugged pretty severely. Here is a screenshot.
In the online version, I ran into a similar situation of running out of power, and the "Loop Now" appeared where this green box, that I placed should have been.
Suffice to say, as I was looking for the Rover, I'm hard-locked from progressing. I liked the desktop version as I could play at my own pace and not worry about online data being lost (as I like to clear cache and cookies on occasion).
The hardlock kinda bummed me out, so probably won't play more of it for a while.
EDIT: Noticed a button in top middle "Waiting". It works, just going to take me a while to dehydrate to death. So not hard-locked. Hrmm.
Other feedback on it:
-> I feel like water and food drain too fast. They are very limited in a lot of places, and its the main limiter to exploration at the moment.
-> The generator said I could remove it, after welding it on. But at Laurion, I couldn't remove it, despite really needing to do it there.
-> I really think the consumption priority system, should be active from the start.
-> I like that hacking doors, means I have the password later, but man does it take forever to hack them. And as they are a one-off event, you don't even get a speed-up boost. Especially the admin door at Laurion.
-> I like that many actions only have to be performed once per playthrough (blue highlights), so even if you die, you feel like you made some progress each time.
-> I wish there was more actions I could do while piloting the rover to a location. Practicing a skill, or playing a card game, or something beneficial. Its just that with some of the driving sections its a long period of just refilling oxygen tanks.
-> I think that the repeat action should be applied per a category of actions, rather than individual actions. So acquiring any source of water, applies a multiplier to all actions involving gaining water. Any action that involves hacking a door, you get a multiplier to that. Adding/removing power cell/fuel cells should be an action group. That way, when you practice one thing, you can practice for all similar actions.
-> I wish I could find some empty power cells at Talos, so that I'd have some full cells in the rover and some empties on hand. That way you could extract 3 full ones, install the 3 empty ones, and have 3 full ones on hand, while the generator now fills up the 4 empty ones in the rover.
-> Why do the water bottles at the start of the game are called small bottles, fill up the normal water bottle slots, but the 2 found at Laurion are actually small bottles, and fill up the small water bottle slots.
-> Maybe provide a hand-crank charger, for recharging Empty Power Cells. That way, you'd have a way to generate the power, but it could take a while to crank a charge to full. Kinda like that idea in the Metro games.
Was your initial issue on your second loop? Because the Loop Now button doesn't appear until your third loop.
- The generator explicitly says you can't remove it because you are welding it in place. That's why there's a warning message saying "are you sure you want to do this?".
- The consumption priority system has little-no benefit until the point you unlock it, and isn't available until then to avoid confusing/overwhelming new players. I may make it unlock a bit earlier, but it definitely won't be from the start.
- Door hacking takes as long as it does to give a meaningful choice between quickly forcing it, or spending a long time hacking it so you get a permenant upgrade. Even as it is, pretty much everyone hacks straight away.
- The familiarity speedup for actions is planned to be partially shared (https://trello.com/c/9stzrBhs/26-familiarity-v2)
- Having fuel and empty power cells and Talos would massively skew the balance of the game, and rover power is already way higher than it should be due to the way familiarity currently works.
- I'm not sure what you mean by 'normal water bottle slots' and 'small water bottle slots'. You can carry up to 5 of each item, so 5 Small Water Bottles, 5 Water Bottles and 5 Water Pouches.
- As mentioned, power is already way too plentiful. More options for long-term power generation are going to be added, but power will have to be nerfed first for them to have any real point.
Yes, my initial issue was on the second loop. And it did appear on the third loop, as you said. So I guess it was just the sequence of events that I took to get there.
The first time I installed the generator, I didn't get that message. Then after I had posted this feedback, I noticed that warning. So the big black popup warning that it would be a permanent change didn't appear the very first time.
I wouldn't say it has no point. I like to grab as much food and water as I can, quickly so that I can empty up the protein/filter water, but the system auto-uses synfood/water pouches, so I had to manually waste them to empty up their resource pallets.
Well, what you "could do" to balance it, is to reduce the hacking time, but the mental concentration needed to do the hacking consumes water/food faster, to offset the time needed.
After posting that suggestion, I realized what I was actually asking for was "skills" that would in another game. A passive upgrade that improves the activity speed of multiple actions. Possibly with a chance for a critical effect, that consumes twice as much time as a normal tick.
Rover power is only "that useful" once you've completed a path section at least once, or an entire path at least once. Until then, it takes forever to complete sections and death from loss of resources is very likely. I do see now that I'm on cycle 9 or so now (was at cycle 2 at the time of posting) that you slowly unlock shortcuts which makes things better, but at the time I had no shortcuts and it was torturously hard to get anywhere, hence the suggestion. But now at cycle 9, with some shortcuts and better route planning, I'm able to do things faster, but as a new player I didn't know about any of that and was ready to give up.
My apologies on the water bottles. I was confused and you are right, they are specifically different.
You don't have to nerf power. What you could do is give the option to add on more objects that drain the power faster. ie:
-> Improved navigation to reduce time needed for optimizing existing paths.
-> Improved detection to find additional objects of interest on side paths that you avoid now (like to first rover with artifact).
-> Build an extra compartment to the rover, that adds weight and thus increases standard travel time costs. Can install the water recycler into it, alongside the generator.
-> Build an extra storage compartment to the rover, that also adds weight. Can stash some supplies in it for an emergency. So you could effectively have 10/10 synthfood, water pouches, etc...
EDIT:
-> Something I have noticed, is that combined actions don't get speed up boosts from repeatedly doing them. ie Repair Upper Floor, I've done at least 3 times, and it says I've completed it 0 times over my 9 loops.
