Colony Ship Early Access Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[lukaszek]

for example I would see such humongous piece of machinery I would definitely comment on it

 

[MRY]

I'm not particularly interested in hearing their views

Ooooh, lets shit on CSG writing! Its bad too!

De gustibus, of course, but I want to make clear that's not what I was saying. I think there are things CSG does well in terms of its writing, but setting up followers for philosophical color commentary is not, right now, one one those things.

Some of your specific criticisms I agree with, most I don't. I thought AOD's "narrative"* was very strong, and while I am thus far somewhat less taken by CSG's, I certainly don't think it's bad; I think it is quite good, as I said in my review.

(* I use "narrative" instead of writing because IMO the actual writing in an RPG isn't that important compared to the scenario, the roleplaying opportunities, etc. As I mentioned in the DS:SL thread, that game may not have virtuoso writing, but I love the narrative.)

 

[lukaszek]

Why are they called heroic feats and not traits?
Why traits offer no downside? Don't you feel that they are too strong right now? Especially gifted(that also got no requirements) and mastermind.
Perhaps give gifted requirement like 'at least 6 in each stat' - it would fit it and will no longer be free. Lower skill learning rate or xp bonus.
Make mastermind work for non combat skills only?

Never a fan of no brainer feats and those 2 are.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Why are they called heroic feats and not traits?
Why traits offer no downside? Don't you feel that they are too strong right now? Especially gifted(that also got no requirements) and mastermind.
Perhaps give gifted requirement like 'at least 6 in each stat' - it would fit it and will no longer be free. Lower skill learning rate or xp bonus.
Make mastermind work for non combat skills only?

Never a fan of no brainer feats and those 2 are.

Except many other people are convinced that different heroic feats are the no-brainer ones and the ones you picked are garbage. Welcome to the internet.

 

[lukaszek]

Why are they called heroic feats and not traits?
Why traits offer no downside? Don't you feel that they are too strong right now? Especially gifted(that also got no requirements) and mastermind.
Perhaps give gifted requirement like 'at least 6 in each stat' - it would fit it and will no longer be free. Lower skill learning rate or xp bonus.
Make mastermind work for non combat skills only?

Never a fan of no brainer feats and those 2 are.

Except many other people are convinced that different heroic feats are the no-brainer ones and the ones you picked are garbage. Welcome to the internet.

those people are wrong and probably pass time by throwing dice

 

[Savecummer]

Gifted is only 2 stat points. Dont see the "too strong". Eg, you get 2 more Per which is 10 more acc... its not world shattering...
Cult Leader is most def trash tier.

Also the crit effect of aimed center mass is -2 to Con which is 10 hp but it does not stack wtih dmg done.
So you do 10 dmg, dude goes from 40/40 to 30/40 and to 30/30 form the crit and... thats it. roffles GREATE CRIT
Doesnt stack either so you wont even use and pray for a crit it if there are enemies that are heavy regen.
Would not make sense anyway since you should be trying to focus shit down in a turn.

 

[thesecret1]

The economy works brilliantly. You really have to plan what to buy, and a single expensive consumable can make an impossible fight winnable. Different parties benefit from different gear, so you'll always have to think strategically with your investments.

I have to disagree. I was drowning in money for the most part without even really trying to. Granted though, I did not use consumables much.

 

[Elhoim]

Having a blast but I remember we spoke back when the demo released regarding death animation and you said that you were looking to improve then, are they still on the plans? Or sadly due to budget and time constraints they were a casuality from the to do list?

We are working on that as we speak, will be added in the following updates.

 

[Pink Eye]

The economy works brilliantly. You really have to plan what to buy, and a single expensive consumable can make an impossible fight winnable. Different parties benefit from different gear, so you'll always have to think strategically with your investments.

I have to disagree. I was drowning in money for the most part without even really trying to. Granted though, I did not use consumables much.

It's skewed, yeah. Don't think they intend for you to have that much money at the end of Chapter One. Unless there's going to be money sinks in Chapter Two.

 

[Elhoim]

Hydroponics is a very annoying area to navigate through due to constant fade-to-black faux loading screens. AoD did this too, but I assumed it had something to do with the outdated Torque engine. What's the deal here, why is this necessary?

They will be less of them in the updates later this month, and more interactions with the environment using skill checks.

I do have this bug when facing Braxton, happens every time as soon as combat begins:

We have a fix coming soon, but send me the savegame and I'll fix it for you.

 

[Savecummer]

I think there are things CSG does well in terms of its writing

examples and why

Here is more shit:
There is an ugly tendency to use descriptive language interspersed in repetitive boring, pointless, purple, whogivesafuck way

How many says teh storekeeper, laughs teh storekeeper, stands the storekepper, fucks teh storekeeper, muffles the storekeeper, shits the storekeeper do I have to read? And why?
DISCUSS!

This is not an isolated case. Brevity and wit pl0x.

CSG dialogue is not a novel trying to convey an atmosphere in a scene. Vince's language and feel is not good enough for it.

 

[Takamori]

The economy works brilliantly. You really have to plan what to buy, and a single expensive consumable can make an impossible fight winnable. Different parties benefit from different gear, so you'll always have to think strategically with your investments.

I have to disagree. I was drowning in money for the most part without even really trying to. Granted though, I did not use consumables much.

To rush arena early I had to gas nades my enemies and smoke but thanks to that I was decked in very nice gear.

Having a blast but I remember we spoke back when the demo released regarding death animation and you said that you were looking to improve then, are they still on the plans? Or sadly due to budget and time constraints they were a casuality from the to do list?

We are working on that as we speak, will be added in the following updates.

Thats awesome! Any chance we see the progress in the dev diary or rather push already in a update and see people reaction?

I don't agree with savescummer assessment that everything is shit. But regarding the beginning during the slider where it show the plights of the ship and what you believe,any chance to include questions more oriented regarding childhood, what your character did previously in the Colony Ship, his family and so on? Mcneil quest and Samuel that is Jonas body guard would feel more impactful if the story showed they had any sort of history previously not just a quick insight during character interaction.

Also a good opportunity to see if the PC have some love for the community around him. Evans questioning you which side you gonna pick during Braxton and Jonas feud is interesting have the opportunity to show if you are just a hothead looking for action, wanting to profit over, wanting political and so on.

 

[Savecummer]

savescummer assessment that everything is shit

its not outright shit, its just not good, some things are even below "ok", which is bad
what we learn is that good > ok > bad

well i guess the cnc is good, some might even call it unique and unparalleled, with caveats

 

[MRY]

There is an ugly tendency to use descriptive language interspersed

Not so sure about this criticism. Interspersing non-dialogue with dialogue serves to chunk the information.

"First, let me tell you this," the man says. "Then, I'll tell you something more."

He pauses, then raises a finger, using this filler to indicate a more substantive break. "I'll conclude with this: a last, less related point."

The idea with the non-dialogue above is not actually to dazzle with a turn of phrase. To the contrary, the goal is actually for the non-dialogue be less dramatic than the dialogue, particularly in the first line. It's there to space out and segment the two pieces of information I want the reader to focus on, so that they don't run together. If the reader focuses too much on the non-dialogue, it's counterproductive.

The non-dialogue in the second line is meant to goose the reader a little, so a little more "dazzle" there might be ok -- I want to get the reader to unfocus and then refocus. But even in the second line, a completely unremarkable phrasing would still serve the job, which is primarily to justify a paragraph break and a longer caesura before giving the last information.

That doesn't answer your criticism that CSG's non-dialogue is purple, but none of what you quote looks remotely purple to me. (That said, as I think I've written elsewhere, the pejorative "purple prose" is kind of like "moon logic"; one of those things where it just means "more of a certain quality than I like.")

 

[Goral]

lukaszek
Not sure what you're trying to say by your shit post, yes, I've written a platitude but considering MRV's response it wasn't that obvious. Saying that NPCs must have exaggerated backgrounds to have unique perspective on topics is just stupid, the question is whether it would be interesting enough. But I would think that Faythe who is a diver or Jed who's been living in this world for a longer time than our character could provide some interesting insight without them having "exaggerated backgrounds" (and if anything they already have them, Faythe with "muh tragic past and vengeance" and Jed "has travelled the Ship from stem to stern" and was a big fish until something happened and he ended up in The Pit).

And as I've said, IT devs could always make it optional so that people like MRV who wouldn't be interested in this could just skip it. But how else can we get attached to the characters and be concerned about them if we'll know nothing about them or we'll get to know them during main quest only where we would decide what to do based on rewards only and not the narrative? That's just silly with MRV's attitude where we might as well flip a coin and decide whether to support them or go against them (if the reward would be similar).

Arcanum has done this best (Planescape Torment too where sacrificing one of the companions wasn't an easy thing to do, otherwise it would be a no-brainer) and I would like to see something like this again.

those people are wrong and probably pass time by throwing dice

If you're playing 10 Cha guy cult leader could definitely be better, same goes for 10 STR melee guys, 10 for PER gunners or 10 CON. Not sure about Fast runner since it seems relatively useless at the moment when in all encounters (not counting arena) you have very small spaces and not much room to run. Anyway, I'm pretty sure that going for gifted won't be optimal in the full game considering we can have implants.

 

[Drowed]

The "issue" with AOD and, not too surprisingly, CSG's texts/dialogues/narrative is that unlike most stories, you are following a story about the world and not about its characters. And this is not a bad thing, but it is something you have to get used to.

As Savecummer has said, if you ask basic questions about the characters, you usually just don't get any answers. Who are your parents? Where are they? Do you have other relatives? How did you grow up? Even Fallout tends to offer minimal context regarding these initial motivations and a "call to action" that launches you into the plot. But in the narrative of these games, the characters have no call to action, they are simply living their lives and end up being carried by the flow. Ironically, it is a game where there are various choices and consequences but at the same time your character has no 'will' - he wants nothing in particular (no revenge, no money, no redemption, no saving something or someone), but nevertheless he always ends up getting involved with more and more influential figures and doing things for (or against) them.

The same can be said for the NPCs, you don't see much "human interaction" between people, it's as if they are tools of the world to pass information to you. (Or as VD said once about AOD, they talk about "business", that is the aspect that he explores.) So far, Faythe is actually the character with the most humanized story I've noticed. She wants revenge for what she has suffered, or at least recover what was stolen. Normally this story would stretch very far into a character arc, where Faythe's character would be gradually be tested as she gradually defines herself, or changes, over the course of the story/game, until the moment she finally achieves what she wants. But CSG says "nah, this game isn't about characters" and Faythe's entire "arc" is resolved literally in the first quest involving her. The character arc closes before it even begins, because precisely, this game is not about characters. And it kind of tells you that.

I remember that talking about AOD at some point I commented that the text style of the game makes you feel more like someone watching a documentary about history than a story with characters. It is as if you are following the events that happen more than the people who participate in them - I don't have a strong impression of any character in AOD except Miltiades, but more for the "meme" he has become here than anything else. I have to admit that this is not exactly the style of story that engages me the most, but at the same time, I am glad that VD writes the way he prefers. Because without a doubt, it is something different, it has a specific feel to it. I can't name any other game that has a narrative similar to AOD or CSG, it is something quite particular to VD. And that makes the game itself memorable, the experience as a whole is unique even if the characters themselves are not.

 

[AdolfSatan]

The criticism against writing quality is valid, it needs thinning, and the monotony in tone can get grating. There's a lot that can be said, but iirc, this is just one guy writing everything. It would be great to see them get a proper editor and a secondary writer on board, but would it make any sense? As it stands right now, it's serviceable, none of my nerd friends who played this had any complaints in that regard. Small studios need to make a living, and I'm willing to bet that they've made the numbers, and it simply doesn't add up, forking out another salary just to please a couple of literary autists.

With that being said, the world building is cool as hell and I'm completely hooked with it. Let's not forget also that this is in EA, and if all other areas of the game are still pending a final pass, why should we assume that the writing will not?

We have a fix coming soon, but send me the savegame and I'll fix it for you.

Found a workaround by accident. Pressing Q/E to circle through the chars made the floor spawn properly. Graciela igualmente chango.

 

[MRY]

Saying that NPCs must have exaggerated backgrounds to have unique perspective on topics is just stupid, the question is whether it would be interesting enough.

IMO, the single biggest problem with dialogue, in all media but most especially in video games, is when it isn't going anywhere. In video games, the worst of all is dialogue that isn't going anywhere and isn't actually a form of gameplay. When that's your dialogue, it needs to be really beautiful (and ideally well voiced), or it's just noise and tedium.

There are many genius design choices in AOD, but one of its foremost is that the dialogues were always going somewhere. There were not dialogues for the sake of dialogue ("More words than the the Biblical begats!"). Partly that was Vince making a virtue of necessity. But partly it's just his disposition. His writing drives to a point. The will through the word, and all that. Anyway, it worked extremely well.

Many post-PS:T RPGs (and even some pre-PS:T RPGs) have extensive dialogue trees with branches yielding boughs and boughs yielding twigs. Typically these dialogues go nowhere, and there is no gameplay. The more items on the list you click, the more words and rewards you receive. When the tree is fully pruned, you go on the next one. Because the only form of interaction these dialogues offer is the pick-order of topics, the dialogues are necessarily directionless, and thus inert. Basically, those dialogues are why I stopped playing RPGs. As noted, for that kind of dialogue to bring me any pleasure, the level of craft required of individual sentences is very high. When that enduring pedestrian writing in that quantity means being trampled.

People yearning for more dialogue without stakes and conflict are like people yearning for trash combat. I can live with trash combat if it's fast and beautiful; I can live with trash dialogue if it's fast and beautiful. But otherwise, stakes and conflict are important. To just say, "Faythe and the PC should talk about the Machine" when there is no reason for them to -- the narrative doesn't call for it, their personalities aren't going to be defined by it, etc. -- doesn't make any sense to me. "Real people would talk about it for sure." Yep. And they'd also take a piss break, sleep for 30% of the time, etc. Storytelling is a distillation of reality, not a duplicate of it.

Basically, RPGs can solve this problem in various ways:

- Less dialogue.
- Characters who are conceived as conflict engines occupying extremes on the valances the games measures (e.g., in AD&D, chaos vs. law; good vs. evil; in a game like AOD, the various political/factional divisions). But the key is extremes. They have to either be pulling the PC farther down the spectrum, or repulsing him up the spectrum. It doesn't work to have dialogues that are just like, "I'm at a 51% Good, but this fool here is at 51% Evil. PC, which shall we choose?" Because that "conflict" is inevitably going to require too much elaboration -- too many of the branch/bough/twig type dialogues.
- Dialogues where the choices have some mechanical result (a factional change, a relationship change, a quest path opens/closes).

AOD used extreme versions of 1 and 3, but even AOD had a fair amount of 2.

With all this in mind, I don't see any appeal to a dialogue that goes: "[PlayerName], let me share some thoughts about Hydroponics." "Yes, [Follower], tell me your thoughts about Hydroponics." "Here is some milquetoast view about Hydroponics." "Tell me more." "A smattering of lore and a small character anecdote about myself." "I modestly contradict that sentiment." "My loyalty has marginally declined." The reason this dialogue goes nowhere is because Hydroponics entails no stakes between the PC and the NPC; no NPC is defined vis-a-vis Hydroponics, nor is the PC. No matter how extreme the position you ask the PC to articulate ("So we played god!") if the interlocutor is milquetoast or there are no stakes, the dialogue will go nowhere. It doesn't implicate any of the spectrums the game identifies at the outset; it doesn't have any thematic heft; it has no real consequences; it's just treading water.

Honestly, a long dialogue like that would accomplish no more (and probably less) than simply having Jed say, "Never did like fucking frogs." Or Faythe saying, "Be careful. My father and I came here once, and what we saw... wasn't pleasant." You don't need branches/boughs/twigs for that. If a quip here and there isn't enough to express the range of the character, probably the character is not a good one for vidya. Faythe's payoff isn't "Wow, what a psychologically rich portrait" it's when her basic two or three traits get expressed in a way that advances the game's themes, connects with the game's factions, forces choices that have stakes, etc.

Anyway, no sense arguing further.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

When will the PopeAMole2 fiasco be adressed by the developers? Will they continue to stay silent and pretend as if nothing has happened?

 

[StaticSpine]

The idea with the non-dialogue above is not actually to dazzle with a turn of phrase. To the contrary, the goal is actually for the non-dialogue be less dramatic than the dialogue, particularly in the first line. It's there to space out and segment the two pieces of information I want the reader to focus on, so that they don't run together. If the reader focuses too much on the non-dialogue, it's counterproductive.

The non-dialogue in the second line is meant to goose the reader a little, so a little more "dazzle" there might be ok -- I want to get the reader to unfocus and then refocus. But even in the second line, a completely unremarkable phrasing would still serve the job, which is primarily to justify a paragraph break and a longer caesura before giving the last information.

That doesn't answer your criticism that CSG's non-dialogue is purple, but none of what you quote looks remotely purple to me. (That said, as I think I've written elsewhere, the pejorative "purple prose" is kind of like "moon logic"; one of those things where it just means "more of a certain quality than I like.")

Do you think non-dialog texts in dialog boxes are a necessity?

I always thought of them as something taken from prose when RPGs had a much smaller arsenal of artistic means, and that approach was never revised. You can change phrases like "The shopkeeper laughs" by just starting the line with "Ha-ha" and also show the change of emotions with the tone of dialog lines.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

AOD had pefect wrtiting and story btw. WAY better than other things on the market. It doesnt make any sense to compare it to most other game as there is no competition.

 

[MRY]

Do you think non-dialog texts in dialog boxes are a necessity?

Of course not a necessity. But they are valuable.

I always thought of them as something taken from prose when RPGs had a much smaller arsenal of artistic means, and that approach was never revised.

Hm. Not sure this is right, historically speaking. While RPGs that used paragraph-style text (like the Gold Box games) had non-dialogue, RPGs with dialogue trees like Ultima VII did not use no-dialogue.

You can change phrases like "The shopkeeper laughs" by just starting the line with "Ha-ha" and also show the change of emotions with the tone of dialog lines.

No, it's not a tone issue, it's a matter of how information is parsed and paced. IMO, if you don't use prose, you need to have much shorter lines. We're not accustomed to reading dialogue that goes for much longer than say 20 words without a non-dialogue interjection, so at some point our brains just give up. At least, mine does. That's the "parsing" side of it. The pacing side of it is just like:

(1) "You got me," the guard says, shifting nervously. "I was sleeping when I was supposed to be on duty."

(2) "You got me. I was sleeping when I was supposed to be on duty."

In #1 "the guard says, shifting nervously" is utterly unremarkable, even banal, prose. But I think #1 has a much better pace than #2. The dialogue is identical, but it's more expressive (at least to me). #2 reads very "flat" to me. If I couldn't have the non-dialogue interjection, I guess I might use an ellipsis after "got me," but it still wouldn't be as good.

Obviously, non-dialogue also just lets you do "tell" without "showing." The whole "show don't tell" line may or may no be true for writing literary fiction, but, like: "With one look, you know he's seen more than his share of fights, and left behind more than his share of corpses." Not good writing, sure. But even with Vince's amazing portraits, I'm not sure you can convey that information. Not to mention stuff like, "He points his gun at your left foot. 'As things go, you could lose worse. Shall we start there?'" How would you do that without text in the dialogue box? A very expensive custom animation that the player might not even notice?

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Theme
The same boring, absolutely uninteresting shit as in AOD - decayed society, power struggle,
mexican standoff between factions for a throne.

The theme is actually pretty clear and established during the first seconds of the game.
You play as intermediate generation which was sacrificed by your progenitors for the sake of your/their descendants. You are not the one benefiting from making that choice, and you are not the one who made that choice for yourself, thus you are the ones who have to endure deprivations without any benefits for yourselves. Should you bear the costs with hope and optimism that it's not going to be fruitless or plunge in despair and decadence? Especially considering that the fanatical conviction and beliefs of your predecessors don't hold anymore after the mutiny? I think that's a pretty interesting and strong theme. Very relevant too, considering how apathetic, depressed and hedonistic modern society has become. It remains to be seen how well this theme will be developed, but there is a lot of potential. Judging by the AOD Iron Tower is a company which is able to provide a satisfying conclusion for themes they put into their games like no other developer.

 

[StaticSpine]

Do you think non-dialog texts in dialog boxes are a necessity?

Of course not a necessity. But they are valuable.

I always thought of them as something taken from prose when RPGs had a much smaller arsenal of artistic means, and that approach was never revised.

Hm. Not sure this is right, historically speaking. While RPGs that used paragraph-style text (like the Gold Box games) had non-dialogue, RPGs with dialogue trees like Ultima VII did not use no-dialogue.

You can change phrases like "The shopkeeper laughs" by just starting the line with "Ha-ha" and also show the change of emotions with the tone of dialog lines.

No, it's not a tone issue, it's a matter of how information is parsed and paced. IMO, if you don't use prose, you need to have much shorter lines. We're not accustomed to reading dialogue that goes for much longer than say 20 words without a non-dialogue interjection, so at some point our brains just give up. At least, mine does. That's the "parsing" side of it. The pacing side of it is just like:

(1) "You got me," the guard says, shifting nervously. "I was sleeping when I was supposed to be on duty."

(2) "You got me. I was sleeping when I was supposed to be on duty."

In #1 "the guard says, shifting nervously" is utterly unremarkable, even banal, prose. But I think #1 has a much better pace than #2. The dialogue is identical, but it's more expressive (at least to me). #2 reads very "flat" to me. If I couldn't have the non-dialogue interjection, I guess I might use an ellipsis after "got me," but it still wouldn't be as good.

Obviously, non-dialogue also just lets you do "tell" without "showing." The whole "show don't tell" line may or may no be true for writing literary fiction, but, like: "With one look, you know he's seen more than his share of fights, and left behind more than his share of corpses." Not good writing, sure. But even with Vince's amazing portraits, I'm not sure you can convey that information. Not to mention stuff like, "He points his gun at your left foot. 'As things go, you could lose worse. Shall we start there?'" How would you do that without text in the dialogue box? A very expensive custom animation that the player might not even notice?

I got your point. It seems, we just value different things.

For me, dialog/text in game is primarily a source of delivering useful information. First of all, it must be functional, if it keeps brevity and has some flavor - awesome, if not, okay, I still got my info. In your example, I don't care which of my feet the guy is pointing gun at. The useful info for me is that he's threatening me.

But anyway, thank you for explaining your point in detail.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Obviously, non-dialogue also just lets you do "tell" without "showing." The whole "show don't tell" line may or may no be true for writing literary fiction, but, like: "With one look, you know he's seen more than his share of fights, and left behind more than his share of corpses." Not good writing, sure. But even with Vince's amazing portraits, I'm not sure you can convey that information.

This is a pretty bad example though. You (the player) don't actually "know" that character seen his share of fights. It's an assumption which is made FOR the player by the character he supposedly controls, not by the player himself based on the information which was presented to him. This is not just meaningless peace of prose, its actually a lie and a bad taste in crpg writing. Something like this can only be written by a person who doesnt think about what he actually says in his text.