Kenshi - open-ended sandbox RPG set in a desert world

[ntonystinson]

If the game releases as it is with no future updates except memory optimisation and crash fixs it would still be a very good game

 

[huckc]

The only major thing missing for me is diplomacy and town assaults, which is planned before release iirc.

 

[Metro]

Second behind only Overgrowth in the perma-Early Access sweepstakes.

 

[Azazel]

After some 12 years since this first showed up on Gamedev.net as a proof of concept, I think it's pretty damn fun to play now.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Well, this looks to be approaching its official 1.0 release, so I went ahead an bought it. It's rarely on sale and the price is supposed to go up after the full release happens, so I figured I'd jump on this 20%.



I've been watching this game for years and it's always been intriguing to me. Was wondering if anyone around here has been playing it recently?

 

[Azazel]

It's fuckin' baller once you get a good base rolling and go explore the world. Graft some robot arms on people and shit, good times.

 

[ColCol]

Power to them for sticking to the project.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

My cousin says it's great! I'm waiting for 1.0 before I try. Been following this game from the start like everybody else

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Was wondering if anyone around here has been playing it recently?

New Map's pretty cool. Definitely has that lovely vibe of starting as a wuss that can potentially become the scourge of your foes, a la Gothic, Mount and Blade etc. Rather stable, but then now I'm waiting for 1.0 like ever'un else.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Was wondering if anyone around here has been playing it recently?

I spawned a robot and a dog.
Tried to loot someone who had gone down in a fight, his friends beat my team up.

 

[Filthy Sauce]

My cousin says it's great

SOLD!

 

[thesheeep]

Whenever I tested the game, the performance has been abysmal, though.
I had to disable pretty much every graphical feature to get a stable frame rate - that was on an i7 with 16gig RAM and a 970 GTX, so it was REALLY strange.
Maybe they invested into performance optimizations in recent months, in that case I'd be willing to give it another shot.

 

[Zombra]

I took the plunge. Installed on my SSD on my power rig and the game runs fine.

MAN this is time consuming. First thing I wanted to do was learn how to grow food so I wouldn't have to spend 800gp, which I didn't have, on a ham sandwich every day. Note that in its current state this is a game you really have to read a beginners' guide to, but I don't like spoilers so I avoided them.

Over the course of five and a half hours I was able to:

* build a small shack (easy)
* hit mineral outcrops with a magic pickaxe from my back pocket (easy)
* not pick up minerals (early game's central mystery)
* buy cheap, inedible fruit from a merchant
* build a small farming area by planting fruit seeds (easy)
* not grow anything because you need water
* build a well (easy)
* spend hours drawing water and pouring it on the farm
* spend most of this time starving
* get the shit beaten out of me by passing bandits 6 times
* finally grow more of the same, inedible fruit
* grow much less than I had to plant to start the farm in the first place
* build a research bench
* learn the concept of boxes
* learn nothing about how to make food
* look up a walkthrough on how to pick up minerals off the ground so I can sell them
* buy an ancient research book
* invent the very concept of cooking food
* build a stove
* learn the recipe for cooked vegetables
* gather all ingredients to use at the stove

Then I am told I cannot cook anything because in order to make the stove work

Spoiler

I have to invent electricity first

How the fuck did humanity survive up to now

Gonna go play some more.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I took the plunge. Installed on my SSD on my power rig and the game runs fine.

MAN this is time consuming. First thing I wanted to do was learn how to grow food so I wouldn't have to spend 800gp, which I didn't have, on a ham sandwich every day. Note that in its current state this is a game you really have to read a beginners' guide to, but I don't like spoilers so I avoided them.

Over the course of five and a half hours I was able to:

* build a small shack (easy)
* hit mineral outcrops with a magic pickaxe from my back pocket (easy)
* not pick up minerals (early game's central mystery)
* buy cheap, inedible fruit from a merchant
* build a small farming area by planting fruit seeds (easy)
* not grow anything because you need water
* build a well (easy)
* spend hours drawing water and pouring it on the farm
* spend most of this time starving
* get the shit beaten out of me by passing bandits 6 times
* finally grow more of the same, inedible fruit
* grow much less than I had to plant to start the farm in the first place
* build a research bench
* learn the concept of boxes
* learn nothing about how to make food
* look up a walkthrough on how to pick up minerals off the ground so I can sell them
* buy an ancient research book
* invent the very concept of cooking food
* build a stove
* learn the recipe for cooked vegetables
* gather all ingredients to use at the stove

Then I am told I cannot cook anything because in order to make the stove work

Spoiler

I have to invent electricity first

How the fuck did humanity survive up to now

Gonna go play some more.

I just went with the ol' follow a buncha dudes around, pick up loot until you're overburdened, walk till you're free of encumbrances, then go and get some dudes to hang back and heal you while you get beaten up. THEN you go base building.

 

[Zombra]

I just went with the ol' follow a buncha dudes around, pick up loot until you're overburdened, walk till you're free of encumbrances, then go and get some dudes to hang back and heal you while you get beaten up. THEN you go base building.

Yeah. I think I'm just going to wander the earth for a while and mine copper when I see it, then buy ham sandwiches with that. Try to find a place where crops can grow at better than 10% efficiency.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I just went with the ol' follow a buncha dudes around, pick up loot until you're overburdened, walk till you're free of encumbrances, then go and get some dudes to hang back and heal you while you get beaten up. THEN you go base building.

Yeah. I think I'm just going to wander the earth for a while and mine copper when I see it, then buy ham sandwiches with that. Try to find a place where crops can grow at better than 10% efficiency.

If you're starting with one dude, build his strength and toughness first and foremost. Rest will follow.

 

[Mebrilia the Viera Queen]

Kenshi was indeed a surprise fo me.
This is one of those early access title that for me deserved, even with all the limitations the developer actually managed to do a nice work and implemented the features that were annunced. The game is close to release i say give it a try.

 

[Mebrilia the Viera Queen]

Another thing to add.. People you can play the game now even if in early access.. The game unlike bethesda games have a pretty nice anti bloat save system.. If a save is corrupted you can generate a new game but injecting in all the progression you did.. So in the end even if a new game is generated the progression you made is totally saved.

 

[Zombra]

Update: I realize that part of my problem with my first farm was I was planting my fruit seeds in the desert, basically trying to grow them in solid rock. I determine that my first "real" base will be built in a fertile area ... and since there are other helpful materials out there I decide I shall build my first base in the perfect spot, a place with easy access to stone, iron, and copper, yet also with unlimited fresh groundwater and lush, fertile soil available. With my dream team of a burned-out prostitute, an insane old man, and a dishonored klingon shek shield maiden - the only people I can find who are so worthless they volunteer to join up for free - I travel halfway across the continent in search of the perfect homestead.

After many travails, I find it. Oh yes. All nature's gifts are in abundance here, and not a competing settlement for miles.

The only problem? A landscape swarming with towering, ravenous dinosaur ... with ... beak ... things. These two-ton monsters eat their body weight in noobs daily and they travel in packs. Their vision is sharp and during the day they can spot you from half a mile away ... and cover that half a mile in 15 seconds to kill you. No wonder there's no town here. The beak things' one saving grace is that they aren't too bright. After hours of trial and error I finally learn that if I break line of sight when they're chasing me, they may discontinue their attack. I hastily build a hut to hide in and sit inside all day, crammed in the tiny, sweaty room with my three four companions (having freed an escaped slave who I found half dead face down in the snow, still in his chains) for hours on end, waiting for the sun to go down. This ugly wigwam shall become my Xanadu, my Shangri-La. I call my new kingdom the Valley of a Thousand Beaks.

With time and excruciating effort I learn how to build a wall without it collapsing. My hope is that the beak things are too dumb to knock down walls if they can't see the tasty meal (me) on the other side. X-ray vision they ain't got. As I begin my long labors of surrounding all my nearby resource collection points into a single walled compound, I receive a message that "the Reavers" are coming for the citizens of the Valley. Risking much, I dare to work during the daytime, desperate to get the wall in place before the assault. There is much hiding among the rocks of the quarry as I play dinosaur-and-mouse with the beak things. My wall is too ambitious and the beak things are too persistent - my labors are in vain. The barrier is not half completed when the Reavers come knocking. They are over a score of them, in black armor and carrying chains and shackles to imprison us and brainwash us into their grisly service. Laughing as they walk around the edges of the wall, the Reavers advance, but find ... no one.

I have become so good at hiding from the beak things that hiding from a few assassin scouts is child's play. And then ... and then.

THEY come.

I never cross swords with a single Reaver. To be honest, I'm not sure they ever even saw me. The Reavers seem to be as dangerous as they look - they fight valiantly and even manage to kill several of the beak things, paying dearly for every victory ... but ... this is the land of the beaks. The Reavers brought a strong force, but the beak things simply never. Stop. Coming.

During the confusion I am even able to get some more work done on the wall. When it is all over there are dinosaur carcasses and bloody black armor strewn everywhere. Across the countryside, beak things can be seen devouring the wounded, whose screams will haunt my nightmares until the end of days. Picking off the few wounded beasts still in the immediate area is hardly child's play, but the odds are right and we drive them out. Soon afterwards, the wall is finished. As hoped, the beak things show no further interest in causing trouble.

And now that I am safe behind my walls ... it has come time to leave my precious Valley to trade for much needed supplies from the nearest town ... miles away through beak thing lands.

 

[Mebrilia the Viera Queen]

And that is why i loved this game... Despite being a large open world each game feel different and you are always under a sensation of paranoia, but what i like most si the dynamism this game have to offer in the end the past day you were traveling and buy supplies... then the next day you could end in a ambush and have your stuff stolen and your party members captured or killed.

To me this game is a massive incline.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Update: I realize that part of my problem with my first farm was I was planting my fruit seeds in the desert, basically trying to grow them in solid rock. I determine that my first "real" base will be built in a fertile area ... and since there are other helpful materials out there I decide I shall build my first base in the perfect spot, a place with easy access to stone, iron, and copper, yet also with unlimited fresh groundwater and lush, fertile soil available. With my dream team of a burned-out prostitute, an insane old man, and a dishonored klingon shek shield maiden - the only people I can find who are so worthless they volunteer to join up for free - I travel halfway across the continent in search of the perfect homestead.

After many travails, I find it. Oh yes. All nature's gifts are in abundance here, and not a competing settlement for miles.

The only problem? A landscape swarming with towering, ravenous dinosaur ... with ... beak ... things. These two-ton monsters eat their body weight in noobs daily and they travel in packs. Their vision is sharp and during the day they can spot you from half a mile away ... and cover that half a mile in 15 seconds to kill you. No wonder there's no town here. The beak things' one saving grace is that they aren't too bright. After hours of trial and error I finally learn that if I break line of sight when they're chasing me, they may discontinue their attack. I hastily build a hut to hide in and sit inside all day, crammed in the tiny, sweaty room with my three four companions (having freed an escaped slave who I found half dead face down in the snow, still in his chains) for hours on end, waiting for the sun to go down. This ugly wigwam shall become my Xanadu, my Shangri-La. I call my new kingdom the Valley of a Thousand Beaks.

With time and excruciating effort I learn how to build a wall without it collapsing. My hope is that the beak things are too dumb to knock down walls if they can't see the tasty meal (me) on the other side. X-ray vision they ain't got. As I begin my long labors of surrounding all my nearby resource collection points into a single walled compound, I receive a message that "the Reavers" are coming for the citizens of the Valley. Risking much, I dare to work during the daytime, desperate to get the wall in place before the assault. There is much hiding among the rocks of the quarry as I play dinosaur-and-mouse with the beak things. My wall is too ambitious and the beak things are too persistent - my labors are in vain. The barrier is not half completed when the Reavers come knocking. They are over a score of them, in black armor and carrying chains and shackles to imprison us and brainwash us into their grisly service. Laughing as they walk around the edges of the wall, the Reavers advance, but find ... no one.

I have become so good at hiding from the beak things that hiding from a few assassin scouts is child's play. And then ... and then.

THEY come.

I never cross swords with a single Reaver. To be honest, I'm not sure they ever even saw me. The Reavers seem to be as dangerous as they look - they fight valiantly and even manage to kill several of the beak things, paying dearly for every victory ... but ... this is the land of the beaks. The Reavers brought a strong force, but the beak things simply never. Stop. Coming.

During the confusion I am even able to get some more work done on the wall. When it is all over there are dinosaur carcasses and bloody black armor strewn everywhere. Across the countryside, beak things can be seen devouring the wounded, whose screams will haunt my nightmares until the end of days. Picking off the few wounded beasts still in the immediate area is hardly child's play, but the odds are right and we drive them out. Soon afterwards, the wall is finished. As hoped, the beak things show no further interest in causing trouble.

And now that I am safe behind my walls ... it has come time to leave my precious Valley to trade for much needed supplies from the nearest town ... miles away through beak thing lands.

What? You didn't loot assassins corpses?

 

[thesheeep]

I never cross swords with a single Reaver. To be honest, I'm not sure they ever even saw me. The Reavers seem to be as dangerous as they look - they fight valiantly and even manage to kill several of the beak things, paying dearly for every victory ... but ... this is the land of the beaks. The Reavers brought a strong force, but the beak things simply never. Stop. Coming.

During the confusion I am even able to get some more work done on the wall. When it is all over there are dinosaur carcasses and bloody black armor strewn everywhere. Across the countryside, beak things can be seen devouring the wounded, whose screams will haunt my nightmares until the end of days. Picking off the few wounded beasts still in the immediate area is hardly child's play, but the odds are right and we drive them out. Soon afterwards, the wall is finished. As hoped, the beak things show no further interest in causing trouble.

And now that I am safe behind my walls ... it has come time to leave my precious Valley to trade for much needed supplies from the nearest town ... miles away through beak thing lands.

What? You didn't loot assassins corpses?

Spoiler

 

[Zombra]

The beak things used to peck on my door but couldn't get in while my engineers fortified it. They would peck and peck then give up and wander off. Now that I put some crossbows on the wall, they can't figure out what's hurting them. They peck and peck until they get killed. And as always, they keep coming. My one hauler literally doesn't have time to strip their valuable hides and move them to storage before more of them come and die. With a single tech advance, the Valley of Beaks has transformed from a terror-ridden hiding spot to a fucking gold mine.

P.S. I want to thank ERYFKRAD for his excellent advice above ... which of course I chose to ignore. I didn't want to turn into a one-man invincible army - I can play a million games with that power fantasy. I liked the game's conceit of just being some jerk in a world that didn't notice me, truly starting at zero. May sound weird, but it's been great having to sneak and run away from everything. I love that he played his way and I played mine and we're both "right".

 

[Mebrilia the Viera Queen]

Seems you will not have food and hide problems anymore! :D

 

[Enrymion]

I guess if I had picked a snowy place to settle or something I might have not gotten so frustrated with the amount of time I had to spend just to figure out where all the browngrey NPCs or their bodies on the browngrey ground were. Still I think their excuse for not having any easily visible indicators for NPCs within your line of sight being just so they can surprise you is kind of stupid considering how much time it can end up wasting.

Was really fun game other than that.