I do find it really odd that a lot of the micro-economical flexibility of Sunless Sea seems to have been removed. Not in terms of money - trading be and smuggling are on the horizon - but in terms of the trade-offs you make with basic ship features.
You can’t run without lights to conserve fuel at the cost of terror, can’t overstoke the engines to increase speed at the cost of fuel and possibly hull, can’t swell your crew as a buffer against terror at the cost of supplies, can’t reduce crew to conserve supplies, balancing it against the dreaded speed gate for being below 50%… These were all important choices when I played Sunless Sea. Can you use supplies to repair hull now? I don’t know about that last one…
Anyway, I know it’s early days, and features will surely be added between now and true launch, but at the moment the inclusion of tracked engine heat (while cool) and hungry bats (not so cool) just don’t make up for what’s been removed, in my eyes. I’m loving the game - it’s just shy of some features I was definitely expecting.
I feel like making the game so much more user friendly compared to it’s prequel might have actually taken away some of it’s charm.
In Sunless Sea I loved the fact that I was becoming a better Zee captain not only because my stats rose, but also in a real way - learning all the tricks as I was getting deeper into the game. So far I’m missing this in the Skies.
I’d like to see a rehash of the old Light mechanic. Perhaps you keep the boiler stoked, meaning terror goes up slower, but the minimum heat of the ship is at 30% instead of 0%, so you have less room for maneuvers in combat.
But yeah, I agree, we’re missing some of the more intresting micro management that was present in SSeas.
Jimmius, that is very much along the lines on what I was thinking - the fuel/terror interplay was pretty central to sunless sea for me, I could see a fuel/heat/terror mechanic working really well for skies.
Regarding the light issue, i’d really like to see some kind of active-use radar added, like zubmariner’s sonar. Which could show us which nearby things are solid, and which we can fly over/under, as well as perhaps detecting nearby ships and creatures. It could have a fuel cost to use
[quote=Pan Tofel]I feel like making the game so much more user friendly compared to it’s prequel might have actually taken away some of it’s charm.
In Sunless Sea I loved the fact that I was becoming a better Zee captain not only because my stats rose, but also in a real way - learning all the tricks as I was getting deeper into the game. So far I’m missing this in the Skies.[/quote]
I do have to agree with this, it feels like many things have been simplified, but the mechanics that were streamlined have lost skill and meaningful choices in the process.
I’m all for streamlining to remove clutter and tedium, but here it seems like some actual gameplay has been removed
A heat mechanic could be tied in with the Guests too, they’re attracted to heat and lived in spaces. So you could stoke the heat to fend off terror but you use more resources and you might attract unwanted attention. And different ship hulls could do a better/worse job at hiding your heat expenditure.
I dunno if they simply haven’t had the time to implement these or whether it’s streamlining to 1) genuinely make things better and more convenient for their players or 2) make it more appealing to a broader audience. If it’s the latter, these games are always gonna be super niche, there are insurmountable entry barriers waaay before we even get to convenience mechanics. Rather expand and lock down the niche than trying to grow beyond it.
I have to admit that the reason I loved SSea so much is because it had many esoteric and weird features that ended up alienating most players. Hard to say where the trade-off should go in that regard.