Hey there! Is there a way to make the journal more user-friendly, or at least organize it better? I’ve just been playing the game for a few days and the journal feature feels completely unintuitive and awkward. Now it has only about 3 pages (i’ve only been recording things i find relevant to the bigger stories) but what’s gonna happen when it reaches something like 30? This is looking like a really big game, with lots of information, so i’m sure to forget a lot of story-related stuff. And it seems like a daunting task navigating through that huge sea (zee?) of unrelated entries.
So, is there an index feature i’m missing? Or a place where all of this is centralised?
edited by Iskandryu on 8/18/2016
No, not yet! The journal is a weird system. However, there has been an announcement about changes to the journal system within the last few weeks, so you can join the rest of us in waiting and hoping for better things!
EDIT: relevant announcement here: http://community.failbettergames.com/topic22815-retiring-reminiscing-about-ambitions.aspx#post157702
edited by Barselaar on 8/18/2016
At the moment the journal isn’t particularly helpful. It’s just chronological and digging out something more than a few pages back is extremely difficult. That said, it sounds like there are some improvements come to it in the not too distant future. The ability to "reminisce" about your ambitions was recently removed in preparation for this.
Well, I did find an older forum post from about 2012 where the developers were saying they want to improve the journal, asking people’s opinions on what should be done, and everybody was saying "indexing feature" for a full 3 pages. And that apparently didn’t happen…
I am actually curious how you guys managed to get by with this. I do feel it takes quite a bit out of the story if you’re not able to remember things from the past, and how things are connected
edited by Iskandryu on 8/18/2016
[quote=Iskandryu]Well, I did find an older forum post from about 2012 where the developers were saying they want to improve the journal, asking people’s opinions on what should be done, and everybody was saying "indexing feature" for a full 3 pages. And that apparently didn’t happen…
I am actually curious how you guys managed to get by with this. I do feel it takes quite a bit out of the story if you’re not able to remember things from the past, and how things are connected
edited by Iskandryu on 8/18/2016[/quote]
As you’ll discover from digging into these Forums, some people make spreadsheets or other reference documents to keep track of important information…
It’s worth bearing in mind that the "echoing" capability the journal represents was originally an "echo" to one’s Twitter feed, and served mostly to entice people into playing the game. (That’s how I became involved with Fallen London, approximately 7 years ago). The current version evolved when it became apparent that repeated echoing was not serving a useful function, for FBG or anyone else. I am sure FBG will get around to adding indexing to it, but they have been kind of busy with other kinds of changes.