a multiplayer game of parenting and civilization building
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Would be more excited if I could hang items (maybe not every item, maybe just tools) on the wall. Or if there were shelves or more stacking.
Here are the results.
I'm curious about people's experiences with griefers.
Some of the time the town can get overwhelming with all of the action and noise and talking so if I'm a dude or if I'm about to hit 40 I grab the horse and ride out to get milkweed or iron or both. It's always needed and I can come back with 4 lassos right quick.
But, whenever I do this when I come back there is some kind of nonsense going on. Murders, baited bears, suspicious puppy farm, etc.
Is this a coincidence or do other "cheerful worker" type players also notice this? I mean I don't do very much to put a stop to nonsense and nonsense is very common, but when I come back once and there is a bear loose (Why do people just stand there looking at the bear?? I've only ever been eaten in the wild trying to kill them...) things calm down I go away again and this time I come back to 4 murders.
It's annoying since I can't sort out who did what when this happens.
Anyone else? I'm kinda glad to "miss" the "action" but still murder chains kill good towns.
This is so cool. Show your deepest root ya'll...
The rocks at stonehenge would crush most carts.
I built some of my first stone walls today and the animation of running slowly with a rock made me think about how people moved large stone in Egypt and at Stonehenge. You would have rollers (straight shaft) and a team of people pulling a rope. What if we had a "huge rock" item that could be found in stone biomes but maybe not all of them? What if it takes two people pulling and one moving the roller to get those suckers? But you can make an obelisk, or a stone pillar or cut it up to get 4 or 5 big stones so it would be a faster way to make stone rooms, but you must coordinate the task...
Anyway, I had no idea moving stones took that long I moved enough for someone else to make the room. Maybe they will.
Yes yes I know some don't like stone walls because they can't be removed when they get old, but really... they look better.
I like the one hour limit too. It gives you time to reflect and not get caught in a kind of daze of playing some game for hours and hours. You stop. Maybe another life? maybe not.
This would probably be impossible to implement, and it would be an incredibly massive amount of data to store, but what if each ground tile had a health value?
Let's say that a grassland tile has 100 health - every time a cart, horse rider, or car crosses that tile the health of the tile goes down by one. You could also use a road making machine (a massive boulder sledge or something) to deal ten damage to that grass tile. Once the tile's health goes down below twenty it becomes a dirt road. Health would go up over time, so if a road stops being used it would go back to a normal tile. Something like this sounds completely impossible to implement, but I think it would make for interesting gameplay.
This is such a neat idea.
In all my one lives something's changed.
So, I've been thinking about the conflict and caring issue and I think one factor is diversity of character models. One of the first things that attracted me to the game was the neat and diverse selection of people you might play as. Now after playing quite a bit I feel like I see the same faces over and over. Ideally, the way that you look would be unique, one of a kind. (and I realize that is a ton of work) One thing that could help is some swappable parts and randomization. For example, there could be a few different mouths, eyes and hair styles for some of the models and you get one at random so fewer people look exactly alike. The tattoo and jewelry ideas are also good. I particularly like anything and is permanent and native to a model to better tell people apart. There are probably interface reasons for it, but a little variation in adult height could be neat too. And of course more models overall.
I just had a pretty nasty experience where I was born with the black girl with braids model and my aunt tried to give me a really racist name that was a blend of two words (it ended up as Niguel fill in the blank) I told her that she was rude and quit out of that town only to be born as *her* son and she is going on and on about how "watch out for Niguel" and basically making stuff up about me. It was pretty funny and I considered waiting around to tell her the same thing again but then just decided I didn't want to play with some one like that and quit again.
I do think the rareness of those models makes such things happen more often or at least makes it more temping to be foolish and rude like that. Though, in the end it's on her.
But, back to the main point: the more unique you look the more valuable keep that person alive can seem. You might not get to play as that face again for ages.
Is there any way to outsource or streamline the avatar design process? For example the more tedious parts, like making masks and re-sizing?
I mean, are you worried about trans fats or something? Lot of chips used to be cooked in palm oil, now they use sunflower and I can't eat chips anymore. It's a disgrace. LOL.
Palm oil is used for food? I don't see the issue. Also I'm allergic to sunflowers so irrationally hate this.
I've always wished that the linage showed the "long lines" where I was in the early generations rather than "you were generation 59" I don't find that exciting because those lives tend to be in large towns where it's hard to have any real impact and staying alive is generally easier. If I knew that a line that I was a part of in the first generations was about to die out I WOULD care, I often watch the eve towns I was a part of closely to see how long they lasted, to see if I did enough to keep things going.
But, it's hard to find the lineages with the way it's set up now. What I want is "greatest number of decedents" and "most generations after you" information.
Death of the family being death of the world is a bit interesting. But, to keep the later generations invested there needs to be more ways to leave your mark. A "death screen shot" could be one way, that way you could stand near what ever you accomplished and say some fitting last words to let the people before you know that you kept it going and didn't let them down.
PS I'm not anti-role playing. I just don't think you should do it unless there is a basket of pies for every person in town (large surplus) and all of the farms have been organized and are ready to start up. To their credit if you start doing work in the area people are lingering most people will join in and help... a little.
Unlike Jason I think this game is pretty good, up to the point that you have a large town. That's when a kind of laziness seems to set in, or maybe lazy people are just attracted to places with stacks of food. This leads to disorganization and a lot of clutter and repeated crisis where the people role playing suddenly notice there are no pies. I think some of the nicest game experiences are when you can do a task with another person and it just works since you have the same goal and both know what's up. In young towns people are focused and busty and new miles stone happen all the time
"we have sheep!"
"we have a deep well!"
"I found iron!"
"we have a pump!"
"we have a cow!"
Then the milestones run out and you have these project that are often done by a few players who like really complex long task over several lifetime like making the radio or the car etc. These things don't really help a village much like the other items do. Most of the players in such towns aren't helping with the radio, they are tripping over the parts an making everything harder to find for anyone who cares about it later. End game tasks are not widely understood so even players who are focused on organizing and keeping things running can't do much about the clutter.
Because starving is the main way people die new milestones need to touch on food production in some way IMO.
Currently we have four skin tones in the game - A, C, D, and F. Skin tones C and D have six distinct characters per set (three males and three females), while A & F have only three (two female and one male). As the A & F sets are not 'complete' (there's less than four characters in the set) they can not have babies in their own skin tone, which means they can only appear as random tiny chance from their respective adjacent skin tones.
Agree! I also think there needs to be one more skin tone between C and D, the difference is just kind of extreme and it would improve symmetry.
For example, using the current curse system, you could have it be that people are more likely to give birth to players who have a lifetime curse value close to their own. People with very high curse values give birth to more griefers. People with very low curse values give birth to more pacifist players. People with average curse scores give birth to more average players. Over time, villages that kill or exclude griefers would be less likely to have them born to their towns. Villages that encourage or turn a blind eye to random murder would be more likely to have high-curse players born into them. You would still have the chance to get a "bad" kid or a "good" kid, if there was no better match available from the pool of fertile females. And towns that are experiencing a population boom would be more likely to gain abnormal offspring. This would also mean that your curse score would have a lasting impact on your game experience and future lives. Living a more violent life would lead you to being around more violence. While living a more peaceful life would increase your chances of being born into a more peaceful village. A kind of "genetic heritage".
I think this is a brilliant idea and I think it could be positive for people with high and low curse values. I don't like the idea of a private server because they tend to be empty and I'd rather deal with nonsense than be alone in an empty place. Players who want more "excitement" would get it. I don't think that any totally restrictive system is good or realistic, but this could help with Jason's "have cultures" goal since not all towns would be the same. Some would be full of try hard goody two shoes and others filled with "helpful" greifers. (being a bit tongue and cheek there if it isn't obvious)
I wonder what other people think?
Alternatively, you could take a very different approach to the idea of grouping. Allow people to join clans or groups - like The Builders or The Daddy Diesels or The Guardians or The Farmers. You could assign yourself to specific clan/group/occupation in the screen before being born and this clan affiliation would be visible in-game beside your name "John Smith the Baker". Through out that life, you would be literally labeled as belonging to the selected group and other members of the group would be able to see that you are one of them. This could be used to allow people to coordinate in-game and find other people with similar interests and skill levels. Perhaps the available occupations could be unlocked by doing certain things in-game. So you might start off only having access to the group "The Noobs", but as you advance further in the game and learn how to farm crops or tend berry bushes, you unlock access to The Farmers group. And later on, you unlock access to The Bakers group by building an adobe oven and baking a certain number of pies in-game. This kind of grouping might change the social landscape of an OHOL village in interesting ways.
I don't like this idea as much because it seems unnatural. I do think that being a nice and helpful person attracts other such people to you mostly. I do think being bold and cut-throat also has an impact and I don't think civilizations can function with only one type of personality. This would also ruin opportunities to teach new players which is something I love to do when I get the chance and it would mean fewer chances to learn.
I really like the burying idea but i think it should also require a grave.
I think it should be separate from curses because we would not want people cursing just to blacklist people they don’t like (for example role players should not be curse by those who wish to avoid them) also any black list must be soft we don’t have enough players to sustain all of the restrictions this could cause. So it would be more like an avoidance list than a true black list.
Honestly what’s worse than greifing is being a pest. In one town one of my kids decided to focus on annoying me (i think because I had two knives and didn’t want to give her one choosing to recycle in instead I could see how that might seem like a slight but she was 7 years old come on) She followed me snatching items I was using standing to block me from picking things up. I think she wanted me to stab her (is that a thing? trying to get killed?) I didn’t stab her but I lost interest in playing and just did mundane things she couldn’t botch. The town needed food and I didn’t want to waste time talking about it. It was so much more annoying than greifing. Let the sheep out eat all the carrots but don’t shadow me like that. I wonder if she was really mad or laughing and misery and occasional “please stop” “please move”. “PLEASE”
I often think about what a town would be like if everyone on some of these forum threads were there at this forum we reach consensus from time to time and it’s reflected in the game I’ll see one of pein’s berry entrances to a pen or someone is digging a row of bushes from a gross too large berry patch and I think
“I’m gonna help them make it happen” often I never find out if I knew them from here or not. So, what if something similar to twin code put you in a group and you are more likely to be born into that lineage. There would still be time bans and it would not be exclusive. But it could give families more character in game.
What about bumper biomes? In one biome milkweed gives string. In another trees give extra wood. In another crops grow faster. In another wild foods respawn. etc. Space these out and people will focus more on the "bumper" from their region.
I tried starting a new town once as a young girl. The town was huge that I was in so I packed a cart and found a good spot. Every kid I had just wanted to go back. They we really vocal about not liking that I wanted to start a new camp. If I try it again I will just say that I'm lost.
I recently played a game where my first two kids suicided when they saw my eve "camp" I was 22 and all I'd done is found a spot with soil and water and laid out some clay. I had a suspicion what it was... I spent the next 7 min. frantically gathering carrots from the desert. I had about 13 wild carrots next to the clay when my next child was born. She stayed so did the rest. Players want to see some food when they start out. An empty area is scary since you could work hard and just die starving.
I think that fear of starving is what keeps people in towns. It's why when I wander out of town I find so much stuff just sitting there that no one has touched for generations. Newer players especially. When I was a bit newer I was alway happy to spawn in a big town since there would be food and I could play longer.
Anyway getting people to leave is tough.
One idea would be if there were some kind of "map" that would lead you to a nearby ruin. It might be more appealing to leave if there is a destination.
One more comment I think that in real life often wars are a function of the ruling class. Kings and presidents wage wars, ordinary people are only as invested as they can be taught to be by propaganda. So, in culture you need to have class before you have war.
We have crowns, but they don't have any power. And who wants to play the game and not be in the ruling class if you start that dynamic? For it to work you'd need a ton of people to play as "followers" and that isn't really appealing gameplay.
I think the most we might see are Hatfield's McCoy's type feuds. But a feud isn't a war. It's just escalating small scale violence over mostly nothing.
Ok but even if you change oil and let people chain again I don't see "war" happening. If my town's oil kept getting swiped by another town I'd probably just move to the other town and work there. I don't see towns not wanting people who produce food and build and making things interesting. Maybe people who build more than I do would care, but what I'd see happening is the town with more people producing more and making it nicer wins not by "war" but by immigration. They get all the people. I also don't care to bring food to an army or police just to guard some well.
Maybe if you also made it so you couldn't just move for some reason, like you can't use the food as efficiently outside of town. But that feels contrived.