Please don’t add unlimited fast travel. Maybe a limited fast travel in the end game, but you would have to grind it and it will be expensive. Like the idea of paying it with Plague ichor or runes that get destroyed after use. If you implement a fast travel and then you change it, it will backlash against you.
And please don’t change bows or basic spells to Stamina. ATM bows are secondary weapons and hence must be FOCUS oriented. Wands and other spells work fine as they are.
Instead, please just release and implement new range MAIN weapons as you mentioned (crossbows, grate bows, bellows, trick bag, etc). And let us experiment with these as main weapons to further polish a range combat system. The combat system before was very bland reggarding range weapons, I think it should have some kind of mele to be challenging and enjoyable.
However, one thing I really hope will not get implemented though are timing mechanics for farming resources. I love having little resource gathering and such in this game, but I wouldn’t want it to go all out on it.
Currently it does not seem like a hassle so I basically chop down every tree, fish every fish, dig out every hole etc. simply because it is so effortless. To me there actually already even is a timing mechanic for this in the game by pressing the Y button for each axe chop etc. (I know you can hold the Y button for the same thing but this brings the right level of engagement for me).
Being forced to click a button at the right time just to collect resources would definitely make be skip it altogether.
I really hated these mechanics in Cult of the Lamb ( another game that mixes both combat and collecting resources etc.) for cooking food, fishing etc.
With that being said, I absolutely adore the resource gathering part so I would definitely not mind those parts being expanded upon. It is just if I were to be forced to time each axe chop when cutting down trees etc., that would get really tiresome.
Hopefully with an incentive to play at higher difficulties, personally would love to see bosses with extra moves, phases, abilities, etc,. Bounties with more mobs. Maybe ambush events that happen throughout your standard play. A simple +hp+dmg toggle would be a decent step, but might not be enough of a challenge in the long run. Though that could be more for a later patch?
Most of the updates for Patch 1 seem great and I can’t wait for it to come out. While I do appreciate the unlimited fast travel, I think the idea that it will take away from the experience of the world is valid. But the magic of discovering the world bit by bit doesn’t last for the entire game, and gathering resources on the way to an objective is only really meaningful early on when you’re starting from zero. Once you’re in mid game, or worse late game, all of that is already settled and shortcuts aren’t that shortcutting and all the drag of having to move your arse to get anywhere is felt much more. So ideally, to preserve the early game experience, fast travel could be slowly unlocked either area by area or by a progression system. Since it’s tied to the lore of the Cerim, maybe in one of the Cerim ruins there could be a thing you can activate to increase the teleportation of the whispers. That way it’s both in-world, and preserves the exploration and gathering needed early game.
Well, something that deletes 1/4th of boss hp bar at P4+10 is pretty critical for me, and I appreciate the flexibility of choosing what kind of critical attack I do. To each his own though, but I’m not enslaved to “critical” meaning only some silly special animation.
As one of the people who really enjoys the soulslike difficulty (pre-hotfix Breach, minus the backstab issue, was perfect for me), I think realm options are a great way to make the game accessible while keeping players like me happy.
The “special” shinies are also great news, because that was one of my biggest actual gripes with the game so far.
I do prefer the limited fast travel to unlimited, but I understand why they feel the pressure to change that. Hopefully with future updated systems it can be brought back, even as a realm option. Personally, I find the limited fast travel makes unlocking shortcuts and exploring properly rewarding.
“Souls-likes” games shouldn’t have difficulty settings, UNLESS there is an incentive to play on the higher difficulties.
(It kills the entire approach to combat if you can just lower the difficulty and get the same success as everybody else)
How to “fix” it:
Simply by adjusting rewards for each difficulty.
(At least that would make it worth it for skilled players to not play on low difficulty)
Is it possible to just get a detailed explanation on why you’re including in-game timers? If it’s engagement/revenue related, be straight up about it. But we’ve heard basically nothing even though they’re universally reviled and Moon steadfastly refuses to remove them from the game.
Thomas, I want to say u guys are doing great. Your game is fucking incredible, and I dont have any doubt u guys are doing your best. Just a suggestion. It would be nice if we could have more side missions in sacrament, just like the Gordon one. Its good to do something else instead of main missions. What I say is like, to have a mission with a story itself but not necessarily a main quest, or just a week/bounty challenges. More like a skyrim thing, or witcher 3 sidequests. It would be fun especially for coop!
I want to leave my 2 cents here as well.
I really like all changes, except realm difficulty and fast travel.
Going completely 180 from almost no fast travel to full fast travel feels really weird, also with the fact that apparently you will revert it later (people usually dont really like that). I think making fast travel only between 1 major whisper in every zone would be enough and wont mess hard with previous vision of making people more explore zones.
Adding some difficulty changes is just not the way. You mentioned Elden Ring, but ER doesnt have any obvious difficulty modifiers, it just has some mechanics that can make the game much easier (mainly spirit summon because bosses just doesnt design to fight multiple units, game become too easy after that), so usually people can “modify” difficulty by using or not using some game mechanics and thats it. And with that people can have completely different experience, but playing on the same difficulty. Why Im even talking about it is because, when you adding some sort of difficulty modifiers, some players (but in reality i think actually a lot of players) will want to play on harder difficulty, even if they dont have enough skill for that just because of their ego, and if they wouldnt be able to play the game on that difficulty, it will mean to them that game just bad. So imo, you shouldnt add any sort of difficulty modifiers and should try to make it not so obvious if you will want to add it anyway
Anyway, great to see that you and your team read community feedbacks and do a lot of changes based on them, I feel NRFTW will be really great at the end
Love the idea of fast travel, thank you. I like to run around every now and then, but it gets repetitive really fast for me. Considering that I need to do trips to farm resources, this whole thing starts feeling more like a routine than anything meaningful.
I don’t care whether it will be every whisper or 1-2 whispers per zone, less restrictions for fast travel is a good change.
This makes me a little sad, because the map isn’t that big, and I don’t think TP is necessary. I loved how I had to unlock and use all these shortcuts you guys made. I mean, running past enemies to reach a certain point takes what, like two minutes? Except the Marin Woods area, where the “plague blockade” thingies that block passage constantly respawn even after completely clearing the area, but that’s clearly a bug. Enabling a free teleport will just destroy this system; no one is going to use it. And you must realize that once you enable it, there’s no going back. People are gonna flip if you suddenly disable it.
That said, I still trust in your vision, and I believe you’ll make a great game. Thank you guys for your work.
Other changes in the list sound awesome, can’t wait for them to go live!
