[quote=“jacob.exe, post:3, topic:14427”]Incoming Novel!
Every game, regardless if it is open ended or not, has an end to the amount of variety forced on a player. At this point a game stops handling new goals and leaves the responsibility up to the player, essentially becoming a sandbox. This is also where people tend to get bored and stop playing or start a new game, only for the cycle to repeat. Although this responsibility can lead to players coming up with interesting and unique ways to play the game, it becomes an issue when trying to appeal to a wide audience.
A way to prolong this issue is to increase variety, which is done in Cataclysm with the use of RNG and a whole heap of content. By doing this, cataclysm is “infinitely” enjoyable to people who have not learned the system, turning initial frustrations into enjoyable learning experiences (usually only seen as enjoyable in hindsight). But this feeling of exploration and adventure fades with experience, often going hand in had with progression. Because a game will eventually run out of variety (learning how the game works contributes to this loss), a game can never be infinitely enjoyable.
The best solution (although almost never the most feasible one) would be to introduce enough variety to last an entire life span. This would obviously require a ludicrous amount of effort and as such is not used. But, varying from game to game, a compromise between an absence of content and infinite content is established, with many different factors determining the outcome. Some of these factors could be: funding, program structure, modularity with regards to game mechanics, developer team size and communication, and demand for a finished or complete project.
My recommendation for Cataclysm:
To increase variety I suggest using a mechanic that causes certain events based on large lapse of time. For instance: Project Zomboid, which heavily draws from Cataclysm, has a system where the water and electricity, for the map you are surviving in, will shut off after a few weeks to a month in game. Because of this, Project Zomboid has an underlying feeling of apprehension that brings urgency and meaning to your actions leading up to this event, creating an enjoyable experience. Another example is Don’t Starve and the looming countdown to winter, again bringing urgency and importance to decisions. Cataclysm does have something of its own with the monster evolution, but most players are able to eventually overcome this on every playthrough.
Some of these mechanics for cataclysm could be:
[ul][li]A temporary emergence, almost invasion (more full scale than what is currently happening on earth) of the blob hive mind, maybe even suddenly advancing zombie evolution through the roof, only to die down a bit afterwards.[/li]
[li]An occasional acid rain season that forces the player to protect their bodies (and items/vehicles) in different ways than they normally would.[/li]
[li]Another, more extreme, dimensional tear that lets hell reach into the players plane even further, if not only for a year or two before collapsing.[/li]
[li]A military occupation by another country or even the remnants of the United States, maybe establishing a few permanent bases and a bunch of temporary ones.[/li]
[li]Some event that, if the player is not careful, will trap or teleport them somewhere where they need to use their skills to survive.[/li]
[li]Flooding (rivers/lakes could extend their banks for a time)[/li]
[li]Bridges and/or buildings could collapse with time.[/li]
[li]Triffids and The Mycus adding new groves and towers/flowers/blooms map tiles based one nearby preexisting ones.[/li]
[li]Issues with the atmosphere that cause extreme heat or cold, or even ambient surface radiation, for a season or two.[/li]
[li]A massive influx or airborne diseases or pollutants, ranging from light to heavy concentrations, that forces a player to wear anything from a simple face mask to a full gas mask in non sealed places.[/li]
[li]Many, many more… the list is practically infinite.[/li][/ul]
All of these things can have periods of years ranging anywhere from one to twenty; the ones that are the most cataclysmic (totally intended) should have periods of about ten or more years to keep the game fresh for extreme late game characters. This very long period also keeps people from experiencing it early on and from learning of its effects and ways to be easily avoided. An easy way to explain the positive effect that these events (with the correct implementation) could have is to look at Cataclysm from the perspective of a new player. A new player will arguably really suck at the game, dying frequently and not getting too far before having to restart. Each time this person plays a new game, their average survivor lifetime will increase, almost exponentially. Because of this non-linear increase, the game would be ill-suited to player progression if the difficulty, or challenges, appeared in a linear fashion. What would be worse is if the events were purely RNG, and could happen at any time. This could, again, lead to the player prematurely learning of an event’s structure and would most likely end up killing them anyway.
TL;DR: A suggestion to add difficult and game changing events five to twenty years after world creation, aimed at extending the game’s enjoyability.[/quote]
Whoa, all of this is amazing. I think this’d totally make the end-game something that would be looked forward to, and striven to reach, as opposed to dreaded, knowing you’ll lose interest.
I guess that those of us with 91 day seasons would have to be extra patient though, waiting five or so in game years. That’s not a problem though, plenty of time to build up for the big stuff you mentioned.
Maybe stuff like you suggested could happen in the late mid-game, and early end-game. Just, on a much smaller scale and level of danger/excitement than blob invasions and military occupation.
