Since I started playing 0.D I’ve noticed that the towns in general seem to become a lot less valuable than they used to be in the mid game, and begin to feel very grindy.
There’s actually much more variety of buildings now, which is really nice, but you can now go through multiple fairly large towns without ever seeing specific building types, like a garage, a bank, a library, or a dojo. The towns seem to have a lot more common houses in them, even in towards what were previously the commercial centers dominated by special buildings. Now its mostly parks, construction projects, and a LOT of houses. I haven’t even seen a gas station in the course of a 50 hour game so far. (not lacking for gas, but you’d think those would be popular…)
Combine this with what seem like substantially faster respawn rates than we had previously, and working your way through towns into the mid game where houses are no longer interesting gets very slow and laborious.
Now that I’m solidly in the mid-game with full survivor gear, crafted weapons, and a nicely built out APC, I still find myself having to spend several days just to clear a couple blocks to safely get in towards town centers - and then there often just aren’t very many buildings of value there any more.
Nothing stays clear for long - I constantly have to deal with back-spawns within just a couple days in cleared areas, some of which can get pretty aggressive now that I’m regularly seeing hulks, dreadnoughts, and the like.
On one hand, it keeps things from feeling ‘safe’ - but on the other it makes towns very unattractive to explore because the risk/reward seems to be getting steadily worse as time proceeds and the evolution rate increases, and most of the stuff there is useless garbage, with a tiny chance of finding something useful or vital.
