The long Dark: who has played it...

[Bikerdude]

Evening

 

I see TLD is on sale on Steam atm, who has played it and what other games woulf you say this is similar to..? (Im thinking Firewatch..?)

 

b.

[Springheel]

 

I've probably put in around 250 hours since buying it in December.

[Bikerdude]

Nice, what would you compare it too, (in addition to the above) what would you say..?

[Sotha]

Long Dark is really nice. I played a lot the sandbox survival. It is really nice, atmospheric and difficult to start. It is survival game like rust, but without the other players and with a really harsh environment. It has a lot of crafting but no house building. And it has roguelike permadeath.

 

The story mode was a disappointment. I expected something new and genius like the sandbox survival was, but instead the story mode is a linear do-petty-chores-for-NPCs festival. I mean: blind person says "gimme wood" and then you go get wood. Then they say "gimme food" and they you get them food. Then when you have brought them all the stuff they want a door opens to the next NPC with boring chores. Sigh. More interesting choices would have been fun.

[Bikerdude]

Thata shame about the story mode, but Firewatch was a bit like that and I didnt mind too much.

[Springheel]

The story mode was a disappointment. I expected something new and genius like the sandbox survival was, but instead the story mode is a linear do-petty-chores-for-NPCs festival. I mean: blind person says "gimme wood" and then you go get wood. Then they say "gimme food" and they you get them food. Then when you have brought them all the stuff they want a door opens to the next NPC with boring chores. Sigh. More interesting choices would have been fun.

 

I think the storymode is basically an extended tutorial; at least the first two chapters are. I enjoyed it, but I'd never played sandbox before. Now that I have, I can see how the storymode doesn't really offer anything new.

 

I still think it's valuable for new players though...just getting dropped into survival mode with no help would be pretty rough.

[Xarg]

The first two chapters are supposed to be getting a rework in time for the chapter 3 release based on the feedback they got on them (they are too hand-holdy and fetch-questy currently), but they do function as Springheel noted, as an extended tutorial. I got the game back when it first went early access on Steam, only had survival mode, and had 1 map for it. I think it took me 6 or 7 tries to live longer than a single day. Still playing it all these years later, 530+ hours, and don't regret the purchase. Amazing game, story *hopefully* gets better, but survival sandbox right now is where it's at. Can't really compare it to anything I've played so far, except *maybe* Don't Starve.

 

edit: Looks like the sale has ended, bad luck to anyone who missed out.

Edited April 10, 2018 by Xarg

[Xarg]

The Long Dark currently 75% off on steam, great opportunity for anyone who didn't get it on a previous discount.

[Shadow]

I tried to play TLD but after an hour or two in the beginning I had no idea what I was supposed to do.

 

Also in the time I played it didn't seem to be anything like Firewatch. Firewatch was a phenomenal story driven tale of intrigue and mystery and suspense.

 

However if you guys encourage me to try TLD again I will do so.

[Springheel]

There are two modes in the game: Story Mode and Survival Mode. The former is story-driven and more or less leads you through how to play the game. The latter is a sandbox game where the only assigned goal is to survive for as long as you can.

[demagogue]

I recall dying the first night a few times and putting it aside. I just haven't gotten back to it yet.

Performance was low for my laptop at the time too.

I like the idea of exploring an authentic wilderness.

I remember trying to get mods to make Skyrim's wilderness a bit more realistic just to make the exploration more immersive, also loved Firewatch & Kona was pretty good & even the survival part of Minecraft I liked, so this is in my interests in theory.

 

Edit: There's also a digital card game called Frost that reminded me of this game; survivalist deck management in a similar kind of harsh environment.

[Springheel]

I recall dying the first night a few times and putting it aside. I just haven't gotten back to it yet.

 

Yes, like TDM, it does not hold your hand. You have to learn things for yourself, although the story mode does a pretty good job of walking you through the basics.

[Sotha]

I played the redux version of the first episode on the xmas holidays just recently. The redux is better than the original, and they had some good new ideas (I really liked the left OR right mouse button choice with the convict.) I really sit a bit pondering what would be the right thing to do. That mechanic was exactly what they should capitalize on more. For example, they could have used it with all the NPC's, somehow:

 

Blind woman meeting: Left click - try to grab the gun, Right click - try to talk

 

Trying to talk would go to the normal course of events, where the player would do chores for the lady. Trying to grab the gun would result in a gun struggle where the gun goes accidentally off, resulting in randomly either:

1) killing the blind lady (player gets a gun. player must find clues in her house to proceed, player loses permanent fire in the fireplace)

2) getting the player locked out from the house with a gunshot wound (player needs to heal up and then explore on his own to proceed, and does not have access to lady's house).

 

That sort of stuff would be great, especially if the player somehow later runs into consequences of his actions earlier ("I saw you leaving from the house with the dead lady. You killed her, now you pay!"). You know... more interesting choices... choices with consequences. That's the stuff that makes a story in computer games.