Is RimWorld a roguelike and/or is that used?

[SymbolicFrank]

You can run through a game like nethack in just a few hours time, if you aren't too unlucky and don't make any important mistake. That is, if you're very good at it. And even then, you will probably lose about half the time.

And it's not as if there aren't an endless amount of activities that can improve your chances. But then again, spending more time increases the chances of bad luck and/or you making a stupid mistake.

So, you can either try to spend just the right amount of time, doing the things that might improve your chances when you have the opportunity, or just take your time and do whatever you fancy until you get killed. Either way, the amount of things to do that might improve your situation is almost limitless, but depends on random terrain features. No two runs are the same.

I very rarely get to the endgame in nethack. I did ascend one time, just because I felt the need to finish (and "win") the game at least once. I just like exploring, collecting and improving more.

And it changes! Things like your required equipment and genocide list keep getting adjusted each game. And to make that happen, you need certain items. Some of those, you just stumble upon. Some require excessive things, like setting up a pudding farm to collect a lot of random stuff and especially staves of polymorph, which you use to polymorph spellbooks, scrolls, staves, tools and potions in just the right ones to make enough blank scrolls, blank books and magic markers to create Wish and Genocide scrolls and holy water, so you can wish for gray dragon scale armor, make enchant armor scrolls, genocide everything not essential and dangerous, and get all the other equipment and magic you need for ascension.

Most often, I tend to spend many hours doing all those things and then get killed by user error. Which are 99.9% of all your deaths in nethack. Don't rush in. Take it slow. Think it through. Don't take too many risks. Don't become overconfident. Watch your surroundings. It's just like Dark Souls, with much more options but a far worse GUI!

If you never make a mistake, which is totally possible as it is turn-based, you would win about 99% of your games.


RimWorld is much less fair and offers far less options to spend time and improve your chances.

An extended manufacturing base and tech tree would help a lot, more precise and more lethal combat as well. But that would mostly make games longer, not more unique.

It would help a lot if that new, crazy and hostile planet you just landed upon, just had a shitload of interesting, helpful and lethal terrain to explore and use. Which would also require either a larger map or 3D. And less external events that either give you free stuff or try to kill you.