The Many RimWorlds

[Nasikabatrachus]

Reading this forum, I've been a bit surprised at how other people interpret the setting of RimWorld. The way I see it, the rim world itself is inhabited, probably by peoples of varying culture and level of technology, but rather sparsely. That's why it's hard to survive, but is still frequented by trade ships (which are probably incapable of interstellar voyages) and pirates seeking plunder. That's also why it's easier to trade with a space ship than with another settlement.

Other people seem to see it as a sort of desert island, alone as a habitable world in its system, and the raids the colony experiences happen primarily because passing ships detect the colony or the space liner's wreck for some reason.

There are many ways to interpret the setting, many of which are equally valid. How do you interpret the setting, and why?

[nomadseifer]

Well all interpretations should branch from the world-primer written by the developer himself : https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pIZyKif0bFbBWten4drrm7kfSSfvBoJPgG9-ywfN8j8/pub

[Nasikabatrachus]

I just read the documents you linked and found that I was more or less familiar with about half of it, so I think the game, media, and kickstarter did a good job of communicating the ideas of the galactic setting.

What I'm more interested in, though, is what people get about the rim world specifically, just from playing the game. In that sense, it's not about what interpretations should or shouldn't stem from, but how people interpret the world through playing the game itself.

Also, I note with delight that the backstory allows for literal dwarf fortresses. In fact, dwarves would be the best colonists to have. Not that I didn't already know that.

[Tynan]

Nastik, your interpretation pretty closely matches how I imagine it. I think this is the most story-rich setting. It gains from the lawlessness and desperation of the old West sparseness, while having multicultural, multitechnological flavor and the occasional presence of more civilized elements. It's a setting containing very diverse people and places and items, which I think really helps with story generation.

[Lechai]

Nastik, your interpretation pretty closely matches how I imagine it. I think this is the most story-rich setting. It gains from the lawlessness and desperation of the old West sparseness, while having multicultural, multitechnological flavor and the occasional presence of more civilized elements. It's a setting containing very diverse people and places and items, which I think really helps with story generation.

All we need now is the game to enhance this setting... get cracking. Or hire more staff, either way I'm hungry for moar.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Also, I note with delight that the backstory allows for literal dwarf fortresses. In fact, dwarves would be the best colonists to have. Not that I didn't already know that.

All we really need now is levers, gears and magma.

[Nasikabatrachus]

I do like how rim worlds are sort of the grab-bags of the galaxy. Everything goes into them.

If you think about it, rim worlds are probably actually more stable than other kinds of worlds, since they're less likely to completely wipe out the people living on them. I imagine there would be settlers who colonize rim worlds specifically because of that factor. (If they're from civs that are really good at tower defense games.)

[murlocdummy]

I'd love to get random settlers from nearby dwarf fortresses, tower defense posts, and locked valuts.

Especially the underground valuts.  I mean, who doesn't like a good valut dweller?

[Nasikabatrachus]

I don't know. What's a valut?



Building a rimworld vault would be an interesting experiment, though. About a third of my games end up as half vaults anyway.

[murlocdummy]

Maybe you should ask Tynan what a valut is, since he's the one who wrote them into the game's universe quick primer.