So I skinned a steer today

[MajorFordson]

So we all realise that the activities in Rimworld and similar games are videogamified for the sake of balance and pacing and all that. Little dudes dig up and plant a square meter of dirt rather quickly, trees are felled into lovely useable wood etc etc.

I'm going to try tanning my own hide with a commercial tanning kit. I got interested in this kind of DIY stuff from games like Rimworld.

Today I had my first chance to skin a steer that dropped dead on my uncles farm. It took me an hour of intense work, stopping to sharpen my knife every few minutes, just to get a very rough cut of the skin from both sides of the animals belly, flank and back. I am wrecked, exhausted. Ahead of me tomorrow morning is hanging the skin over a fence post and using my knife to further cut flesh and fat off of the skin, before the process can continue. Which involve salting, more scraping, DAYS of soaking, stirring, wringing out and washing.

Really helps you appreciate just how much work goes into these things IRL. It's incredible to think of how many people experience all of these crafting processed presented simplified in video games but never get the chance to see it in reality. Even trying to look up some help for DIY things online often brings up more video game related crafting guides than DIY guides.

So next time your colonist in game completely skins and butchers a muffalo in an hour or two, try to remember that in real life it's like trying to wrestle with a dirty, stinking queen sized duvet which is covered in lard and raw steaks.

[Boston]

Yup, Rimworld HILARIOUSLY abstracts the process for, well...... Pretty much everything.

It can take DAYS to properly dress an animal, cut the meat into joints, process and tan the hide, so on and so forth. That is why hides and furs were, and still are, so valuable. They took a lot of time and effort to make usable.

Just like cloth. Even using a spinning wheel and a horizontal loom, it can take quite some time to spin, dye, and weave cloth. Not to mention the time it takes to sew the finished cloth into clothing. Meanwhile, in-game cotton just..... "Appears" once you harvest a cotton plant.

Dont even mention farming! In-game, all the colonists do is yank out vegetation. They dont plow the soil, aerate it, break up clods, amything you need to do in order to grow crops worth eating.

I, for one, would LOVE to see the above processes in the game. It would make farming less of a silver-boost, even. Or at least more of a timesink.

[crazyroosterman]

well to integrate what your thinking of into the game sounds like it would take its own dedicated patch(or 2) but I think id like it my self could end up creating a hell of a lot of interesting narrative.

[satch4684]

certainly aware of the actual work behind such things IRL, but that's pretty cool to hear about.

however I guess nowadays its kind of a moot point relating to *most* activities, you know, mass production, factories and such. but anyways seeing any of the "hard work" that goes into that stuff simulated in a video game, no way for me. any mmo already feels like more of a job than pasttime

[henk]

If you're interested in seeing skinning implemented in details in a video game, I recommend Unreal World. It's a free game about iron age survival, sort of an open world sandbox roguelike. Punishing and fairly complex, but easily hours and hours of challenging fun.

[Lawlzer]

well to integrate what your thinking of into the game sounds like it would take its own dedicated patch(or 2) but I think id like it my self could end up creating a hell of a lot of interesting narrative.

If you've ever played Factorio, there is a huge mod set called "Bob's Mods" and make the simplest things, much, much more complicated...
I can imagine something similar for this game, but you'd practically have to play on an easier difficulty, as it'd be so hard and tedious, that it'd likely be just boring, rather than fun. But, of course, maybe!

[Snafu_RW]

You're pretty much describing the Hardcore SK modpack, maybe without extra races &c

[FlorenceTWA]

Honestly, the colonists can build a spaceship just in a few years. Skinning sth or farming is far from the most questionable detail here. In real life if we crash somewhere with just steel and wood, good luck on researching/building a comms console or even a solar generator! Or more like we can't even put together a room with doors safe enough against angry iguanas. Not in the first week at least, and with how much actual work to be done, guess how long we'll have to eat without a table.

[Beestre]

You're pretty much describing the best steroids weight loss, maybe without extra races &c

that's the exact same thing that i was thinking about, to be honest.