Long Term future of Rimworld

[brobe94]

All the modmakers should go on strike and break their mods for a round. See how many people are playing vanilla Rimworld after a few months.

A little harsh, but I get what you are saying ... personally I get more enjoyment out of playing vanilla but that is just me. Mods get old/boring too, that's why I always end up going back and playing vanilla (same with Minecraft). I see far too many posts about why is this mod not in vanilla in games like this and Minecraft ... well, tbh they would be bloated as hell for one. I like the idea of a game that sticks to their "vision" instead of incorporating things from the community just to do it. That is the whole point of the modding community is to make mods in "their" own vision and share it.

[cultist]

All the modmakers should go on strike and break their mods for a round. See how many people are playing vanilla Rimworld after a few months.

I don't understand what you're trying to accomplish. You're not even making an argument, just trying to persuade people to sabotage the game's development. Why? I thought you wanted the game to get better.

[REMworlder]

Honestly I like vanilla Rimworld just fine. Modding's awesome and it's cool to see what people come up with, but oftentimes it's almost an antithesis to Tynan's design strategy of avoiding certain types of complexity.

It seems like maybe we killed the Simulation Dream. You can't just simulate a super-complex world because players won't understand it. And even if you did, it would be boring, because even Middle Earth isn't very story rich.

But the Simulation Dream lives on. We just know we have to approach it very carefully. We can't blindly simulate everything, because most things are boring and people can't understand over-complex systems anyway. We have to carefully craft a condensed system of simple, understandable hints that cue players' apophenia to do the heavy lifting of ascribing emotion and meaning.

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/TynanSylvester/20130602/193462/The_Simulation_Dream.php

For all the features that RimWorld could have and all the five-year plans and design document it'd be cool to have, it's important to keep in mind the really awesome stuff is what we least expect.

[CodyRex123]

The problem is, Mutiplayer games have people prone to cheating whether for some kind of hack or just abusing game mechanics, So a muliplayer game with such a major sim thing like that fails quickly, Now single player games like that are either to hard to grasp, To annoying to get though, or just boring, mutiplayer can fix that, but it also has trouble of being slow or hard to grasp to the other players.

[RemingtonRyder]

Actually, I think that modding helps to push forward development. It's a way of finding limitations that are not immediately obvious.

For example, you can make new stuffs from existing stuffs, but the properties of the new stuffs have to be defined rather than being inherited. Not a big deal right now, but in the future, who knows?

[akiceabear]

I own the company so I don't have investors demanding that I grow the company or pump up the valuation. I'm in this for my own lifestyle, lifelihood, and creative satisfaction .

Erm.. I think you do have investors. Investors who expect a product sooner rather than later.

I think you fundamentally misunderstand the differences in contractual obligations to early access backers and financial investors. There is zero chance that those who purchased the game count as investors.

I also think complaints about the $30 price are whiny and without basis. My rule of thumb is that a game is good value for money if I average roughly $1 per hour or better over a year or so after purchase. Thus, I always wait for AAA titles to go on discount, usually within a few months (!). Sandbox games I'm more willing to take a risk on, because the chances are so much higher than I can tinker with it for many hours before getting bored.

By this metric, RimWorld as it stands today (A9) is good value for money, even assuming no other development adds to it. Tynan could wrap up development, stomp remaining bugs, and consider it a success. It might not be a 10-year play like DF, SimCity 4, etc - but it doesn't have to be. We as the community can't force Tynan to develop something he feels is already complete. [Note that this is my thinking aloud - not trying to represent Tynan's views at all]

There are a few big features I would like to see added, the top being good fog of war mechanics and some mechanic to move around the world with a given set of colonists (see signature links). Tynan is not obligated to do these things. I do think if he added the core mechanics of these points the modding community could help propel this game into the multi-year lifespan.

That said, I do recognize there are limits to development of this title. Maybe there are real challenges with new features in the existing engine. Maybe Tynan is ready to move onto something else for awhile - long projects in any industry can feel like a slog by the end, even the most interesting ones. So many possibilities, and most of them reasonable. I do hope we see more functionality added to enable bigger and better story telling, but accept it may come in a mod, paid expansion, or sequel in addition to the current development cycle. Personally, that is all fine - I've more than gotten fair value out of my transaction already.

A big part of that feeling is realistic expectations, which I think many complaining in this board lack.

[tommytom]

You make a good point. A very open community and developer can be a bad thing, to an extend. It kind of portrays "the community will decide how the game will be developed", but this is and isn't the case. In the end, Tynan will make the game the way he wants, but he will also get ideas from the community.

In reality, you can voice your opinion, but it doesn't mean it will be enacted.

Blessing and a curse. I know I have gotten frustrated, and probably will here and there in the future, when I want to see this and that and it doesn't get put in, but I just own the game and part of a community, I'm not the developer. I'm am glad Tynan listens tho and I'm sure it's just as frustrating to him as well.

I probably look at modding at some point. At least then I can contribute and get things in that I want to see myself, even if it's just for me or a few people. Glad this is a moddable game.

[Manly]

I would be considered an old guy by most of you here.  I have been gaming since you put a cassette in the computer and played mouse in a maze...black screen with green lines showing walls.  Me and my buds gathered around the HS Library computer and played that game until we were kicked off.

I have played a LOT of different games and have seen so many changes over the years.  And one thing I have learned like so many of you have is...I LOVE finding a game I lose hours of time playing...the type I find myself looking at the clock and realizing "Holy Smokes it is 3am...again".

Rimworld does that for me and I have been playing it since A4 or so.  I use mods...I like having them to play the awesome game the way I want to play it (think tower defense ).  This game will NOT be deleted from my hard drive this year and likely not next year either.  I really enjoy playing this game in between games of CS:GO, 7 Days to Die and whatever else is top of mind at the time.  I always come back to play Rimworld. This is a brilliant game and getting better every time there is a new iteration. 

The modding community is amazing here, too.  So many unbelievably intelligent and creative people pouring hours of time into enhancing my free time.  I try to thank someone whenever I come to the forums for putting in such effort for people they don't know.  Long story short, the community is one of the reasons I keep coming back to Rimworld and cheers to you all for that

So...call me a fanboi if you want...I have been called worse in 35 years of gaming...this game rocks.

[akiceabear]

I probably look at modding at some point. At least then I can contribute and get things in that I want to see myself, even if it's just for me or a few people. Glad this is a moddable game.

Likewise.

The mods so far are amazing additions to the game. That said, I do think the best mods for this game are yet to come - and probably won't even start development until the game is "final" and the core code more stable. For big mods (e.g. massive new features or total conversions) the development cycle can take longer than a current beta phase of a few months. This is one reason that we might want to "support" Tynan finalizing the core features of the game and ending the alpha phase of development sooner rather than later, just to reduce the amount of mods lost with each update. That doesn't mean he can't keep developing a expansion or sequel (or separate title), just that the modding community will have a solid base to build on, and with expansion to Steam etc will know all basic players are using the same core.

This game is also the first one that's gotten me thinking about what I'd like to see in the game and feeling that it might be possible to do myself, if I'm willing to invest my time in educating myself how to do it. That accessibility is a good thing!

[Kelvorn]

Erm.. I think you do have investors. Investors who expect a product sooner rather than later.

Nope, I have backers and customers, and they've all already gotten everything they were promised, barring a few final fixups.

EDIT: Of course we're still adding new goodies for everyone, but the game is there and I'm pretty happy with the state of it.

I am going to just say, if Development stopped and all we had for Future content was what the modding community provided us, I would feel like I got my moneys worth and be very pleased.

[erebus2075]

personally i feel rimworld in its current state is an alpha type thing.
it is teh fundation for something great. but nothing more, it is diffinately not a fully done game in my oppinion.
hell yer it is worlds better then most of the trash you see sold as full games from small devs, but in my eyes they are not even done alpha games.

this game have tons of potential, but at this point i feel like it is a fundation which is lacking the actual house that needs to be build on top of it.

i feel like the dev is taking his sweet time adding stuff or changing stuff.
not sure how many hours a day he works on it but it doesnt feel like the 8h i would expect from the changes in each update and the time between each update
then again its ONE person and coding can take a long time, so might just be that.

[akiceabear]

not sure how many hours a day he works on it but it doesnt feel like the 8h i would expect from the changes in each update and the time between each update
then again its ONE person and coding can take a long time, so might just be that.

IF you think it is both lucrative and easy, then start some competition - can only be good for the market. I welcome your addition to the genre!

There is a reason this genre is ignored by most developers - it is a very niche and hard to satisfy client base. I'm not sure we do ourselves any favors by being overly venomous of the best attempts in years to provide good entertainment for money.

[REMworlder]

i feel like the dev is taking his sweet time adding stuff or changing stuff.

Take a look at the changelog, Tynan's pretty active. Go back three months and RimWorld didn't have key features like temperature, art, herbal medicine... If you'd played RimWorld for more than a few versions, you'd know the game's gone through a lot of change in a relatively short period of time.

[tommytom]

i feel like the dev is taking his sweet time adding stuff or changing stuff.
not sure how many hours a day he works on it but it doesnt feel like the 8h i would expect from the changes in each update and the time between each update
then again its ONE person and coding can take a long time, so might just be that.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_rCdGYp3nbSUXFG4Ky96RZW1cJGt9g_6ANZZPOHyNsg/pub

He updates the game almost daily. He responds to posts here about suggestions or bug reports. If anything, he is doing more than most/usual/whatever.

Granted, he is only one person.

As far as how many hours, well that's hard to gauge as someone like myself might make a "simple" program that's about 5-10 lines of code and does "one thing", but it may take me 6 hours to research, fix bugs, optimize, etc.

Other times, I can make a complicated program in 30m or less. Just depends on how specific the code needs to be and if you already know what you need to code beforehand.

[Justin C]

i feel like the dev is taking his sweet time adding stuff or changing stuff.
not sure how many hours a day he works on it but it doesnt feel like the 8h i would expect from the changes in each update and the time between each update
then again its ONE person and coding can take a long time, so might just be that.

And I'm sure that's your totally informed opinion as a professional game designer and programmer with years of experience, and not just baseless ranting from a clueless idiot who has no idea how time-consuming game development actually is.