Thoughts after 2-3 months of play

I have been playing the game for a few months now, lvl 33, here are my thoughts...

The main issue for me is there are too many different tiers of waiting times.
Once a day fields and water needs sorting and provision house managed.
2 or 3 times a day buffs need to be applied to gold mines etc
At various increments of time from 1min to 4 hours prospectors are sent out
At 6hr or 12 or 24h explorers need to be sent out
Generals being sent out takes 30min
From ordering a general to attack a bandit camp to their return takes 4-5min
The process of getting all units needed for adventure to be delivered to a zone requires dealing with a series of 30min waits.

I understand some aspects of free online games is tedious tasks and time sinks. The problem for me is the game isnt something you can sit down and play for 1 hour a day to get the most out of it, nor is it something you can just log in for 2-3min a few times a day. Why not? Well due to the way adventures work and the way prospecting must be done for the various types.

Adventures are really rather poor experiences in my opinion. I dont mind the home map and city building/management being a bit tedious if the adventures were an exciting reward for all that effort, but adventures are fantastically tedious, many, many 30min travel waits and 3-5min fighting waits. Then the nature of units required for each fight, that is also tedious and lacks any play enjoyment. I stopped watching the battle reports a long, long time ago, even they are tedious experiences, completely predictable and too much timing between each phase.

My suggestion would be to rework the adventures to play fluidly without silly and rather pointless time sinks. When my general is off to a fight I want to be excited not bored with the tedium of watching him take 2-3min to get to the fight! The time sink is our main island management, let adventures be fun please!
I would also rework buffing/prospecting/exploring so they are easier to manage.
I would also add the wording of all text from quests to adventures to mail to enemy tool tips etc is rather dull and a little awkward, maybe directly translated from another language. Could do with spicing up. This text is a major part of the games character and it can be improved dramatically.

I understand the game is designed at first to hook you in with the reasonable level of pace of first 17 levels and then more and more layers of tediousness are added, which the goal being to entice people to pay real cash to buy things to reduce this tediousness to more manageable levels BUT even if you did splash the cash there is nowhere within the game to enjoy some real fun. Adventures even with all the gem generals are still going to be predictable, slow and dull.

So with no real fun to be had all we are left with is as a possible motive to play is beautification of our home map. I would suggest adding more ways to personalize our Island. Being able to manipulate land, maybe add rivers to the game and allow players to change their course or damn them to power windmills or divert them to irrigate farms. Some genuine land management would be fun. Also allowing people to give names to their buildings. Could be fun, naming the Brewery after your personal favourite beer.

For me as it is the same is just so tedious its painful and I am glad I resisted the urge to buy gems as having played a little longer I can see this game is not going to offer much in its current state.

Yes the game is free but my time is of value to me, this game tries to rob you of that time until the point where the urge to open the wallet is too great. I dont mind paying good money for a good game, but this game is just dull and the only reward for actions is just more dull tasks. I didnt have to write this, I could have not bothered but I like the company behind this game based on previous games and think feedback is always of value. Ultimately this game feels like it is set up as a sting, designed to bore you into submission and pay cash. I dont think long term this type of game adds value to a company. I'll be less likely to buy a future game from them based on this experience.

In summary... The game is tedious in every aspect. Real money can allow people to reduce some of the tedium BUT still as it stands even with large amounts of cash investment the game would still give back very little. Please make some aspect of the game less tedious. Make adventures actually fun and pleasurable and keep the gem/cash aspect of the game to the main map. The devs have over cooked the tedious factor to generate income, reduce the tedium in some areas and the game may have a longer life span for customers.

So true.

+1

I too have been thinking about naming. Three possibilities have come to mind, 1 Island name, a area at the top of the map where you can put the name of your island "Joe's Place" with a sub-title for some text "Here be dragons". 2 Sector name's as island name but no sub-title. 3 Location names, click on one of the signpost graphic and a name pops up, this allows players to name as many locations on their island as they like providing they have the signposts.

There is a fundamental problem with the game with regard to lack of on going enjoyment through diversity of play and goal achievement in general.

Even when you understand the game is deliberately slow to progress in, so you don't blast through to the top level in a month, there's a distinct lack of short term goals.. leveling works for a while until the XP gap between levels becomes disproportionately huge.

Adventures are seriously boring affairs.. they seem new and exciting at first until you realize they are just the same island clearing over and over again. The rigid "best path" on each island and combat that punishes mistakes in ways that prohibit experimentation means it becomes a game of: start adventure > check 3rd party guide for troops and order of attack > repeat. its fundamentally boring.. no randomisation, no experimentation and paltry rewards.

Even special seasonal events are either just another rigid adventure island and/or collect the special currency. The special items are a fantastic bonus to be fair but the process of acquiring them is tedious at best.

For the first time in months I had some fun with the game after the last update when a pile of quests popped up and i had a dozen goals to complete. It made me want to do them and even to level up but it was short lived as the quests quickly got completed and the meager XP now looks even less enticing when i need 200,000 to level up and the quests bring in less than 3,000 each.

It made me think they should have daily quests and guild quests (as broken as the mechanics of those are) but also weekly quests.. give players a dozen or two minor quests with stuff to do and attain that can't just be done in a day with help from friends trading that gives more short term goals that regular players can have fun with and that infrequent players wont be miffed about.

Island personalisation is a basic surely! Most online games allow you some degree of personalisation to give you a sense of ownership, pride and satisfaction but again the rigid concept means yes your island can look different to other peoples but since they are all shaped the same with the same resources in the same place.. realistically there are very few combinations that exploit the landscape equally efficiently. Even our avatars are selected from a very limited list of generic faces that mean at a glance you cant even tell friend from stranger.

Guilds are a great gaming concept to bring in distractions and fun with minimal effort but all guilds do here is give a absolutly basic chat facility and a (currently) broken quest system... where are the usual guild benefits with grouped resources, purchases, influence and power.. its totally missing and divorced from other guilds too. Guilds are for pride, conquest and rivalry.. but they don't even function well for the people in them let alone in comparison to one another.

Truth be told it feels like all the Dev teams time is spent in fire fighting bugs and less on development and expansion. Don't get me wrong the vast majority of the new material adds hugely to the game in positive ways but it's just so few, far between and limited in scope and vision.. and when we hear people who spend time on the test server pointing out flaws and bugs only for those to just get ignored and ported over to the live game you can't blame people being miffed.

the game fails when you realise if you just sold the stuff on the auction taht you would have used to do an adventure and bought the rewards with the money you gained you would be better off and have what you wanted.

effectively your buying XP. so many of my friends i introduced to this game don't play anymore cause the wells, fields and adventures ritual got boring.

it would be so easy to make the general run 10x faster to a camp to make it interesting - losses should be significantly less and you shouldn't be able to block camps - you should't know what's in your set of camps till you join the island, random is more fun than reading someone's guide.

also, loot should be soulbound and not producable

In my opinion this game is an awful representation of the original The Settlers game concept.

It would be much better if all adventures were unique, like unlocking areas on your home island for the first time, and loot was more varied and only raw materials. So many weapons as loot killed the market, and lost the need to make the buildings that produce those weapons even though they are all in the quests now.

I find it very relaxing game and i can actually log in for 5-10 min at a time sort some stuff out log out without any issues.
Adventures have long timers from 24 hours to several days, so if you cant finish adventuro on one go, you can do it in the span of couple days.
As there is no rankings yet or anything like player vs player activity, this game is the definition of a peacefull economical simulator with a little side step in to combat.
Unless you feel the pressure to have everything maxed (which is your problem) I don't see how this game requires so much time, for me it doesn't.
(p.s. lvl 39)

Certainly the pace of the game will suit the casual player and balance of production makes a massive difference to how much time you need to spend building and maintaining production lines. The issue for me is more with the lack of diversity and content for the more invested player. There's no reason the game cant be fun for both styles of player and there is a frame work in place to build off... they just don't seem to be building off it.

There is a woeful lack of information and guidance in game, that you can to go to 3rd party sites to find out about, but you see these same issues time and again in the forums and chat because the game doesn't let you know itself. The new tutorial does a lot better than the previous one but still there's a tonne of info missing that could help people appreciate how this game actually works.

As a player of every Settlers game, from 2 onwards, we are used to rapid city building and great animations and yet they don't really capture that here and it's a shame. Of course this is a whole new medium and its not going to work the same way but still there's something lacking.

totally agree with Zosimus - finally its boring game with boring everyday habits - fields, water, buffs, mines, geologist trips, something to sell, produce many hundreds of recruits to lose them in "adventure" ...

To all of the above. Why don't you stop moaning. It's still in beta so stop expecting so much. Despite it's flaws it's a free game with a lot of content and more to come. If you don't like TSO don't play.

Hey guys,

Some great constructive feedback here.

Keeping an eye on this.

best
BB_Dantesama

Random placed troops in adventures won't work, as it would mean you wouldn't have an clue what troops you need to bring to your adventure and due to the time involved in building troops the adventure time would be too short. Just think about it carefully. Also because you need to built the troops after you start your adventure you preparation time will be gone.

To give an example. Stealing from the rich is an rather fixed adventure, without vets this adventure will cost you about 1000 recruits. Just think about it. You start the adventure and send some scouts to it, they will discover the enemies placed on the island. Then the boring parts starts. You have to calculate EVERY camp how you need to fight it and add the total number of troops needed and start building those. Not everyone is able to produce hundreds of troops before hand without even knowing if you need them. Just imagine you prepared 1000 recruits and then you discover that they won't cut it. As Wild Mary is there with two camps :( Producing the needed troops takes severall hours, which are just being wasted. The entire length of the adventure will be increased soo long that you will be only able to do one per severall days. Which makes levelling even more time consuming. At this moment, you prepare your troops beforehand and then send them off and do your adventure. Which all can be planned very easily. Also a lot of people NEED the guides to be able to do the adventures,

An possible solution would be having a lot of interconnect smaller adventures. I am thinking about an series of battles on small adventure maps with 3 to 8 camps. Something about the sectors we have in our curent adventures. The further you go the more loot you are receiving, and you can have severall of those small adventures pending. You can ask friends to join into your series of adventures to help out, and share the loot. I think a big adventure like SE would be perfect to be split up in severall smallish ones. To make it new and exciting every time, BB could make it like this that every part of the adventure has got severall FIXED versions, but you never know which version you are getting.

The adventures seriously need some reworking. It wouldnt hurt to add a little variety and a simple tactical battle system like the one in the Might and Magic series.

Wow it sounds like you lot might as well just give up as everything you find boring is actually the game itself and if you could just rush through the high levels and adventures etc then what would the point actually be in playing it anyway as you would complete it in a month or two.

There are certain things that can make the game easier like buying silo's, watermills and bottomless copper mines for example that would take away the daily chores of having to rebuild but of course that means spending money and of course it is a free to play game so they have to make the game tedious but playable to a certain extent to make people think about spending money for al these reasons that's how BB make there money for hosting the game.

But apart from one or two valid points that could improve the game like actually making more levels above 50 and some fresh adventures and new sections etc what else would be the point. You would make the game more boring implementing all these things.

Sorry I don't have much more to say on the topic other than how many other free to play games do you know of that they will make it that easy for the person who doesn't pay so that you would never want to spend money.

For me I have been here since the start of the Sandycove server and have really enjoyed the game up until now,what I am concerned about is BB are not doing anything they stated in the dev diary to make the game playable once you reach level 50 and not just lose all your xp and many long standing players who have spent alot of money are now leaving the game.
So other than that which is a massive problem in itself I don't see many other valid issues really.

To comment on Gavin's post:

I see a lot of people concerned that once 50 there is nothing to do and it all becomes a bit pointless. Leveling up seems to be the main source of drive and enjoyment in the game. That in its self exposes this game's real weaknesses. Its a dull game, there really is no way to say it nicely.
Many people are suggesting improvements and would make a difference to the game. But I think some are too focused on the game's current format to see the big picture here.
Examples of leveling in other games: WoW - the game only really starts at max level. Planetside2 (free) - amazingly fun that leveling is just a by product of having fun. CivIV - No leveling at all and I played that game for years and years.
If a game delivers genuine fun leveling is not an issue and reaching max level doesnt matter.

Adventures are just following spreadsheets. The home map is following a formula. There is no strategy in this game, none, 0%. Blue Byte should look to something like their Battle Isle game of 20 years ago imo for adventures. That game was fun. In the adventures we are delivered less than a game developed 20 years ago by the same people. The gaming experience has gone backwards. I know browser games have limitations but surely something more engaging and delivering some strategy is possible here. If games made for the Commodore 64 and Amstrad can deliver mentally stimulating games I am sure free web browsers games of today can manage it.
Anyone remember North and South for the Amiga? That was awesome fun and battles and units available similar to this game...but done in a far superior way.
I have played countless different games over the years and this game is brutally dull. Everything is a time sink, there is a serious lack of fun, no strategy at all, basically no mental stimulus with no way to play the game well. You just follow the formulas and pay in time and money for....for what I have no idea :)

I will end first week of playing tomorrow and so far I made one adventure. And it was for me enough to notice that waiting for general is very boring. I totally do not understand why the hell he have to come back to his camp?? Why he can't stay at the battlefield and ask: Shall I attack next enemy base or come back to my camp?

Also battles are poorly designed with such stupid things like archers shooting when all other units attacked. Usually firefight is first in all real wars and strategy games. I would also like to have influance on battle, not just sending units and watching how they die. At least I would like to see battles live, not as a replay after I know the outcome. It is like watching a football game after someone told you who won.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DumaZ

I find it very relaxing game and i can actually log in for 5-10 min at a time sort some stuff out log out without any issues.
Adventures have long timers from 24 hours to several days, so if you cant finish adventuro on one go, you can do it in the span of couple days.
As there is no rankings yet or anything like player vs player activity, this game is the definition of a peacefull economical simulator with a little side step in to combat.
Unless you feel the pressure to have everything maxed (which is your problem) I don't see how this game requires so much time, for me it doesn't.
(p.s. lvl 39)

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I agree. I come on a few minutes in the morning before work, then log on a couple f times in the evening to top things up, send off explorers etc. Adventures - generally only do them once a fortnight maybe. I agree there's a few things that could be worked on, but this was never meant to be an fast paced, action packed game. There's plenty of those out there. It's taken me 14 months to get to level 41 - there's no rush.

I agree with Zosimus. Having played PC based Settlers for years, this seems a pretty dull and tedious version. I think I'll go back to playing Civ. At least you could acquire some decent weaponry like Modern Armour and Nukes! And it didn't involve the endless repetition experienced here.

He's right, it all seems to be geared up to getting you to buy gems to short cut the endless waits.

Good comments, and I agree with most of them.
Having reached L32 there's little to do except rebuild mines etc, and increase pop and storage.

I tried an adventure and got so bored waiting for the General to go back and forwards - 30 mins each way - and I have to sleep as well so I'm not going to finish the adventure before time runs out.

That 30 min thing with the General is a real turn-off to me - I can't see the point really, like it's some kind of penalty?

Sorry to say losing interest now.

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Originally Posted by Zosimus

Generals being sent out takes 30min

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Buy faster generals, they only take 15 mins.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Zosimus

From ordering a general to attack a bandit camp to their return takes 4-5min

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The very best part of the game, since it allows effective round blocks. Again, buy faster generals if this is a problem, they also fight faster.

This isn't a fastpaced game, it should be obvious to everyone. So I don't know why some of you guys complains. If everything was done quick and easy, it would have been a "rush to max lvl, then quit" sort of game. No thanks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Zosimus

I see a lot of people concerned that once 50 there is nothing to do and it all becomes a bit pointless. Leveling up seems to be the main source of drive and enjoyment in the game. That in its self exposes this game's real weaknesses. Its a dull game, there really is no way to say it nicely.
Many people are suggesting improvements and would make a difference to the game. But I think some are too focused on the game's current format to see the big picture here.
Examples of leveling in other games: WoW - the game only really starts at max level. Planetside2 (free) - amazingly fun that leveling is just a by product of having fun. CivIV - No leveling at all and I played that game for years and years.
If a game delivers genuine fun leveling is not an issue and reaching max level doesnt matter.

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A dull game? Well, if that's how you feel, then it's simply not for you. It would obviously require so many changes to satisfy you, that it woldn't be the same game anymore.

You're comparing a browser sim with one of the most content rich MMOs (WoW) that exists? There are so many wrongs with this alone that I don't even know where to start. So I'll just leave this one hanging, for yourself to figure it out.

Of course we're focused on the game's current format. It's not that we're against improvements, but you want the game to become something completely different. I do NOT want that.

Btw, obviously suggestions (if implemented) would make differences to the game. But not all differences are good ones, neither are all the suggestions. And you're also forgetting this is a browser game - it has far more technical restrictions than client based games, and the devs has to consider that carefully constantly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rafnir

Buy faster generals, they only take 15 mins.

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I think this sentence just summed up the game brilliantly. Awesome.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Zosimus

I think this sentence just summed up the game brilliantly. Awesome.

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The last comment here is over a month old, and you are starting it back up again ? Also for something that was so dull you have ibviously decided to stay here and continue playing, so what kept you here ?

And all free games are of course geared up to try and make you spend money or why would they be here ? there revenue comes from advertising and of course people buying gems so yes it is certainly in there interest to try and make you buy gems.

But there must be something keeping you here now, would you care to share that with us and not just the negatives you add so frequently ?

Gavin

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Originally Posted by itsmegavin

The last comment here is over a month old, and you are starting it back up again ?

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2 days old actually, the post I quoted, certainly not over a month.

I haven't played for a long time now but I check by from time to time to see how development is going, see if any changes have been made that might tempt me back but none so far.

I understand people who enjoy this game in its current state will be irritated by negative comments possibly, but I do not think I am of a minority of thinking.
I think over my previous comments here I have made a sound and fair assessment of the game.

I think this game lacks tactical combat, say like in Caesar 2. The sorry excuse for the 'brawl' graphics are just a very very sorry excuse. They don't even change for armies with different troops. I mean how difficult is it to draw something more elaborate, for Blue Byte. I don't even want to discuss the 'replay' graphics, they are simply insulting. You can find better combat representation in 1970s games

Tactical warfare at least would be something to look forward to, while managing your fief.