Personally, what I'm hoping for with this is basically just 1.0 versions of this old thing, and for all races. It'd give a nice overview of various historical and culturally important things for each species if we had that.
maybe forget the guide part as you said, and focus only on the lore and maybe a bit of how it was to develop the game, show some early sketches and ideias you know?
I'm just here for the art and lore. If there is a creatures section, can it be more detailed than the in-game one?
As someone who's worked on... okay, easily one of THE most extensive and referenced online wikis out there for a decade and a big proponent on the strengths of a wiki... ...I'm 100% down with this book and plan on buying it right away. Both forms of media have their strengths and weaknesses, and both serve different functions. If this gets in brick-and-mortar stores where games are sold, all the better. The book is a good place to deliver more lore and art, plus serves as a much easier "newbie" guide to the game. I mean I'm impressed with Starbounder, but I'm not gonna lie: it needs work in the "ease of use" realm. Large chunks of it feel more hastily-cobbled than a Floran starship. I see a lot of evidence of past furniture-shuffling and incomplete alterations due to the steadily-changing nature of the game's development that need detangling and cleanup bigtime. And even if/when those issues are largely resolved... well, a physical book is still a solid information delivery system for the beginner. And having worked on official game guide books in the past, there's something really NICE about owning a bit of physical media about the game. Makes it feel more "real" even if the game is a purely digital distribution deal.
Hello there. Is there any chance that it is sold in Book Depository? It would be the only way I could get it since I am in Latin America.
I really like this game. I'll buy this guide in my collection. It will support the developers. Not bad deal, because they make my favorite game...
One area where a book would be more useful than a wiki are lists. Being able to look down at a book sitting on the desk along side your laptop or desktop would be far easier than having to switch between your Starbound window and the wiki window, or have two small windows side-by-side. A list of tenant tags would be very handy; I remember when the new quest system had be implemented in the nightly beta (1.0 beta) I was a little confused by the quests that asked for objects objects based on their tag. One last note. I am looking forward to the Glitch lore, I am not certain if the Glitch are controlled by a hive mind or if they are simply machines programmed with the capacity to build, survive, and reason on some level. I more confident in the latter because most Glitch appear to be self-aware, there is absolutely no mention of the hive mind, and your Glitch character when examining certain objects talks about the persecution of the self-aware as if it were a thing of the past.
I'm pretty sure they're not "controlled" by it so much as "constantly connected to it" (until they're not).
I mean, the concept of a hive mind is kinda silly. If you actually look at actual insect hives, you can see calling those a single mind is as silly as calling a human government one. A single mind rarely has civil wars with itself. Besides, wouldn't it be less "connected to" or "controlled by" and more "acting as part of"?
If I recall my Glitch lore correctly, the self-awareness refers to knowing that they're robots running simulations. The persecution would be akin to quite literal witch hunts from the perspective of the unaware. After all, a Glitch who breaks out of the simulation's delusion can actively use and understand modern technology... which to a medieval person would be witchcraft! Think of the Star Trek holodeck and its non-playable characters. They don't know (generally, assuming the deck functions correctly and they're not otherwise meant to be aware) that they are holographic, and shrug off if not outright ignore when the players break character. That makes the Glitch akin to holodeck characters, and playable Glitch likewise akin to, say, the Emergency Medical Hologram and Professor Moriarty.
Yeah, Kawa's take is more or less how I've muddled it out, with a bit of "Glitch normally have a constant internet connection in their noggins they're usually not conscious of that influences them in small and subtle ways". It's a good idea, it's just not presented well thanks to what appears as a scattershot and goal-less lore creation process (plus an odd tendency of the old lore to try and be way darker than the game ever seemed to want to actually be) for the pre-Giraffe/1.0 development.
I just read over all of the glitch lore and I found absolutely nothing that seems to hint to the hive mind. Seems like most, if not all, Glitch are self-aware at the moment of Earth's destruction; I remember that before 1.0 NPCs would often ask you if you are self-aware and the guards in villages tended to call you an outcast. However I have seen absolutely none of this post 1.0.
Hmm... I like the idea; seeing that how well the MC books on the shelves are nicely done. I wouldn't mind owning a Volume. Hopefully it does end up at local stores, as that would be the way I most likely obtain it. Regardless I am quite overjoyed with the idea.
if i remember glitch lore correctly, self-aware glitch are rare occurence and are isolated from the others, who thinks that self-awareness is some kind of decease (or more likely computer virus). And "player glitches" are always self-aware. but it was before V1.0 of starbound. now we have at least 1 self-aware glitch, that wasn't fully isolated from others (Baron and his two or more guards) and glitch lore seems not very accurate anymore... the book must solve this mystery ^_^ EDIT: "questions on this survey" link leads to the page "survey end", not the survey itself
Since the hive-mind discussion got a little larger than I expected it to I started a new discussion here. Any who want to continue to input on this discussion can put what they have to say there.
I know this will sound stupid, but that Floran entry really bugs me with the whole genderless things when plants do have genders (usually both, but plants also do occur in single sexes). I assume it means of a more hermaphroditic thing?
