One flaw, in my opinion, starbound has.

First of all, I know this is Beta. I know they might change it in the future, so the "this is beta"-argument doesn't work here because this is feedback, not critism.

Secondly, this is more of an idea then a suggestion. I'd like to hear other opinions about it before actualy posting this as suggestion.


I love Starbound's random generation mechanic. It makes everything feel so much more personal, as if it was MY adventure and I'm not limited to my character's storyline. I'll never know what I'll encounter next in my adventure, how the next world is gonna look and how I'll venture my way trough it.

However, the randomly generated worlds have one flaw:

They are too random.

What I mean is, every world looks like it was made by a 8 year old playing with claydough. Please don't see this as the insult it seems to be, but just think about it.

The best way to describe this by giving you an example:


I'm a honest, hard working Floran. I just landed on this world, and it seems pretty well filled with resources. On the surface I can see there are thick jungles to the east, crowded with trees. No doubt it will be filled with dangerous predators. This seems like a good place to hunt, while I feel the growth of a big smile on my face.

Now this is the kind of story I like to make. However what do you think will happen as shoon as she approaches the jungle?

I start cutting my way trough the thick layered fines. I hear a branch break behind me. I turn around and see...

http://community.playstarbound.com/index.php?threads/a-generated-monster-every-friday.8063/

Now pick a random monster from that.


What I mean to say it, that the monsters never feel like they actually belong to that planet. They all seem so random, they often bear no similarity at all the planet they are living on, and greatly reduce the world's atmosphere by this. An polar biome may have the same creatures as an forest biome, and the monsters just ignore "logic". It'd be beneficial for a monster to be camouflaged, streamlined, and to haveno unnecesary attachments but the monsters just feel... too random.

This was my opinion on it anyway, please leave your feedback. Also please tell me if I'm wrong, but I'd prefer if you would add logical arguments to that tough .

 

totally agree. they should have different random templates for each biome, things like colors that help them blend in, big shaggy slow monsters in snow biomes, skinny fast jumping monsters in jungle biomes, etc.

 

I think having the specific color palette of monsters tied to the color palette of planets is a brilliant idea and would go a long way toward remedying this problem. Who knows? Maybe they already have this planned.

 

Yeah, that was exactly the way I imagined it as well. And perhaps like, if the planet is red, there is an increased amount of change the creature is red too. Random, yet fitting.

EDIT:Ninja'd by Lenney

 

Just 4 views :c?

 

It would be nice if the hostility level of the monster was tied to their appearance as well. Xenomorphs? Nuts to this, where's my flamethrower...just gotta...wait, they're friendly? Well all right then. Hey, cute little stegosauras thi-OH GOD ITS EATING MY FACE.

 

I agree with you, Mr OP. I do think the worlds look pretty cool by themselves, but more often than not we see a creature that doesn't seem to be a part of that environment at all. Some are just simply too unlike their surroundings, sometimes in a silly manner. This takes me to a suggestion of mine, which was to have creature parts linked to the different worlds. For example, creatures for a desert-planet would spawn from the desert-parts-and-colors pool. Monsters for a jungle-world would come from the jungle-pool, and so forth.

 

Yes, definitely. Desert biomes need to have creatures that dig and burrow. Forrest biome need climbing creatures. Slime biomes need slimes of different shapes and sizes.

We also need more creature types. Not all creatures should fly by flapping wings or be smaller than the player. Not all land animals should walk on 2-4 legs. Some should hop, slither, roll, float. Some should transform, disappear, split into two, combine into one, etc.

theres so much they can do

 

I have thought about this a few times too. It's quite weird when most of the trees are very "Earthy", and the monsters have an eye ball on their tail and a goofy face and sounding like a horse. They do seem a bit too goofy and out of place quite often. I don't have a problem with the goofiness, though, it's just the contrast between them and the environment.

And the sounds... The sounds is really my biggest peeve. They sound too familiar, and quite often they just don't go well with what you'd expect the monster to sound like.

Indeed. I guess there is a tradeoff they have to think about when having monsters being randomly generated, some of those things may not be viable options due to that (I wouldn't know, just conjecturing), but I think they could take it into consideration and implement any that might be viable. Because monsters, currently, are pretty much all the same, except some fly and some don't, and some throw things and some don't.

We mustn't overcomplicate things as well. This genre is still in its experimental stage where developers have to try things and see what works. At this point they already have a few games in the market too look at and learn from, but they aren't many. So as the genre progresses, devs shouldn't take leaps they may not be able to cope with later on. So keeping it simple is an option (and it may be their intention). For now maybe the simple is a safe approach, and maybe later they can add more to it. I would hope so.

 

Maybe this comes from moving a ton as a kid, and as a young adult. Or perhaps looking up wonderful and bizarre things in our world. But in what fucking way do Pink Flamingos "fit in" with their surroundings in any way shape or form? Their bright and vibrant colors are for mating purposes. In that regard, alot of the random monsters feel like they are much the same way. Look up some bizarre creatures from earth, look up where they live, not all of them blend in well, if at all for where they are. Some of them are just outlandish.

All that said, I could still see and in some ways support a better monster generation system, more for the fact I've already seen a few duplicate monsters, and you can never quite tell what's aggresive or not. I had a world earlier where the thing with giant fangs, claws and glowing red eyes was friendly, but a tiny blue guy with a smile and a green fin, tried to eat my god damned face off. That bugs me more then the bizarre color pallettes do, I think the big issue with this, is it'd make spotting danger a bit to easy. "Oh look, that has giant fangs, and claws, a dead body in it's mouth and is dripping blood everywhere, must be angry."

 

I think alot of people seem to like nit picking the smallest things and making a mountain out of a mole hill. It's fine I am sure they will refine it more over time.

 

How can we be sure if no one were to speak their minds? How will the devs know what we want if we were to never come clean with it?
I think some people here have too much faith in the devs, in the sense that they "know everything" and because this is a beta "stuff will be implemented later" - sure it will, but what stuff? And will it ever? Feedback is feedback, no need to burst other's bubbles just because you yourself don't want to nitpick have all the faith in the world in the creators.

 

I agree to this as well I find it so weird finding a bright colored monster on a snow planet that looks like it should live in a desert with it's lack of furs. I'm just hoping alot of this stuff is in the land of place holders until launch.

 

I think some people have to much faith in them selves. I personally have faith in no one, I just don't like artist works to be radically changed by screaming voices over the smallest things.

 

Think of it in this way, it's bright-colored to ward off would-be predators, alot of animals in nature do this, the most commonly spoken of is the poison dart frog. It's bright and vibrant colors help it survive in a place where it otherwise couldn't. Not all animals have fur that live in the cold, look at 99% of sea-creatures, things like a Walrus, even penguins aren't that fluffy, they have other ways to adapt the cold.

 

I agree. The planets should have more rules that govern what is on them. I'd also like see to a "mid-ground" layer added as well. The forests just don't feel dense enough to be forests. I think adding anther layer of very thick tree line to fill in the negative space between foreground trees would go a long way.

When I first starting following this game, I thought random monster generation was going to be awesome. Now I'm kind of missing some of the biome specific pre-gen monsters from Terraria.

 

True but living up here in Canada most of the animals I've seen blend to their surroundings alot more cause it gets rather grey at times. So it seems a bit odd seeing the bright yellow snow monster. It would make more sense if it was tropical like the poison dart frog which is a rather cute critter. So if they cut their pallet down to a color tone range for different planets it could make some niffy not to out there creatures.

 

I couldn't agree more! I've been saying this since I first saw the randomly generated monsters, and I'll keep saying it even if people attack me for it. They're random to the point of derpy. There needs to be some rules and logic to the generation, otherwise it's just a huge mess. Like it is now.

It's almost as if all of the random monsters just landed on the planet too and still have a few million years to go before they actually adapt and make sense...

 

Beauty is in the details - ever heard of that?
There's always room for improvements - an artist's work is never done, its never perfect - its a skill that you master with time and could sometimes be made even better with the right criticism. Also "radically changed"? All the OP is asking is for the monsters to have a color pallet more compatible with the world they're in... logic is debatable in an alien world but I guess it doesn't hurt to have some form of it in its entirety... camouflaging predators, animals who climb trees and slither - what's wrong with all that? Seems reasonable to me and only adds more flavor to the game!

Everyone has their own opinions.
I personally find it unfair to disregard someone because they happen to be a minority. The guy is being constructive in his feedback, which is better than you standard whiner and troll that so often lives in forums like this - tell me, why should we treat him the same way? In the end it doesn't really matter one way or the other, because the ultimate choice will be made by the devs not you nor I.

 

Alot of things in life are not fair. I personally will disregard his opinion and you can go ahead and disregard mine. Very true that is why I dislike these opinion debates they are pointless and will be forgotten in weeks.