What's Wrong With Starbound

Iv'e been watching the gameplay footage Tiy streamed. I think it looks fine. Maybe some refining would be in order, but no complaints from me. Random is fine with me as long glitches aren't involved.

 

The only thing I have to say about Starbound that I do not like currently that is relevant is the disgusting randomly generated monsters. Sometimes they look cool but yeah, seeing a bird that has no feet with giant bee wings doesn't really appeal to me. I't just looks choppy and blocked up.

 

Im gunna have to go with the randomly generated monsters... Everything just feels all over the place. Im not sure how much work it would take but i would love to see monsters that really make sense in the biome theyre in. Like some crystal monster growing in a forest really would feel out of place, but in a deep dark cave underground it would be pretty wicked. Same goes for finding some super flashy coloured bird underground... It just doesnt really make sense. I feel you can only go so far with "Aliens!! Not like earth!! Different thing happen!!" Not that im implying the devs are like that.

 

From what i've seen the terrain for planets is bland and uninteresting, also something other than dirt, ores, and stone would be nice. Something to help make the underground areas more interesting to look at.

 

chestssssssssss and maybe underground camps here n there?

 

For all the comments regarding the random monster generator, I won't be surprised if post-release mods are able to harness it to some degree, either disallowing some part combos or restricting it to a predefined list of monsters to assemble, things like that.

...Now I'm gonna need to go and learn lua.

 

I think we are reading "random monster generator" here a lot because there is so little else we have really seen. And I even agree, some of the monsters have been weird, but then I remember that earth has produced the platypus, kiwi bird, coconut crab, angler fish, spider crab and giraffe, among others. If you did not know those animals existed and someone showed you photos of them, you would think they had made them in photoshop.

If the generator glitches out and puts a leg where an arm should be that is a bug that should be fixed, but if it just prduces both weird and normal looking animals, I think it is working as intended.

SO I guess, if anything, I am worried that the final release will have bugs. I have had that worry for every game I ever bought.

*edit for typos*

 

while those are true i meant more block types other than technicolor dirt. Oh and before somebody says it yes, i know it's still early.

 

HMPH... I was going to do that.

In slightly more elaborate wording, but still...

Do you mean the poop monsters?

Do you think it was a crappy idea? Perhaps shitty execution? Nothing more than toilet humor?

Hahahaaa... oooh... okay, I'm done.

But back on topic, just looking at the list of confirmed game features, the first one that strikes me as odd is the fact that hunger is still "optional".

That seems a bit odd. Is it a difficulty-mode thing (like, only characters playing in medium-to-hard difficulties have it, but not easy-mode characters)? If it's something you can literally turn off and on in the menu then it seems like something that's not going to effectively pose any limitations...

 

I have no problems with Starbound this far. Only thing I am afraid of is that it lacks the purpose of NPC's. Like.. They would just be there. They would have no purpose (except saying a couple phrases or something). So far Chucklefish have said that they are going to make the NPC's feel 'alive', but so far we have no idea what they mean by that.

Still, I have faith on them to make it work well.

 

Forgive me if I'm seeing this wrong, but so far the biggest "I dislike X" about Starbound is that it won't be awesome enough. "I don't think there will be enough change in the planets" Even though there are no less then a dozen different unique "biomes", each of which can alter in size, things that populate it, and as we saw from some very early tech demos, the weather within it. "I am not sure about Monster Generation" This one I understand the point, floating arms, or half-in the body legs etc look a bit odd, that said, it's still saying that in a game of millions of possible combinations, you don't like a few.

What is my intent in this post? I am glad that most of the complaints are "I mean it's awesome, but it could be awesomer" ^_^

My complaint? The removal of Space Stations for the player, I was really looking forward to a little floaty NPC hub etc, while I understand and like the shuttle, I thought the Space Stations were awesome.

 

that reminds me, have we ever seen some actual DEEP underground screens/vids yet?

 

The toilet humor that is unnecessary and out of place.
Back animations being in - but the team unsure about adding climbing. (Technically this is something in game, it counts! ;p)
Some design animation choices such as smiles on monsters and some of the more extreme whimsical parts and enemies.
The high focus on modding in game as a catch all solution to possible issues over proper design planning and implementation.
I want to be clear I understand they are experimental but: Some sound FX seem like they lacked punch over some streams.
Navigation is a little flat. It seems fairly static and inanimate. (Something they will fix I'm sure- but at the moment is.)

Solvable issues for the most part but these are the ones that stand out for me.

 

Let me start by saying I absolutely LOVE this thread. Not for its opportunistic cynicism, but for its constructive criticism. I could "like" or "reply" to nearly every comment thus far. But to save everyones eyes, I'll keep it short as possible. My problem with SB is one that has always been a fear of mine, something's that's been around for a while, but hasn't become prevalent until recently (last 3 months or so).

This whimsical and lighthearted approach its taking on. Almost as if its a parody or mash-up.

SB had the opportunity of being a "serious" game, consequences, thoughtful decision making, care and concern for your character, etc. But decision after decision is making it painfully obvious that, that isn't the direction its going in. And possibly hadn't ever intended on going in. Things like optional hunger bar, too broad difficulty ranges [I would have loved simply creative and adventure modes], comical character/monster design. I think this can be blamed on its ties to Terraria. Which was fine for Terraria, it lacked a storyline, but its making SB increasingly hard to stomach (for me).

Its making this much more a casual game, and less of one that you can even have the opportunity of being immersed in. Way too many outside references, head nods, and winks at other games/genres. I could go on, honestly, but I'll end it with this. Starbound could have been a 2D platformer with some serious draw. But the things that are being revealed as of late has removed the fourth wall for me.

That's not to say that this won't be a great game, in many respects it already is. Just not in the way I had hoped/assumed. But you know what they say about assumptions.

This speaks volumes to exactly how I feel. You get it.

 

This sort of train of thought. That the game cannot have lighthearted elements because it's got dark elements. I've never liked that. It's what turns me off of franchises like Warhammer 40k, everything is always grimdark all the time. Likewise I don't often enjoy things that are pure fluff. Let the game have it's poo monsters AND it's apocalyptic backdrop.

 

I'm holding my observations of the game until I can get my hands onto it and actually play it. It's like looking at a car and without getting inside or driving, but letting another person drive while you watch on the curb.

 

Captain Obvious states that since nobody has really played it, it's too early to tell.
Simple as. You can make a few preliminary judgments about the art style and such, but nothing really objective since the way a game looks and how it plays (ideally) are quite different.
Or put another way: If you can get the same experience from a game by watching someone else play as you can playing it yourself, it's a bad game. (or it's based entirely on static puzzles)

 

I'm worried that the random monster generation will make very different animals in the same planet. such as a bird with bee wings, a bird with normal wings, a bird with feet, and stuff like that. I would like to see some uniform between the animals. slightly different is ok, but when it comes to bazaar animals with the same color palate, it seems to become sloppy per say. I'm hoping the animals will all have a similar color palate, and similar characteristics. i don't want bugs with bird wings in the same world as bugs with monster feet.. just doesn't feel right. and i would also like to see animals more than once per world, the randomly generated animals should correspond to the world and not be completely random. give them a set of rules, but let the RMG (random monster generator) do its thing so we can still see similar animals within the same species but different variations on certain planets. at the same time, a different planet shouldn't have too similar animals as the last.


Good god this is poorly written.. sorry about that, i'm not a writer..

 

You can still tell that you don't like the color of the car, or the size of the wheels ('rims' if you rather) without having to drive it...

What would getting in and driving the car enlighten you to about the way it looks? You don't have to like every single thing about a game to like the game as a whole.

 

I agree with the guy that pointed out the bland dirt surfaces. I mean sure, it makes sense that there would be just dirt sometimes, but it's boring. If all of the surface was always crazy or interesting, I don't think someone would lament at how there isn't any flat dirt.