First of all, devs/producers, hats off. It’s not easy to be fresh in this genre, and you’ve pulled the rabbit out of the hat.
I’m going to dump my notes on ya, but don’t get me wrong at all, I think the game is absolutely fantastic, especially considering the polish for an early access release. Zero crashes so far, and while performance is a bit of a struggle, the game works which is more than many AAA titles can manage these days.
Devs are welcome to PM me if you’d like my Steam ID or any other details that might be helpful.
I’ll leave out things I know others have mentioned (stone, logistics, etc.) that I know you’re aware of and I know are being worked on.
Core Gameplay:
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Temporary Shelter needs a lot more functionality. Should pull in water in addition to food, should work for more types of workers, should identify when it’s being used by more than 4 people when requesting supplies (sure it can only house 4 people but I don’t see why it couldn’t store food for 10).
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Game seems to reset my workers on Load, sometimes. It’s quite common I’ll save and log out with 1/2 people working weaver, potter, cobbler, etc, then log back in and it’s all maxed out, often with laborer count at zero. Definitely happens, definitely should be fixed
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Consider introducing seeds, or just removing the 1 gold cost for planting trees. Maybe just increase the labor cost of it, or balance it some other way - but paying gold to plant trees just feels like an arbitrary and unrealistic quick answer to making it balanced. I think there are ways to make it fair without just slapping gold price to it.
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land next to mountains should always have a really good irrigation level (relative to surroundings). That’s just how mountains work.
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mines should not require flat land to build on. I completely understand how problematic that would be for the folks who have to make that work graphically, but it just doesn’t make sense to have to flatten out the side of a mountain to mine iron ore out of it. It’s ugly, unnecessarily time-consuming, and doesn’t make any sense.
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similar to above, I don’t think Shelters and some other basic wooden buildings should require flat land. Just slap some wooden slats or stone foundations on the bottom of the 3D model for them (each version of them) and it should work! This is more realistic, and would also help reduce the droll “make everything flat” meta which results in every city on every map being visually identical. Lets build some towns on some hills!
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I know this is broad, but how workers choose what to go build when looking at prioritization etc needs a lot of work IMO. An obvious way to improve it that I know you must have considered is priority level instead of just a flag, but please reconsider! It has worked amazingly well in other games, and there’s no shame in borrowing it. It’s also more realistic and would make gameplay far more pleasant.
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Consider different environments, and perhaps other factors, impact the time of year where crops can be worked, instead of just the static bar always being identical. This increases realism and also makes each map/biome more unique. Irrigation level could play into that, map type, difficulty level, tech advancement, specialized farming tools, etc.
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Consider letting farmers do other tasks other than just helping other farmers, during downtime. This can already be done with painstaking micro, but painstaking micro is not fun. Maybe just give them a radius where they’ll go do any other task (while still prioritizing other farming tasks, if available)?
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Consider allowing generic “laborers” to assist with stocking trading post as a generic task. Why not?
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Stock AMOUNT limits on storage units per item type. I want 25 candles in this distant market, not 500, and not zero!
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Consider some kind of “experience” for soldiers. It’s realistic, fun, and should help build some connection to these vils instead of looking at them as completely fungible pawns. This would require making it easier to assign a specific person to specific barracks/towers instead of just using the + button (that might already exist but I haven’t figured it out yet if so).
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Similar to above, but more broadly, I’d look for some ways to make individual vils matter. Maybe just a simple “proficiency” flag for each vil that they get after X number of activities on different tasks. 5 raiders killed, 1000 crops harvested, 500 work counters of building, etc. After they are proficient, they just work a little better on those things, and those traits last until they die essentially (and can be proficient in everything, theoretically, if they are swapped around).
^ consider having random vils (and immigrants) start with 0-2 traits, randomly.
^ Overall I just would like to see individual vils matter more. A good “leader” of a village should not just view every single person as identical interchangeable bodies.
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A “call for trader” option, that comes with some cost. Maybe exclusive to Tier 2 trading post, or just cheaper or lower cooldown at Tier 2.
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GOALS. (both per game, and per account)
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I know this is cheesy but please put a +1 in the column of players who’d like to see some form of civil traits tree. I personally think something similar to the Frostpunk model where you make a series of A or B options that are effectively permanent for your colony. It would really fit FF well, and once again, would really add some individual flavor and uniqueness to each playthrough. I WANT CHILD LABOR DAMNIT!
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more recipes for basic stuff like baskets. I’m pretty sure humans are smart enough to make baskets out of more than literally only Willow branches. Just adds some spice to the game, while also opening up more balancing options on various map types beyond just “willow just doesn’t spawn here, ever”.
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Consider allowing traders (or something else) to offer improved / alternative recipes. Yes, this is stolen directly from Satisfactory, because it’s a fantastic concept (and yet again, adds uniqueness to each playthrough).
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IMO I think it makes more sense to remove gold upkeep on watchtowers (building) and purely charge per guard. Can keep the total (manned) amount the same, it just doesn’t make sense to me to pay gold monthly for a glorified pile of sticks to exist. IMO a guard tower with two guards should cost twice as much, not like 30% more than a single guard.
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Please consider dramatically increasing forager range, or letting us ADJUST the range. I don’t see why I couldn’t ring up my forager and just say FORAGE THE WHOLE WORLD. The balance should be on their travel distance, danger, foraging speed, and quantities available - not an arbitrary circle.
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Consider having fishing shoals move / disappear / appear every 5-10 years. Spice things up a bit. Fishing is a little boring. If implemented, I’d suggest a notification if a fishing shoal that’s being worked dries up.
QOL:
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wish we could assign workers, assign harvesting zones, during construction. It’s quite frustrating putting down a fishing shack, work camp, etc, and trying to remember to come back to it (not knowing when that will be) to set the zone, worker count, harvesting ratios, etc. At the very least, should be able to set the harvesting zone (circle) during construction.
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cannot prioritize upgrade of roads. Would be a nice-to-have.
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please add “prioritize” to Manage Walls UI
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please add removal of buildings to CLEAR command (if already possible, I’m not aware of how).
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could add more animals. Rabbits, lions, zebra, why not go wild - easy way to spice things up!
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let hunter’s zone be increased/decreased in radius. Arbitrary circles are not a good element IMO. Even if not implemented, consider letting hunters leave their zone if they find nothing within it, while searching for targets.
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consider adding stronger versions of animals, randomly. Again, spices things up.
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consider spawning 1-2 wolves when a wolf den is attacked. Feels way too easy currently. If you asked me and one other dude to go attack a wolf den, I’d go find a new colony to live in.
General opinions:
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Blueberry bushes are weird. I like that you can move them, but it doesn’t really make sense that one can move them, but not any other bushes or plants. Plus, why can’t we plant them? Dig a hole, put some blueberries in it. It really works, trust me! I know this has balance implications (big ones probably) but blueberries are pretty immersion-breaking as is, as every game just starts with a big square of blueberry bushes optimized for harvesting. Maybe let us plant blueberry bushes but it costs like 100 berries to do it, or maybe just allow us to plant them cheaply but let them have a chance to die every year.
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Arborist just feels boring. It’s also kindof annoying that the zone is a circle, for square trees. I think Arborist could be changed to work more like a designated zone, with max of 2 workers for larger areas. I should be able to make a square and put my Arborist building in a corner, IMO. Fruit tree interaction with roads is also a little obnoxious - IMO it would make more sense to have trees take up 1 block, not 4, but not let them be adjacent to one another. This would allow roads. This already works for Apiaries, but not for roads (“obstructed by fruit tree”). Could just allow roads on top of trees!
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should give a warning before houses get abandoned. If possible.
My personal opinion on the stone topic:
I very much like the concept of a resource that is tough to come by and requires expansion / exploration to attain. Seems like we have a lot of that already with other things, but I don’t think “quarries” is necessarily a good solution. I don’t really want to just put a quarry down and forget about stone.
At the same time, it’s very unrealistic that we just can’t get stone, when standing next to a mountain.
One easy solution is to just add minable stone (like other ores) on mountains, but I’d make it lots of small lodes, like 500 each, instead of the typical long-term lodes of more dense minerals. “Raw stone” would also be a good concept, which would need to be refined into usable stone resources, which would make it always a second-choice to today’s gatherable stone and trading, but still gives a route for tough maps, bad trader RNG, and super-long-term maps for zillions of years.
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let grazing zone be drag-and-dropped. The big ugly square is big and ugly (and not fun).
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IMO should let us slightly move the “circle” for things like markets, arborists, mines, and some others. Need to keep it within a clear range (perhaps just containing the building itself) but I really like the idea of a market in a corner of a village instead of the dead center every single time. Still same exact amount of influence, and technically less efficient the farther away from the center it is, but IT SPICES THINGS UP.